Highgate School Culture

[BlessedMumm]

Request guidance from parents with pupils in senior years at Highgate. My daughter has received an offer and we are very keen on the school. However, I am concerned by the recent sexual abuse allegations and bullying, especially the attitude towards whistleblowers. In your experience or discussion with your daughters, is the rich boys club culture deep rooted or have you seen a genuine change ? I am extremely keen on a co-ed and top ranking school but not at the expense of the wellbeing of kids.

@Hatscarfgloves - you seem to have a real beef with the school - in all honesty, it seems a bit strange.

It's totally fine if Highgate wasn't the right choice for you/your child. But, I can't imagine feeling I needed to justify my reasoning over and over again about a school my child wasn't even at - and therefore simply don't have the knowledge that existing parents clearly do!

I have three kids at Highgate who have been there from nursery to sixth form level - and like some others on this thread, know the reality of how the school runs itself and what the culture is like very well indeed. Our family have found it to be a brilliant school.

I really don’t! I responded to the OP because I’d been in the same position and had the same concerns. Then others replied to me and asked me questions, so I responded. I thought I was being polite! Will step away now…

OP, here’s an aspect of the school culture. A current Highgate parent making the serious allegations sound like fabrication by adding airquotes to them:

@aztecbird The allegations surrounding 'sexual abuse/bullying' isn't our experience of the school AT ALL. I don't mean to minimise anyone's traumatic experience whatsoever, but the majority of what was being claimed was with regards to teen boys behaviour […]

We had a place for DD before the scandal broke lose but turned it down as it felt too boy heavy. Didn’t apply last year for younger DD at all.

@Mrseven - maybe they put it in inverted commas because they were quoting the OP? But also, as several current parents are saying, there is a big difference between suggesting that a school has a systemic problem with sexual abuse and bullying - which, in my experience, Highgate does not - and an individual having a negative experience at a teenage party and making allegations on the back of that.

Most of the posts in this thread seem dismissive about the allegations made in 2020 and it's hard to know if anything has changed based on responses here

The full independent report (linked by a PP in the first page) isn't available in the school website anymore; an executive summary is still available (though the full report can be requested by contacting the school directly and explaining the purpose of the request)

I don't have a DC in the school, nor am I prospective parent, but was curious about changes the school made and if those had an impact. Mainly because a school like this has the resources and probably strong incentive to change and improve.

Unfortunately most posts here are along the lines of (paraphrasing) - "My DC didn't experience any such thing", "people we know never experienced any such thing", "problems were outside the school, in social events and parties", "other schools also have such problems", "parents who didn't get an offer from Highgate are spreading rumour"

And one particular shocker (for me) was this post :

"They said the issues (in the years above) were mainly confined to a group that had one or two very toxic boys and a couple of teachers were complicit."

It's not clear from the executive report in the website or any of the posters here if the school did anything about the "couple of teachers" who were complicit.

Whereas reading the testimonies from 2020, (available here: https://docs.google.com/document/d/e/2PACX-1vQI6oq9hag7lrGWm49D90z_aWSZ6Wsu40sTIfmAc5pr5NIgfh3PWzgaWS44DZ_Sui663AtThWx1beqI/pub?urp=gmail_link) it's evident that

• the incidents were not confined to social events outside parties alone. Many testimonies of groping, upskirting, inappropriate touching, rape jokes, slut shaming inside the school too
• Some teachers were aware of serious issues but failed to support victims/ignored the issues ("boys will be boys")
• the school often rewarded boys subject to serious reports (the independent report mentions this aspect too)

Maybe the school has genuinely changed and improved matters since then, but we can't really tell from the posts here, most of them don't even acknowledge there ever was a problem.

It's all very sad really. These kind of behaviour is probably rife everywhere, but if us parents continue to be so blasé about it (because our DC never faced these), there is little hope for improvement.

@justanotherdaduser there is a highgate then and highgate now. it used to be the school for rich local kids with low entry criteria. think large Highagte and HGS houses, generational wealth, not-involved always busy dads and SAHMs. these type of kids came with the problems (not all of course but some of them): poor behaviour, wild parties, sporty alpha males, inappropriate jokes and behaviour. the girls were also coming from similar well off backgrounds, so they were confident and woudnt tolerate any nonsence (rightly so) so they took it to the web-site which was set up by private schools kids for private schools kids.

the reason you don't find many concerned Highgate parents in real life is that the school is now very academically selective so you need to work hard to get admitted. they also got very socially and ethnically diverse, so that solved some of the issues. also they revamped their pastoral care. i think its has best pastoral care set up in place out of all three private schools my DCs attend.

its a large schools and incidents of various nature do happen but less so than they were in the past thanks to great pastoral care in place and very academic kids whose focus is on achieving high grades exams

To answer your question yes in my opinion the school has done a great job to address the issues raised in the report.

It's now a school for rich kids who are tutored to meet the high entry criteria, plus some bright poor kids on a bursary. Most are extremely wealthy - more so than in many other private schools.

It amazes me why people comment about the school they clearly have no knowledge about otherwise you would know that majority of children in Highgate (well, at least nowadays) are middle class children with in fact a minority being wealthy. The parental body in Highgate is similar to the one in other selective schools in the area like South Hampstead and UCS (id say Highgate is slightly more ethnically diverse as international families tend to pick co-ed if they have a choice). and Highgate has quite a generous bursary fund in place. plus they do a lot of joint projects with local state schools ( tottenham academy, etc.)

Also you don't seem to be familiar with 11+ game in NW/North London at all as you don't realise kids need to do a lot of support/tutoring to get to Highgate or any other super selective school in the area. even those with extra support may not get in as they are looking at the child and their overall abilities including good manner and behaviour etc. and some children just are not suitable for super academic school and no amount of parental wealth and tutoring will get them through.

I also hope people realise that Everyone Invited pulled the naming school option early as the campaign runners admitted that some schools took disproportionate amount of blame. but the damage was done and Highgate needed to act. The school has done brilliantly on putting extra measures in place to ensure safe and happy environment for girls , so i think one's daughter will be the safest in Highgate now as the school has to put extra safeguarding mechanisms i place and many other schools just don't care. and for those who are familiar with senior schools in the area are well aware that some schools have really "bad" boys on the roll, just speak to the teen girls who socialise locally. Highgate boys (in general) is a decent lot.

Also quite a few girls transfer from single-sex schools (Channing, South Hampstead etc.) to Highgate.

Did you apply to state schools including the grammars as well?

I have friends with kids at this school and they love it and cannot fault it. They do moan about the ever increasing fees though. I think it is great to support bursary children and state schools but if you are a more middle class middle earner (for London) but have very bright children then you really need to do the maths carefully and if your kids get a grammar place as well then it really is not an easy choice.
Teachers at all these schools get discounts, bursary kids are supported financially and the very rich are happy but for those in the middle for ever increasing fees and potentially VAT, that has to be factored in and modelled carefully. So if you are worried about school culture I would personally be more worried along those lines aka what will the school do for this group going forward/can they even do anything.

Not my experience but we can agree to disagree.

fair point but this comes to grammar versus selective indie great debate. id assume OP lives somewhere in London (North/NW) and grammar places for girls are limited (its Latymer and Henrietta Barnett i can think of) also grammar school is just a state school with over selective intake hence good GSCE/a level results but they have limited funds for extracurricular activities, sports, pastoral care and specialist teachers, etc. plus commute might be an issue (daily tracks fro leafy and naive NW London to Latymer in edmonton is not he best). so its down to individual families/ their finances and priorities to decide what's the best.

Generally Highgate Senior's fees are in line with other schools like for example UCS and Habs,. NLCS is more expensive (1.5K more per annum). SH and City is 1.5K per annum less expensive but City for example have limited facilities compared to others so in a great scheme of things not a massive difference. all private schools of a same league in North London charge the same.

Potential fee hike is widely discussed at all 3 schools my other DCs are attending. I feel like Highgate, being a large school, will be in better position to tackle the hike (its just my impression after speaking to schools, parents and getting their thought on issue). However, nobody knows how this is going to work in practice yet though, if this is going to happen, what expenses they are going to tax and how much of a hike (if any) will be transferred to to the parents, there are a lot of legal challenges ahead of this and possible loops to lessen the burden

but you don't have have DCs at the school (which is clear form your original comment). its just massively unfair to fellow mumsnetters during the week when they are making a choice of schools to provide negative feedback about the school you have no knowledge about, that's all. again of course we all can agree to disagree and its public forum anyone can write anything they like.

To OP, id agree with some other posters, there are a lot of local parents who didnt get an offer to Highgate/ or got waitlisted (even if they have siblings in Highgate) while getting offers from some other selective schools, so during the offer acceptance window period you get all sorts of tales about the school, funnily enough the same parents who spread the rumours jump on every opportunity to accept Highgate once they get an offer from the reserve list ( i have personally came across those parents in real life) they just say oh we changed our minds due to whatever (what a surprise!) Good luck with the choice!

I have a lot of friends and relatives with kids at Highgate and hear their views.

@Tiredmumofthreekids - my friends started years ago with their eldest when fees where 10k-12k a year and you could still buy a house in Highgate for 500k. Looking at the school fees and house prices too it really is quite baffling! And her youngest hasn’t finished yet. School fees really have grown massively. It is a different market now and I assume possibly less larger families too.

@Araminta1003 I'd totally agree the school fees have gone up quite a lot, but its not Highgate specific issue...
despite the falling birth rates, covid and brexit exodus, the competition for the places in schools like Highgate didnt get less...

P.S. when did the houses in highgate cost 500K??😂

Back in 2003! You could still get a proper house for that price and it felt really expensive at the time. I remember looking at a 5 bed house in Stoke Newington for 400k in those days with a proper garden. My friends bought then with huge mortgages just before having kids. Things have changed a lot in the last 20 years.

What do you want us to do? Make up that my kids were involved and affected? I was furious at the time reading the testimonies about the affected girls. I joined all the focus groups and gave my views and sent heated emails.

I am an ardent feminist and the mother of a very fragile and potentially vulnerable girl who was definitely not as mature as her peers. If I felt she was in the slightest bit threatened, I would have pulled her out of that school as quick as I could.

@newlaptop12 - it's definitely not a school for 'rich kids who've been tutored to get through the 11plus' - this sounds like sour grapes! I think as the 11plus has become more competitive in London, tutoring has become inevitable to extent - and this applies just as much to other privates like City and South Hampstead.

If anything I think Highgate places more importance than other schools in building a well-rounded intake in each year group. I wouldn't go so far as to say 'mixed ability' as the school is a very academic one and gets great results - however, they are also looking at personalities and interests/talents in other areas and not just about getting 10 A*s at GCSE. Remember they have kids who have been at the school since nursery level - not all of them are going to turn out to be uber-academic. It's all about balance.

Remember they have kids who have been at the school since nursery level - not all of them are going to turn out to be uber-academic. It's all about balance.

A point of interest for anyone taking a longer term view is that there is no longer nursery entry- pre-prep now starts at Reception. However they have also expanded the size of the pre-prep from 2 to 3 forms per year. This means that, for the first time, children from pre-prep going into Junior School in Sept 2024 will outnumber children entering from other schools having done the 7+.

Yes, the school is selective at 4+ but it is much harder to predict top academic performance at that age. Yes, the school does have a caveat that any child who does not “thrive” in the Highgate academic environment at any stage will be encouraged to look elsewhere (aka managed out to preserve academic results…) but I do think that is seen as a pretty extreme action. I don’t personally know of any to whom this has happened, though I accept that it would be kept fairly quiet.

The shift of balance between pre prep and external does mean that the school population is now more weighted towards those with the money to pay for private at Early Years level, however let’s not kid ourselves that a majority of 7+ kids were coming from state- lots were coming from private feeder schools like the Hall and the Avenue.

I don’t know about numbers at senior and what percentage the pre prep kids form of the overall senior intake, but I understand that the school has no plans to increase overall numbers so I presume they will eventually form a larger proportion of senior school too.

Noone says the majority came from state at 7+, but they significantly upped the number of state applicants at 7+ and 11+

at 4+ they run a ballot now so the kids come from all over in North London which also helps with the diversity.

The point here is that the school is NO different from other selective schools in the area (UCS, SH) when it comes to social and ethnic diversity. The same candidates are usually sitting UCS, SH, Habs, NLCS, City (7+) and then pick one (often based on the easiest commute).

its indeed a case of sour grapes from parents who have no experience with this school or little understanding of how 7+ and 11+ work in NW London. You need A LOT of extra support and tutoring to get in any of the above-mentioned schools.

The majority of negative comments here are from parents who base their information on hearsay rather than personal experience.

I think you misunderstand me @Melabela10 . The points I made in my post were supposed to be positive ones, building on previous comments about academic homogeneity, because if lots of kids come through from 4+ the academic range will be a bit wider than if all selected at 11+.

And I do have a child in the school.

Ive got what you meant, sorry for the confusion 😊

My comments about "parents with no experience of the school" were directed to the other posters commenting that this is "a school for rich and N6 locals only, all boys are bad there, and one needs to be rich and tutor to get into Highgate". just total nonsense and pretty annoying tbh. sour grapes indeed

😂at the sour grapes idea! I wouldn't personally send a child there even on a free place.