Private or state for primary with aim to go to highly selective secondary

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I need some advice as we are struggling to decide. Our aim and this is always if our kid succeeds is to go to a highly selective secondary school. Do i send him to a private one now or go with a state with tuition? As the cost is quite high for primary 30k per year now.

The best thing you can do is keep them stable. Moving schools and houses in primary has been shown to be very unstabilising and can affect learning. A good state is fine, but for super selective I'd do tuition too - London is the most competitive area.

Why don’t you just do the 7+ exam for Latymer Prep then your child would be in without having to take further exams to go into Latymer Upper? If you want them to go there that seems the best solution.

Are you aiming for a selective private school at 11 plus? Or a selective state school?

For people who are rich and fees are not a problem, they join early and then go selective private at 11.
For those who can only afford selective private secondary and want that, they go state and get a tutor. Some primary schools in London are full of children doing just that and even the teachers know and do help somewhat. Quite often if you need a scholarship or a bursary it helps to come from a state school. Contrary to popular belief on MN, some state schools teach Maths and English really well and better than some shiny “prep” schools that tend to do a much broader curriculum of sport, music, drama, French, humanities, Science but far less hours on Maths and English.
There are also some private preps that do lots of Maths and English and verbal and non verbal reasoning and lots of homework and they tend to target state selective schools and also tend to be cheaper.
You need to figure out where you want your child to go at secondary.
Some schools like Latymer U are really quite exclusive now because they are scrapping GCSEs so they are hardly for normal people who may want to go back into state Sixth Form when there are lots of selective high performing state schools.

@Araminta1003 thanknyou so much. That is a very informative answer and helps a lot to clarifies a few things for the system in the uk.

@Araminta1003 aiming for a selective private secondary school if he gets in. But as majority of people said it mighr make more sense for either a cheaper private for primary and tutors or state if he gets into an excellent one.

Not necessarily. It depends on the school and the area. If, for example, it’s a through school then a private primary will not prepare them for grammar entrance exams. Private school entrance exams and grammar exams are also very different, requiring in some cases, different knowledge and definitely a different skill set.

State and tutor from the beginning of year four. A good tutor will be far more beneficial as it’s targeted to the exam. Even with a private school you would still need a tutor.

One of my DCs is at a highly selective London school from a state primary. I will be frank, it is a much harder path than going to a prep school whose whole raison d’etre is getting them in and I saw that when I talked to close friends whose kids were parallel path at local preps.

Yes of course the state primary teaches them maths, English etc. but what the selectives look for does not map to the national curriculum. For example schools are often looking for maths that covers all of year 6 and beyond yet you are doing a third or half way through the year. They may require verbal and non verbal reasoning that state schools won’t teach.

so is it doable from state, yes. Is it harder, yes. Does being in a prep make it easier, yes But do you still need to make effort at home with preps, yes. So is it worth the costs? Only you can decide that.

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@NowYouSee thank you. That was my worry as well.
At a prep that aim is entry to highly selective privates they prepare them and focus on it. I was thinking its different to go to school that you have different focus (state) snd then prepare for exams for maybe 1/2 hours at home with tuition whereas working on it for 8 hours st school with/without tuition.
obviously cost is a major factor for us. If it wasnt i wouldnt have question it. However i also dont want to cut all extra curiculumn activities and stress (we can cover it but it would be tight if something happens) of covering the 30k plus cost for the next 6 years. Also i was told that reception and 1y children do not attend aftercare clubs hence i would also Need to find aftercare.
i was thinking to aim to get into a cheaper prep or state for reception and assess on the way how they are doing snd if possible and they can do it to get them to a private prep (that they have excellent record for prep for the selective secondaries). For now at 3 year 3 months they are bright and know all letters and counting and super social and confident but again no one knows how it would be down the line. I know it might be too much distribution and i am worried about this but i will assess at the time how my kid is socially and how they are doing. Thank you all for all the input and advice! It actually helped me
massively!

I think prep school which aims for the secondary schools you want is an advantage in academic terms (though prep school parents still look outside for tutors etc) and behaviour, but that for local friends, cost, a mixed environment (if you see that as an advantage) and a shorter school run then a good primary is better.

I also think that the prep schools and the parents who invest in them have a strong interest in making it seem almost impossible to get into highly selective private secondaries from a state primary. It’s really not, my DC did it and so did plenty of others we know.

If you do go the prep route, you will feel more supported during the 11+ process and have access to advice and CAT scores to help decide where to apply. But the downside is that it feels more competitive and high stakes for the DC. My DC’s weren’t the only ones in their primary class applying to selective schools, but they were a minority and it wasn’t a big topic of conversation at school about who had got in where (except when the grammar results came out). However, they did have to spend a lot of time preparing for SATs (which were easy compared to 11+, but all the practice was boring), at the time when the prep school kids were doing lots of fun activities.

You will find pupils from all the good local states schools get children into the local West London privates, with tutoring usually from year 4. There is even a free tutoring programme from year 5 (think it’s for children who would get full bursaries) that heads can nominate children for. So there is no need to go private for 4-11.
Paying for the feeder school or another prep won’t guarantee entry to secondary (children do get moved on and I would say that sometimes children who should be moved on aren’t and it doesn’t ends well).
There are some great state options local to Laymer Upper and some great state secondaries. Let your child develop and take a view in year 3 if highly selective is the way forward. That is what I am doing with mine and I’m coming to the conclusion that what they do outside of school is what is shaping their futures.

However i also dont want to cut all extra curiculumn activities and stress (we can cover it but it would be tight if something happens) of covering the 30k plus cost for the next 6 years.

Looks like we’re in the same boat. We could pay the fees for a private prep school with a 90% success rate into selective secondary (that then sends almost everyone to RG and large chunk to Oxbridge), but it would stretch the budget to the limit—no buffer, no proper holidays, and a load of money stress (we have two children).
Don't get me wrong - I grew up in a family that put education first. My mum took extra shifts so I could have private English and Spanish lessons. No expense was spared, so my first instinct is to grit my teeth and pay. But in the end I decided against it, for three reasons.

First of all, that 90 per cent figure worries me. It sounds great, but statistically it makes me wonder what gets sacrificed—music, art, sport? Can every single child that goes to this school really be academically minded, or have they traded other talents because that 'was the thing everyone was doing'?

I also want to support my children talents/interest 'organically'. That takes money and time/attention. If all our cash goes on fees, what happens if one turns out to be musical or the other loves sport? I don’t want to say no to music lessons or I don't know, pottery :D, because every penny’s tied up in school fees.

The last one is the type family life that I want us to have. I want to give my children opportunity to explore as much as possible. I cannot imagine not being able to take them on holidays or teach them how to ski (assuming obviously our financial situation or health does not change). The way things are now we have enough money to go to theatre, cinema, concerts, weekends away without really worrying about costs. We ski, we cycle & sail, if we want to pick up new activity tomorrow that's not a big deal. I want my children to experience all of that as I see it as a very relevant part of their 'education'. Private prep would make it impossible.

So we decided we will go private tutoring route (only if our children show interest) and consider private secondary (which will be easier as we'll have time to save).

Also a practical one: check the 'added' costs of any private school you are aiming for. Uniforms or trips can be much more expensive than in state, easily adding thousands to the bill every year for slightly older kids.

@Epli thank you. Exactly my thoughts!
We will register at another private prep (much cheaper) just in case my kid wont get into an outstanding primary as the closest school to us is currently good and see how we will go from there. Depending on my kid and their strengths and weaknesses we will assess again in year 2/3. I slept on my decision and I feel much better with this route. And obviously all the experience and advice here was greatly helpful to make me made a decision.

Having privately educated both my kids (yr 6 and yr 9), if cost is a factor, and your child doesn’t have SEN, I would advise against private education.

We are really feeling the impact of VAT and fee increases, with our expected bill to be £78,000 from September. When making the choice 10 years ago, we expected this phase of their education to be approx £60K.

If the government raise VAT, income tax, etc the straw will well and truly break the camels back for us.

All of this to say, if you don’t think you can comfortably accommodate £35,000 - £40,000 in fees (or even £60K if you’re planning for private senior school), think very hard about the benefits they will gain at a time when the economy is rapidly becoming less credentialed and more skills based.