When parents are slagging off the local comp...

[Everyoneafter3]

I've posted before about my concerns over the local secondary, which, thanks to comments on this board and an excellent recent Ofsted, are very much allayed. I had a very good read of school newsletters etc and am much happier. Dd1 (Y4) is musically gifted and will also audition for a specialist music school.

The area in which we live is very affluent: many children round here go to fee-paying independent schools. These dc are going to school and telling my dd (and others) that the local secondary is rubbish ("my mum and dad say..."). One particularly stupid parent has said at home that "no child of mind will set foot in x school" which of course is coming back home with our dd.

Dd1 has now got it into her head that the local school is terrible, that she's really upset to go to not a good school, that she wishes we weren't poor (we're not! But no, we can't afford independent school fees without having to sacrifice other stuff we prioritise as a family). She's been researching exam results and all sorts.

For our part we've said well look at any local school she'd like to, although as we live across the road from the school in question it'd be unlikely that she'd get in.

I'm heartily sick of parents telling their dc how awful the local school is. It's simply not fair. My dc won't receive a 'lesser' education. They aren't going to a 'rubbish' school. If this continues I'm tempted to speak to their current primary school tbh. What else can I do? I've told dd to not listen, we've looked at the school website, talked about results (!) but I'm at a loss.

Bert I'm amazed at your forebearance - it's taken over 600 posts!

Bobo, don't forget that Goodbye also knows that there is no independent school in the country that tests for critical thinking at 11+ despite me proving otherwise

BoboChic At the risk of sounding like goodbyestranger's cheerleader, she has managed to oversee more of her own dc get into Oxford than you have other peoples' dc in your professional capacity.

Calendar if you re-read what I wrote I said that grammars test critical thinking skills so independents which do aren't unique. I did not say what you said I said.

I can do with a bit of cheering cowgirls, don't worry about it!

cowgirls - but I am not in the business of getting anyone into Oxford! To accuse me of failing to do something I never attempted to try is a bit pointless

You claim to advise students on their university applications BoboChic

Yes, but that very rarely involves Oxbridge. Most of the students I advise are not remotely interested in Oxbridge for UG. I had a whole group this year but that was for a one-off reason and there is a 100% offer rate (they won't all make their offers, however. In fact three of them are not firming their Cambridge offer).

I can do with a bit of cheering cowgirls, don't worry about it!

Well, I think it's a thing , but Goodbye , probably the sea air Don't get over yourself

Ha ha - have just conflated , Do get over yourself , and Don't get above yourself - no mother of 6 Oxford u/gs me

Calendar - it wasn't you who said that interviews at 11+ can assess the critical thinkers who will get into Oxbridge - it was someone else.

You chimed in to support so I thought you agreed with that too!

Bobo - what are the unis that everyone in France wants to go to? International or do the grandes ecoles still dominate?

Bertrand - I think that's an interesting statement.

Clearly most people on mumsnet think their DC are high achieving.

I also think there is an encouraging sign that the London comps have transformed themselves over the past 20 years. Lots of exciting new academies and free schools achieving very well with a very deprived intake.

I hope this means that discussions focusing on high achievers will become even more relevant. Of course then the benchmark for high achiever will be even higher than it is now...

Whenever I look at Michaela school I feel almost jealous that my education, great though it was, wasn't undertaken there!

Well educated French people have traditionally attended more than one HE establishment. These days, having at least one non-French degree in your portfolio of qualifications is de rigueur. The Grandes Écoles still dominate the French scene but a foreign university or two need to be in there somewhere.

God, the horror of having to have 2 degrees minimum to get a professional job.

I was never academic enough to get into oxbridge in hindsight, I only ever wanted a degree and to be done with formal education.

I admire those who have the stamina and intellectual inquiry for 2 demanding degrees!

Bertrand all it takes is for one poor PP to mention a comprehensive Oxbridge offer, you and GetaHaircut to respond about contextual offers and then it set the scene for another PP to launch into their Oxbridge college conspiracy theories.

Indeed.
I made a fairly low key correction about contextual offers ( because I think it's very important that wrong information about then doesn't persist).
The rest has been driven pretty much by one poster's assertions about Oxbridge and certain private schools. And criticisms of super selective grammars.

Unsurprisingly, many posters want to point out the mistakes in those assertions. Why wouldn't they?

I'd home educate rather than send my child to Michaela school! Each to their own.

I'd home educate rather than send my child to Michaela school! Each to their own

I just googled the Michaela school. Wow. That deserves a thread of its own!

The head seems rather formidable.

That's one way of putting it. I think it has had threads of its own - I first came across it on mumsnet iirc.

Sendsummer - I think it's very important to point out how the deck is stacked against all state applicants.

The sutton trust info shows there's a real problem - my own experience indicates to me that this is partly due to some schools having relationships with the colleges that advantage applicants. (just look at eton and christ church college!)

Apparently this is the equivalent of saying that all oxbridge tutors accept bribes, and apparently top private school kids are just, in some ineffable way that no one can explain, "better" and totally deserve to dominate oxbridge admissions.

Alyosha - you refuse to take on board many of the hypotheses advanced on this thread as to why privately educated DC might be better educated than state educated DC. It's not, however, rocket science to imagine that DC with very many times more educational resources at their disposal over many years might be a bit more educationally advanced. Surely?

Alyosha - my DSS1 was telling us very recently about the way the bank in which he is currently doing an internship "scores" the very many applications it receives from undergraduates at universities in the UK. Fascinating, and DSS2 will use that "insider info" for himself. Of course this is unfair to other applicants who cannot get the information in time to prepare themselves. This is what privilege means. But it is not corruption, or cheating.

I made decisions on student admissions at a RG University DH is an admissions tutor still. I attended a very bog standard comp, he went to one of the best public schools in the country.

Cambridge tutorials were 1:2 DH used to actually give them as a paid PhD student to undergrads.

Many children are clever but hardly any are really gifted. My own DS is very clever indeed I suppose I am but the truly gifted are rare indeed. Having walked as a mere mortal amongst them they do exist but I would dispute having a PhD automatically makes someone gifted, it makes them very hard working and able to stick something out. They also need to have a supervisor that gives a shit.

An incident left me with complex ptsd and I stopped working in higher education as my brain stopped working properly. It damaged the internal workings so badly I lost the capacity to even speak for months and I'm painfully aware that I cannot write well anymore either. Not even on a forum.

Bobo - are the educational opportunities at elite grammars and westminster/NLCS/SHHS so different? I don't think so. In fact the only thing you have been able to point out as being different is the individual experiences offered by children's wealthy families. The only concrete thing we can all agree on is smaller class sizes. But actually, HBS has 25 per year current (going up to 26 I think), which is the same as many private schools in N London.

Again, I have personal experience of benefiting from school connections with a college. I have classmates who knew the offer they were going to get before they got it.

Does that not concern anyone? Do you think I'm making it up? Do you not find it odd someone with predicted a level grades of AAB knew she would get an interview with a particular oxford college because her school told her they would?

Is it not concerning to anyone the huge number of Eton and Winchester leavers who all go to one particular college...?!

How does everyone know who Bobo is irl and what her consulting is? I haven't the faintest clue. Everyone on mumsnet really is anonymous to me.

I take your point Bertrand. The OP was about feeling that one's secondary school choices are inadequate and being judged somehow to be lacking by one's peers. This conversation turning into s heated debate about elite grammars vs elite private day schools and oxbridge entrance is hardly likely to be soothing.

peantbuttercheese

Your writing is very cogent.