To think being prejudiced against the privately educated is OK

[EastLondonObserver]

I have spent 25 years working in the advertising industry at some of the most highly regarded agencies in the world. Most of these have been dominated (in certain roles, at least) by the privately educated who gained their entry to the industry through having personal/family contacts in it, were subbed by rich parents while working in low-paid or free internships to gain experience and had that empty confidence private schools instil.

Perfectly capable graduates educated comprehensive schools didn't get much of a look in. However a few managed to break through, including myself.

Consequently, throughout my career I have actively rejected almost all privately educated graduates applying for entry level positions. This runs into hundreds of applicants. I have managed to do this without being called out. Sometimes I have rejected them even when they clearly would have done a better job than a comprehensive school educated alternative. These were corporate companies - it made no meaningful difference to me if they were mildly less successful as a consequence. The only exception was one graduate educated at Harrow and Bristol. I gave him the job as an experiment. He was average at best.

I did this in the name of social justice: re-distributing opportunities away from those with unearned privilege.

Have I been unreasonable? Has anyone else done the same?

Hmmm...interesting. So in this hypothetical situation, even if it was made clear that your child was the best man or woman for the job, you would be quite happy for the other candidate to get the job due to which school they went to?

*due to which school they went to? (In this case a state school)

I think....why not put your money where your mouth is. If you want to start really being fair, then start with your own children. Make sure that they don't have an unfair advantage over others right from the start. No music lessons, no expensive hobbies, no tutoring, no nice car, no nice house in nice area.
Slum it like the rest of us! Anything else would just be champagne socialism surely.

Ultimately, you shouldn't be trying to atone for your guilt at being privileged, by taking it out on those you consider privileged. It's a strange way of trying to balance the scales and like other posters have mentioned, ultimately produces no real change except to make those who are binning private school CVs feel good about themselves.

I would be, yes.

They're called principles.

You can all be as 'principled' as you like, but no rational company would reject an objectively better candidate and hire an 'underprivileged' applicant 'out of principle'.
Successful companies generally hire the 'best' candidates they can find because they're in business to make money.

So...you would be quite happy that the employer had not stated at the outset that it would be pointless for private school candidates to even apply? Would you not be even the least bit annoyed that they had wasted your child's time?

Wouldn't be ideal, but I'd get past it.

How about the very many agencies who only recruit from their own kind? Would be nice if they had a sign in the door 'no plebs need apply'. But they don't, do they? And that's the far bigger problem.

People trying to give ordinary kids a start in professional life is met with outrage - 'it's so unfair!'. But you meet the enormous bias in favour of the privately-educated in every major profession with a shrug of the shoulders.

Again, privilege hates being challenged.

And the point that's been made, over and over again, is that if you hire someone from an ordinary background, with a lesser cv, but with obvious drive and determination, they'll give more to the company, and given time, will overtake and generate more profit for the company.

Plenty of far-sighted organisations do this now. There are studies that show that businesses that take active steps to grow a diverse workforce benefit from that financially.

What are your bona fides in the business world, just out of interest? What profitable business have you ever built up?

Do you think the disproportionate representation of the privately educated in so many well-paid and prestigious spheres is down to companies usually selecting the best person for the job? It sounds exceedingly unlikely to me.

No, but it should be. May the BEST man or woman win. That's how it should be. Not may the richest man win, or the poorest man win, but the BEST man win.

‘And - hypothetically speaking, how would you feel if a recruiter, deliberately chose someone else, even though they admitted that your child/children were the best candidate for the job, simply based on the fact that your child was white, spoke with a 'posh' accent, lived in a nice area, played the violin, did nice hobbies?’

honestly? I would think, fair enough. they’ll have many other shots including through our work and connections. DD is showing interest in an industry where a friend is very influential. DD will definitely have auditioning opportunities via that if that’s what she wants to do.

They don’t have a ‘posh’ accent though. A recruiter wouldn’t know what area they lived in. They play sports - but normal ones like football. I doubt music will come up unless they do music at a high level and it’s relevant to the role.

it’s not fair though, is it? Which is why I as someone who grew up on the breadline would like to give people, young people in particular, a chance that many in my position in my profession would not.

DD is showing interest in an industry where a friend is very influential. DD will definitely have auditioning opportunities via that if that’s what she wants to do.

Just like companies should only choose the BEST man or woman for any job, the institution where your dd might audition should only take the BEST man or woman, right?

Think dancing bear, think. Thinking is so important. If the OP is man and his career is all he says, he has benefited from discrimination.

yes my kids are at state school but are advantaged. If they were beaten by a candidate from an under privileged back ground who had overcome the odds yes I would be ok with that. Would be gutted if it went to a candidate who beat them because they went to a particular private school. Mine are resourceful smart hard working and likeable - they will make their own way in the world - on their own merit.

If they were beaten by a candidate from an under privileged back ground who had overcome the odds yes I would be ok with that. Would be gutted if it went to a candidate who beat them because they went to a particular private school.

What if they were 'beaten' by a candidate who was simply better suited to the job, a candidate who had the most relevant skills for that particular job?

Regardless of which school their parents might have sent them as children?!

Well that’s the right outcome of course. Don’t really get the question hardly controversial - job given to better candidate.

i would be sad if they were beaten by inferior candidates with better connections. Like I was 😔

But the op says that the other candidate wasn't better. The one who went to the private school was a better candidate, ( "when they clearly would have done a better job than a comprehensive school educated alternative."). They chose the candidate not on ability, but on which school they went to. In that particular case, the state school.

If other things being equal, the private school candidate was beaten fair and square by the state school candidate, then like you say , "yes I would be ok with that". However, the reverse is also true. I too, like you, would be gutted if it went to a candidate who beat my child simply because they went to a particular school.

Can you not see the irony of the whole situation?

If given two candidates the same at grad level and one was private school and one was state, I’d chose the state because I’d genuinely believe they had more to give if they had achieved the same as the private school kid. After grad level, school would be utterly irrelevant- actually it is utterly irrelevant at grad level too but after grad level I’d want to choose something else - toss a coin?

I said I did this sometimes, but it was not the case the majority of the time.

As I said earlier if both candidates were that far along the process they were probably both good candidates and there wouldn’t be a huge amount in it. If there is going to be a selection I think on balance the less privileged one should get it - whichever ever side of that my own child fell on.

I didn’t get a crucial rare training contract in my city it went to my friend with a lower class degree who didn’t interview well but his dad knew the partners.

OP went to a comp so doesn't know how to do the job as well as a private school kid would have done.

Her job should have gone to a better candidate.

This happened a lot IME too. Frankly pretty dense people spoon fed through private school and then with crap degree results still getting training contracts at the top firms due to the old school tie

For entry level graduate jobs there’s surely good enough rather than this ‘excellence’ ‘best’ ideology - consider the line of Etonians destroying Britain. Candidates who are ambitious, hardworking, cheerful (much under rated quality) and intelligent are among the 95% of the population as well as the 5%.