Double standards in public life

24

Comments

  • Merry VoleMerry Vole Shipmate
    Apart from the reference to Corbyn there seems to be an assumption the politician in question is making the school decision unilateraly whereas if he or she is half of a couple they probably make the decision together -in which case why should it then become public knowledge how they as a couple came to their decision?
  • And I'll repeat again my claim that children are not all the same. A particular school may well be a "good school" and have excellent results for many children, but be a poor fit for a particular child. That's OK.
    What would a private school provide for a particular child that couldn't be provided by a state funded school?

    As well as the smaller class sizes already mentioned, I’d add an expectation of success and a drive to get the best possible result for every pupil. Too many state schools are content to let the brighter pupils coast to a handful of Bs because they have to put all their efforts into helping the dimmer ones get one or two Es.

    One would be too many, but I've never encountered this tendency in the state sector (either as a pupil or a teacher). It's a pretty good descriptor of my wife's private education, however.
  • KarlLBKarlLB Shipmate
    I get the impression that one of the benefits private sector pupils get is connections. Hobnobbing with the sort of people who know someone who can put in a word for you at this investment bank, that City firm, this Chambers, that private equity firm. The sort of entry level opportunities which never make it to graduate recruitment fairs, recruitment agencies, the Sits Vac pages of the local paper or the Job Centre.
  • Gramps49Gramps49 Shipmate
    Gramps49 wrote: »
    Can't speak to the UK system, but I do want to point out the Obama's also sent their daughters to private school when Barrak was in office. I agree it is partly because of the desire to give children the best, but in Obama's case, it was also about security for his daughters. It is much easier to vet the families who are sending their children to a private school than to trust the safety of the public school system.

    As I understand it in the US it's not just vetting students but dealing with the fact that schools are public property so it's harder to restrict the press from getting access.

    Good point. I believe the Obamas were ready to send their girls to public school, but the head of the Secret Service, which is tasked with protecting the president's family encouraged them to look elsewhere.
  • <snip> a boarding school, with all the emotional damage that implies.
    Far too sweeping a statement. Not everyone who attended a boarding school is emotionally damaged. In fact, for some children in a bitter and acrimonious divorce boarding school can provide a haven - I speak from experience.
    What would a private school provide for a particular child that couldn't be provided by a state funded school?
    In the case of my old school, quite a lot:
    In Year 9 every boy studies Art, Biology, Chemistry, Computing, Design and Technology, English, History, Geography, Latin or Classical Civilisation, Mathematics, Music, Physics and Theology and Philosophy, as well as a choice of two languages from Classical Greek, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Mandarin, Russian or Spanish.
    By contrast, the "outstanding" state school attended by my sons offered only 2 languages, you could study History or Geography but not both, Art or Music, no Philosophy, Latin or Greek at any level.
    KarlLB wrote: »
    I get the impression that one of the benefits private sector pupils get is connections. Hobnobbing with the sort of people who know someone who can put in a word for you at this investment bank, that City firm, this Chambers, that private equity firm. The sort of entry level opportunities which never make it to graduate recruitment fairs, recruitment agencies, the Sits Vac pages of the local paper or the Job Centre.
    Yes and No.

    What private schools have is the old pupils association, with a newsletter, annual meeting at the school, alumni clubs at some universities, etc. That is where the connections are made.

    It is perfectly possible for state schools to offer such a post-school link but most don't.
  • Kwesi wrote: »
    There seems to be an underlying suggestion by a number of shipmates that the best state schools offer just as good an education as the better public schools. If that is the case then there are a lot of parents wasting money on Eton and Winchester et. al.. There is also the danger that a politician might argue that if state schools are performing as well as the public schools their case for better funding is diminished. My guess is that pupils at public schools are significantly advantaged through the greater resources they enjoy across a variety of activities which the state system will never be able to employ. The fact is that only with great difficulty would the state be able to invest the per capita spending undertaken by the top public schools, and were they to be abolished the state schools would be unable to continue the quality of education they afford. The argument for public school abolition is less about improving state education than removing an institution that helps to underpin structural inequality in British society.

    The state school I went to was on its way up in my time and sent a handful of people to Oxbridge (around 5% of leavers each year). It is now, as a comprehensive sixth form college academy in the top 3 in the UK. Entrance criteria now mean its more selective as a Comprehensive than it ever was as a Grammar School.

    It provided/provides as good an education in many ways as any private school. It doesn't though provide the opportunities through the introductions such private schools can provide.

  • Gee DGee D Shipmate
    Crœsos wrote: »
    There are similar discussions about the makeup of the U.S. Supreme Court. With the exception of Amy Coney Barrett (Notre Dame), all of the current Justices got their law degrees from Yale (Thomas, Alito, Sotomayor, Kavanaugh) or Harvard (Breyer, Roberts, Kagan, Gorsuch). Prior to Barrett the last Supreme Court Justice that didn't come from either Harvard or Yale was Sandra Day O'Connor (Stanford), who was nominated in 1981.

    Notre Dame is not exactly to be sneezed at, is it?
  • cgichardcgichard Shipmate
    edited April 14
    Smaller class sizes.
    This is not always the case in Australia. The private school my son moved to in Grade 6 had more than half again the number of pupils at his grade than his former state primary school. I was concerned about this until he told me: "It's fine. The difference is that no-one plays around in class so we learn much more."
  • KarlLBKarlLB Shipmate
    KarlLB wrote: »
    I get the impression that one of the benefits private sector pupils get is connections. Hobnobbing with the sort of people who know someone who can put in a word for you at this investment bank, that City firm, this Chambers, that private equity firm. The sort of entry level opportunities which never make it to graduate recruitment fairs, recruitment agencies, the Sits Vac pages of the local paper or the Job Centre.
    Yes and No.

    What private schools have is the old pupils association, with a newsletter, annual meeting at the school, alumni clubs at some universities, etc. That is where the connections are made.

    It is perfectly possible for state schools to offer such a post-school link but most don't.

    I think that underestimates the degree of advantage that an alumni group of people with a high concentration of useful connections confers.
  • Gee DGee D Shipmate
    I suppose that it depends on what you call a private school. The systemic Catholic schools were often more crowded than state schools until after the Intermediate Certificate (in the old days that some of us grew up in). I gather that many of the new evangelical/fundamentalist private schools have been swamped with enrolments both for primary and secondary schooling. The more traditional ones generally keep numbers down by employing plenty of teaching staff, and charging for it.
  • Penny SPenny S Shipmate
    edited April 14
    Not all private schools offer such a range of subjects. My friend who was able through scholarship to attend a lesser offshoot of a well-known public (as in private) school in South London regrets not being able to study Geography and History, excluded as in the above state example. They didn't do athletics, either.
  • I was prevented from studying both history and geography by the government's insistence that everyone take a foreign language to GCSE. Of all my GCSEs I think French was the most useless. I've had more value out of Drama or Food Tech than French.

    My wife, on the other hand, didn't even get to take separate sciences at GCSE at her private school. I maintain that her parents were utterly conned.
  • KarlLBKarlLB Shipmate
    I was prevented from studying both history and geography by the government's insistence that everyone take a foreign language to GCSE. Of all my GCSEs I think French was the most useless. I've had more value out of Drama or Food Tech than French.

    My wife, on the other hand, didn't even get to take separate sciences at GCSE at her private school. I maintain that her parents were utterly conned.

    Our kids don't have to take a foreign language - I don't think the govt insisted but strongly recommended because of the requirements of the EBacc.

    The feepaying school I went to gave me very little choice. The top form did O levels a year early and dropped Geography to do it; my only choice was Greek or German; theoretically you could choose technical drawing instead of Latin but in reality that was only allowed if your family connections (yes really) suggested a mechanical engineering or similar technical career.

    It was a stupid system.
  • BoogieBoogie Shipmate
    edited April 14
    It was a stupid system.

    It still is.

    People with real expertise and skills are sidelined while people with the right connections get promoted way, way, way beyond their abilities.

    See all our present Cabinet.
  • HeavenlyannieHeavenlyannie Shipmate
    edited April 14
    Our children also didn't take foreign languages at GCSE as the school (local academy) didn't insist on it.

    My children both attended Hills Road Sixth Form College in Cambridge, a highly selective state school which usually tops the chart of sixth form college in the UK. It is in the top 5 schools sending students to Oxbridge, alongside 4 private schools. However, despite being highly selective it actually takes in nearly 50% of the local students. Why are so many local students grade A? Because 40% of the local adults are graduates, twice the average for the UK population. The students do well because their parents did well, they have the social and cultural capital to help them achieve. I don't think Hills Road has particularly better teaching than the other Cambridge Sixth Form College, which takes most of the other students.
  • BoogieBoogie Shipmate
    Our children also didn't take foreign languages at GCSE as the school (local academy) didn't insist on it.

    My children both attended Hills Road Sixth Form College in Cambridge, a highly selective state school which usually tops the chart of sixth form college in the UK. It is in the top 5 schools sending students to Oxbridge, alongside 4 private schools. However, despite being highly selective it actually takes in nearly 50% of the local students. Why are so many local students grade A? Because 40% of the local adults are graduates, twice the average for the UK population. The students do well because their parents did well, they have the social and cultural capital to help them achieve. I don't think Hills Road has particularly better teaching than the other Cambridge Sixth Form College, which takes most of the other students.

    Which is why judging schools and teachers by their pupils results is madness.

  • KarlLBKarlLB Shipmate
    edited April 14
    It's funny you should mention that. My parents both left school at 15 with one O level between them. They valued education but had no idea how studying actually worked. My school assumed a home environment that did, so by the time I got my autistic head around what everyone else was doing, and that it was actually the best thing to be doing it was too late and I already had a fairly rubbish set of O level grades and was on course for some pretty mediocre A Levels as well. To be honest, I really only grasped it on my second attempt at university.

    This in someone accelerated a year in mainstream school and in the top form throughout my school career.

    Much as I defend my parents' right to do as they did without accusations of hypocrisy being aimed at them, I am far from convinced that with hindsight it was the best choice. They did it as much as any to get me away from bullying but bullies are everywhere and can detect things like autism much more quickly and accurately than any psychologist.
  • I was pretty pissed off at having to drop geography to take French. I was really pissed off when the government changed the rules the following year.
  • cgichard wrote: »
    Smaller class sizes.
    This is not always the case in Australia.

    Generally private schools will have greater resources and will deploy them in a combination of ways; either teaching ratios and/or range of subject and/or extra-curricular activities (including alumni associations -- they don't tend to run themselves) etc.

    There will be some private and/or selective schools that concentrate the academically able, but generally there are cheaper alternate ways of parents achieving the same thing.

    Whether any of that is good for a particular individual is up for debate, but the majority of the time parents choose private education for the material or social advantage it conveys.
  • KarlLBKarlLB Shipmate
    I was pretty pissed off at having to drop geography to take French. I was really pissed off when the government changed the rules the following year.

    I'm glad my kids can drop it. Eldest is doing double maths, physics and computer science at A level and aiming at university courses wanting AAB or higher; OTOH he did Spanish for three years and can barely ask for a coke in the language.

    We're not good at learning languages in the UK and pretty poor at teaching them.

    It's partly motivation. For the vast majority of UK citizens foreign languages are only of potential use for a week a year in Malaga. For the rest of the world, English is an invaluable skill as a common Lingua Franca (although it's Saxon more than Frankish, sorry, linguist joke) and the language of technology and computing.

    Dw i'n dysgu Cymraeg achos mai .... anarferol ydw i, nid achos mai defnyddiol i mi ydy hi.

    *I'm learning Welsh because I'm.... unusual. Not because it's useful to me.
  • Our children also didn't take foreign languages at GCSE as the school (local academy) didn't insist on it.

    My children both attended Hills Road Sixth Form College in Cambridge, a highly selective state school which usually tops the chart of sixth form college in the UK. It is in the top 5 schools sending students to Oxbridge, alongside 4 private schools. However, despite being highly selective it actually takes in nearly 50% of the local students. Why are so many local students grade A? Because 40% of the local adults are graduates, twice the average for the UK population. The students do well because their parents did well, they have the social and cultural capital to help them achieve. I don't think Hills Road has particularly better teaching than the other Cambridge Sixth Form College, which takes most of the other students.

    Hills Road was the very school of which I spoke. It is way more selective and homogenous than it was when I was there from 1969 to 1976. There were lots of us from working class homes - next to none now.

    One or two of us are immortalised with our names on the honours board. Mine is!

  • Hills Road was the very school of which I spoke. It is way more selective and homogenous than it was when I was there from 1969 to 1976. There were lots of us from working class homes - next to none now.

    One or two of us are immortalised with our names on the honours board. Mine is!
    I did wonder if it was Hills you were referring to :) If I am ever allowed in again (my younger son is back at college now) to see the Honours boards I will look and try to guess who you are!
  • ExclamationMarkExclamationMark Shipmate
    edited April 14

    Hills Road was the very school of which I spoke. It is way more selective and homogenous than it was when I was there from 1969 to 1976. There were lots of us from working class homes - next to none now.

    One or two of us are immortalised with our names on the honours board. Mine is!
    I did wonder if it was Hills you were referring to :) If I am ever allowed in again (my younger son is back at college now) to see the Honours boards I will look and try to guess who you are!

    Sure was HRSFC! Look at 1976 - you can PM me with your guess - one of 3 (I think).
  • KwesiKwesi Shipmate
    Boogie:. People with real expertise and skills are sidelined while people with the right connections get promoted way, way, way beyond their abilities.

    .......and gave the UK David Cameron and Boris Johnson, and that old buffer, Sir Alec Douglas Home, who explained the operation of the economy with a box of matches. It may be a tribute to Eton's capacity to given significant added value to its pupils, (sorry, students), but it hasn't done the rest of the country a favour. Sir Alec may have been a decent cove, but the latter two have been a dangerous disgrace. The UK is now governed by the insouciant upper middle class supported by the prejudices of a red wall.

    It may be just an impression, but when the nitty gritty of the covid pandemic is being addressed rather than politically spun, it seems to me the number of regional accents increases, not to mention those from ethnic minorities.
  • ForthviewForthview Shipmate
    A few days ago I was passing a well known comprehensive school in Edinburgh where many of the 'middle class' parents (university lecturers, etc) send their children, if they choose not to send them to private schools.
    Two young men on bicycles happened to come past at the very same moment.
    Said one to the other ; is that a private school ?
    'No' came the reply,' but it's just a good as - only posh people go there'.
  • KwesiKwesi Shipmate
    Forthview: A few days ago I was passing a well known comprehensive school in Edinburgh ...................

    You might have added, Forthview, that the quality of state education has so declined in Scotland under the present SNP regime that it has withdrawn from participation in international comparators, and is withholding a report on school performance until after the elections to the devolved parliament. Furthermore, admittance to Scottish Universities is less socially diverse than in England.
  • tclunetclune Shipmate
    Gee D wrote: »
    Crœsos wrote: »
    There are similar discussions about the makeup of the U.S. Supreme Court. With the exception of Amy Coney Barrett (Notre Dame), all of the current Justices got their law degrees from Yale (Thomas, Alito, Sotomayor, Kavanaugh) or Harvard (Breyer, Roberts, Kagan, Gorsuch). Prior to Barrett the last Supreme Court Justice that didn't come from either Harvard or Yale was Sandra Day O'Connor (Stanford), who was nominated in 1981.

    Notre Dame is not exactly to be sneezed at, is it?

    Some people even think that Stanford is a decent school -- but folks who believe either of these myths are clearly not from the East Coast, so consider the source.
  • MooMoo Kerygmania Host
    Gee D wrote: »

    No, but the fact that Notre Dame is not exactly to be sneezed at, is it?

    No, but there might be a greater range of opinion if the justices had been educated at a wider variety of law schools.

  • Nick TamenNick Tamen Shipmate
    Gee D wrote: »
    Crœsos wrote: »
    There are similar discussions about the makeup of the U.S. Supreme Court. With the exception of Amy Coney Barrett (Notre Dame), all of the current Justices got their law degrees from Yale (Thomas, Alito, Sotomayor, Kavanaugh) or Harvard (Breyer, Roberts, Kagan, Gorsuch). Prior to Barrett the last Supreme Court Justice that didn't come from either Harvard or Yale was Sandra Day O'Connor (Stanford), who was nominated in 1981.

    Notre Dame is not exactly to be sneezed at, is it?
    No, it’s not. There are almost 200 accredited law schools in the US. According to those who rank such things, Yale, Stanford and Harvard generally rank in the top 5 in the country. Notre Dame generally ranks in the top 25–30. US News & World Report, which does the annual rankings most law schools care about, currently has Notre Dame tied with the University of Minnesota for a rank of 22nd best. Yale currently ranks first, Stanford second and Harvard third.

  • Gramps49Gramps49 Shipmate
    Our kids were fortunate, they attended the 2nd best public school district in Washington State. Because of the university setting from primary through high school, the kids were all taught by teachers at the Master's Level. Many had PhDs. The schools offered four languages. German, French, Spanish, and Japanese (remotely). Many students were from around the world because their parents either taught at the university or were graduate students at the university. They not only had an excellent academic program but also an applied technology program as well. At the time my kids went through, they had to take woodworking and home economics in middle school, then in high school, they had to take at least two other technological options which covered a wide range of topics. In other words, they came out very well rounded. Heck, the boys are better cooks than I will ever be.
  • CaissaCaissa Shipmate
    We sent our children to inter-city elementary and middle schools when we had an opportunity to send them to schools where the students tended to come from a higher socio-economic background. They went to schools that I attended when growing up in working class family.
  • RussRuss Shipmate
    Boogie wrote: »
    who can blame them for trying to do what’s best for their own children?

    If you believe there's nothing wrong in trying to do what's best for your own children, then how can you seek to ban private schools ? If conversely you believe that there is something wrong with it, how can you do it yourself ?
  • KarlLBKarlLB Shipmate
    Russ wrote: »
    Boogie wrote: »
    who can blame them for trying to do what’s best for their own children?

    If you believe there's nothing wrong in trying to do what's best for your own children, then how can you seek to ban private schools ? If conversely you believe that there is something wrong with it, how can you do it yourself ?

    Banning private schools will force the powers that be to ensure that the schools they have to use as well as the rest of us proles will be the best they can be. At the moment they have no motivation to do so.

    Until such time, there could be circumstances where the best option is to reluctantly use the private sector - a bit like needing a procedure which the NHS is too underfunded to provide. You don't have to approve of private medicine to accept that in the circumstances you have no option.

    We've been through all this above so I'm not sure why you're asking this question again.
  • ForthviewForthview Shipmate
    It is surely a mistake to think that the 'rest of us' who use the maintained sector of education are all 'proles'. If you insist on dividing society into these classes many who are higher up in societal classification do indeed use the public education system, not just the 'proles'.
  • Gee DGee D Shipmate
    Thanks to all for comments on Notre Dame

    Moo - I keep forgetting that your Supreme Court is now much more political than our High Court.
  • BoogieBoogie Shipmate
    edited April 15
    Russ wrote: »
    Boogie wrote: »
    who can blame them for trying to do what’s best for their own children?

    If you believe there's nothing wrong in trying to do what's best for your own children, then how can you seek to ban private schools ? If conversely you believe that there is something wrong with it, how can you do it yourself ?

    I think equal access to all is essential. This is a long term political aim. There is something deeply wrong with an elitist system where the mediocre (and often incompetent) rise to the highest offices in the land through privilege. It leads to societal inequality which is bad for all - including the rich. Why do the rich live in gated secure communities? Because they don’t feel safe. Whey don’t they feel safe? Because society is so very unequal.

    Personally we need to do what we think is best. If there isn’t equality of access - and there isn’t - then people who can will choose the best they can.

    I didn’t do it myself. My children went to the comprehensive school down the road. But I don’t blame those who do choose otherwise in the current system.

    We were lucky, we knew our boys would thrive wherever they went. And, if they didn’t, we still had plenty of choices of schools to move them to. My husband and I were both very well paid indeed at the time.



  • Alan29Alan29 Shipmate
    This retired teacher reckons that the attitude at home to education and learning has a massive bearing on a childs educational outcomes no mattrr what the school.
    Its interesting to see how this discussion as almost always when education is discussed, focuses on academic attainment and not on skills education, for which there is a glaring need. Its almost as though all the research about kinds of intelligence counts counts for nothing.
  • GarethMoonGarethMoon Shipmate
    edited April 15
    Boogie wrote: »
    There is something deeply wrong with an elitist system where the mediocre (and often incompetent) rise to the highest offices in the land through privilege. It leads to societal inequality which is bad for all - including the rich.

    This is where I feel uneasy, especially when it comes to education, jobs and "meritocracy":

    * Privilege due to wealth = bad

    * Privilege due to connections = bad

    * Privilege due to being "smart"/high IQ = good, and they deserve all the privilege, prestige and wealth they get because they "earned" it.

    I have a nagging feeling that they "earned" it in the same way Prince Charles/Willian will "earn" being King; they were given a lucky hand when they were born. Yes you can screw it up like the Queen's uncle or Prince Andrew, but it's due to an accident of birth ultimately.

    EDIT - It's also worth pointing out that the qualification for the "highest offices in the land", at least the political ones, is purely the ability to get the most people in your parliamentary party to like or fear you enough to vote for you. The MP's qualification is to get more people in their constituency to vote for them than any other individual.

    The "qualification" is popularity not competence nor ability to do the job.
  • GarethMoon wrote: »
    Boogie wrote: »
    There is something deeply wrong with an elitist system where the mediocre (and often incompetent) rise to the highest offices in the land through privilege. It leads to societal inequality which is bad for all - including the rich.

    This is where I feel uneasy, especially when it comes to education, jobs and "meritocracy"

    * Privilege due to wealth = bad

    * Privilege due to connections = bad

    * Privilege due to being "smart"/high IQ = good, and they deserve all the privilege, prestige and wealth they get because they "earned" it. I have a nagging feeling that they "earned" it in the same way Prince Charles/Willian will "earn" being King; they were given a lucky hand when they were born. Yes you can screw it up like the Queen's uncle or Prince Andrew, but it's due to an accident of birth ultimately.

    I agree with that, but there is an advantage to a genuine meritocracy (if such be achievable) in that more capable people should perform better in those top jobs, which should benefit everyone. The other side of the coin is that the rewards involved should not be excessive and everyone should be able to live comfortably from whatever work they're capable of.
  • KwesiKwesi Shipmate
    KarlLB: Banning private schools will force the powers that be to ensure that the schools they have to use as well as the rest of us proles will be the best they can be. At the moment they have no motivation to do so.

    I've heard this argument many times, but except in places where there is a high density of private schools, Edinburgh comes to mind, I find the argument unconvincing. (Even, Edinburgh, however, as already mentioned, has a high status state comprehensive academy, James Gillespie, in posh Marchmont). In not a few areas parents eschew the private sector in favour of purchasing an expensive house in "a good school area". Universal comprehensivisation does not spread equality of access but consolidates class differentiation through residence. It is notable, in that respect, it was a Conservative local authority, Leicestershire, that first introduced comprehensives, and that middle class opposition to their expansion was so weak - abolition of the 11+ removed a major source of their social angst.

    In regard to examinations, be suspicious of covid-inspired moves to abolish them in favour of so-called continuous assessment, which is already the curse of the university sector. Their removal are not in the interests of social mobility.

    Arguments for educational improvement are often expressed in egalitarian language, but hide the true reasons. In Scotland, for example, students are not charged university fees for noble reasons, but it is effectively a middle class subsidy and social diversity at its universities is less than in England.

    If public schools were abolished, we shouldn't deceive ourselves it will generally raise educational attainment, because most of the children affected would go to already well-resourced state comprehensives. Upper middle class parents, anyway, would send their kids to posh schools in other countries. As I said upthread, I think there are good arguments for 'public' school abolition, but do not think is will have measurable benefits for the quality of state education.

    **************

    Re the US Supreme Court: Give an accolade to Howard: Thurgood Marshall.





  • KarlLBKarlLB Shipmate
    It's necessary, but not sufficient. We also need to fix the problem you describe.
  • KarlLBKarlLB Shipmate
    Forthview wrote: »
    It is surely a mistake to think that the 'rest of us' who use the maintained sector of education are all 'proles'. If you insist on dividing society into these classes many who are higher up in societal classification do indeed use the public education system, not just the 'proles'.

    I think you need to recalibrate your irony meter. I was referring to how some of those in power see us, not how I see us.
  • GarethMoon wrote: »
    * Privilege due to being "smart"/high IQ = good, and they deserve all the privilege, prestige and wealth they get because they "earned" it.

    I have a nagging feeling that they "earned" it in the same way Prince Charles/Willian will "earn" being King; they were given a lucky hand when they were born. Yes you can screw it up like the Queen's uncle or Prince Andrew, but it's due to an accident of birth ultimately.

    Yes, absolutely, equally all of your abilities would be no good if you were born blind, midway up a mountain in 12th century Tibet. Your family circumstances are beyond your control. Even your ability to work hard is in large part genetically driven.

    It's all an accident (Rawls) or all of Grace, so what @Arethosemyfeet said, Welcome comrade.

  • BoogieBoogie Shipmate
    edited April 15
    @GarethMoon said -
    * Privilege due to being "smart"/high IQ = good, and they deserve all the privilege, prestige and wealth they get because they "earned" it.

    I have a nagging feeling that they "earned" it in the same way Prince Charles/Willian will "earn" being King; they were given a lucky hand when they were born. Yes you can screw it up like the Queen's uncle or Prince Andrew, but it's due to an accident of birth ultimately.

    Yes, I understand that.

    But we do want the best of the best to be our surgeons, scientists, airline pilots and cabinet ministers etc. So ‘getting a good job’ does require high intelligence (and skills, as @Alan29 pointed out).

    Carers, cleaners etc are also essential, as we have had brought into clear focus this year, and their pay should reflect that fact too.
  • ForthviewForthview Shipmate
    'posh Marchmont' (in Edinburgh) and similar expressions are all relative. Some people just might describe that area of Edinburgh as 'solid artisan' which would also no longer be true.
    The tenement flats which are a feature of the district would mostly have been built over 100 years ago when many of the people who bought flats there would obviously not had flat screen TVs ,nor washing machines, but who may well have had a live in maid. (many of the flats have what was called a 'maid's room'. They would tend to have worked in 'trades' or offices but would have been counted as 'posh' by those who lived in the city centre which did not have the cachet that it now has.

    The real posh people would live in the New Town, but once again they would not generally have been as high in the pecking order as the landed aristocrats.

    I write this about Edinburgh, but any large town or city would have similar divisions within it.
  • As a privately educated parent of children who went to a comprehensive after private prep school my sons and I would make the following observations.

    The elephant in the room is parental attitude towards school, education and discipline. You can put every child in the same school and you'll still have results at the end that don't reflect intellectual possibility because of parental attitude. Yes, there are disengaged parents of children at private schools but, especially if they board, this is flattened out by the school.

    Pastoral care/concern: with a few exceptions the notion of pastoral care among the staff at my sons' was alien. Bullying went unchecked, theft was not investigated.

    At no time during 7 years were reports issued. Parent-teacher consultations were held at such a time that many parents found it impossible to go to them, and the sessions were so chaotic many parents left without having spoken to anyone who taught their child.

    Communication with parents was abysmal, most letters going unacknowledged and unanswered.

    If you and your child could cope with that through Years 7-11 it was better at sixth form level, mainly because of a Head of Sixth Form who was engaged and driven to do the job.

    And all of the above in a school ranked as Good/Excellent by Ofsted.

    As, when and if this kind of thing can be sorted out then maybe private schools will become a thing if the past.
  • The reports thing is more than a little unusual.

    I'm not sure why you think that bullying is dealt with effectively at private schools.
  • KarlLBKarlLB Shipmate
    The reports thing is more than a little unusual.

    I'm not sure why you think that bullying is dealt with effectively at private schools.

    I can assure you it isn't.

    The other issues @TheOrganist lists will never be sorted whilst the people with the power to sort them out have the option to just opt out.
  • Marvin the MartianMarvin the Martian Admin Emeritus
    KarlLB wrote: »
    The other issues @TheOrganist lists will never be sorted whilst the people with the power to sort them out have the option to just opt out.

    I'm not sure what anyone can do about issues of parental attitude and disengagement which cause their children to be disruptive to the education and/or wellbeing of all the others. Other than removing those children from the school, of course - but then you've just created a new two-tier system.

    Basically, and I've said this before, the main reason I'd prefer a grammar or private education for my kids isn't the quality of the teaching or facilities on offer at comprehensive schools, it's the quality of the other students.
  • Nick TamenNick Tamen Shipmate
    Gee D wrote: »
    Moo - I keep forgetting that your Supreme Court is now much more political than our High Court.
    I might question the “now” part. The Supreme Court has always been political.

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