The Labour Government

[mexico1970]

View attachment 125751

Sweet baby Jesus !!

 

[I'm With Stupid]

"So how did these schools come by all this land? Ironically, in many cases, the founders wanted to create educational opportunities for poor children, or bring them into the church."

Original charitable purposes subverted by the rich for the rich.

How England’s top private schools came to own 38,000 acres of land

Students at top fee-paying institutions benefit from centuries of philanthropy originally intended to help the poor

www.theguardian.com

You see this all the time with these "not for profit (no really)" institutions. They basically make huge profits, but they're not allowed to technically make a profit, so they consistently spend the excess on assets rather than actually helping anyone. That's why you have universities in America where lecturers struggle to get a decent-paying full-time job, but their food hall looks like a 5 star hotel buffet, they have a new multi-billion dollar wing on the engineering department, and a stadium that wouldn't look out of place in the Premier League. It's why churches are frequently among the biggest property-owners in the US.

Plenty of private schools are the same. We could fund an extra 100 poorer children for five years, or we could upgrade the rowing lake. Because let's be honest, if they really did operate a system of, for example, 50% of students being from troubled, underprivileged backgrounds who struggled in the state system, a good chunk of their paying customers would leave, because the whole reason they're paying in the first place is to get their kids away from kids like this.

 

[I'm With Stupid]

I can't find the graph, but there's research that tests children at reception and reckons:

a child with better ability from a deprived background will be overtaken (in attainment) during primary school by a child with less ability from a less deprived background.

Yep, it's why the concept of "value added" as a way of judging teachers is problematic. You'd think it'd make things fair, because we're not just judging teachers by the score their kids get, but by the improvement. But every study shows that those from a more affluent, stable background don't just get better results, they actually make more progress.

It's also one of the reasons Finland performs so highly. Yes, their teaching is excellent, but they also have a more equal society overall, and lower levels of all of the sorts of out-of-class problems that lead to kids not doing so well.

 

[Ifwecouldjust.......]

"So how did these schools come by all this land? Ironically, in many cases, the founders wanted to create educational opportunities for poor children, or bring them into the church."

Original charitable purposes subverted by the rich for the rich.

How England’s top private schools came to own 38,000 acres of land

Students at top fee-paying institutions benefit from centuries of philanthropy originally intended to help the poor

www.theguardian.com

You can walk from Oxford to Bury St Edmunds and never step off land owned by Cambridge University.

 

[Vic]

You can walk from Oxford to Bury St Edmunds and never step off land owned by Cambridge University.

Nah.

 

[Johnny Mars Bar]

I can't find the graph, but there's research that tests children at reception and reckons:

a child with better ability from a deprived background will be overtaken (in attainment) during primary school by a child with less ability from a less deprived background.

That’s almost certainly true but it’s not the same thing.

I can say for certain that if I went to a rough state school full of council estate kids for example I would not have thrived at all.

Not saying it’s right, wrong or otherwise - and certainly not saying all state schools are rough - but I’d have hated it as a kid.

 

[Kazzydeyna]

You see this all the time with these "not for profit (no really)" institutions. They basically make huge profits, but they're not allowed to technically make a profit, so they consistently spend the excess on assets rather than actually helping anyone. That's why you have universities in America where lecturers struggle to get a decent-paying full-time job, but their food hall looks like a 5 star hotel buffet, they have a new multi-billion dollar wing on the engineering department, and a stadium that wouldn't look out of place in the Premier League. It's why churches are frequently among the biggest property-owners in the US.

Plenty of private schools are the same. We could fund an extra 100 poorer children for five years, or we could upgrade the rowing lake. Because let's be honest, if they really did operate a system of, for example, 50% of students being from troubled, underprivileged backgrounds who struggled in the state system, a good chunk of their paying customers would leave, because the whole reason they're paying in the first place is to get their kids away from kids like this.

Thank you for such a wonderful post. I especially admire the last line. Lots of private school parents put their kids in these schools precisely to get them away from the kids from the council estate, and that is sick, twisted , and vile.

 

[BrianW]

"So how did these schools come by all this land? Ironically, in many cases, the founders wanted to create educational opportunities for poor children, or bring them into the church."

Original charitable purposes subverted by the rich for the rich.

How England’s top private schools came to own 38,000 acres of land

Students at top fee-paying institutions benefit from centuries of philanthropy originally intended to help the poor

www.theguardian.com

I'm afraid this is an issue that boils my piss, and it's an ancient wrong.

The local example is Chetham's. It was set up (and heavily endowed) by its founder to be a school for poor boys. Somehow, it has transformed itself into a school for musicians, but it has not given up its endowments.

Now, a school of music is a wonderful thing, and of all the private schools in England, Chetham's is one of the least egregious. But in my mind, such a school should be funded by the state. It ought not to be living off an endowment given for something else.

If we look at Eton, it was founded By Henry VI as a college of priests to say masses for his soul and to educate poor boys. Now the first bit has not been done since the Reformation, so that's a failure. They do give scholarships, in fairness, but they tend to go to the likes of Boris Johnson. Johnson was not a 'poor boy' by any rational standards. Compared to Sheikh Mansour, maybe, but not to the average English child. The upper middle classes have got this nicely sown up.

I would have every last one of these endowments looked at and stripped if they were failing to do what the founder intended. This would be harsh, but fair. The legal precedent would be the Dissolution of the Monasteries.

 

[gordondaviesmoustache]

Thank you for such a wonderful post. I especially admire the last line. Lots of private school parents put their kids in these schools precisely to get them away from the kids from the council estate, and that is sick, twisted , and vile.

It’s plainly not the only reason. I’m sure it’s a material motivation for some, but the principal reason will be the advantage it gives their children. Which is why it should be subject to VAT. It’s absurd to suggest otherwise. Absolutely outrageous it’s happening now and not many years ago.

 

[metalblue]

I’d be interested to know what school your daughter goes to as that’s the exception rather than the norm if this the straw that breaks the camels back for you rather than the increase in fees private schools have done themselves over the last decade, I did say some would close due to it though. That’s their choice, there’s ways that they could absorb it and have chosen not to.

Agree on your last point, that’s how I’d have implemented it too. As I said though, there’s not many private schools that haven’t increased their fees by a similar price over that period anyway.

It’s disingenuous to compare a 15 year increase (20%) with an overnight increase. If the government proposed brining this in 2% per year over next decade it would be comparable.

I believe it’s likely to be about a net 15% increase and I anticipate, if it becomes law, schools will look to phase it in rather than in 1 hit. However I expect it to be met with some fairly robust legal challenges. SEND students who receive EHCP will be exempt from the VAT, those who don’t will not - that sounds potentially discriminatory to me - that would be my first port of call if I had a dog in this fight. I’m sure there are a few legal types who do send their kids to private schools who will happily take up the cause.