Bursaries

[EverythingAllatOnceAllTheTime]

Merely as a footnote to the comprehensively-debated VAT on school fees, we donate several thousand per year to our children’s private school, in order to provide bursaries for less-fortunate children.

We have just cancelled these donations and are aware of other parents doing similarly. It’s genuinely sad for the kids who will lose out, but the Government need to realise there are consequences to their actions.

Just a comment - I have no plans to enter into another debate.

That goes both ways doesn’t it!

The VAT on private school fees is probably the only thing I am pleased about with the Labour Government. Bring it on I say. Shake it up. And - even if the we have a change of government in 5 years, I have no doubt this VAT will stay. They won't be able to afford to undo it.

Has anyone else made a derogatory 'play on words' out of another poster's username? This can also be interpreted as a personal attack.

I laughed at the idea that private schools create a sense of togetherness this is nonsense as many of the threads recently started on Mumsnet can demonstrate.

There are not enough opportunities going around for all and many are restricted depending on where you live. To suggest I’m lazy is frankly funny, people tend to resort to being rude when they are losing the argument.

I'm not saying you are lazy as I don't know you. However, yes, many people are restricted when it comes to opportunities because they are lazy. I remember helping my children with their exams or tests, spending hours with them and some of my friends commenting "gosh I could never do it. I think it would drive me crazy haha." So yes, don't expect the same results

Your children are very lucky to have you. I work in further education and see lots of young people who don’t have parents who have the ability to support them, or they don’t have the time or as you say in some cases sadly don’t care.. many would benefit massively from more opportunities and sadly they don’t get them for various reasons. So while it’s great that some children get support and opportunities as a consequence of private schools many, many more don’t. And I think this is part of reason people become resentful of private schools. I don’t have the answers but the education system is not working for many and it seems no one is happy at the moment.

Lots of parents are lazy. However some are held back by learning difficulties and confidence themselves and some parents can buy tutors or private schooling to cover their laziness.

This is very true and sad @northernerinthesouth2000 . I agree with you but I also think that the main support comes from home. My kids would not be where they are and in the schools they are in without me. As a foreigner, I have the impression that the British people send kids to school thinking the school will do everything - this will always fail and I feel incredibly sad for the teachers. I understand the teacher recruitment crisis in the UK. I would be scared to be a teacher in this scenario. Education is always a parent / teacher partnership. I also understand that some people are unable to help and do some basic maths or English. This is a legacy not of the last government but many governments before. In Europe, if people don't achieve a certain standard, they have to repeat the year. Every year at my school there were 1-4 kids repeating the year. In the UK, they just send them to the next class. How is it fair on them when they are massively behind and how is it going to work? And then we have so many people leaving the school at 11 not being able to read or do basic maths? This should never happen and I never ever understood this system

@Sherrystrull you illustrate my point so well... Just because you pay, doesn't mean the school will fix everything, including your parenting. If your child doesn't work or care, they will ask you to leave

I don't think I was making the point you think.

I was commenting on laziness of parenting. I wasn't commenting on the laziness of the pupil.

I do however think that laziness is a lazy term. The reality for most parents is very different and much more nuanced.

Laziness... or exhausted after long days at work.
Laziness... or lack of confidence in their own ability to support their child and worried about helping them wrongly.
There's so many reasons why parents don't help their child.

Yes, but this will be true regardless of the sector, state or private

I wasn't arguing with you and I didn't suggest you were lazy either. I merely state the facts that there are lots of opportunities available to state pupils only. Oxbridge is not on our doorstep yet my state educated DC1 regularly participated in their FREE OF CHARGE programmes for state pupils ONLY so it's not about the money or location. The opportunities have been in place for years, even with all the funding cuts under Tories.

I don't live anywhere near Oxbridge. I haven't seen any opportunities only open to state school pupils. What other things have you seen?

I would need to go to my mailbox and make a long list. I stopped paying attention as my DC2 is in private and those opportunities are not available to them, despite being from a single parent household and in private only thanks to a scholarship. The only thing I can remember off the top of my head is various music opportunities all over the country like NYO Inspire, for example.

Any examples would be appreciated @Ubertomusic and I will look up the NYO music as I'm sure many parents are unaware.

As I mentioned in an earlier post the opportunities are not as many as you suggest - I’m talking about opportunities offered by private schools.. not those offered by universities which is different - people are arguing that private schools help state school children, the evidence suggests this is very limited. You also need parents or a school to support young people to access these opportunities.. many young people do not have parents or teachers that will do that for them.

Schools have been required to separate means tested bursaries from ability-based scholarships for some time. While the bursary pupil still needs to meet the admissions criteria, they don’t need to be scholars. In many schools the scholarships now have minimal fee reduction, so only bursaries offer significant financial advantage.

The new round has not started yet but this is just one example https://www.suttontrust.com/our-programmes/

They also do programmes with universities and the info is usually on the uni web sites. E.g. amazing programme at Imperial but you need to be within one hour https://www.imperial.ac.uk/be-inspired/schools-outreach/secondary-schools/stem-programmes/pathways-to-medicine/
I'm sure there are similar programmes at regional unis.

Oxbridge cover tickets and stay on many programmes.

Thanks for the info.

Sorry but I have DC on a scholarship in private and we had several offers so private schools do offer opportunities. All schools I know of help state schools in various ways - sharing facilities, sending teachers, fundraising etc etc
Sorry they can't provide supportive parents, I think that's too much to ask.

You maybe fortunate to get opportunities but you’re in the minority. The “help” that private schools offer is the very limited.. there are various articles about this if you want to read up on this topic. This is why the Labour Party considered very seriously removing the charitable status of private schools as they really aren’t pulling there weight when it comes to charitable status. I understand people with children in the private schools sector don’t want to admit how unfair it is, but this is another reason why their is little sympathy for the changes in VAT.

We have masses of activities that are shared between 4 private schools and 14 state schools via the Southwark Schools Learning Partnership.

https://sslp.education/newsletter/

Maybe your HT needs to look at what is available locally.

And Labour are not looking at Charitable Status - they've already u-turned on that.

Yes, it's probably "unfair" that some people earn more than others - from a communist's point of view of course, think Soviet Russia, North Korea where everyone gets roughly the same amount (but some animals are slightly more equal :) )

Labour are not Communists though :) They are crushing the middle class in favour of the rich. Well, it's not just them, I guess it's the current trend everywhere. I just think it very naive to expect this to be beneficial for the poor but never mind.

PS We are not fortunate, we just work really really hard from a very young age.

I’ve just looked this up. Interesting, but I can assure you that the local private schools near my children’s school offer nothing like this.

If you had read my post correctly, you would have seen I never said they were doing that.. but that they seriously considered this. And I think they are right to do so as many private schools aren’t doing enough in my opinion.

oh right so if you don’t get paid enough money to send your child private you’re just not working hard enough… that’s the kind of attitude that gets people’s back up