Why would / did you choose prep school?

[Staplesandglue]

If you can (or, theoretically, could) afford it, did/would you send your child to private school at primary level? And what are your reasons for that decision?

Guaranteed wraparound care so I wouldn't lose my state school teaching job.

Having worked in a prep school: better music, drama and sports, and the ability to push more capable children beyond the national curriculum.

We did because my child did not get a place at the FOUR nearest state schools. We were offered one across the borough in quite a rough neighbourhood. All four of the ones nearer us were rated ‘outstanding’. The one offered was either Fair or Good (ratings have changed since then). We could afford private so that’s where he went. It was a co ed school so my DD followed. When I moved after my DH passed away none of the schools were good, and many had very small or combined classes. I sent them to the one decent school which was an independent school (non selective coed).

Prep Schools finish after year 8, so you get an extra 2 years in a younger setting. I think this can be hugely beneficial - many children struggle with the move to senior school at year 7.
A much more varied curriculum - lots more art (including ceramics, design and textiles from subject specialists) and sport. More opportunities for drama.
Longer school day/after school clubs very useful for working parents.
Small class sizes so more personalised learning. Ability to be stretched or supported to reach full academic potential.

Small class sizes, TA in each class for all students, forest school, weekly swimming onsite, massive focus on sport, focus on whole child ethos, high expectation of behaviour, lack of disruption, wraparound care on an ad hoc basis as well as permanent, long-term staff, on site nurse for mental heath as well as physical, art, languages from nursery, music, drama etc.

Because it gives (almost) guaranteed entry to the attached senior school. Competition at 11+ is horrific and the local comps aren’t great, so we’re sidestepping both of those.

Plus wraparound as PP said.

Yeah so we have all of that at our local state school and far more - state of the art gym, Astro pitch, full working theatre, many many languages, many school trips (local and abroad) etc.

We can afford it no issue and I wouldn’t send my kids if it was free. Sending based on its private so it’s better is crazy.

Smaller class sizes tend to be because a lot of the kids aren’t supported properly in state schools and have specific needs so are sent by the council to the private school (easy money for them) or by parents who feel they will be better supported.

Sports are limited because class sizes are so small so they can’t always get enough kids together for a team. Or a decent one anyway. My kids senior beats them easily at every sport.

It is a complete and utter illusion that prep is better. It completely depends on your local school and your options.

I have been to both and can speak from experience. No one can tell you as it’s very personal and it depends on your specific actions.

We chose the private option at primary because it was far better than our local state alternatives. Far more sports and music opportunities, smaller classes and more tailored education, less disruption. They had a better chance of finding out where their strengths lie because they had more opportunity to discover them.

Music, Drama and Sport.

I teach in a Primary school and academically there wasn't much difference, but state schools just don't have the money / space / facilities for anything beyond the curriculum.

They had 3 or 4 classes of 20ish in each year group, so no problems making up teams / orchestras / play casts.

Also, I think boys benefit massively from spending Years 7 and 8 with teachers who already know them, and from the positions of responsibility they have to take on.

You’re very lucky to live in an area with such great state provision. Unfortunately, most of the country do not. There is not a single state primary school in our wider area which has a gym, astro or theatre, and most offer only very basic French (if anything).

“Smaller class sizes tend to be because a lot of the kids aren’t supported properly in state schools and have specific needs so are sent by the council to the private school”
This very much depends on the school. Some focus on those with SEN, others have very few pupils with SEN and actually wouldn’t be the best place for those with additional needs.

Sports are limited because class sizes are so small so they can’t always get enough kids together for a team. Or a decent one anyway
Again, this depends on the school. The majority of private primaries/preps have more than 1 form per year and, therefore, often have more pupils in one year than single form entry state schools. Ours certainly never had any issues fielding a very decent team. This might be different for very small schools, which personally I would avoid anyway.

My kids senior beats them easily at every sport.
I think that must be area specific. No primary school (which the OP is asking about) plays against senior school teams in our area. In fact, in our area, private primaries don’t even have sports fixtures. They certainly wouldn’t be able to hold fixtures against private schools because they don’t offer the same sports. Our local privates offer rugby, cricket, and hockey fixtures for example which none of our local state primaries even play. This might be different in different areas.

Another reason for choosing private at primary level might be dependent on your choice of secondary. Preps/private primaries tend to feed into certain secondaries and prep them well for any entrance exams. That preparation for exams normally isn’t done in the state system (there might be exceptions). For example, some private secondaries have specific science and Latin entrance papers, the content of which isn’t covered by the national curriculum at state.

To be fair, you are very lucky with your state provision. I don’t know of any state primaries with a theatre, a proper gym, a swimming pool on site or that do languages with a specialist from nursery. I have only ever heard of a couple doing a trip to France, and that was years ago, I suspect it’s even rarer now. What you describe is amazing and yes if I had a state primary near me offering that i wouldn’t consider private either! Unfortunately most state schools aren’t like that.

Yes we could have afforded it and no, we decided not to.

Academically, the private doesn't perform as well as primary. Both children test in the top 1% nationally so haven't suffered academically. That said, we've had to push school in that respect. We are probably the parents the labour government wanted to attract to state schools - pushy and invested. We've pushed for extra language tuition (paid for) as an after school club and another like minded parent now runs the school chess club. When our kids attend chess comps, they are almost always with private schools.

Sports facilities are better at private. However we just pay for our children to access sports clubs at the private school separately.

Music is not good at either state or primary. But we pay for private music lessons across 3 instruments and the teachers come here to home or attend school in a separate arrangement (just for DC).

They also have separate language tuition as I think MFL in state is poor.

Basically, some of the money we would have spent at private, we spend on extra curricular.

It's wholly dependent on the schools and area. Both children will attend state secondary. Working in law, I now see a trend to employ state school graduates and I think some universities favour admissions from state kids over private.

We decided not to because we know some of the teachers at the private that would most fit and they warned us off. They said while class sizes are small, lots of SEN which they aren't well equipped for and international students who are very cliquey.

Dd's best friend did go and had had a horrible time because there are only 6 girls in her class and they all turned against her. When dd had friendship issues I was glad of her 60-pupil intake!

The main reason most my private schooling friends started it was because it was a through school 3-18 so they start in nursery, also wrap around care 8am-6pm from 3 too. It’s not really about achievement at that stage but small class sizes help. Alas two friends’ kids were kicked out by age 7 due to sen, private schools tend to only want the easy kids (neither met the criteria for special school but one has a shared ta in their classroom with dedicated 1:1 time, the other didn’t even meet the threshold for an adhd diagnosis which isn’t difficult to meet

We like the small class sizes, the nurturing ethos, music and arts, sports, trips, nutritious and tasty lunches and extracurriculars. We liked the fact we could live in an interesting, busy part of central London and not have to move out to the suburbs for excellent schools. It gets excellent 11+ results and I liked the fact that most of the time spent doing exam prep will be in school, so they still have plenty of time for extracurriculars after school.

Our local schools are fine, but don't offer nearly as much, and they suffer from lack of funding and have to prioritise resources to SEND and families with social issues. Financially we are fortunate to have a sum which we can spend on the things we value most, and one of the top priorities is education.

Thanks for your perspective. Do you work full time? I’m wondering how difficult it is to try and supplement with sport/music/language provision outside of school.

A definite advantage of our prep was lots of activities on site and they would take your child to the activities and to breakfast and after school club. So it was fairly seamless and your child could be there from 7.30am to 6pm and attend e.g. cooking or choir or Taekwondo within that time. At a cost of course!

How much do you spend on tuition each month?

At our prep, everyone was mostly there for top notch destination schools. Not one dc would be sent by the council! Some notions of a prep school are way off the mark. Preps that prep for Eton and Wycombe Abbey really don’t have sen dc sent by the council! Utter tosh.

Our prep had lacrosse and lots of sports and mostly competed against other preps. Sometimes against state primaries at netball, swimming, athletics, etc. It had first class academics and brilliant art, music and theatre and after school clubs. Great trips and classes of 18 - 3 per year and all girls. Not merger difficult to get into.

Preps that have the best destination schools are not private primaries. They teach a full secondary y7/8 curriculum. Plus, I would say up to y6, a very good state primary can extend dc or no state dc would get to Oxbridge! The best preps just have a far better range of facilities and a very broad curriculum and club options - that’s what you pay for. A private primary offering little above a good state primary is of questionable value.

Yes I work full time. Professional services. Senior fee earner position (international law firm). I work from home which helps with school run.

I can drop off at 8.30am and be back at my desk and working by 8.50am. They do after school club until 6pm two nights a week and chess and some sports are at school. DC has two music lessons in school hours (one arranged via school, one arranged separately but school will facilitate the lesson and the teacher goes in just for DC) and her other music teacher comes to the house.

I flex my hours to do pick up twice a week. My husband flexes his hours to do pick up (and coaches the sports team for my son) on another night.

It's a juggle but its doable. It's harder when the extra curricular change - so Beavers to Cubs needed some adjustments and likewise when cricket changes from winter nets to summer matches there is always a week or two of adjusting to a new normal.

Private schools here would be about £60k a year for both kids so it's worth some slight inconvenience. Thats a lot of savings to go into pension / family holiday / standard of living / university fund and time as a family we wouldn't get if we put them private.

I would say I'm probably the only member of my extended family and friendship group from University (and colleagues) who doesn't use private. I don't think that their kids are smarter or more accomplished than ours. Certainly their kids grades are ok but no better than they would have achieved at state I don't think. There is maybe an element of polish and innate confidence you get from private that I think has been knocked from our kids in state school - our state primary school is good but it is quite woke in that academic competition is discouraged and it's all about the effort because it would make others feel bad. I don't think that's necessarily representative of working life so that's been my only criticism. I also suspect it will change at secondary to reflect life.

I know there is always the argument that private school gives you a "network" but I feel our kids have that through us anyway.

For DC, we pay roughly £225 a month in term time which covers:
(1) 3 separate instruments for a 30 minute lesson a week. It works out to be £15--20 per lesson depending on the instrument.
(2) 16 hours of supervised additional orchestral practice per month across two orchestral instruments and musical ensembles we access via county music provision (now of an acceptable standard)
(3) Concert and performance practice extra.

There are also music weeks at various musical colleges and schools we can access for summer holiday activities. Open to all based on talent - you just need to know where to look. I'm aware that I'm in a privileged position to be able to know where to look to find these opportunities.

We would these costs regardless of prep or private because prep wouldn't necessarily give private lessons for free. Around here, prep charges and I think their private lessons are £20-30 a week as the school skims off the top.

Both the state and private do group classes on a particular instrument in school but I don't count that as particularly high class musical provision.

Additional language provision is £15 a week.

I agree with most of this and in the same boat.

I don't agree that private always gives you a network though. There are five private schools locally to me. Most have very large international cohorts. Other UK parents who we know who send their DC to them are a mid-level accountant, several builders' children, a woman whose husband earns a lot selling imported goods on a shopping channel and a few doctors' children.

Perfectly good 'circle' locally but I think I would have been disappointed if I'd paid the fees with the motive to throw them into the paths of those in the higher echelons. I don't think you get that until you're looking at your etons, roedeans etc.

Calmer class environment, better music, sport and arts. I like that dc spend significant time outside everyday vs. In state where it was just one PE lesson a week and a couple of 15 min breaks on a small playground.

I don’t think they do more math or English than state, but in a small class they get through it more quickly, which means more time for enrichment within the day (coding, extra art or music, languages, special topics, hands on stem lessons, etc.) Ithink they find school more interesting than they did at state, which hopefully fosters a lifelong love of learning. I didn’t think extracurriculars were that big of a deal when we were deciding, but it is a massive relief to have school coordinate so much of it - especially with two children who have very different interests.

This is exactly why we’re looking at moving our academic Year 2 DD to prep for KS2. Her current London state primary is all Death by PowerPoint, with little physical movement in a typical school day, art, drama and music deprioritised and an obsession with ‘equity’ and ‘narrowing the gap’ which means that higher attaining pupils are deliberately held back while resources are targeted at those who are struggling.

DD is hugely intellectually curious and enthusiastic about learning, but even at 7 you can see her becoming bored and jaded about how the school system works.