private school - is anyone going to put their hands up and admit

[HerHonesty]

that one of the reasons why they are sending their children to private school is because they dont want DCs mixing with chavs/plebs?.

My children are both in private school now (Y5 and Reception) My Ds was moved from the state school he attended half way through year 4.
He was in a year group that had 60 pupils, albeit split into 2 separate groups for maths and English but together for all other subjects. He was bullied consistently by another child for 2 years with the injuries slowly increasing in severity, This child (whose mum happened to work at the school!) was never ever reprimanded, and we went through all the proper channels to sort this out, Teacher, Head, Governors, LEA and nothing was done. He was bullied for wanting to work!
He is now in a prep school that has changed him from the quiet, shy boy he was into someone who is among peers who also think it is cool to study!!
I am paying for the small classes (16 in each class) for the Common Entrance curriculum (which is quite frankly far tougher than the National Curriculum - my Year 5 DS is studying what I am teaching at Y7 in my state secondary) for the far tougher stance on behaviour, fantastic opportunities and great equipment/facilities that the school can offer. The wrap around care too!

I know that I am fortunate that I can afford to remove my children from the school that was letting him fail, not because of the teachers, they were fantastic, but because the Govt have interfered so much with education that they aren't allowed to teach properly anymore and sort out problem behaviour etc.

Im sure that under the OP's description, I am a chav! new money and all!

Ooh I love these threads where OP makes a highly contentious statement and then disappears!
(Mine went to private schools because one was very academic and had the opportunity to go at reduced cost to one of the best schools in the country; the other ended up in the independent sector to benefit from smaller classes)

I'm not a drive by. I'm just someone who likes people to be honest about their motives. I know that ONE of the reasons for choosing state school for my children was our political views - and the fact that we were making a point to many of our friends who assume that private is the only way to go. Any person who does not admit - even in the dark watches of the night - that part of the reason to go private is to keep their children a little apart from the ....rougher element... of the community is, in my opinion, deluding themselves.

Excellent post, Belma, spot on. Life is one big social mix, bringing together people with different skills, abilities, aspirations, behaviours, backgrounds and cultures. I like my children to be exposed to that social mix, warts and all, to show them that not everyone is the same as them, not everyone comes from white, middle class, university educated parents with similar aspirations. There will be some kids who will come from completely different backgrounds, with different levels of income - and I want my children to be able to see past the cars, houses, holidays and clothes and see the person inside. I don't want them cocooned in a world where they only ever meet a certain kind of person - I don't think it does them any favours, or prepares them for life in the big wide world.

Seeker - were you the original poster, then?
I'm happy to stick with my "delusions" that I sent my DSs to independent school for parts of their education for educational reasons rather than class reasons.

Seeker if by 'rougher element' you mean children who are disruptive then I think most indie parents (myself included) would hold their hand uptothat being part of their reasoning.

The problem is that that somehow gets equated with 'the working class' or 'the great unwashed' therefore implying that indie parents are snobs who do not want their precious bundles associating with children from the council estate or those who'd qualify for free school meals. And that is frankly, rubbish.

I don't give a toss where they live or how much money their parents have. I don't care about their accent or their clothes. The poverty I worry about is poverty of aspiration.

And I think those on here who are equating disruptive pupils with pupils from council estates are the ones showing shocking predjudice.

i.e those who say 'ah but by disruptive pupils you really mean poor pupils'.

Well, lets face it - you don't get many poor pupils at private schools!

On a more serious note, poverty and deprivation tend to bring more social problems, with children from families operating in those circumstances tending to have more behavioural problems. It's not prejudice at all!

I chose private school as the only way I could manage childcare without being dependent on others (ie outside school). Obviously there are other benefits too but for me the wraparound care was key. As for social mix it is the same as we'd experience at the local state primary - mostly wealthy area so state v private is more about choice than need.

Children are children, if left up to them, they would happily play with one another without ever asking about class, race, gender, it is us parents who put this chips into children heads, fill them with rubbish about non important things and condition them to be just like us, sometimes oh sooooo unreasonable. I teach a piano to the children of all ages and all abilities, some of them are very good and some of them not so good, which is fine, but the kids I teach who tend to be on the lazy side are those who's parents are comfortably well off, children who already know at young age, that they do not have to work so hard, as majority of others. Funny enough brightest ones are the always ones that come from modest backgrounds and with very limited means. Ones with pure talent. So you see, money maybe can buy you expensive school, but it can not buy you talent, will to work hard, high ability.

'tend to bring', yes, but it's not a given! I teach in an inner city school so I know very well how the disruptive children are in the minority. How most kids are good kids,keen to do well and have supportive parents or at least those who do not come in threatening staff.

But, the disruptive minority are a significant minority and there is no getting away from the fact that it affects both teaching and learning.

And no, you do not get many poor pupils at private schools but many good schools (ours included) offer significant bursaries to bright but disadvantaged kids. Not as much as they should though there are schools like MGS who are addressing this. I've yet to meet a parent who dislikes such schemes fearing their child will mix with the wrong SE group.

I do remember someone I used to work with, an ex-private school girl, going on about how much she loathed 'poor people' and would then go on about how unpleasant, smelly they were, etc.

So I can well imagine that some people who send their kids to private schools would secretly agree with the op.

Also,Paolosgirl, you talk about mixing with other races and seeing past the cars etc.

There is a far greater racial mix at our independent school than at our local primary which is very white middle class. As for the cars; Sure, there are very expensive cars at school but alongside them are far more modest wheels and a few battered old volvo estates. Outside our local primary on the other hand is alive of 4X4s the length of the street. Range Rovers, X5s, Q8s, Mercs etc. Well heeled glamorous women driving 40k worth of metal 300metres to school.

But,Mrsmerry, that had nothing to do with her being privately educated. Those vile prejudices would unquestionably have come from her upbringing.

There is anecdotal evidence to back up almost everything.

Actually what I was trying to say was that had the poor girl lived to have children, I daresay that would be one of her reasons for sending them to private school.

hear hear Myredcardigan!

The state school my son used to attend, was very middle class white families only, The cars parked outside the gates were all big petrol guzzlers!

Thats not to say that the car park at my dcs school does not have its fair share of these tanks but we have far more modest cars (mine included!) and more of a racial mix.

I teach at a great(state) secondary school, but in every class even top sets, we have disruptive pupils who can make teaching a challenge, we can do virtually nothing about these pupils, exclusion for a few days for persistent bad behaviour does not work, and in these classes there are 99% of the class who want to work, who do want to achieve. None of these pupils are chavs btw!!!

I want my children to be in an environment where learning is considered cool! and consistent bad behaviour means removal from the school.

Most prejudice that children or adults show, is borne from their upbringing, their home environment. I've come across a 3 year old recently at my nieces nursery school who kept calling a little Indian girl, a dirty black bugger (and worse) This little girl had no idea what she was saying but just repeating what she hears from home. Same for the girl in MrsMerryHenry post, this wasn't because she attended private school that she got those views! I was educated at state and Private and do not hold these views!

'Most prejudice that children or adults show is borne from their upbringing' - well said CowsGoMoo.
I was educated at state school my brother at public school - social engineering at it's finest. Despite vast differences in expenditure there is not much difference between us now.
I was horrifically bullied at state school hence why my brother was sent 'somewhere where that would not be allowed to happen' (not my words) Personally I think that can happen anywhere. I refused to go in the end and taught myself at home and got all my exams GCSE and A level at A* A and B's.
My parents fully admitted the reason they chose private for my brother was so he didn't have to mix with 'chavs' as it was phrased. The difference between my brother and I is he is much more intolerant of individual differences than I am.

In my defence - as said earlier, myredcardigan misunderstood my post.

I am not the OP, no. But I believe people should be up front about their motives for doing things. I chose state schools for my children because I don't want them to grow up in a bubble. In my opinion, they are privileged enough by their home life without buying them any more. People who send their children to private school are obviously happy for the bubble to enclose school as well as home, and that's fine. Just don't pretend it's for any other reason.

'I teach at a great(state) secondary school, but in every class even top sets, we have disruptive pupils who can make teaching a challenge, we can do virtually nothing'

• this doesn't sound like a great school to me. And no, I'm not interested in whether Ofsted describe it as 'great' - I wouldn't call a school where such disruption is routinely going on, 'great'. If top sets are taught in a challenging, pacy way by high calibre staff, there should be very few problems, and any that do arise can be diffused quickly and smoothly. It would really concern me if my kids were in sets like the ones Cowsgomoo describes.

MollieO - that is a crucial reason for us. We have upredicatble working patterns and it is just impossible to schedule childcare at short notice. We have to know they are in after scool care/clubs (which they really enjoy) without question.

Well said seeker, as always.