Head of St Pauls Girl’s School

[jeanne16]

Anyone else find the article about the forthcoming book by Clarissa Farr about her time as Head of SPGS extraordinary. She complains that parents are too pushy and that independent schools are too focused on getting the top academic results.

Since that is an exact description of St Paul’s itself, it seems odd to complain about it.

I don't think SPGS is unique in the head's fundraising dinner circuit for parents to donate large sums. The late Bernice McCabe did the same at North London Collegiate.

I never recognise the descriptions of Paulinas or of St Paul's that people who have not had direct involvement with the school either as parents or children come up with. It really is very interesting how the impressions of people with no personal knowledge of the school can be so much at odds with my actual experience of it either as a parent or as a child.

I quite agree Glaciferous.

I went to a similar school to spgs, and know many who went there. From my experience, all the school wanted was good grades at any cost. There was no pastoral care to speak of. Anyone who might bring the schools results down was asked to leave.

I'm not sure why everyone clamours to get a place at these schools. They get good results by recruiting bright girls, and asking them to leave if they don't perform. Anywhere could get good results if they did that

Polyjuice Gacoferous can you please elaborate? i know plenty who have come out of SPGS and SPS for that matter. There is such a conflict between what they achieved and what it cost them.

Honestly it is so sad and beyond any opinion you would have about the schools involved. My daughter is quite bright but honestly i will not push it to the end because I have seen what you what to pay for. Putney High or Godolphin will do just as fine for results but much better on the mental health side.

DD has had some really fantastic pastoral care over the last year at St Paul's. There has been little evidence of competitiveness and in fact the minimal talk about achievement or goals has all been to do with doing your own personal best rather than comparing yourself to others, which I think very sensible and surely what we would all tell our children anyway.

I don't think pastoral care was very good when I was there, but then I don't think it was especially good anywhere (eg corporal punishment still legal when I started secondary school until not long before I left and I don't think anyone anywhere was worrying much about pupils' mental health).

I was extremely lazy and quite badly behaved during my time at St Paul's but was not asked to leave at any time, though I am sure all my teachers were heartily sick of my by the time I left. However even during the worst of the bad behaviour they were all pretty damn nice to me tbh. Not sure I'd have had as much patience with myself! Don't remember any competitiveness unless self-inflicted.

I don't personally know of anyone asked to leave as a result of poor academic performance (I do know of a few friends who got lowish grades for some of their O Levels but all continued to A Levels at the school). Maybe it is different now? I have no idea. It really doesn't seem very likely from what I've seen so far, but then DD is a fairly high flyer so it may be different for others. I can only say what I have personally witnessed.

I sent my daughter there because I received a truly outstanding education and wanted the same for my daughter. Plus I had specific curriculum-related wants that suit my daughter that were not available at local state schools (where she would have gone had she not got in to St Paul's or the single other selective school we applied for). I looked round lots of schools and this was the place I felt best suited my daughter's particular personality and interests. I did not feel any of the other very good selective schools in SW London would have suited her in quite the same way.

The levels of interest in this school just seem to be off the charts and not in a good way and I find it hard to understand why. The commentary from people with no real personal experience probably doesn't help. Two of DD's friends were stopped by a random mother with a couple of kids on the way home from school and quizzed as to what tutoring they had done to get in. They were 11 at the time. It is bonkers. DD has learnt to say 'Hammersmith' when asked where she goes to school because of weird reactions from complete strangers. However the actual education she is getting is fantastic, the pastoral care has been excellent and she is genuinely having the time of her life (so prob worth a bit of weirdness).

I came out of St Paul's with an excellent education and absolutely no mental health issues whatsoever, good university, interesting career etc etc. I expect my daughter to do the same. I know a few girls from St Paul's who did have problems in some way, but equally the maddest workaholic I know went to G&L and had an eating disorder throughout her time there (and several people I know through her were just as bonkers). No school will proof your child against problems. You have to do that yourself, don't you? All the girls I knew who had problems also had problems at home. Their problems weren't caused by the school they attended.

All I can say is that I do not recognise the picture painted by those who don't have direct experience of the school and that my experience some decades ago and my daughter's experience now have been really good. If that changes I will hold my hands up and say so. But for now, DD's experience has been wonderful. She is so happy. Very tired! But intellectually happy and fulfilled in a way that I have not seen before. And the long tradition that I experienced of teachers going above and beyond to help with personal interests is clearly still in evidence.

But according to recent press it is Clarissa Farr who complains that parents are too pushy and that independent schools are too focused on getting the top academic results.

She is not an outsider.

And as someone who went through the West London school thing, not at SPGS, it was a stereotype that fitted some.

Just the parents? Passed onto the girls? From the school? Who knows, but there is clearly a distinctiveness that sets SPHS apart from the other very good schools in the area.

An eye opening insight to the school appeal is not necessarily the current parents, but open day. My Dd has had to attend 3 or 4 where she has shown groups of prospective parents around with their children. Some have turned up with 5 year olds asking “ Is Latin available all through the school because she is going to be a doctor “ “ we would expect her to be able to take her Maths early as she is already doing GCSE papers” “ Do all girls have to take art as I would prefer she studies a more academic subject, art isn’t important in our family” “ why do only 50% of the girls get into Oxbridge” and the question nearly all the girls are asked “ so how long were you tutored prior to the entrance exam and what should we focus on”
In some cultures the number on the paper is seen as the only measure of success. I’m in no way racist but the intake of Chinese and Indian students over the last 4 years has increased noticeably and the benchmark internally generally is set by these girls who study relentlessly to meet parental / family expectations & pushes an already high benchmark even higher.

And as long as the school keeps achieving high Oxbridge/Ivy League acceptance then it follows it will continue to attract families who see this as the ultimate end game, hence the self perpetuating cycle.

Can I just say I experienced CF as a Head for 4 years. Obviously a different school but I do not recognise the person described by some here. I think a lot of pressure is from parents. In that I suspect she’s right. Parents could choose to go elsewhere. Very bright girls have so many options. As I said earlier, very competitive parents ensure SPGS is what it is.

Very few girls schools have big bursary funds and they will need to fund raise.

At Rugby Patrick Dereham actively avoided speaking to parents by cycling round the playing fields and not stopping to chat! Yes, cannot wait for his book.

CF came from an ultra sporty school in Q. She was very interested in sport and her former DH was a sports journalist. St Paul’s possibly doesn’t have the greatest facilities due to location. As she says, other schools have better. If you want that, you know where they are.

Bubbles, what are you talking about?

What is wrong with SPGS sports facilities? They are at least the equal of other London day schools, and SPGS produces some very good sports people. We know at least three who were accepted onto Ivy sports programmes or ended in Oxbridge boats.

I have never heard of "Q" but assume it is not the same sort of school as SPGS. (Queensgate, Queens College, Queen Margaret?) Perhaps it suited a different sort of head. Equally I dont know if any of your many daughters were at Rugby, but that is not the description I recognise. Patrick Derham, from our experience, was fab, knew his pupils and happy to talk to parents. My understanding is that Rugby parents were sad to lose him.

Also, forgive me if I am wrong, but hasn't Farr been at SPGS for years. Certainly before DD started at secondary and shr is 2nd year University now. Surely she cant have been head of two schools simultaneously?!

Bubbles your experience of CF is at least from 12 years ago our so? A lot of water under the bridge since then.... compare with the consensus of people who have met and interacted with her more recently.

Yes. I said that unthread. That people seemed to be talking about someone different to the CF I knew. If you knew where she came from you would know what school Q is.

The sport comment was responding to a poster that mentioned that she didn’t seem to value sport. I thought differently.

At least my DDs were taught by her and knew her. In fact I knew her in those days - as a mum. However I’m sure people who have never met her or talked to her know more than me. Except you don’t appear to know where she worked previously. Or what her ethos was.

I didn’t say Rugby parents were not sorry to lose PD. I said he cycled around the sports field and didn’t speak to them! Not quite the same thing.

It is not a mystery where Clarissa Farr (CF), worked over 20 years ago (1996-2006) and it was Queenswood school in Hatfield. A lot has changed since then.

One of my dds left SPGS last year and my experience of CF is that she is a very nice woman but contributed to the competitive and results driven ethos of the school. It is not a bad thing in itself but let’s not pretend that the environment she describes in her book is all about the parents. The teachers at the school are as pushy as any parent, no question.

But Bubbles Queenswood is a totally different school it’s like comparing Apples with Pears, CF will have had a job spec to fulfill. However we are all assuming she is referring solely to Spgs parents, when in truth there are pushy parents at every school, whether it’s academics, music, sports or drama, they exist. But she cannot pass the blame entirely to parents. In the case of Spgs she was proud of the academic achievements and the subliminal messages in assembly were that the girls should maintain their high standards the subsequent year, so for a school not submitting results for league tables the girls were always made aware of the schools status and do feel a pressure to have to maintain it.

Call my cynical but can’t help thinking she bailed once the 9-1 new system was introduced as the director of studies kept beating on as to how the grades would drop and it wouldn’t be a failing of the school. - bit of course that’s not how Spgs haters would view it !

Of course it’s different! Do you think I dint know that? But that’s the point! Different parents, different sporting aspiration and boarding. I’m trying to say, obviously unsuccessfully, that she may well have changed to suit St Paul’s. It’s no coincidence that parents moan about this school on MN, yet flock to apply there. Don’t apply if it’s not what you want. The Head of any school is part of the ethos but not the sole driver of ambition. Would anyone not expect this school to be results driven? It’s what the whole of West London appears to talk about. I think you get what the majority want! As I said, there are so many other options I don’t know why parents don’t take them but they seem to like the competition and one-up-man-ship. That plainly wasn’t what her former school was about. Fortunately for us in the dark ages!

My experience at university of girls from SPGS was that they did like people to know where they had gone to school and they came across as arrogant. I didn't find people from other schools going out of their way to drop into conversation what school they had attended. I was left in no doubt that having attended SPGS was supposed to be a Big Thing - even if the person telling you about it was pretty unspectacular. It left me with the impression that there must, indeed, be a surfeit of unnecessarily competitive, aggressive and snobby families sending their children there, which is a shame if, in fact, other personality types could also thrive at the school.

All the premier league London schools have their share of ultra-pushy parents who ask insane questions at open days (My dc have been coming back for years reporting on the lunacy), though it's true the most pleased with themselves are the ones with dd at SPGS. Having said that all schools, including SPGS, have plenty of delightful, normal parents too. The girls I know who've thrived at SPGS are nerdy, quiet types and the school seems an excellent environment for them.

Walkaround, not sure how old you are but it seems odd to be judging a school in 2019 on the people you met at university. With a child in senior school myself, I usually recognise that many years have elapsed, and most institutions have changed significantly in that time, so my personal impression based on a handful of people I met years ago may not be all that relevant to a thread nowadays (but for what it’s worth mine was different to yours). I also never met anyone at university whom I’d label “unspectacular”

No idea who all these Paulinas are who are so keen to tell everyone where they went to school. I have literally never done so in real life, unless asked a direct question, largely because of the bonkers reactions (I do mention it on threads on here, purely to counter the v weird narrative that is generally put forward). However, if there really are actual adults going around trumpeting it, that is obv weird. Pleased to say that none of my friends from St Paul's would be so odd.

And yes, literally every private school has their share of weird pushy parents. However all schools are probably the same in that the normal parents outweigh the nutters by and large.

However all schools are probably the same in that the normal parents outweigh the nutters by and large.

Agreed, obviously the nutters are the ones who stick in the memory ...

I remember asking the head of Bute about the parent culture and her saying "a few are mad, of course, but the majority are great." I loved that.

Glaciferous - I am glad to hear that you would also consider the behaviour weird! And yes, ForeverbyJudyBlume, those particular individuals will forever stick in my memory, together with the unfortunate fact they felt it relevant to tell everyone around them where they went to school (to justify the superiority of their argument). I know it's unfair, but any mention of the school since then and those girls come straight to mind. That is possibly one of the problems with having gone to a prestigious school that many people have heard of - it is expected to have a strong ethos and to have had an effect on the outlook of its students in a way not really expected (possibly unjustifiably) of schools nobody has heard of. If someone from such a school then behaves badly while invoking the name of the school, you are more likely to judge the whole school, not just the individuals concerned. Even if they were a bit drunk at the time. I will try to erase my prejudices!