The "Durham difference" - huge bias towards Private schools

[mummymeister]

I have just been to the open day at Durham Uni with one of my DC. I have other children in Uni and at various stages of education but have never felt so incredibly angry before.

My DC wants to study a subject in the Classics department. There was a last minute room change which meant we missed a talk and had 50 minutes to kill so I looked at some stats and wished I hadnt!

66% of the 100 students taken by the Classics department come from Private education. In the "real world" only 6% of students are privately educated.

When I challenged the admissions officer about this massive bias against state pupils she just ummed and erred with no real idea of a plan but kept saying that they were "working on trying to improve this"! Sorry but this is just not good enough imo. And to make it even worse this year the figure has gone up by nearly 2% so clearly what they have been doing has made stuff all difference.

They seem to put great store on reading all applications and personal statements so this is clearly where something needs to be done. I know many parents of children in private schools so I know how much time, effort and money is spent on making sure that the personal statement is perfect. No such help at our state school.

My DC will meet the predicted grades but honestly am just not sure I want them to be somewhere so incredibly elitist. It feels like a waste of a choice to me.

I guess I thought we were moving towards a level playing field and that the school you went to didnt really matter but clearly at Durham it does. I cant be the only parent that feels like this can I? I am unsure what to do next, whether to write in and express these feelings again or just to accept that life isnt fair.

Could it be that more children from private schools then state schools are choosing to do the classics? I went to state school and I don't know of anyone who chose to study the classics at university.

It isn't not a waste of time going to university, I know people who have gone on to be Dr's and Lawyers who were not privately educated, and I know people who have not gone on to highly paid and qualified work who were privately educated.

Is it not skewed by the availability of teachers and take up of Latin and Greek? Even if a uni takes students ab initio you need to have had some exposure to it to gain enthusiasm and be convincing about why you want to pursue it as a subject. Relatively fewer state schools are able to offer it compared to private sector,

I don’t think this is really Durham (or other universities) fault. Look at the percentage of students studying Latin or Greek or other subjects needed to do classics. I would bet more than 60% would be private school students. I didn’t have the option to study Latin or Greek at my school and I woulsnt have been unusual. What is more concerning to me is there are more and more courses being put out of reach of state school pupils because of the options offered at A-level. Neither of the two local high schools near me allow two language GCSEs and if that trend is widespread language degrees will become the preserve of private school pupils.

Do not put your views onto your child. If Durham or another university is the best choice for them, don’t interfere with your inverse snobbery. All the top universities will have a big chunk of private school pupils.

My DC have had a mixture of state & private education, and I think the fact that an awful lot of state schools (in our area anyway) simply don't teach Latin or Classics would surely affect the percentages.

My DD is at a private school, and does Classics. Her best friend (at the top rated state secondary in the area and her cousins at the local Grammar school had never heard of the subject before.

My DC have had a mixture of state & private education, and I think the fact that an awful lot of state schools (in our area anyway) simply don't teach Latin or Classics would surely affect the percentages.

My DD is at a private school, and does Classics. Her best friend (at the top rated state secondary in the area and her cousins at the local Grammar school had never heard of the subject before.

I think complaining about admissions to study classics is pointless. Two of my sister’s children study Latin at their state grammar, but I don’t know any child at a state comprehensive that does. Your complaint should perhaps be that state schools aren’t teaching Latin. But equally, Latin is probably not high on the agenda for most people, is it?

Just because over 60% of the students in the Classics department are from private schools doesn't make that department inherently biased against state school pupils. You are being ridiculous and directing your anger against the university when it is not their fault. Very few state schools offer Classics these days, whereas many private schools do, so it's hardly surprising that Classics departments at universities are full of privately educated students. Universities take students who have done no Latin or Greek before, so the opportunity to take these and other Classics subjects is there for state school pupils. It's not the fault of the universities that these subjects have been eroded from the curriculum in most schools. If a pupil is sufficiently interested, they can research the subject themselves - there's a wealth of material on line and in libraries etc.

I think its more to do with the subject than the university. Very few state school pupils will have had the opportunity to study classics at either GCSE or A level and although this is often not a pre-requisite not having that opportunity will mean less people consider the subject as a degree choice. Even less will have the option to study latin or Greek.

In the city where I live none of the state school offer latin or greek GCSE and I doubt they offer classics either.

The huge 6th form college does offer classical civilation, but not Latin. ( I wanted to study classics there many years ago but my parents didn't allow it as they didn't know what it was/thought it was a useless subject so I had to do history instead which I turned out hating and doing badly at.)

Most state schools don't teach Greek or Latin and most state school students won't even know what classics is. It's not a subject I would have encouraged my DC to take from a careers point of view.

It's just that Classics isn't very often offered as a subject in State schools.

It is known to be a Uni largely favoured by Privatly educated students regardless of what they study.
I would prefer my children not to go there as I feel they would find the social mix limited, but it is entirely up to them where they study.
With respect OP, you sound a little over involved.

DD1 went to a state comprehensive, and did her maths degree at Durham. She felt sorry for the large numbers of students from private schools whose parents regarded them as failures for not getting into Oxbridge - they viewed Durham as a consolation prize!
She said a significant minority of the private school boys were ghastly sexist and elitist yahs with drug problems, and some of the private school girls openly admitted they were just at uni to snare a suitable husband. She is now a Communist and grateful that she had a state education!

Yeah sorry OP but having just graduated (mid twenties mature student) I would confidently say the BIGGEST factor in these figures is student choice!

Most of those studying classics are private school/ middle class kids....because those from low income or normal backgrounds tend to think it’s a shit subject and don’t want to do it!

If anything your DS will be massively aided by being a non private student as they’ll want to balance it out more.

I have a friend who works in admissions for one of the UK’s best Uni’s and she’s always saying ‘you CAN’T have diversity in admissions if you don’t have diversity in applications!’

You do not know how many private school vs non private apply for classics each year

I dont know any local state school that does classics or classical civilisation

Dd is thinking of applying to Durham for classics, shes privately educated so has done all the correct a levels and gcses.

Why would you not want your children to be somewhere elitist if that is what they are capable of. Your child will be part of this elite group, what kind of weird inverted snobbery makes you want to hold them back? Dictionary def of elite: the richest, most powerful, best-educated, or best-trained group in a society. The reasons for the % of privately educated people on the course are obvious. I despair of our countries anti-intellectual anti-‘expert’ attitude.

Used to work at Durham. The elitism stank. Part of the reason I left.

She said a significant minority of the private school boys were ghastly sexist and elitist yahs with drug problems, and some of the private school girls openly admitted they were just at uni to snare a suitable husband

Oh do fuck off.

DD4 is applying to Durham for Classics from the state sector but she's the only one at her school to be applying for Classics anywhere. I think you should calm down a bit and reflect on just how few state school applicants are in the market for Classics. The state sector gave up on Classics years ago - blame someone else not Durham.

Incidentally my DD4 would go balistic if I tried to harangue an admissions person at an Open Day (not that I go to Open Days). There's probably a better time and place especially since I don't think your anger is especially well placed.

I'm completely happy for DD4 to go to Durham to read Classics, if they make her an offer, regardless of those stats. Privately educated DC can be perfectly good company you know.

Dd1 went to state 6th form. I thought a lot of the kids she met were bad mannered and unhealthy looking with no aspiration. Is that acceptable to say?

Oh and they all took ket at the weekends.

I went to a state grammar with an intake of 66 pupils a year. We were a pretty traditional school, we all did Latin in yr 7 but only 2 took Latin at GCSE. And only one took classics at A’level. That was 20 years ago. So I doubt the universities have that many applicants from state schools.

As for elitist, I’m about to send my son to Independant school. I’m a single mum, I don’t pay higher rate tax and I come from a free school meals family. Nothing elitist here, just years of saving, no holidays, old cars etc. His best mate is going to the same school as a boarder because his parents have been posted with the forces.

Independant schools aren’t all Eton.

DD at private school, doing classics as it's on offer there.

DD Best friend at local (outstanding) secondary and cousins at local grammar had never even heard of Classics until DD said she was doing it.

In our area - can't speak for others - Classics is simply not being taught st state / grammar schools, so by default the % of private school pupils taking it at degree level would be high in comparison. In fact I'm surprised it's 66% I'd have expected it to be much higher.

southernsofties DD4 is at a superselective grammar and there's no Classical language on offer at all at any stage, nor even Ancient History.

I was at Durham yesterday with DC2.

Our subject talk summed it up really when the lecturer said ' if you're good enough for Durham the you're good enough for anywhere'

I was disappointed to be honest. A beautiful city but my D.C. from a state school and sixth form college didn't get the vibe.

Having done a few uni visits this year and last year for elder DC I am came away feeling it was elitist, stuck in tradition and had a narrow view in the subject area.

My DC was not inspired by the subject talk unlike others we have heard.

It is definitely the choice for certain people if they fail Oxbridge so the circle will continue

@goodbye, yes that's my point, very few state or grammars offer any 'classics' subjects so I don't see how anyone could expect there to be a high % of them studying it an uni.

When I said I thought it would be higher I meant I thought the % of private school pupils would have been higher than 66%