Why do people openly criticise decisions to send your kids to a private school?

[scotmum1977]

I sent my Son to a private school (Glasgow) last year for various reasons and it's working out really well. There is the cost but we just do without expensive holidays etc. I can't think of a better gift for my children than a good education. I was so surprised at how offended people get when they ask which school he attends. They think it's ok to criticise you openly and make bitchy comments here and there. Surely how you spend your own money is your own business. Anyone else have this experience?

“Comps that do well are gamed by MC parents. There really is no good argument against grammars.”

Bollocks - in my area, anyway. London is full of really good comps that are not majority middle class, and many have way over the national average for FSM / EAL etc.

I have kids of very high potential / very high achievement who have received excellent education in a perfectly normal comp. Setting, student pathways etc.

can'tkeepawayforever you can say what you like, obviously, but it doesn't make it correct.

TP there are some very poor performing grammars yes - and there shouldn't be. There are also some very poor performing comps - and there shouldn't be. I'm not sure what's with the creepy tee hee. Also, could you explain - purely out of curiosity - why you only seem to write, or at least so often write, in staccato format?

why you only seem to write, or at least so often write, in staccato format?
its how my brain works
I talk the same

I'm not intending to link TP, so you can whistle for the data. It's not data I've come across on the internet but in a professional setting. I don't usually operate unprofessionally and I'm not intending to start anytime soon.

Ok. That's dead weird though.

Ok. That's dead weird though.
I'll take that as a compliment

It's not data I've come across on the internet but in a professional setting.
Of course.

Absolutely of course. Which Is why I've always found you remarkably under informed and your sound bites so empty.

I haven't got statistics but from my own reading I think that the small number of pupil premium children who do get into grammar schools tend to do well. I suspect that many of these children would do well wherever they go. They have after all passed a test that many other more advantaged children have been coached for.

The issue is that not many pupil premium students get into grammars. There are in excess of 20 grammar schools that did not admit a single PP student last year.

If I an right students can be classed as pupil premium if their parents were in the forces, figures for students still in receipt of fsm ( rather than a few years ago) would be of more interest.

I suspect things are changing a little - not because grammar schools care about social mobility but because many of them have crumbling buildings or need the funding that pupil premium students bring.

I didn’t go to private school but my husband did . We met at the same high ranking university as students . I didn’t have the same support to get there . He earns more than me . I did well at school / university etc and ended up going to one of the Hugh ranking universities where you get more
Private educated students . I think he he did better than me overall , because he was given a better vision than I was . For me doing a degree was going to be an achievement .. he went into further study and I suppose I was never given the same opportunity to think of dream of going that far with it . That’s the difference with the peer group he went to school with , his friends have mainly done extremely well for themselves and have had a different level of aspirations and the belief that they can achieve it ...

I'm using FSM students to mean those on FSM, not those who are children of a parent or parents in the forces. Quite right to query the terminology though.

Doesn’t Kent provide the evidence that Grammar schools don’t work? In that overall the county’s results are no better than fully comprehensive areas?

Just out of interest how many grammars are located in areas where there is much pp.
We have more than our share of pp in our area but strangely enough no grammars.
If certain children don't apply or aren't encouraged by parents and teachers, there will only be the mc heavily coached children.
Send some of your lovely grammar schools to East Lancashire, please.

Romanyroots-in our town we have a grammar and a non grammar a mile apart. Both serving areas of significant social deprivation. One has 37% pp children- the other less than 1%. Guess which is which.

@RomanyRoots no grammar schools in Scotland hence why we went private and hence the post about openly criticising this decision.

Bollocks - in my area, anyway. London is full of really good comps that are not majority middle class, and many have way over the national average for FSM / EAL etc.

No, London isn’t “full” of good comps let alone “really good comps”.

That’s fanciful.

Scotsmum- does the fact that there are no grammar schools in Scotland not tell you something about the psyche in Scotland and general attitude to selective education?? If there is no/ limited attitude to free selection what do you think it is likely to be for one you have to pay for!!

And you can’t jusy go to a grammar- you have to sit the eleven plus and only a relatively small percentage pass. In the area I live they certainly aren’t known for their ability to support children with additional needs. When I was at one not that long ago additional needs weren’t even discussed or on the agenda, and I was at one of the more progressive.

Sorry OP I thought you revealed that you went private due to your dc’s asn, but it was that he couldn’t go to a selective school? The two are not mutually exclusive obviously but I would be surprised if a council run school wasn’t well set up to cope with physical disabilities (even down to the more modern buildings, the privates near me seem to be in former castle type buildings!). Every state school I’ve encountered will set classes by ability in many subjects.

London and excellent comps. We lived in SW London for decades. We moved DS at 8 when we realised we could not put one single school on the application form. DD stayed until 11. There were two schools fit for the application but one was clearly on a downward trajectory and the other too far away. Neither were in our own Borough which had done remarkably well with primary standards.

And yes there were a lot of snarky comments. I had gone back to work by then and had to bite my tongue more than once to stop "well you could go back to work rather than bitch and bleat" from escaping.

Oddly the snarky comments never came from mothers who worked chuffing hard to keep a roof over their heads rather from the more privileged SAHMS who played tennis.

@Mistressiggi yes he has asn however never once have I said this was the only reason for moving his school. Also his asn are not exclusive to physical disabilities and no the local schools are def not set out to cope - otherwise I wouldn't be spending £12k pa on independent education.

@flossietoot yeah totally appreciate you don't just walk into a grammar but academically he is doing better than most thus I'd hope he'd have a good chance of passing - but yes you are right to point out I shouldn't assume. In Scotland asd legally has to be on the agenda. Not sure about England though,

In the area I am in if you have a statement of special needs the grammar schools have special rules and will often take children with ASD for example, however the one child I do know who got in via this route has moved back to state secondary as it was better equipped to support his needs.

OP im surprised you don't seem to recognise the Glasgow Flossie describes to the point that you're quite offended and accusing her of lying about working there. I'm in a town just outside of the East End which is of predominantly Irish Catholic descent, traditionally working class and deprived although it's improved over the last few years. Practically everywhere from my town all the way into Trongate could fit Flossie's description. There's huge deprivation still, sectarianism, social issues. Carlton in the mid noughties had an average male life expectancy of 54, these days it's 67. For comparison average male life expectancy in Gaza is 71. There are of course very affluent areas, you obviously live in one, but you won't have to go far to enter a Kightswood or a Drumpchapel. Btw I've lived in Gorbals and Saltmarket and Carlton so I'm very much not relying on a Google search.

@flossietoot that's such a shame. Asn Kids (and parents) have it tough. Everything is a fight - starting with local authorities, occupational health, psychology etc. It sometimes feels like a full-time job.

Twatty thank you- I was left thinking I was going mad!! Interestingly, there was a documentary on about Billy Connolly this evening and it also touched on what Glasgow was like and it wasn’t at all what the OP seems to think!