Transferring from private to state - things not to say to/ask the Head.

[thedolly]

I have a meeting with the Head of our catchment primary school (5-9) next week.

So what things shouldn't I say/ask the Head if I want to give the right impression.

It's beginning to feel like a bit of a soap opera now - this is my 4th thread on the same topic . I nearly posted this in AIBU .

However it does have the potential of being quite a funny thread and it may even help me from committing an unwitting private/state faux pas.

Thanks.

I went to a rural school with the same surroundings. It meant nothing to me as a child.

It sounds like the school was more about you than your kids.

Sounds like The Sound of Music!!
get real thedolly. Real world, real expectations, real life. It's not bad out here, you know!

If it was so great then why change. Wasn't it because you'd have to go to work? At least then I'd guess you could make more demands on the school with all those extra taxes you'd be paying.

hercules1 - you are twisting my words. I did not say that private school parents are ' paying more therefore expecting more'.

I am just trying to rationalise why it is that private schools are more 'successful' in the business of education.

If I postulate an idea it would be more useful if you could talk it through rather than make a judgement about me on it.

hercules1 - you are still being mean.

Three years down the line when my youngest is five, yes I would have to go to work to enable us to pay 3 sets of school fees.

You said private school parents want to see a return on their investment and as they pay more I guess you mean this means they expect more of a return.
It is hard to discuss this as it is such a ludicrous point. Parents of children in state schools also have high expectations and I really can't see how (not forgetting many state parents earn a lot of money and pay a lot of taxes). Spend some time looking at the education threads. Maybe go on to the TES chat room and ask the teachers there if they don't work as hard if they teach in the state sector.

How would you have managed when your dc went to secondary school and university? Your teachers wage would not have paid for the additional expenses.

"I am just trying to rationalise why it is that private schools are more 'successful' in the business of education."

because they are not merely selective (ina social sense) but they are socially exclusive. In that they exclude the majority of the population, and most particularly those living in the degree of disadvantage (including poverty) that leads to dissaffection.

And by more successful - there is little evidence that they are more succesful in educating the individual child, just that the average group grade is higher.But it would be because of the social exclusion / selection. If all those individual children went to state schools they could well each achieve the same grades for themselves.

Private schools are full of chavs these days anyway. If you have any class, you go state.

hercules1 - you are making assumptions all over the place.

Are you forgetting that I am/was a teacher?

As such I have met many teachers across the state/private divide. This 'debate' has never been about teachers.

Blu - for me education is not about achieving the grades. Achieving the grades are a by-product.

If you have met many teachers in the state sector than you'd know the answers to your questions, surely. You don't seem that knowledgeable as a teacher, sorry, but you don't.

Blu- good post.

So how do you know that this other unquantifiable aspect of education that you are interested in, that you believe private schools offer is more successful?

(I was privately educated, by the way, sort of...my child is in a state school)

For me, education is about achieving a life-long love of learning. And when I speak about aspiration, I don't mean aspiration to be a doctor/lawyer/vet, I mean aspiration to want to learn new things.

hercules1 - which questions should I know the answers to?

Blu - good question.

The answer is, I don't.

That a life long love of learning doesnt come from going to school surrounded by trees and a nice building for one.

So where does it come from?

I would agree.
I just don't know how you can measure it or assert, therfore, that private schools do it better.
In our family state educated DP has, I would say, a more enduring intellectual curiosity and stamina than I do. It wasn't handed to him on a plate, he wasn't allowed to coast along in the knowledge that extra teaching and the luxury of smal classes would make up for laziness and a bit of dimness (like lots of us in my highly selective academic school), and his self-motivation (while I had structure and nagging to work non-stop)has stood him in v good stead. Privelige can breed complacency as easily as aspiration.

I don't understand why you cannot love learning and have aspirations if you go to a state school?

Yes it can Blu.

My own experience was of a semi-private/grammar school. And whilst others may think that I haven't achieved much I feel that my experience helped to mould me into the person that I am proud to be today.

(Disclaimer: I have no beef with parents who choose private schools for thier children - they all make individual choices for thie children. It's just generalisations about the nature of the education that other people choose, or have to accept, that i can't accept)