Is Westminster School the best school on Earth?

[statesmom]

Just looking at their website and they have 97 places for their students at Oxford and Cambridge this year?!

We have an 8 year old son and want to focus on getting him into this place, just next to the Palace of Westminster. It looks amazing! Any thought on parents with children at the school very welcome indeed, especially any thoughts on the application process. Thank you for someone new to London.

Ah, it's one of a dozen now and not the best school on earth .

Who cares about the dining room; what matters is that the boys are happy and the quality of the food is good. After a while the boys would become so familiar they would be contemptuous anyway.

My DS who has just left what might be one of a dozen schools is presently full of "you know if you'd sent me to Whitgift or one of the grammar schools, I'd have been mixing with people from the real world don't you and in the longer term, that might have been better for me because it is so wrong that money buys privilege". He's in his revolutionary stage though.

Your question "Is Westminster the best school?" is not outlandish. It's your assumption that you can steer him there with four digit donations, super-tutors, or your American connection with the endowment officer.

Sounds like in the States you can still buy your way in, here that has pretty much gone and is certainly frowned on. If you are genuinely old money then you would know that those people tend not to brag about it.

Wow so your family has had dinner at the house of the President of the university. Am I impressed - nope.

My nephew went to a state grammar and talks with a distinctly northern accent, yet has a double first from Oxford and has been accepted onto the fast track civil service scheme for the foreign office. Oh and he has spent 6 months at Harvard on a special scholarship.

Amazingly he did this without having to be bought in.

How you ask as it must shock you to think this is possible. He did it by not only being highly intelligent and hard working, but because he is a thoroughly likeable and competent young man, a talented musician who gives as much as he takes.

and I am sure mateysmum your son doesn't feel the need to drop that in to a conversation with every person he meets ...which seems to be statesmom's ultimate goal in choosing schools....because he's not that insecure....well done to him...

OP hasn't really discussed her DS, his strengths/weaknesses, current schooling and performance at all. It feels as if he's almost an irrelevancy.

OP: if you want to boast that your son is at "X" school, you do know there are quite a range with equal (start a new fight) greater cachet, don't you?

It actually my nephew ballylee, but I'm a very proud Auntie and you are right he is likeable partly because he is unassuming and wears his talents lightly.

sorry missed that bit mateysmum....sure your nephew will go far in life and sounds like he is educated and civilised ...I went to Oxford and I have to say there are plenty of unassuming types there too, but they don't get as noticed as the arrogant ones...conversely, there are also plenty of those who were very academic in their particular subject but quite uneducated about the world in general, lacking social or political awareness or insight into other cultures...let's not confuse academia with education in the holistic sense - they can be two entirely different things. Something statesmom would be never be able to grasp with her ideas of best schools and getting ahead by name dropping at parties.

actually talking about parties, the only rare time i have bothered to mention going to Oxford has been when someone else has brayed about going there to me ....so I might have dropped it in in a way to say, "so what? So did I and it holds no special mystique for me..."...otherwise to mention it seems an irrelevance now.

Sounds like in the States you can still buy your way in, here that has pretty much gone

What a self delusion! Just explaining away your own privileged situation. Social mobility is getting worse, not better.

Nobody answered my question about the prospects of estimated 10,000 brightest top 1% kids in the country - how do they get into top universities and top jobs?

Statesmom is absolutely right. Money gets you anywhere. The more you throw at it, the more you 'achieve'.

That's strange, Ballylee, because there are over a dozen people here who felt the need to "bray" about going to Oxbridge or having their children attend.

And yet these self same people give me a hard time for my wanting my son to be able to say he went to Westminster for the rest of his life.

It means something, being able to say such a thing.

What one might write on forum statesmom is different from what one says in real life.

I am sure many of us know people who got a bit carried away with the "name" of the school and university they went to and assumed it would open all sorts of doors for them, not getting that they had to demonstrate all sorts of other qualities like hard work and social skills to get anywhere. The deregulation of the city in the 80s was particularly painful in that respect. There were a couple on my MBA who couldn't get why they hadn't already got jobs in the city, and throwing a bit of money at an MBA was their last desperate attempt to increase their marketability. Two languid years of snooty parties (which I quite enjoyed, especially telling them which school I went to ) and doing the bare minimum later and they still didn't get anywhere.

I would like to think that was something that had faded out, that they were a relic of the past but I have to say the some of the arrogant alpha girls who queened it through DDs school and are emerging from uni don't seem to be getting it either.

The worst thing you can give your child is a sense of entitlement........

Near, what is hypocrisy?

Oh and then there are those here with the misguided idea that they are omniscient about where their son will be happy. You can guess, but you have no idea. Is that hard to grasp people?

There are boys who are happy at Westminster and boys who are not happy, but I bet every parent sending him thought ex ante their son would be happy.

There are people who don't get into their first choice school and unhappily must go elsewhere, who find to their surprise that they are very happy.

So you don't know.

Why not at least take the same chance on a Westminster? The worst thing that will happen is that the kid will be unhappy, but have that imprimatur stamped on his CV for life.

exactly NeartheWindmill...an anonymous forum and I haven't exactly said Oxbridge is be all and end all either ...

But you did enjoy informing us where you went to school.

But past the 2nd degree nobody puts the name of their school on their CV do they? Most employers know that if you have an MBA from, say, Harvard or the LSE or a PhD from Imperial then you had to reach a certain bar to do so and it becomes irrelevant.

statesmom you definitely can tell which schools will suit your DCs ability and personality, if, that is, you have the sensitivity and skills to make that judgement.

In fact my DD knew exactly what school she would be happy in. She came out of the StPauls' interview saying that she found them cold, arrogant and disinterested. She came out of the interview with the Head at the school she went to, laughing having really enjoyed the challenge of having a good argument with her about North Korea and nuclear disarmament, during which she gave Dubya a good dissing. She knew then that the school was a match for her, would value her sense of humour and international background. She was indeed very happy there, as she is at the London university she has gone to which has given her all sorts of opportunities she does not feel she would have had out in Oxford or Cambridge.

She choose what felt right for her and I would never have got in the way of the happiness that has brought for her.

Though there is sad lack of pre Victorian architecture in her choices........

OP: you've been asked a few times about your DS, but haven't really said anything about him. It does begin and end with him. Is he in a prep now? Have you spoken to his HT about what schools are likely to be a good fit for him? Because that's a good starting point for finding the best school for him.

And if not in a prep, then will you be moving him to one?

There's nothing whatsoever wrong in aiming for particular schools from early on. There is however potential harm in being blinkered about it. You have to find what will be best for him, not a theoretical (and rather shakily founded) idea of "best" (which does not exist in absolute terms anyway).

Employers don't care where you went to school as going to the likes of Westminster generally relies on how deep your parents pockets are in the first place or you cannot even apply.

University matters as gaining a place is purely down to your strength as a candidate not the state of your parents bank balance.

Who puts the school they went to in their résumé anyway? No employer gives a rat's arse.

But you are more likely to be a strong candidate if your parents have paid for your education...

They have an absolutely ancient refectory at ds's school, but they sadly only sent about 5% to Oxbridge last year. It was a slightly anomalous year in which 15% or so went to RCM and similar/Rada. Courses for (very talented and suitably guided) horses?

Better move ds quickly because he'll never get to work for Rovio creating Angry Birds toons if he doesn't have a better school on his cv.

Employers want the most talented individuals working for them. If two candidates both have Oxbridge firsts in the same subject, the one who went to Shitsville comp will come across aside talented than the ex Westminster boy because there will be no question of them being spooned.

So once you have got your degree from a prestigious university your school is at best irrelevant.