Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. A phone that grows with your child.

Meet the Other Phone.
A phone that grows with your child.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
News
Original poster

I'm a diehard Leftie but my son is going to private school - Will Self

229 replies

Swedes · 15/02/2009 23:11

Discuss

OP posts:
Original poster
Swedes · 15/02/2009 23:56

We have Labour to thank for abolishing Grammar schools. They were key to social mobility for bright children whose parents can't afford to live in the catchment of a satisfactory comprehensive.

OP posts:
edam · 16/02/2009 00:02

Go on then, Swedes, was the secondary in this neck of the woods or at a previous address?

I don't think there have been any left-wingers in positions of power since about, ooh, 1979. So hardly able to inflict their principles on anyone else.

Shame, really, as our economy wouldn't have been so badly fucked over by believing that bankers were the masters of the universe.

Grammar schools were a route out for a very, very few bright working class kids. But kept the majority down.

Quattrocento · 16/02/2009 00:04

I'm not sure I agree that grammar schools were the way out for very very few. An awful lot of people (from memory around 20%) used be able to benefit from a grammar school education. Social mobility has decreased substantially since they were abolished, has it not?

Nighbynight · 16/02/2009 00:06

well, living in a an ueber-grammar school system as I do, I loathe them. who gets teh places? children whose parents can afford to SAH to coach them and have the qualifications to do so, or pay tutors.

HerBeatitudeLittleBella · 16/02/2009 00:07

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn

Heated · 16/02/2009 00:09

Be interesting to know which type of school the current cabinet attended.

Quattrocento · 16/02/2009 00:09

"Who gets teh places? children whose parents can afford to SAH to coach them and have the qualifications to do so, or pay tutors."

Well we currently have until a date in the middle of March to decide whether or not to take up a grammar school place. I work full-time (full time plus) as does DH. We did not pay tutors or coach her ourselves.

edam · 16/02/2009 00:10

I can tell you what kind of school the shadow cabinet attended without bothering to look it up. Four letters, starts with E.

Nighbynight · 16/02/2009 00:12

do you think your experience is typical though Q?
I can assure you, that round here, no child gets to gs without help. I dont know of any, anyway. and from what I am hearing from the uk, its going the same way there.

HerBeatitudeLittleBella · 16/02/2009 00:12

In that case your DD is v. bright Q. Where tutoring matters, is for borderline kids who wouldn't pass without the tutoring. Borderline kids from families with money, who may be elbowing out borderline or slightly brighter kids from families without money.

I would like to know what percentage of school pupils who pass the 11+, were in fact tutored. I don't suppose any government body is interested in collecting that data.

HerBeatitudeLittleBella · 16/02/2009 00:14

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn

Nighbynight · 16/02/2009 00:14

When most children are tutored, an untutored childs chances of passing are minimal, however bright they are!

edam · 16/02/2009 00:15

what % of working class kids got into grammar schools in ye olden days, or in those places that retain the grammar system?

My parents both went to grammar schools so I'm not biased against them at all, was definitely a route out for my mother. (Ironically my uncle, who failed the 11+, is FAR more successful in terms of money - and became a teacher on the way to earning his first million.) But you don't have to be gifted and talented in maths to work out that they only helped a minority.

Nighbynight · 16/02/2009 00:16

I have seen children going to the GS who IMO are as thick as shit, but have been coached for every test.

dd's teacher admitted the same to me privately!!

Original poster
Swedes · 16/02/2009 00:21

I went to GS, as did my 3 sisters. None of us was coached. It wasn't necessary back then as the system was deemed fair to all.

OP posts:
Heated · 16/02/2009 00:22

Ok, so it's better not to get in based on ability but on house price?

Original poster
Swedes · 16/02/2009 00:22

Edam - It's simply not true that grammar schools only helped a minority.

OP posts:
Original poster
Swedes · 16/02/2009 00:27

Heated - That is terrible isn't it? I think lotteries are the only fair method for comps. Anything else is simply unfair.

OP posts:
Thunderduck · 16/02/2009 00:27

I'm pretty left wing but dp and I are planning on sending our future children to private school. I don't feel at all guilty about that, and I don't see why Will Self feels the need to justify it.

edam · 16/02/2009 00:27

How do you work that out, Swedes? Clearly only a minority of children got into grammar schools, that's the whole point of them. And fewer girls than boys, as I mentioned earlier.

edam · 16/02/2009 00:29

ooh, have just remembered, what about the poor kids who past the 11+ but their parents couldn't afford the uniforms for grammar?

edam · 16/02/2009 00:29

(must go to bed, brain clearly shutting down if I can't get 'past' and 'passed' right. Oops.)

twinsetandpearls · 16/02/2009 00:31

I am sure the houseprice thing exists but have never particularly encoutered it, I teach in a very good state school we have children from huge houses with swimming pools and kids from the council estate. My dd goes to a good primary and again there is a mixed intake in terms of income.

The school I taught at previously was seen as a sink school and had more children from very poor backgrounds but was in an area where there were more expensive houses but they tended to use the private schools.

Have taught in London and again had a very mixed intake as was the school taught in in Wakefield.

Original poster
Swedes · 16/02/2009 00:32

Edam - here

OP posts:
RiaParkinson · 16/02/2009 00:36

why do these threads always turn into the only 11+ successes are tutored