"A rose will bloom wherever." True? Experiences?

[fircone]

Ds is by all accounts very bright.

He is off to the local comp this September, which is very good, the best in the county even, but obviously not an academic powerhouse.

Please reassure me that even though he won't be doing classics and wearing a blazer and tie he'll do as well as those who do!

Really? What sector do you both work in, and where? Dh and I certainly haven't experienced that and we are similarly educated. I wonder if this is something that is more prevalent in certain areas of the UK.

We're both in the NHS. Of all the unlikely places to notice it. Neither of us in a patient facing role - management / policy stuff. Up north.

I thought this was going to be a discussion about whether a rose will actually bloom anywhere, which is the reality some of us face, not the best comp in the county!

Fair enough, chosenone, although I am talking about top of the range independents as the OP wanted a 'like for like' comparison ( well, that's how I chose to interpret it!) for her ds.

The pupils in my present school would 'eat you alive' if you didn't adopt a diverse and engaging approach. No, they wouldn't be trying to exit via the windows or punch the person next to them or adjust their make up and hair ( been there, done that!) but they'd soon be asking awkward questions about what they were supposed to be doing / learning and why ( majority), whilst the minority would be silently texting / trying to listen to their i-pods. We too have rigorous inspections - one due sometime soon and , no, we don't know when - which are available for public scrutiny. The pressure of being a top performing school cannot be underestimated in matters like inspections where you cannot be seen to be anything other than excellent ( or should that be outstanding?) in everything you do.

The National Curriculum may well have improved since I was last delivering it 4 years ago but, when the occasional vacancy occurs higher up the school, we find it difficult to accommodate pupils transferring from the state system ( say in yr 9) as they usually haven't covered the same ground, despite being obviously bright.Extra tutoring can get round that to some extent but it does suggest to me that the state system is still not providing enough for all pupils.

It is great to be in a school where, as you say, learning is cool and achievement is assumed

Yes - NHS here too at the same level (DH is a tax strategist in accountancy practice). Private school pupils are very definitely a minority in this part of the NHS! Dh remembers when he first qualified as a CA many years ago that the public school pupils would do their classics or art history degrees and then expect to become an accountant. That just doesn't happen nowadays.

And yet conversely, campion, my friend who is a primary school teacher at my son's primary school has had to provide learning support to pupils who have moved from our local private school having supposedly achieved certain levels (we don't have SATS in Scotland), and yet are nowhere near that level.

There is a rose growing out of the concrete foundations of my house. Can't kill the bastard no matter how hard I try.

And, on a totally unrelated note, I'm sure your son will thrive at his new school, fircone.

My husband and I have similar intellect and background - he went to an independent school, me to an enormous comp - we had teenage pregnancies and a stabbing in my year and that was in the 1980's. Don't let anyone kid you that sort of thing is just a recent phenomena.

But we came out with the same A levels, got the same degrees, similar levels at work.

The thing I would say is that when I went to university, I was taken aback by the social confidence of the students from the independent schools. I did law as my degree, and these kids were all well ahead in terms of current affairs, music, debating clubs, where they want to be in ten years time. Me and my comprehensive friends tended to be - in the main - good kids who had worked hard and kept our heads down at school.

We were not lacking academically - it was the background stuff we lacked. Hence my own children are going to their local comp (a good one), but we are doing stacks of stuff with them - lots of theatre, museums, discussion at home over dinner, music lessons etc etc.

The gifted and talented programme is a big step forward in this regard.

Totally agree re G&T. A friend of mine has a DS in an 'average' comp oop north ( not the best in the county!) BUT he is thriving, as they have followed thru the G&T identified in primary, give him extra work to stretch him, and he is taking some GCSES a year early. (FWIW he is also good looking, very socially confident, has a girlfriend, is not ostracised for being a 'boffin' - friend VERY happy with his school!) - so as always in edcutaion depends on the individual school... cannot just categorise indie, grammar or comp...

Thanks for your comments.

I guess the trick is for ds to keep his head down at school, and for my part to keep blasting Radio 3 and BBC 4 at him!

Maria - your experience is very similar to mine. I was that rose in a difficult comp, and I did bloom, but boy was it hard.
As others have said, being brainy and hardworking did not give me any social cachet. Bullying was rife.
Neither my parents nor I had any choice in the matter and I'm proud to say we made the best of it. They supported me through thick and thin and I succeeded in spite of peer pressure etc. Did I enjoy it? No.

But it sounds like you're not talking about this type of school thank goodness. My heart really goes out to the academically ambitious children in failing schools.

I don't think any child appreciates R3 and BBC4, state or private - well, not the normal ones!

If a bright kid did well wherever he/she went then the schools wouldn't be filled with more thorns than roses as most kids are bright.

Pagwatch: - Agree with you 100%. I sent my son to the independent day catholic school and cannot run from there quick enough. I made the decision to move him in the 2nd term. The destruction of my son's happiness in progress. The good thing is you can still change schools if you find the school is not right for your child

There seem to be a lot of stories on here about people who went on to Oxbridge via a bog standard comp. But it's not the norm is it? About half of the Oxbridge intake are from the independent sector, another big chunk from the academically selective state sector and actually very few, percentage wise, from bog standard comps. And I think Russell Group unis are broadly similar.

You might want to look at some of the Sutton Trust's research. Our country is basically run by the independently and selective state educated. So the research would lead me to conclude that he won't do as well as those at selective academic schools. But that's not to say he won't do very well indeed of course.

I did Swedes, and I found when I got there my education was so full of gaps compared to my independently educated peers.

But it is the norm, many bog standard comps send children to Oxbridge, maybe 1 or 2 a year. It doesn't need to be hundreds of children going, you just need to know that your child, if they want to go to a particular university or do a particular course, will be able to do so.

I didn't actually notice much difference in educational standards between my comp-educated peers at school and privately educated peers at university. I'd expected to, say in languages which I'd always thought my school wasn't great at, but I didn't find it.

As for social confidence etc, true there's a certain public school confidence which some children acquire, but there are also a lot of people coming through private schools with a lack of confidence - the incidence of girls with eating disorders and self harm is high in many private schools - it was absolutely rife at Oxford. There are different pressures for bright children in private schools and in comps.

Paolo's girl, I wonder if you went to the same school as me, mind i don't think it has been in the top five for a while, more like the top ten.
I don't think some of the arguments on here apply strongly in Scotland as we don't have selective state schools, but the independant sector is expanding and I do worry about that, it is easier for "roses" to bloom if they have the company of a few other roses.

And there is absolutely no support for young women with eating disorders at Oxford, although I hope it might have changed now.

Fennel - Most comps send no children to Oxbridge each year

Which page of the report shows that, I can't see it?

You have to know if they are actually comps too, in some areas there are grammars and "comps" = I wouldn't call the latter comps.

But in fact it's looking at stats the wrong way to say that "a high percentage of children at top universities come from independent schools, therefore a particular child is more likely to go to a top university if they go to an independent or grammar school". That's not what the figures show - though admittedly I haven't read all that Sutton trust report.

The research which I find convincing is on how bright children with supportive families do, in two recent studies at least, "perform" equally well whichever sector they are educated in:

www.guardian.co.uk/education/2008/feb/21/schools.uk - This is the Reay report last year, which concludes that Children from white middle-class homes suffer no academic disadvantage from going to badly performing state schools.

Also www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2002/oct/18/education.schools -"An Edinburgh University study has found there is little difference in exam pass rates between middle-class pupils at state schools and those in the independent sector. Although school league tables consistently show independent schools outperforming state comprehensives, the research indicates that when family background is taken into account there is very little difference in exam pass rates."

Once you compare like with like - the same sort of child from a supportive educated family, the differences between achievement and entry to universities more or less disappears.

I think the key factor is parental knowledge and backing. If your parents went to university, you are much more likely to go to university yourself.

And guess what, most kids from independent schools have parents who went to university.

Kids from independent and grammar schools are much more likely to have parents who were academically successful.

The aspirations of teachers is an enormous factor also - this is an area where the state system can be weak. A friend of mine has a son, a bright lad who wants to do law. But he has chosen to study sociology, film studies and law as his A levels. By choosing these options, he has severely dented his chances of getting into a 'good'university - he should have received better advice both from the college, and from his parents - neither of whom went to university and are just glad he's still studying.

Its knowing the system, and acting at an early age. My kids are both in the training orchestras for their city - and I'll make no bones about it, its because I know it will look good on an application form for one of the good universities.

Surely the fact that we are on this thread means that we are all generally heading in the right direction, whether it be through the state or independent systems.

Very depressing that everyone seems to be judging education by the attaimnets in public exams. Our choice of schools has been entirely about which school most encourages learning and development and engenders enthusiam in the child. The exam results and 'oxbridge' thing is depressingly utilitarian. Could not care less what a levels mine get or if they get into oxbridge - just want them to have a happy school life, in a place they can thrive and make hopefully lifelong friends, - they only get one childhood - do not want ot waste it stressing about a level results. Where an individual child will be happiest is not going to show up in ofsted reports or league tables - you have to visit the schools, talk to other parents, ex-pupils, current pupils.. Put some effort into it...

The right school for one child isn't always the right school for another. Children thrive under different environments, depending on their own needs, capabilities, strengths, etc.

Obviously in a good school a child has more chance of suceeding, but even in some of the worst schoos some children do do very well and are able to achieve their potential. Often they just have to work harder to do so though, which is obviously unfair.

Have known children to do very well in even the dodgiest of schools, but equally have known children to fail to achieve their potential because a school has failed to help them thrive.

Itis all very dependent ont he school being right for the child.