Is it worth switching from independent to state for A level if applying for a highly competitive subject?

[rougheredges]

DS is in yr 10 in an independent school. He’s really happy there- we’re pleased with the academics and he’s got a lovely group of friends. He’s currently predicted grade 8/9 in 9 of his GCSEs (and a 7 in DT which he’s doing because he loves if!) He’s managing this pretty effortlessly.

Currently he’s thinking he’d like to study Economics at one of the tougher universities to get an offer from. He knows he’ll need lots of extra/ super curriculars as well, but his friend’s dad told him today that he might find it harder applying from an independent school. Apparently there’s less wiggle room and the bar is higher.

I’ve looked online and there’s a lot of conflicting information. Most of what’s out there seems to refer to contextual offers which isn’t relevant. I’ve read that it does matter/ it doesn’t matter/ they take where you did GCSEs into account so it’s too late/ they prioritise state schools/ it’s all about grades and PS.

I fear the answer may lie somewhere in the middle of all that but is there anyone who could give more guidance? His current school are keen to keep him (he’s currently an academic scholar with a princely 5% bursary!) so I’m not convinced they’d give unbiased advice.

(Local state school is great. He’d have gone there but it’s C of E and we didn’t qualify being disorganised atheists who figured it out too late. They remove the church attendance requirement at A level.)

Does anyone have any info?

Because this was what we used to have. Free for everyone.

It seems that different groups of people all feel hard done by student loans.
People who never attended college feel discontented because they see student loans as a way for others to climb the social ladder into the educated class.
Those who took out student loans find it unfair that they have to repay such large amounts, believing higher education should be close to free as in Germany or in the UK 30 years ago.
Wealthy people who never needed student loans also feel unfairly treated, because they view student loans as a form of government subsidy which they do not enjoy.
Personally, I think current domestic tuition fees are already pretty decent — they’re only about a third of what international students pay, have barely gone up in over a decade, while fees for international students have more than doubled. The monetarization of UK universities is not a bad idea either. The UK does well as the world’s second-largest exporter of education, and its education industry benefits every British resident in one way or another.
I also think student loan is a good innovation to ease the burden. It just means reducing some consumption(a few.coffees a day perhaps) later on, but it still gives people a chance at social mobility. Of course, social mobility is lower these days, but not simplily because of student loans or university tuition fees.

It’s great that it worked for you. I have friends in the same situation.

My doubts over @swdd’s idea concern the WC families whose DC are not heading to university. If government brings student loans onto the books - because there is no profit to be made in @swdd ’s plan - then our taxes will be seen to fund the loans. It will be a big piece of government debt.

That only works if you value HE. My concern is that Reform (and possibly other opposition parties) will stir up resentment. They will say that honest WC folk are being asked to fund the HE of other, richer families’ DC.

It’s smoke and mirrors as the government own the SLC but it is very easy to stir up resentment at present, and Reform are the experts.

My post above was for @mumsneedwine

You do realize that my 'plan' is essentially just the current Plan 5 student loan?

Social mobility has gone backwards since 1998, when student loans were introduced.
We are far too obsessed with class and social markers of educational attainment.

When you look at social moblity, income equality trumps everything else. If you stuff a working class kid who has made it to uni with 250k of lifetime earnings used to pay back a student loan, you have actually detrimentally affected income equality.
Income equality is far more relevant than anything else in determining how the next generation do.

The unis are getting wise to this now. It's not just state vs private. If you go to a really good state school then you aren't getting a contextual offer. They look at the amount of FSM and average attainment at a school and give contextual offers as appropriate. It's to level the playing field. So they want the best from private school and the best from state school. I wouldn't disadvantage my child by sending them to a tough school just so they can get a contextual offer. it might lower their grade--hence the need for contextual offers.

How many properly rough state schools actually offer the combo of those A levels though in different option blocks? The subjects chosen are already more likely to be offered at selective state schools.

It is quite common now to not get in or not want to move house for a good state school for Year 7, but then switch sector for Sixth Form because 1) private school extracurriculars are less relevant because most kids just work solidly for 2 years and ditch a lot of hobbies 2) a lot of parents save up for uni fees instead for 2 years so the kids do not have to take the loans 3) going to state sixth form can be better life prep anyway and a lot of change could be happening at the existing private school and 4) info on uni and prep for it is all easily accessible online now to everyone, most do not need the specialist private school advice like in the olden days. The outreach and online websites mean the info is everywhere.
So I do not think unis can ever “presume” anyone intentions behind a switch, especially not with the cost of living crisis and all this VAT on private school business going on. Plenty of people just cannot afford it anymore or have realised paying for your kids uni fees and giving them a housing deposit purchases more privilege than private school (especially when you have a decent selective state option, of which there tend to be plenty at Sixth Form level in most cities at least).

Oh yes, most of us can 'save up' £100,000 in spare cash (2 kids). Really do wonder how people do not see their privilege. Most people are lucky to just pay bills.

And why would a state school not offer the same subjects as private ? Maybe History of Art and Classics but I've never known one not offer FM. We don't even need options blocks as so large we can got round the kids. There are 22 different subjects in our 6th form.

I think Araminta was specifically talking about private school parents who send their kids to state sixth form so they can save for uni fees instead. Which makes sense. She wasn't talking about "most of us"!

Yes, I was talking about the ones who joined the state Sixth Form DD is at from the private sector.
Also more broadly we have been told to save for DCs housing deposit or pension for many years or for grandparents to give for that purpose, rather than uni fees. And we have also been told to go to the “best” uni, rather than the local one, even if it is perfectly good enough and offers a course DC is generally happy with. So potentially some savings in some families could be made.

Ffs. So you want him to have had all the benefits of a private education but then pretend he's been at a state school because top unis are trying to mitigate against this kind of privilege.
My heart bleeds.

missed that ! Apologies. I really do get fed up with rich people telling the rest of us we 'just need to save harder'.

Never having seen a state school to not offer FM is also a privilege.

Spot on. In fact, around 1/3 of state sixth forms across the UK don’t offer Further Maths, mostly in unprivileged areas.

My understanding is that this statistic is not recent. No one has cared to look recently, but the educated guess is that still 25-30% if Sixth Forms do not offer FM.

And you are correct, almost all in disadvantaged areas.

I work in one of the top 5 deprived areas of the UK. Every school offers FM. I know some v expensive schools that don't.

I have the impression you are in London, is that right? London does very well for FM offerings. Loads of pupils in rural areas are nowhere near a school that offers it.

I work in London, and do agree some rural areas face much bigger poverty issues. But there are also some private schools that also don't offer FM - it's not all about money.

”I work in one of the top 5 deprived areas in the UK" and also "I work in London". @mumsneedwine

Pick one, because London simply isn’t in the national top 5 most deprived areas.

It’s fair enough that universities take into account the elevation in grades a student gets by attending a private or grammar school.
Most private or grammar school parents, if they are being honest, will admit their child would not have got as high grades if they had gone to the local bog-standard comp.

Agreed, there are lots of rich parents who would have sent their children private if they hadn’t got into a grammar school.
They are just as privileged but pretend not to be and bang on about their children going to state school.
They just forget to mention it’s not an average state school and they’re state school by calculated choice, not necessity.

It’s fair only to a point that private and grammar schools often have a less distracting environment which supports achievement. But when you look at Progress 8, many top non-selective comprehensives actually deliver higher value-added results than grammars, so I don’t believe that most able students would necessarily get lower grades in a non-selective comprehensive. And we shouldn’t discredit the genuine hard work and ability of students who earn their places at highly selective schools.

One significant reason people pay for education is because their children are suffering in mainstream schools, either socially (eg being bullied) or educationally (eg SEN that is not being well catered for in the lottery that is the state sector.) There are plenty of private schools out there whose selling point is that they provide a gentler more supportive environment.

No need for them to provide FM. It is very likely that a child who has started to flourish and is looking at FM will move at sixth form.

Another is teenagers arriving from different educational systems at awkward stages who need a supportive environment in which to make the transition.

Amongst both groups are pupils who benefit from less pressured schooling but who have the potential to fly once at University.

Looking at sectors is simplistic.

Agreed. I’m also not sure about the repeated references on the thread to ‘inflated grades’. This suggests students are somehow doing better than their maximum potential, surely?

Many private school threads have posters stating that the teaching in private schools is inferior to state schools, in which case how are students’ grades simultaneously ‘inflated’?

My son will do his best and hopefully achieve his best. It’s certainly possible that he’ll do better than if he was at a large comprehensive (this isn’t why he’s at a private school though). He won’t achieve better than his maximum though because that isn’t possible!