Public schools gurus - Eton?

[carltonscroop]

This is more a fond dream than an actual plan. Yes, I've done some reading up, but wanted to ask any parents with recent(ish) first hand knowledge.

What's it really like? What sort of boy does it suit? Is it really worth the additional expense. (not the fees themselves IYSWIM but being at the high end - and on the same theme, are many things billed as extras) How hard is the scholarship exam? Has anything in particular surprised/pleased/disappointed you/your son/s?

pete I've cross posted. Had I seen your last three posts I wouldn't have posted. I find your own very disturbing.

FWIW I would never send my own DC's to boarding school, however good the school.

"You've no idea who I am or where my interests lie . . ."

So, am I supposed to fall immediately on my knees and change my mind and opinions about you?

"It's a bit lame to be doing down Oxford and Cambridge now pete. Why would you do that I wonder?"

Honestly, it?s more lame to be telling a parent on another thread, "I have 3 DC at Oxford and you have one each at Oxford and Cambridge." How puerile and ridiculous can one gets to be? I've often wondered myself have you really got 3 DC at Oxford?

It is only your misguided perception that I?m doing down Oxford and Cambridge; the same way you perceived wrongly I?ve issues with (successful) grammars. If it makes you feel better, I absolutely love Oxford and have lived there for 3 years in another era. However, I couldn?t convince both DD and DS to apply there which is the point I was making about Victorian Oxbridge and 21st century Oxbridge in the eyes of present day teenagers.

As for grammars, yes, my own DD went to a highly successful one and to her this is the greatest school on earth and I did say somewhere in MN that I find no reason(s) to disagree with her. Again, if it makes you feel better, in the days when parents were able to petition the closure of grammars, you couldn?t find a bigger advocate for keeping them than myself. Poor GS closure supporters who innocently knocked on my door asking for my signature couldn?t have got a bigger shock of their lives with my reaction to them.

"The tortuous suggestions (the hypothetical adding in more students to other schools, removing girls from Westminster) shows a desperation which can only be explained by a deep insecurity about the school whose placing you're artificially attempting to elevate."

This one makes my day.

ETON desperately need to feel deeply insecure!

Say no more.

Don?t worry too much about league tables. Eton will be the first to tell you they don?t believe in that kind of nonsense and have actually stopped supplying their exam details for many years now unless legally bound e.g. to the Department for Education

This fact alone makes it sound like a good school-I wish they all did the same!

Eton is a fantastic place. There is no need to keep comparing with other schools, all of which have their own strengths.

The boys who go there are bright, on an absolute scale. The do a pretest in Year five, which excludes a lot of boys who may be "doing well" at school but are plodders. The CE pass mark of 70% is challenging too, even to those with high IQs, although, in reality, hardly anyone fails the CE.

A boy does not have to be "driven" to survive Eton. The only time this is tested is when they are interviewed at their pretest - a bit early to assess their drive. The main criterion for surviving Eton is to be happy with boarding, and this is tested in the two years they spend in prep school. Other than that, it has the same routines as anywhere else.

A boy who will thrive at Eton is someone who takes advantage of the special/extra curricular things that Eton has to offer that few schools can match. Many boys are content to just do the academic part of school and not get involved in the top class sports/drama/music, or to be involved in clubs.

I have always been amazingly impressed with Eton boys. The main thing that always strikes me is how incredibly polite they are. Then they can hold a conversation on virtually any topic with an adult.

If I had the money, I wouldn't think twice about sending DS2 there, but I wouldn't have sent DS1 as he wouldn't have liked boarding.

All I can say is that when I looked I was amazingly impressed. However, even if I had the money, it would only have suited one of my DSs.
You have to pick the school to suit your DC, not find the school and fit your DC.
I think that DS1 would have thrived-however no money!

pete I think it best to stop replying to your nightmare posts but I do want to say that taking part of a sentence out of context to try to imply that I was point scoring about DCs at Oxford and Cambridge is as out of order as most of the rest of what you say. Quite odd to keep crossing threads too.

The comment was in the context of how many A levels are needed for competitive universities and the exchange between myself and the other poster was mutual and civil and the point had nothing to do with how many children we had where.

Anything I post about my own DCs is almost always some way into a thread and is invariably qualified. I know roughly where they are in a wider context and where their school is in a wider context. That wider world view is something perhaps you should acquire.

"You've no idea who I am or where my interests lie" simply means that you should perhaps stop treating everyone on MN as though they're dead stupid and let posts speak for themselves.

pete with the greatest respect, bugger off about where my DCs are at uni. That's from me as well as a bleary DD. There are lots of sibling clusters up there, we're not particularly unusual. The weird thing is, why would you care?

Quite a relief to know I won't have to battle with you for parking space at the start or end of term though, that's stressful enough as it is.

I wonder why people who send their children to Eton seem to feel the need to present it as incontrovertibly the best school in the whole world. As I've said before, I'm sure it's a wonderful school - for the right boy and the right family. But the people who defend it seem to get rather hysterical about it, as if their world view is simply unassailable.

I don't see many people doing this.

You might want to give Parents who seem keen to lead a vicarious life a wide berth ,plenty of parents who have more than(a max) five years experience of the school just see it as the school that was/is right for the individual child,many of them are happy enough in themselves that they dont feel the need to denigrate while they should just be pointing out the positives.
Class cant be bought.

Sorry, Mme Blueberry, you're absolutely right - I was generalising unfairly. There are a couple of posters on this thread who seem to feel that need, and I've noticed them posting on other threads in a similar way. I shouldn't have extended that to make it sound as if I meant 'all parents who send their children to Eton'.

I think whenever we have a thread about Eton (or anything else considered elite), people try to bring out down a peg or two, and point out its flaws, and say how other places are better for x,y,z.

Eton is a great school. Other schools are great too, and this fact doesn't take anything away from Eton.

To say that a particular school is great, doesn't mean that others aren't great too.

We send our kids to three different independent schools. That means we see value in each of these and are trying to match up the schools to each individual child's needs. I can say that one of the schools is fab, but I've rejected it for some of my children, so although it is just as fab despite their absence, it is not the best school for them.

No one is saying it is the best school in the world. In fact I think Phillips Exeter is but DS refused to be shipped overseas!

So we hear comments about so and so hating his time at Eton - how many people hated their time at school? That's normal!

I also don't think it's right for some children but it would be right for the vast majority of bright boys. But I do feel that, along with a few other schools, they are far superior than any UK university and it has been noted by many OE's that university was a huge disappointment after Eton and rather dull and slow paced!

Colleger you lose credibility when you make claims that the top schools 'are far superior than any UK university'.

The top universities are teaching at a wholly different level and it's nonsense to assert that they aren't.

Collager, DH went to PEA. Back when he was there, they'd often refer to themselves as the Eton of America. But they are very, very different schools.

We considered for sixth form for DS2 but didn't move fast enough with the application.

Surely university is more about an academic education too but as it is, the top boys from Eton and Winchester are already covering unexamined 2nd and 3rd year university work at school. Of course these schools are superior to top universities, though not top US universitities which are in a league of their own.

You seem to have a huge chip on your shoulder. Full of vitriol towards some posters and gloating about how amazing your three children are with one at Magdalen - one of the most academic of the Colleges. I that really the pinnacle for you? As another poster said, by stating a school is one of the best it is not stating that every other child has had a substandard education. Is there a little bit of Fox and Grapes going on there?

Colleger this is absurd. Another poster mentioned the fact of where my eldest three are. I have absolutely no chip at all as all my posts anywhere will show. The vitriol all comes from the weird posts of a MNer called pete. Check out this thread and it shows exactly where the chips lie and where they don't.

Why you and pete should have such big chips I don't know, you're clearly both very privileged (as I am, in my own way) but slipping in the fact of a DD about to start at Magdalen is hardly a chip! It didn't even amount to a boast! Is it a name which can't be mentioned? If not, why not? It was fairly oblique.

My poor DC. I love them a lot but where did I discuss them on this thread and where did I say they were amazing? Leave them alone.

With the greatest respect yellowstone you did mention that your DD was a magdalen offeree...

In fact, I've seen you mention how many of your children are at Oxbridge lots and lots of times on many many threads. To say you don't is utterly disingenuous.

In fact I've never seen you on a thread that wasn't about education and you didn't mention it...

Just sayin'.

OP - excellent thread which has produced the most interesting read I've had for ages.

I would love to send my DS to Eton, but can only just afford a normal day-school, nevertheless, it sounds amazing and from what I've seen on TV and read, the Head seems determined to produce down to earth boys who, (if they are from amazingly priviledged backgrounds), don't bleat on about it all the time.

You get parents everywhere who are incredibly passionate about their DC's school and sometimes go a little overboard. As I said, it's made for a fascinating read.

word you were the first person to slam me for daring to mention the name Oxford and then you were slammed yourself. I've mentioned it always in an appropriate context and I'm never quick to do so but often a lot of rubbish is talked about Oxford and Cambridge so it's quite justified to correct it (as on this thread after Colleger's post re. independent school quotas of 30%). I have a reasonable parental perspective, that's all, why not comment when appropriate? You do frequently when you feel you know something about a subject. Tbh we're both regular visitors to the education threads. Actually I believe I say a lot less than you and tbf we're both pretty measured - in fact I don't think I've ever used an adjective to puff my DCs, unlike many MNers when they describe their own kids.

I draw a line in the sand when it comes to commenting on other MNers DCs but DD has avoided revision by looking back at certain posters past posts and can see why I might be be coming in for stick.

It's an absurd over-reaction to mentioning the name Magdalen, Jesus Christ. It's like she's got The Great Plague. Anyhow, look at the context word, before you have another go please.

There are plenty of families with as many or more DC up at one university or the other, I know several and there must be a shed load more. At least my lot know their place in the grand scheme of things and they get that from me.

pete I'd ask that if you wish to launch another unprovoked overnight attack you leave my DC out of it and preferably, actually, just call it a day.

DD has wasted a while after lunch looking at your past posts and has read all the background. She opted for that over Hitler.

As I've just said to word, vicious comments about another poster's DCs (along the lines of oh how amazing) is unpleasant, undeserved and OTT.

I've made no comment about your DS at all, it wouldn't occur to me, so perhaps show a little grace and return the favour?

MmeBlueberry - I think it will come down to whether he wants to board. But they'll be no way of finding out as you suggest because I would not want him to miss the last two years of his current (day) prep. So I'm soliciting views here (where people might be a bit franker than RL) to see if it might fit be a good fit for DS - not because I'm expecting any clinchers, but because I wanted to see what parents knew was good/bad.

And I was particularly interested to note those who have sent one DS to Eton and others elsewhere - if not too personal/revealing, I was wondering if you could expand on what traits (in school or boy) led you to choose one or t'other.

Diabolo - you sound like me! We might be able to afford it, but cannot predict with certainty yet.

This thread hasn't been remotely what I'd expected, but has been very illuminating, nonetheless.

Does your DS's prep school offer occasional boarding?
My Godson went to Eton from a traditional prep school. He did not board but did enough occasional boarding to satisfy Eton.