Has anyone actually met Kate, Pippa or the Middletons?

[Littlepiggyinablanket]

Either before or after William appeared on the scene? Mn is very disparaging about the Middleton's so following on from the has anyone met Meghan thread... Has anyone met the Middleton's or Kate?

I think it's the other students around you. I went to a school where it was assumed you were going to university. That did raise the amount of effort students put in. There was no room for delusion. Yeh, you can only do your best but if your best isn't good enough you're going to need grinds or to repeat.

At other schools the teachers might be saying ''it's just the leaving cert''. At our school it was pretty much said out loud ''this will shape the rest of your lives''.

I wasn't talking about good genes really @Iamthewombat. More that study and exams are taken seriously at home, parents prepared and able to pay for grinds if they see their DC struggling with a subject, the attitude at home towrds third-level, that sort of thing. When I spoke of parents wanting their children to get in with the right-set, I partly meant this sort of thing. To be among people with the same aspirations as themselves. There's also a bit of a snob element going on for some I think.

@mathanxiety & all the other Irish mumsnetters that's for the indepth insight into Irish system. What strikes me is the amount of choice available & nothing is based on academic ability except uni..
So non fee paying schools include Irish medium, educated together & local primary/secondary. Then you have a fee paying option.

Are the educated together schools thought highly of in Ireland? I would love so much choice for my dc.

Still not sure the hugely well equipped labs of private schools offer too much advantage at LC level @JenniferBarkley. I am a scientist but not a teacher so I could the wrong of course.

@Kateforqueen I don't think they are highly thought of no. When I was selecting a secondary school for my DC2, the chat amongst the other parents was ''anywhere but ET ha ah''. They have no uniform, call the teachers paddy and fiona and the students are allowed do interesting things with their hair. But I chose one for DC2 because they're the only school that would have tolerated his rule-bending. He's not able for a lot of discipline. He does have a dx but is in mainstream education and i think there are a high % of other students who also have a dx of some description, could be just dyspraxia though. A normal school would have suspended him by week three.

OK, so this thread has been totally derailed by the Irish class/education system.

But I think highly of my DC2's school he is a child who is basically on the border of school refusal but because their reaction to that has been deliberate faux insouciance, he keeps going in half the time approx. That may not sound like much but it is due to their understanding of him. Other schools would have been ''the rules are that you must...'' and I do get that, generally speaking.

Well, if there's one thing MN needs right now, it's a discussion on the British royal family

www.instagram.com/reel/CnWZC-fpuWJ/?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=

As there is so many Irish mumsnetters on here, thought this might give you a laugh. My Irish colleague sent it on!

Ha ha sorry about that. There is only so much you can say about a family (with naturally thick hair) that keeps its nose very clean.

There was a poster on the thread who wanted to meet Carol and make some dig about nuts. Took me a minute to understand that. I wonder does that poster have such an illustrious pedigree that nobody in their family has ever worked for a living. I can't imagine ever wanting to make a dig about somebody because they worked {mind boggles}

Wow. What an incredible achievement. She must have worked incredibly hard to do that.
Personally I'd have more respect for all the fellow mums (like myself) out there who struggle when their severely disabled child has a meltdown on a shop floor.

That's so true, for the scientists, conversation about TRF has reached super saturation :-p

For citizens of a Republic , the neighbouring royalty are a great topic for discussion! Especially when they visit.
Our local et is really fabulous, and I would have happily sent my kids there if it had existed. I pass by the gaelscoil, and never hear kids speaking Irish outside.

To be fair it's more interesting than kates hair extensions

@Iamthewombat

I think your assessment of Irish schools is coloured a bit too much by what I'm assuming is your observations and experience of British schools.

There are so many really good free schools available in most parts of the country that the perceived academic advantage is very slight, and there is a huge grind industry parents are willing to pay for if their child is struggling in a specific subject in the school that's chosen. And students can repeat the LC too if they're close to getting the points needed.

Going to a fee paying school can be fine if you're OK with rigid rule enforcement, acceptance of a very high degree of conformity, and a culture of take it or leave it on the part of the administration. As seen in the recent disclosures of abuse in Willow Park Junior school and Blackrock College, private ed can have huge drawbacks, a horrific example of a school culture. I have a relative who has experienced the take it or leave it/ completely unbending approach to attendance in a very well regarded girls' school, in the context of covid's impact on a student's health.

For every student whose parents decide Clongowes or Blackrock or Loreto Dalkey or Alexandra College is the school for them, there are fifteen + choosing something else. In my father's family, two generations of boys were sent to one of the schools I just mentioned - my father and uncles were determined that no son of theirs would ever go there.

@Iamthewombat
On the topic of expense, yes, 10p is more expensive than free.

Most Irish school fees are not the eye watering affair you would expect in the UK.

There is also the alternative route to further or higher education, via post leaving cert courses.

Im always fascinated by hair extensions when im at the hairdresser. I think good hairdressers are amazing, the colours, extensions, upstyles etc.

A culture of take it or leave it! this is it. It is not as bad as it was but it still exists. I went to a few meetings for schools before I made the final decision for my son and one school did say that. The head got up and spoke. He was confident, charismatic, had a lovely accent but omg, it gave me Holden Caulfield vibes. he wanted a school full of stradlaters! Dykwim?

I'd been to school with his younger brothers. He said, paraphrasing but not losing the spirit ''we're happy with our school how it is. It's pretty academic. If you don't think that's right for your child then this isn't the school for you''. He also made it clear that each child would be encouraged, no actually it was mandatory so the word is forced to do one extra curricular.

I'm happy with the ET ethos. They're not pushing him which has meant that he hasn't given up. It's been right for him. I used to be more stressed about it all, now I just have faith in him to figure something out, he's clever, he'll figure something out.

Luckily being in Dublinn we have two of those plc course places dartable distance away. It'll all be ok in the end.

Pencey Prep vibes!

@Kateforqueen Thank you for the Instagram reel you posted at 10.56 😂

Id love to do some of the plc courses, they should run them for interested older people. Our local evening classes are dull in comparison.
My kids went to the local community school, I can't think of a single classmate who hasn't figured something out 😊

Kates extensions debate is based on the assumption that extensions are very visible.

Because we've all seen the very cheap ones/ones that are growing out.

There aren't the ones that Kate will be using. She'll be using the top top end ones, the same as most of the red carpet stars wear. She'll also be having the kind of maintenance schedule on them that must be very very frequent and lovely blow-dries every time she needs to step outside her front door.

Is kinda of her job to look immaculate. Remember all the shit Fergie got for basically being a bit messy looking (like most of us!)?

So Kate needs to do what is expected of her and look immaculately turned out and give the papers what they want. A slim, smiling woman with good posture, teeth, hair and skin. She does it very well (she's not doing it for me because I don't give a shit and want the RF gone, but she has her fans and good for her).

Is the same as fake tits, everyone says they can spot them a mile away, yes when they are like Jordan's of Posh Spices, but there must be millions of women that have had them done and you would never know.

@tappinginto2023 yes I agree.
I always imagine extensions like them girls on Love Island, where you can see the hooks and bonds sticking and clearly showing in ponytails or hair up dos.
Or even them clip ones, I had one of those, a long hair strip on clips to clip in - I got it from H&M for £15 circa in 2010 and it didn’t even matched my hair, I never wore it outside, but I had to have it as desired long hair. It looked dreadful when on me anyway.
I did not know that other type of extensions even exist..

Yep. Molly-Mae has extensions and her hair always looks perfect.