Private school bursaries

[pollycat12]

Hi,
I know all schools are different but is it normal to have a mortgage ?

Or is it possible to apply if you rent ?

Thanks

"It would be good for an extremely wealthy school like Eton to offer the opportunity of extra support early on at primary schooL"

No need for the conditional tense, this already happens.

meditrina that's interesting, I knew E targeted secondary state schools for sixth form bursaries. At which primary schools do they offer extra help to potential candidates? Does that include primary schools not in the South-East?

We was asked about our outgoings but to date (since last November) we have not had to provide any evidence.

We currently receive 20% Sports Scholarship and 60% Assisted Place - The Bursar apparently reviews these once a year?

Our prep school used to offer 2 x fully funded year 7 and 8 with good connections to carry on the bursary to secondary schooling. They had 1 or 2 applicants each year even though it was broadly promoted. We get a bursary 50 percent and the expectation that the head will have enough gravitas to persuade the next school to carry this on due to good connections, this is the way it works for us. No surprise visits, a thorough truthful financial statement and a lot of support from the school. Every school is different however and our school has a super rich customer base and no one Wd think anyone has a bursary there but they do good luck !

' Does that include primary schools not in the South-East?'

No it's all local because staff go into the schools, or the pupils go to them. Similar for getting to governors' meetings etc. It's aimed for all children at those schools, btw, not just potential joiners.

Eton is not the only school which participates in local schools partnership arrangements, so if you are interested in a specific area, look at the websites of your nearby private schools and see what they are doing.

Of course, it can only happen if the state school wants to be in partnership, and some do not. There's no obligation on the state schools.

Ok you are talking about state-private school partnerships which as you say are fairly frequent, although sometimes a token gesture from the private sector.
I was referring to Kuppen's point. Eton do have certain secondary schools nationally that they target to ask for potential sixth form bursary candidates from reports in the press. These DCs will already have jumped through several educational hurdles.
However the 13+ entrance, even with pretest at 10, may miss out those with parents who are les equipped to be involved with their DCs' education and therefore may already have lost out on academic attainment and motivation by age 10.

The outreach programme is in addition to the help for schools (I though you were talking about the latter).

Yes, that goes on as well (full time staff on widening access) both for ordinary and 6th form entry. I don't know it's geographic spread; if you want them to come to your area, perhaps drop them a line?

Bottom line though, is that a handful of 'rich' schools can't fix underachievement in a younger age group all across the country.

Yes I agree meditrina. Eton is well positioned to be the gold standard as well intentioned and attracts so much in the way of donations that otherwise goes to new buildings, centres etc.

Why are educationally successful children from supportive and often middle-class families in receipt of charity money to remove them from the state sector?

It's just wrong in every possible way.

nicoleshitzinger your point is in part echoed in the previous posts.

However even MC DCs with supportive parents may be poorly served by their local state schools for a variety of reasons similarly to DCs whose parents are not themselves in a position to support their DC.
You can also not blame parents for seeking better opportunities for their DCs.

nicole a child will have to be from a relatively low income family in order to qualify for a significant bursary. Whether that family meets the definition of middle class or not is irrelevant, it is the household income and Childs academic ability that the school are offering the bursary based upon. It is perfectly possible for a family to be seen as middle class and yet have a low income.
For example: teaching is considered to be a middle class profession, so a child could come from a family where they have a single parent who is a teacher but the household income is less than 30k, should that child be less entitled to a bursary than a child whose parents are working class but have a higher household income?
There are some trades which can bring in quite a good income but are considered working class - plumbers, electricians etc.
Middle class does not always equal Middle income.
Fortunately bursary schemes look at household income and the child's ability and not what class somebody would traditionally fit into.

By all means argue that point that independent schools should not be creaming off the brightest children with the lure of generous bursaries but don't confuse class status and income as part of the argument.

Nicoleshitzinger, the term 'middle class' is a very emotive term and quite difficult to universally define. If you switch out the 'middle class' bit with 'low to moderate income' - which is surely a more relevant description of those in receipt of bursaries, it's much less of a conundrum.

Why are educationally successful children from supportive, low to middle income families in receipt of charity money to remove them from the state sector?

To my ears this doesn't sound at all wrong. Surely this simply frees up resources for the state sector to focus on the rest. Many of these schools were endowed with properties and land hundreds of years ago, before there was any state sector to speak of, for this very purpose. Why shouldn't these charities continue to offer children opportunities thay might otherwise not have access to. Surely this is the very definition of charity. Some state schools are very good at providing for 'educationally successful' children, but many really are not.

Pepperpot

"As all schools compete against each other in the same sports it would be rather difficult to have a select few schools with their own 'elite sport'."

Rugby, cricket, rowing, lacrosse, hockey and even football. Look up some of the inter-school competitions for these sports and you find them dominated by private schools and a couple of grammar and faith schools. That's not to say state schools don't also compete with each other, but the small number of private schools tend to keep themselves to themselves. Easily done when it's only 7% of schools and even easier for the concentration in SE and London.

Have a look at this site for example ...

www.schoolsfootball.co.uk/Team.aspx?ID=3064&TID=289158

Private schools could do a lot more to engage with state primary schools and identify bursary candidates.

Private schools could do a lot more to provide bursaries and financial assistance, rather than continually upgrade facilities to attract wealthy families.

Primary schools could do more to encourage students to go for bursaries (and grammar schools for that matter).

Clearly, one can have a separate debate about whether selective schools (of any sort - faith, gender, academic, economic, postcode) are a good thing or not, but, given the system we have I think a lot more could be done to "cream bright kids off the top" / "improve social mobility" ...

Exactly, MN164. If sums spent on rowing (a quite ridiculously expensive and exclusive sport) were diverted instead to bursaries, huge numbers of children would benefit. Schools could forego glory at Henley and take pride in widening access. But they don't. Up to them but nobody should be under illusions about what these schools' priorities really are and who it is they have chosen to indulge.

Schools could divert money to bursary students instead of spending on things that attract wealthy parents but they do need to attract enough full fee paying students to keep the school bauble and financially sound. If the facilities, extra curricular opportunities and results only match the local state schools then the private schools wouldn't exist for very long and no bursary students would be able to have a place.

Superexcited, I don't think Westminster School, St Paul's School, or St Paul's Girls' School, to name just a few at the top of the academic league tables, would find that they "wouldn't exist long" if they each dropped rowing. That is precisely the kind of thing they ought to be doing if they genuinely want to widen access. They have chosen to have some quite unnecessarily large expenses, which should not be priorities for them.

How many pupils are attracted to those top academic schools because of expensive sports? Could the schools cope if a handful of ace rowers went elsewhere and in their place came many more children from modest backgrounds with high academic potential? Yes, I think they could; they would continue to flourish. Furthermore, they would be returning to their roots and living by their founders' principles.

They might even find that currently alienated former pupils would resume their donations, so it would be a virtuous circle.

Although I generally agree with sentiments above it's a bit unfair to pick on rowing as the sport which is a waste of money . It has been a traditional sport for many schools, is argued to have many benefits for fitness and teamwork and is available at universities.
One of the aspects that worries me about the allocation of bursaries relates to the sentiment I have come across of some parents of certain schools (not the big name boys' schools) which may be reflected by the governors.
These parents approve of the use of bursaries to keep DCs at school when their previously full -fee paying parents are in financial difficulty. They accept bursaries for DCs of teachers, armed forces etc. However bursaries for widening access seem to be rather low on their list of priorities unless a DC will bring some sort of glory to the school.

Rowing certainly has benefits, summerends, but it has just become too expensive for schools to indulge in nowadays. A farsighted head would drop it. There are plenty of other traditions which schools have foregone without losing their reputations.

It's all a question of choices. Too many heads choose to impress Tatler magazine, rather than do anything brave, principled and good for the wider community.

Actually ... From what I've seen it is precisely these "expensive" extras that might make one school more attractive than another to the parent of a child requiring a bursary. Clever children want fun too - rather than simply an exam factory. And a parent wants to know that alongside academic stretching such a child will be constantly encouraged to broaden their horizons and use up their excess energy in a wide range of activities taught at the highest level. Otherwise they'd look for a different type of school.

Isn't rowing charged for separately at most independent schools? I would have thought that like optional music lessons rowing was not part of the normal school fees. I haven't got a clue though because none of the schools in my region offer rowing.

All this rowing discussion is quite misguided and blown out of proportion. Chiswick comprehensive offers rowing as does the west free school. It's not insanely expensive and a good use of the river.

"Isn't rowing charged for separately at most independent schools?"

Not necessarily. For example, it's a big (but not compulsory, other than tasters to see if you like it) at Emanuel, and the rowing club is always fundraising to supplement what the school covers. But AFAIK it's not a direct billed extra.

Emanuel offers a range of sports; hard for boys to avoid the majors of rugby and cricket, but if they want to branch off, eg into fives, they can.

at how these threads develop from the original OP. We can now discuss the relative expense of different sports offered by schools. Polo must be up there as the most expensive?

My fault. Rowing is just one example of something expensive which could be dropped if a school really wanted to widen access.

That goal requires lower fees for all as well as more bursaries. It's not easy and requires sacrifices.

The message so many schools are sending these days is you can get anything you like if you throw money at it. Parents like OP should think very carefully about seeking largesse from people with those values. As I have said, there are honourable exceptions but those schools don't offer rowing.