arabella weir on why we must send our kids to state schools

[nowirehangers]

Arabella on why she would never send her kids to private schools
What do people think?
Fwiw I find the tone unbelievably smug. I also disagree with a lot of what's being said. I don't think all parents send thier kids to private schools so they can avoid the great unwashed, though some do. I would love my dcs to go to a state school for the reasons she mentions.
What puts me off is the fact the teaching is so often mediocre - as the Chief Inspector of Schools admitted this week. Of course there are so incredible teachers in the state system but I fear there are a lot of second-rate one too. I went to a state primary where the teaching was awful then was moved in to a private school and couldn't believe how much more stimulating the atmosphere was and how much more inspirational the teachers were. I dislike the idea of my dcs mixing only with posh kids, so I'm going to put mye experience down as an unlucky one and give the local state school the benefit of the doubt but if I feel they're being taught badly I will remove them and remortgage the house or whatever to make it work. Anyway, that's my opinion, interested in others.

But what qualifies her to make those points in a public arena, other than the fact that she has been on telly? I just get pig sick of hearing singers and comedians and actors telling us the right way to live.

We pay them to entertain us, so I wish they would bloody well get on with it.

As for the grammar, well as the article was on the subject of state education being perfectly fab, and it was such a daft mistake, I couldn't resist. Especially taking into account that the woman is not a bloody journalist!

But it was wrong and bad, I know...

I wonder why AW didn't go to University?

Bobbie, you did better than me (I agree with your previous post completely FWIW) I always try to spot the spelling/grammar errors in Grauniad articles and that one eluded me!

If I ever need to stop and think whether I am on track, I have a quick scoot through the Grauniad and see what all the lefties are doing. If I'm doing and thinking the opposite, I feel immensely reassured.

AW should do a Giles Coren and write an email to the Guardian subs.

The lefties can do what they like.

The Righties can do what they like.

The fence sitters can do what they like.

As long as they don't try to make me do the same, or even tell me about it!

Coren email to subeditors here

Xenia, I take issue with your views that giving your child a state education is 'a kick in the teeth'.

At a push, we could afford to send our daughter to the local(ish) private school, but we felt the sacrifices we would have to make were not worth the advantages.

Obviously I do recognise there are advantages, the school has amazing facilities and a good academic record, although it is only 5 places above my daughters state school in the acheivement tables.

However, my issues with this school were

All girls, so no opportunity to mix with boys, which I feel is especially important for girls.

Distance- I like that my daughter can walk to school.

Financial- my daughter would have been from a family much less well off than most of the pupils, and my little old Peugeot may not have fitted in too well amongst the X5s and Cayennes I see pulling into the school car park
Although holidays abroad may seem unimportant, in our family they are the only time we spend 2 whole weeks together, and this is extremely important to us.

Also, my best friend and her 2 sisters were educated at this school, one is an estate agent, the other two are jobless heroin addicts living off their Daddy's money, so ime private schooling does not always equal higher acheivement and better prospects.

Georgimama

Tee hee.

I like that.

But I don't believe Arabella is a victim of the subs.

I think she can't write.

And I know because I've read one of her books.

"It's like buying a Macdonald's meal when you could buy the child healthy food." and "they'll have fewer life chances"

sigh xenia, tis ever the same with you, all about money (earning potential) not really happiness

Well, I'd probably be more steamed up about AW being asked to do a journalist's job if it wasn't an opinion piece. That's all it is, someone's opinion. She's no more qualified than any of us to comment - her only qualification is to be a parent.

And yet none of us hold back with our opinions on here! OK, so some idiot at the Guardian paid her to do this. Well more fool them. Or maybe they're not a fool, because they know that celebrities sell papers.

But noone's saying you have to agree with her because she's on the telly. They're saying 'here's an opinion, discuss'.

Which we are doing, when we can stop getting personal.

I don't think I was making a personal attack.

If you put something of your own out in the public arena to be commented on, well, it will be commented on, positively or negatively.

To be honest, I could do without all opinion pieces, whomever they are from. I wish newspapers would just report the news, rather than concern themselves with telling readers how they ought to think and behave.

It's not as if papers routinely put opposing viewpoints out there for our discussion. They are all pushing an agenda. And somehow it annoys me all the more when they use a comedienne to push it for them, simply because they think we will listen because we like her.

frankiesbestfriend, you shouldn't take anything Xenia says personally. Rather with a pinch of salt

STOP PRESS

ARABELLA'S DAUGHTER HAS JUST BEEN SEEN WALKING THROUGH A REAL LIVE COUNCIL ESTATE. SHE APPEARS TO HAVE :

A)DONE THIS VOLUNTARILY

B)SURVIVED WITHOUT EITHER BEING STABBED OR HAVING DROPPED ANY OF HER AITCHES

Was she alone with her friend?

Pity, good aitches is hard to find these days. Could have got a bomb for them in the clippy club.

I really don't think AW is trying to tell people how to live their lives. She's expressing an opinion, which could hardly be construed as offensive to anyone. What happened to freedom of speech?

Her article was really refreshing to me. As parents who have made the straightforward decision to send their DC to the nearest school, we get hacked off with other parents thinking the school is not good enough, and driving their DC 4+ miles every day to go to 'better' schools. We are left feeling that people think we don't care about our DC, or ostracized for being smug.

Parents who make the decision to send their DC to 'not so good schools' are in a minority, and it's quite uplifting to read an article like this in a decent newspaper.

I had to laugh when I read it though. I do remember being driven home once when I was a teenager by the posh friend of a friend. As the car entered my estate he honestly did say " Gosh, is this a real council estate?"

ah, what it is to be down with the kids.

"But many have false confidence. An overblown sense of self importance.
Private schools are full of the type of people she describes- quite dull and petty and obsessed with status"

I knew I shouldn't have clicked on this thread. I only had to read mrsruffallo's comment - the third one made - with its breath-takingly sweeping generalisation to realise my mistake. So, mrsruffalo, how much time have you spent interviewing private school students and how many private schools have you visited to come to this conclusion? And how do you find time to do anything else, if you feel qualified to comment on every single private school?

It makes me so ! I would never dream of writing the equivalent about state schools - I would expect to be flamed for it and quite rightly. But still this horrible bigotry exists which makes it somehow acceptable to malign private schools and their students freely. That's my 5 yr old ds you are talking about and he is just as lovely to me as all your children are to you

i really wish there was no such thing as private schools

me too bundle. then all the teachers, good and bad, and resources would be in the state sector, and there wouldn't be this whole elitist divide.

you only have to look at Bristol secondary to see what fee paying schools do to the state sector in terms of siphoning off resources.

I also question the notion that if I sent my kids the the local state school it would somehow lift their standards. I'm just not arrogant enough to believe that.
How are a couple of white middle class families going to change things? I can't provide books, motivated teachers or choirs. I can't rid the school of the damn SATs or league tables.
The idea that my sunny white teethed kiddies can change the prospects of the school just by beeing there is, frankly, patronising.

I have just removed DD1 from her private school (my reasons for sending her were not elitist, it was because we had no choice as we moved to the area too late to get her into the decent State schools) because:

1. Financial reasons, they upped the fees 12% which was too much with not enough gain for the children.

1. I noticed parents from Years 5 and 6 were having to pay for extra tuition to get their children into the Private Secondary School. (obviously children were not bright enough but hey, you pay a fortune, you should get miracles }

1. There was nothing in the school of a benefit to my daughter other than a small class size of 15.

She started her state school on Tuesday and in all honesty, I know she already prefers it. It is full of hustle and bustle (very large primary, 4 classes in each year), there are wonderful outdoor facilities (nothing of the sort in the private school) and she has a lot more children to mix with and choose to be friends with.

At the end of the day, you do what is best for your child but I found that a lot of the people who sent their children to private school had a high expectation of how their child should be performing without taking into account that if their child is bright enough, they will do well in any decent state school.

We are now £7500 a year better off and my daughter is happier. So for me, State wins.

I think the theory, Litchick, is not that one family or even five can change a school, but that if more people participated in the state sector it would improve things.

it's a bit like recycling - your bottles going into the bottle bank doesn't change much, but if everyone does it, it makes a huge difference.

trouble is, that requires a cultural change sufficient for people to change their behaviour in large numbers, otherwise it's just lone martyrs doing it and making no difference.