Lying on Bursary application

[Secondarypissed]

Some one we know lied on their Bursary application for private school application. They rent a place for application while there main home is some where else. What would you do. We applied the same schools and are expected to pay the full fee.

Where they actually live is a bit of a red herring. Schools look at hard facts so they will have had to declare incomings and outgoings and the value of any assets held. Are you saying they have not admitted to owning the property?

**I'd definitely report it.

Not only are they pushing fees up by lying, they've also deprived a deserving child of a their bursary place.**

^This. A deserving child missing out because of their deceitful behaviour is shocking. I would have to report it.

Schools can transfer surpluses to the bursary fund. I never meant to say it was impossible, nor imply that no schools ever do so.

But generally schools do not do this.

GDST schools (or at least the ones I know) do not top up the bursary pot from fees. Parents, if they wish to contribute, do so via well-publicised schemes such as the Girls First Fund (or similar) with other contributions coming from alumnae, companies and other grant-giving organisations. So yes some comes from parents, but not via compulsion of an element inthe fees.

Unfortunately, low interest rates and low returns on investments have meant harder times for funds in bursary pots.

I'm not sure you're right about GDST. According to their annual reviews they spend about 5% of their fee income on bursaries. This ties up with the Independent article below which explains that the donations from HSBC etc have allowed them to double their bursary awards.

www.independent.co.uk/news/education/schools/bursaries-and-scholarships-charity-begins-at-the-school-gate-397099.html

Their educational grants entry is vague in that it states that many bursaries are funded by charitable partnerships, donations etc but doesn't say how the rest are funded.

educational-grants.org/find-charity/girls-day-school-trust/

The GDST's 2017 annual statement specifies that they allocated over £12.3MM to bursaries (pg 14). Their financials indicate that their income included £4.5MM from Donations and legacies, £2.8MM from Other trading activies, £2.6MM from investments, and £2.9MM of unspecified other income. Even taking into account the expenditures involved with these activities, they had a net income of £10MM from non-tuition activities. On top of that, they booked a gain on investment assets of £11.3MM. (pg 33)

They earned more than enough non-tuition income to pay for the bursaries they gave out.

But the Independent article states "The Trust spends £10m a year, nearly 7 per cent of its fee income, on bursaries and scholarships. Via sponsorship the Trust can nearly double that money, providing assistance for 20 per cent of its pupils, most on means-tested bursaries."

I would expect the £4.5m to go into the endowment pot rather than be spent on bursaries for one year only. I am also intiuged by the other income as other than be a school I'm not sure what they can do. It's obvious from the listing that HSBC is their biggest donator and the smallest is the Catherine Cookson which probably just gives something to a school in Yorkshire. In 2007 HSBC were paying 50% of fees for 12 GDST pupils, I'm sure that numbers increased since then but there's a lot of pupils at GDST schools on bursaries and they are very vague about where the rest of the money comes from.

This old thread has some good info about bursaries and charitable status.

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/education/837006-Private-schools-should-they-scrap-their-bursaries?pg=2

And this gives detailed explanations of where bursary funds come from.

www.suttontrust.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/07/finalbursariesreportstaffs-1.pdf

And to make it clear I'm not having a pop at GDST but I'm just making a point that girls schools will not have the same financial backing as older boys schools.
For example the SPGS endowment fund was only opened in 2004 and currently funds 13 bursaries.I'm not going to look at the firgures for St Pauls boys school because I'll get depressed.

For example the SPGS endowment fund was only opened in 2004 and currently funds 13 bursaries.

But there are many more children than 13 in the school that receive bursaries. DD is there and I got the foundation report through the door whenever it arrived and more than 10% of the school's pupils receive a bursary. I cannot remember the actual percentage but think it may have been 12%. This is probably around a hundred children at SPGS. Both St Paul's schools have made it clear that they want to move to needs blind admission so any child who is academically appropriate for the school will get means-tested funding to allow them to attend. That may not be completely the case now, but it is certainly an aspiration of theirs.

I appreciate that more than 13 receive bursaries Glaciferous but that is the number funded by the bursary fund, the rest must be funded out of fee income. And becoming needs blind will be much easier for the boys school because they have an old bursary fund which has received generous donations from successful old boys for years and years.
I think we take womens rights a bit for granted now and forget how short a period it is that women have had the same education and career opportunities as men.

WWID? I would think 'dicks' then I would leave well alone as it is exactly none of my business.

cake

I would expect the £4.5m to go into the endowment pot rather than be spent on bursaries for one year only.

Why would you expect that? With the exception of certain restricted grants, it is up to the schools whether they wish to build up an endowment or whether they wish to use the funds in the current year. At many schools parents of leaving students are strongly encouraged to donate their deposits to a bursary fund; these donations are often restricted to be used for ongoing bursaries, not to build up an endowment.

It's very possible that HSBC, for example, has committed to a multi-year agreement where they provide a certain amount each year for current year tuition. In that case the grants each year would show up in the Donations and legacies field. It is also possible that they made a large one-off grant whose income is now funding the bursaries but, if so, the capital amount would have been recorded as a donation in the year it was made and the bursaries would be funded out of Investment income.

Money is fungible, again with the exception of certain restricted grants. Whether a school uses surplus income to fund current bursaries or to build up an endowment to fund future bursaries is irrelevant. As long as a school is generating more non-tuition net income than it spends on bursaries, I don't think you can reasonably claim that bursaries are being subsidized by tuition fees.

Funding from fee income is the norm for most schools as per the Sutton report, I don't understand why it's such a big deal. It is possible that GDST doesn't follow the usual accounting practices of schools and if you are a parent you could write to the bursar and ask. The report re-iterates the point made upthread about the older boys schools having large endowment funds and also mentions church schools having them but most schools do not but are still trying to improve access in line with the charity commission guidance.

I am not sure what "other income" schools have although this is also mentioned in the Sutton report but if it costs X to run a school and the school receives Y "other Income" then a school that is able to pay bursaries seperately from an endowment fund only has to raise X-Y from fees, whereas as a school without an endowment has to raise X if it using Y to fund bursaries.

Prudence is the reason that I would expect the £4.5m to go into the endowment fund. Schools are looking at the long term and are investing in bursaries funds to provide bursary income in the future. Again it is discussed in the Sutton report and the SPGS fund spells out exactly how much investment it takes to fund one bursary place, £750k. Similarly, DS1 just finished school and donated deposits were put into the bursary fund not used as income for that year. It doesn't seem particularly prudent to me to take all of one years donations and spend the whole amount on bursaries for that year only. What happens next year? HSBC is committed at the moment but another crash and who knows?

It is not a level playing field, schools with large endowment funds have an advantage and because they are all boys schools it's annoyed me. Maybe I'll pop over to the feminist board and moan there about unrecognised male privilege.

cake I do not disagree that some ancient boys schools have much larger endowments than other schools, specifically the "top" girls schools. I do not disagree that those boys schools can and do offer more bursaries than the girls schools because of those resources. I do disagree with your assertion that GDST bursaries [are] significantly funded by existing parents. Their financials show that the GDST are currently "living within their means" in the sense of offering no more bursaries than they can cover with donations and other income. It would be different if they offered as many bursaries as the boys schools. But, at the current level of bursaries offered, there is no evidence to support that they are forcing current parents to fund those bursaries out of tuition fees.

How do you know they are not going through hardship and had to let their house whilst renting a cheaper flat? Do not make assumptions that could affect a child. Do you have ALL the facts? I suspect you don't.

expat - you are obviously a parent and taking the GDST data very personally so I apologise. For me it's just the largest supplier of Indy girls education in the UK which is why I find their data and vagueness interesting.

I am still very annoyed about the difference in bursary provisions. I know there are far worse inequalities in life than different gender schools having vastly different bursary funds but it just rankles that funds that were set up to address inequality favour one sex.

100% sure about their house is still a “real life” main home.

Does it really matter? The fact that the INTENSION is to gain the bursary place. As I said, the unethical and immoral act for personal gain deriving other children from their genuine application is eating me. (And they have got fantastic few grammar school results so not as they are desperate).

*Intention

cake There is no need to apologize. I do not believe that our exchange has been uncivil. I do believe that we have been talking past each other to some extent and my tenaciousness has been driven by my desire for clarity and precision.

I am a parent and, while we have applied to a GDST school in the past, my DDs are not in GDST schools nor do I expect them to be in the future. While being fortunate enough not to be eligible for bursaries myself, I am interested in the subject of how they are funded and the question of whether I am being forced to subsidize them at my DDs' school.

The Sutton Trust report to which you linked earlier highlights that some schools do indeed openly reserve some fee income for bursaries, thereby forcing full-fee paying parents to explicitly subsidize bursaries. However, other schools are able to pay for bursaries through a combination of (current) donations, investment income from endowments (i.e., past donations), and other income. It may be that at these schools parents implicitly subsidize bursaries; after all, if the school didn't offer bursaries it might be able to reduce tuition fees. However, my belief is that much or most of the donations, both current and past (the endowments) were given for the purpose of bursaries, so if a school didn't offer bursaries it wouldn't have the extra income to reduce school fees anyway.

Eton and Westminster were founded and endowed (generously) to educate "poor" boys in the days before the state provided universal education. I agree it is unfortunate that English monarchs failed to similarly endow schools to educate girls. Some solutions to that inequality might be for the boys schools to go co-ed or for them to establish "sister" schools and share their endowments, but I don't see anything like that happening soon.

Expat - Understood.

I know that as a full fee paying parent parent I fund/funded bursaries at all DCs senior schools. DS1s allocated about 4% of fee income if I remember correctly to the Bursary fund. At DD's schools it has either been itemised on the bill or known about as her current school gives 100% bursaries to local underprivileged DCs and there is no bursary fund. DS2 the percentage is smaller but it's boarding so more in £!

I love the idea of the boys schools opening sister schools and sharing their endowments. St Pauls wouldn't have far too look. I am still completely shocked that SPGS didn't even create an endowment fund until 2004.That was after my DD was born.

Sorry OP for derailing your thread. I know a few people who lied to get bursaries and only one got caught out. I believe in karma and wouldn't tell but maybe that just shows that I lack social responsibility. I have more respect for the people who have said that they would tell.

I think what would sway me is the thought of a child who needed the bursary losing out on it because of another families deceit.

I am still completely shocked that SPGS didn't even create an endowment fund until 2004.That was after my DD was born.

Actually, it did have some type of fund from 1980 or so, not sure of all the details. This was called the Rowan Education Trust and it was in the days of assisted places so was not paying for fees but funding things like textbooks and school trips (which can be £££ at a school like that) for children who were having their fees paid by the means-tested assisted places scheme (abolished 1997 but children already at independent schools were funded until the natural end of their schooldays which would coincide with 2004 for children who had only just begun). This fund is now apparently 'substantial' and has been merged with the bursary fund to help with bursary availability.

The schools we have looked at / had children at have all required, for bursary applications, copies of bank statements and tax returns along with detailed questioning to elicit a full picture of our finances. It would be hard to be renting and hiding a second property I would have thought. (coi paying less than 1 set of full fees, 2 children currently at boarding senior schools)