GCSE exam fees £750

[MrsHGWells]

GCSEs are upon us in the coming weeks - do all pupils need to pay £750 for exam fees . Is this standard practice or negotiable by school? how do parents cover this fee ?

Wouldn’t it be great if it worked like that?

It doesn’t.

Same as opting for private schooling. You don’t get a rebate for ‘saving the tax payer for state school costs’.

Suppose, in turn, that the NHS offered a knee replacement clinic with a stellar reputation and a (say) 95% success rate in (say) Exeter, but a knee replacement clinic with a less experienced team and a 75% success rate in Newcastle. Then a private clinic in Newcastle offers a stellar reputation and 95% success rate (ie in line with the NHS Exeter offering).

If I live in Newcastle and feel strongly that I want the same 95% chance of success that I might have with the NHS in Exeter, but therefore have to 'choose' the private clinic because the NHS doesn't offer me what it offers people in Exeter, should I have to bear the entire cost of the whole procedure with no contribution from the NHS even though my 'choice' resulted from the fact that the NHS could only offer me something less good than it might offer others?

I would venture that the answer is clearly 'no'. Interested in your views though.

It would be great if it worked like that. So why can't it? 🙂

This is really my central point. It seems to me that it clearly should work like that, and yet, as you say, it doesn't. But when I ask 'why', no one can provide a good reason other than 'it just doesn't'. That's not a criticism of anyone; I just don't think there is a good reason which anyone could point to.

It's pragmatic; another way of saving the government money. But, in my view, deeply unprincipled. Hence my frustration.

I’d go for the NHS option in Exeter obviously.

Duh.

I risk repeating my answer to a previous thread but, briefly:

I have saved the government / taxpayer money through my choice. That is simple, hard fact. The word 'favour' is a loaded term and best avoided.

I don't think that entitles me to a subsidy. I think I should remain entitled to seek the same level of funding that I am otherwise entitled to. I see no issue with that.

The issue of whether I have bought advantage is nowhere near that straightforward. As it happens, I think I have 'bought' a less good education than would have been provided by some state schools, including the state grammar I went to. But I have paid to avoid the significantly less good options that the state provide locally to me. So I have bought something that is both a relative disadvantage as well as a relative advantage.

Why should I be penalised for doing so? Why should I forfeit any (even partial) government funding for education just because I have done so?

🙂

But it's not offered to me. Because I don't get offered a free choice within the NHS 'market', even if I could travel 366 miles for the 'privilege'.

That is obviously more so the case with schooling, where you only get, at most, a partial say in options, which are primarily dictated by area and availability.

If someone goes private for a hip operation, for example, they're usually jumping a waiting list of several years.

The operation may take place at a private hospital with better facilities, more staff and more aftercare and support - eg more intensive physiotherapy.

It's a premium service, for which there's a premium price.

Independent education is also premium (the exact nature of "premium" will obviously vary from school to school), otherwise people wouldn't see the value of paying for it.

By the way, the NHS operates the "right to choose" for the first outpatient appointment. So, in your scenario, you could indeed choose Exeter.

However, your ‘example’ says you were offered the Exeter NHS option.

Are you always this disingenuous?

Wow how big is that chip
on your shoulder??if you can afford private, then you can afford to pay the exam fees.
Try to remember that most people in state education are less wealthy than you, less holidays, less cars, less less less so drop your whinging and pay your fees, or send your children to state schools.

Look at it this way - state schools cover the cost of exams and the "price" parents essentially pay for this is giving their child a state education (which is clearly too high a price to pay for parents sending their children to private school).

If you don't want to pay that particular price, the alternative is you pay ca. £750...plus whatever prívate school fées are.

No this really should not be how it works either in schools or for the nhs. Such systems destroy and degrade the central principle of meeting everyone's needs without favouritism.

In both, 100% of people are entitled to a reasonable acceptable level of service, free at point if use, and no-one but no-one gets a better grade of service within the state system on the basis of ability to pay. Resources are allocated on the basis of need, not giving the nicest slices to the wealthiest (though that can happen a bit with selection-by-house-price in catchment areas of desirable schools, which is why many such schools are opting for lottery based systens rather than catchment)

Firstly, running a school or a hosipital serving X000 people does not become a set amount of money cheaper if it only has to serve X000-1 people. No significant savings are made, so there isn't a pot of "savings" that could follow those going private.

Secondly - it opens the doors to a spectrum of different levels of service offered on the basis of wealth not need. School A remains free and takes only the poorest and most disadvantaged children who have no alternative. School B is just a bit nicer, you only have to pay £1200 per year - £100 per month - to get a slightly nicer education experience and the great thing is that your kids can avoid mixing with the no-hopers in school A. School B chargest a mere £3600 per year top up above state funding and you get a significantly better education experience than those stuck in school A and while its a stretch, a lot of families can manage that with a bit of additional belt-tightening in their budget for Christmas and summer holidays. And the overall outcome is that the most vulnerable children get left behind and have the worst education. The whole idea ought to be abhorrent and is abhorrent to anyone who isn't totally selfush about advancing their own interests above those of people who are weaker and in greater need.

All children have a right to an education. All children can get that education completely free from the state. It is right that parents are at liberty to choose a different option outside the state. No there is no justification at all for them to get a singke penny of state funding to facilitate that.

My daughter did 9 GCSEs online. It cost £3000 but it was covered by her SEN finding THANK GOD. Insane money.

i actually can't decide whether you are saying this in jest or not. If I have misread this, I apologise.

You are, I am afraid, wrong. I said that the NHS offered an Exeter option. I didn't say I was offered it (on my hypothetical example). The whole point of using diametrically opposite places such as Exeter and Newcastle was to make the point that whilst both were offered by the NHS, different areas, and thus groups of people, were offered different things. I think that's obvious from the wording, though I am happy to explain it further to you if needed.

In my book, to accuse someone of being disingenuous is rather serious and rude. Perfectly ok if justified by the content, but where you base this on your own misconstruction of what I said, it is not.

You can't really call it inequality. The option is there for your DC to attend state school, all children have the equal opportunity to attend state school, only the privileged ones have the opportunity to attend private school. Those attending private school are not victims of inequality.

Hi Candy - appreciate your thoughtful reply. I agree with much of what you say, but hold to what I acknowledge to be a different ideological outlook.

Surely the spectrum of different levels of service will always be there, will it not? A state school in an area where parents pay hefty 'voluntary contributions' will bring this about, yet no one would (I think) suggest that the total funding should remain the same but simply include less from state funding because of the contribution.

More concerningly , I consider that the current trend risks creating a greater rift of opportunity. Instead of having a range of options, you either stick with the 'basic' state funded option, or opt for a far more expensive option. We risk losing the middle ground; a 'basic' state funded education with some additional funding.

I can understand why you (or others) might want to make it more difficult to 'purchase' a 'better' option. I would respectfully emphasise choice over uniformity.

Give over love. Your example was clearly ‘ooh I’m in Newcastle but I’d like to have my surgery in Exeter’.

You can do that. On the NHS.

What’s maybe even worse (for you) is that NHS patients are getting their joint replacement operations in private hospitals, getting the full private healthcare experience, and paying nothing.

Local authorities already fund some pupils at independent schools - primarily when there is an EHCP and it names a specific independent school because there is no suitable state school provision.
For everyone else, who presumably doesn't have circumstances that warrant it, the state-funded option is a state school (which is also provided more cost-effectively due to economies of scale; unlike an independent school, where arguably costs are higher partly due to diseconomies of scale such as smaller classes etc)

If a child doesn't not take up a state school place, the budget is not created or allocated in the first place.

Creating a £4.6k+ budget (there's a formula for how much funding a school receives per pupil which is based on a number of factors) per pupil in an independent school would take away funding from some other public service.

With public funds being over-stretched as it is, there are arguably significantly more important things to fund than a top-up to families who voluntarily chose to pay for a premium service (which is what independent schools are, regardless of how good or "less good" they are) that the state (via the LA) does not deem eligible for funding.

Why should the state system be penalised for a voluntary choice for a less cost-efficent option, in order to gain an advantage over state-educated children?

I hardly dare jump in, but what people are overlooking is there actually is a half way house that a significant % take (no idea what %) and that is go state but supplement with tutoring where appropriate.
That of course doesn't help the kids for whom large state schools are overwhelming but does mean that where parents feel their cild needs a boost in a subject or two, they can access that.

Though writing the above, I realise that some parents at private schools not only pay for the schooling but then pay again for tutoring.

One interesting aspect (a side effect but still of interest) that occurred to me is that despite saving the state so much money, parents who choose private schools are still depriving the state schools of a great resource – their DC and themselves. Chances are that their DC are more able (yes not all privates are selective, but a lot are, and plenty refuse to progress a weaker student) and more engaged in their education (this based on friends who work or have worked in private schools). For sure their parents are very engaged in their DCs' education.

State schools take everyone and that’s as it should be; but it would be foolish to suggest that those parents would not be welcomed with open arms in a state school. I wanted to help and support all the YP I taught; but if a parent and child were engaged and interested, that made the whole thing much more pleasant.

I don't argue, btw, that engaged parents should be made to use state provision – but when they don't, it’s not a complete win-win for the state system.

I agree @clary . A higher proportion of engaged parents and children makes life easier for everyone.

On average, classes will have more engaged pupils which dilutes the less well behaved and may stop a critical mass of poor behaviour developing.

Engaged parents may be more likely to support school events and a PTA raising more funds just by being active but also as better off parents have more money to spend.

They may also be more articulate and willing to push the school where standards are slipping, or stand to be a governor or whatever.

They may also be better placed to influence politics regarding funding of schools instead of just opting out. (See specifically MPs.)

(Though they may be 'over demanding' of teachers expecting a private school service for free.)

That’s also true of areas that are less than salubrious, but I don’t see MNetters desperate to live in Jaywick, or the deprived estates of Middlesbrough or Liverpool or Birmingham. The middle classes moving into those places would improve them, but it won’t be happening.

Well yes – that’s what I am saying.

I specifically said that I don't in any way suggest that parents who would prefer private school should be made to use state provision, any more than they should be made to move to less salubrious areas of the country.

But if they did, then it would make a difference. So their choice to use private, while it means state money is not spent on them (which some posters here think should be spent on them, because they are freeing up the state space), has a negative effect on the state schools.

Fair enough - I’ve been up since 5. I probably need some extra tuition myself!

I am not convinced it would make as much difference as people think, as the number of children from private schools spread across the number of state schools across a city or area is likely to be very small.

So, very close to where I work are two independent schools. According to my quick search one has 510 students; the other is smaller with 133. So 643 students. I know it’s unlikely they’ll be totally evenly distributed but rounding up that gives us 92 students per year group.

We have two state schools very local to the private schools (they are on the same road strangely enough) but not all (or indeed most) of the private school pupils live locally. We actually bought our house from people with two girls who attend and they now live in the next county. There’s probably a pool of the best part of twenty to thirty schools. So even a conservative estimate gives us about five children per year group, most probably fewer.

Yes that’s true. It’s also true tho that even one or two DC can make quite a difference to the dynamic of a class, for better or worse.

I mean I am not advocating some mass piece of altruism by better-off families; simple suggesting that it’s not as simple as some suggest. It rarely is.