So how does English education really compare with other systems?

[chocconut]

Thought it would be interesting to start a thread about the wise Mners' experience of English secondary education compared with others around the world. I was brought up abroad and so am very connected with children being educated abroad and since living here was always convinced I'd send my kids to private school as all I read in the news was how awful state schools were, standards dumbed down, UK kids not being prepared for employment etc etc. However, my kids are now in the state system (private not really an option financially) and they have been happy to go everyday, come home happy and -dare I say it- acutally seem to be learning well!!! Am I deluding myself? Are standards really very low but I can't see it because they are happy, and I want to justify my decisions? am I going to regret it when they are older if I realise they are able to compete in a globalised world? or.... is the system better than the news items would dare us to believe?? Over to you.. wise ladies!!

Asiatic, I wonder if we work in the same school? Certainly in a very similar one!

I have lost count of the amount of students whose parents I've called in/ seen only to call in the same parents the following year AND IT'S NOT THE SAME ONES!!!!

Or I've reported a couple of situations this year (yes, two!) in which the 'parents' were very obviously not the parents. In one case the mum was completely the wrong skin colour and in the other was only about five years older than the child.

Often quite sad cases, really. I don't actually think the kids (or the ones I deal with, anyway) are generally sent here just for education but also because their parents think they'll have a better life. And of course, they don't. They are often the ones who misbehave because they've got such rubbish home lives.

Tortu, it's heart breaking sometimes, isn't it.

I see asiatic, I didn't realise you were talking about the younger age groups.

Even so, I think it may well be related to some kind of reverence to Britishness, and quite possibly to a sense of the importance of speaking fluent English, rather than an insightful evaluation of the school in question and of whether the British system is in fact better than the German or Dutch.

Or to put it another way, for parents from former British colonies looking for something better than their own country, Britain is probably the only place that springs to mind. That does not necessarily mean that British students won't have to compete globally with other countries which have an equally good or better system.

Noone is saying that Britain is bottom of the pile. But the fact that some parents choose to send their children here doesn't prove that it is top of the pile either.

Actually, thinking it over, your explanation doesn't alter what I said in my first posts. A family from an Asian or African country who are looking to bettering their child's situation won't want to send them to a Finnish primary even if you tell them the Finnish primaries are the best in the world, because of the language; it just isn't seen as an asset.

And then there are the immigration issues: unless you are a proven refugee seeking asylum it can be virtually impossible to gain entry into a country that has no colonial ties with yours. Even assuming the family in question hankered for a Finnish education, they couldn't get the child into the country.

Quite, Cory.

gramercy [.......but still have an admiration for our inherent "Britishness" whatever that is and feel it is of value to get a handle on it.] Have you ever considered that it is just curiosity, genera knowledge, culture awareness....? my ds is 10. He knows everything about the British system, politics, parties, monuments,....when we lived in the US during the elections we followed all of the details and we learnt a lot as a family; geography with all the states, population...., we looked at how it was covered by different channels, speeches,.....my ds was even younger then but he discussed it with our friends, listened to their views and shared his. Sometimes it is just interest no ha ha about it.l

And to add my papa's bit to boschy's dad....
"good better best, may i never rest,
Until my good is better
And my better best"

oh god gunz (great name btw) I am so glad he stopped at the 'rest' bit.... it used to make me want to poke his eyes out with a sharp stick!

On a tangent but maybe of a tiny bit of relevance:

I know of a retired professional couple who spent many years in the middle East in the oil business and did very nicely, financially. They sent their 3 DCs back to the UK for a top-rung, 'world's yer oyster' education.

All the DC are now married and with DC of their own. The mother (now gran) told my aunt (owns a holiday home next to my Aunt's only home in a picturesque fishing village) that their retirement dreams of settling in that village were gone as they were selling up to buy 'near Heathrow' and how sorry she was, but she'd had a bit of a row with one of her DDs, a doctor in NY when gran complained about never seeing her own grandchildren. The DD said 'You jetted off leaving us kids to have an 'International Education' which is what we got and now we're all scattered to the winds, living 'internationally'.... this DD is in NY, another is in Singapore, the DB in Vancouver...

So be careful what you wish for!

I worked with a top consultant surgeon in Oz many years ago- and his advice to his senior trainees was 'Be aware that the enemy of 'good' can be 'better''...

There is another education thread at the moment where people are discussing the homely ethos of potential boarding schools, how important it is that the place should feel like home and the housemaster should keep pets etc.

I just want to say "keep them at home with you"!!! I realise of course this is completely useless for some people who have little choice, or feel they have little choice, but for me it's relevant to littenTrees posts above....

boschy I've not been following this thread but I'm interested to know what your direct experience of full boarding schools is? Is your statement based on recent experience by recent I'm talking in the last 10 - 15 years have you children in boarding schools or perhaps you're a teacher or even better a housemistress in a boarding school so can base you statement on real knowledge and facts.

happy none at all recently, which is why I dont contribute to that type of thread. I have nothing useful at all to add; I am sure it is all absolutely lovely and that some kids really enjoy it and that some parents have no other realistic choice than boarding. It's just that for me, if what you really want is a homely feel, then I long to just say "keep them with you".

It is emotional rather than logical. I full boarded from the age of 10-18 as did DH. (as we are now 50 it was of course a while ago). My parents had a real 'reason' (father in the forces); his didnt. He hated it; I didnt mind it. What I do think was odd was the fact that I never lived properly at home since I was 10 years old....

The reason I commented on boarding on this thread in particular was because it rang a bell for me in relation to litten's comments above.

I think it's a bit of a generalisation to assume those who've boarded scatter across the world and grand parents don't see their grand children. Neither myself or my DH boarded my in laws live 120 miles away a relatively easy drive as its literally the other end of out local motorway. We haven't seem them since Xmas day! The world has changed we live in a globalised world where more and more people not only don't live in the town they were born in but he country they were born in. I hope my boarding DS if offered work abroad will jump at the opportunity. In fact one of the many reasons we send him to boarding school is so that he will have the confidence to strike out on his own and grasp new opportunities wherever they my be.