Eton College Weekend Activities

[FullofPossibilities]

Hi all, I would like to tap into the experiences of current Eton parents on the weekend program in Eton. I asked the tour guide during our visit and he seems to suggest that it's not particularly organized/ time-tabled by the school, unlike some other full boarding schools, which have all the whole year group weekend activities/ outings arranged & scheduled for pupils. It seems that the boys will arrange their own schedule and pick and do sports/ clubs/activities they like, is that the case? Also during weekdays, will there be a specific time assigned for prep and bedtime? Many thanks, any advice and experience with Eton will be gratefully received.

What about the endemic bullying at boarding schools? Yes there is also bullying at day schools but at least those afflicted get respite and support from their parents.

Stop nurturing the snowflake generation.
It’s time to bring back some resilience.
Boarding rulez!👊

@Hippyhippybake
What about bullying at all schools? There’s no more at boarding schools. Where is your evidence? What about behaviour on the way to school and on the way home? How many DC are excluded from day schools vs boarding schools? What about low level disruption in day schools? Or rudeness to staff? We know there are pluses and minuses to all education but you cannot single out alleged bullying as just in boarding schools and angels are in all the other schools. As if!

@TizerorFizz as a former boarder to me it looks like an ideological campaign. Boarders are a close knit community with friendships that more often than not last into adulthood. This makes it a fairly attractive target for those who look to divide and conquer in my opinion.

Divide and conquer? 😂. Mate, it’s people giving their opinions on mumsnet.

@Nowand4ever I do think people have strong views but rarely are they up to date. Father in law is decades ago! They try and divide, but that’s society. Conquer? Not sure! I suspect local schools cannot take an influx of privately educated Dc if they were abolished. What I fundamentally object to is outdated anecdotes being used as fact.

I doubt it @Ffffruit this has been fuelled by propaganda starting with books like the boarding school syndrome making their way into university reading lists and the public consciousness eventually distorting reality.
My friends and I used to laugh at it in the early days, but it is becoming more and more worrying how a bunch of people who have never seen the inside of a boarding school before, or anyone who went there for that matter, can opine on it with such conviction yet without any experience

You are right that bullying is everywhere but the impact of it can be so much worse in a boarding environment where the bullies have free rein at night time and weekends when supervision is absent. My son’s boarding school had 3 suicides in 6 years (it’s a famous one). I’m amazed this was never picked up by the press.

And by the way, I went to boarding school and so did my eldest. The two youngest went to day schools.

@Hippyhippybake Sorry to hear about that. If it is true then it is really very sad. Which famous boarding school was that exactly?

I’m not naming it in a public forum but it is accurate. 2 boys and 1 girl, 1 girl actually in a boarding house, 1 boy on his way back to school and another at home.

I remember once a few years back seeing on Mumsnet a mother declaring “there is no bullying at xxxxx, it is simply not tolerated” when I knew for a fact that five, yes five girls in year 9 had recently left just one girls house due to the toxic bullying that was going on. Those with happy children either often don’t see it or choose to deny it.

My son’s year was persecuted by the year above in his house. Physical punishments were constantly handed out and they were forced to hand over money etc etc. One boy was actually shot at close range with an air rifle. Like any normal person I was utterly horrified by it but when I spoke to the other parents in our year, they didn’t want to know. Even the parents of children my son had been at prep school with and whom I knew well just wanted to pretend it wasn’t happening. It was a hell of a revelation to me as to how far some people are willing to go to protect the image of an institution.

I am just so glad we kept our 2 youngest at home. I wouldn’t swap those precious years with them for anything. Fortunately my son seems to be unscathed by his experience but I can never forgive myself for putting him in that environment.

Now without a school name and no news reports (unlikely) it could be simply an indeed very sad yet possibly fictional story to fit a narrative, couldn’t it?

Why do you think there were no news reports? My point was simply that the press didn’t connect the dots as to the fact that this one school had suffered 3 suicides in 6 years. I actually just googled and discovered another suicide a few years earlier which makes 4. I really support the current push to force universities to publicly report suicide numbers and think this should extend to all schools.