"Privileged" Education

[Bathsheba]

Nail on head Fiona! "Confidence" or you can call it "an ability to kick ar$e when necessary". Onyx and Divvy illustrate this well! Infact so many privately educated women i know have this enviable trait that timid ole me can only dream of! Thankfully my 15yo DD has received this too from her primary and secondary private education. I'm not saying that publicly educated people never have this... but just from personal experience it's not as common. And it's this trait that DH needed in his graduate assistant banker: the ability to hold ground if an arrogant CEO is trying to Lord it over them! From his experience the private kids can handle themselves pretty well... and not lose the client in the process!

I don't want to sound too "pro" private system though. Because just like Fiona I REALLY want to support the public system... I care about education... I aim to be a teacher... it's just that especially here in Victoria the public system (the most under-funded in Australia) is not a system I particularly admire compared to what I'm fortunate enough to be able to afford in the private system.

[krisp]

Interesting conversation about the "confidence" aspect private schooling provides.

Even though I didn't go to a private school I have always been a confident person. My Mum and Dad always told me I could do anything and be anything I wanted to be. I was encouraged to be vocal and express my opinion, to stand up for myself and also others.

I don't know that private schooling instills confidence. I think confidence comes from many different things. It can be part of the molding that your parents provide, it can come from being knocked down and finding the inner strength you need to get back up and get you through, it can be imparted on you by an influential teacher, priest, role model etc, it can come from being an elite athlete or just because that is how you were "made".

I believe confidence is about being sure of who you are and your place in the world.

[boomba]

Isn't that passing judgement of someone by where they went to school? And to not be hired for a job due to the school you went to is discrimination?
Personally I think you will succeed if you want to...yes a little help from a school is great but you could go to heaps of different schools and still have the same outcome if you don't want to learn? I know lots of people who went to the worst highschools and have amazing lives now?

People pass judgement on my DH all the time as he loves to wear boardies and thongs they talk down to him as he is dumb and treat him like dirt...but you know what he owns and runs a successful business and he went to a basic state high school, his success has come from within him self and his upbringing not from his school. This mentality really annoys me you are not better than someone else just because of the school you went to. People are wonderful in their own right not because of the school they went to?

[Bathsheba]

ONLY from my personal experience it seems that this confidence seems to come from the relationship between students and teachers. Now I'm walking on shaky ground here because I also know of quite a few public school teachers who seem to teach in a manner that imparts confidence with their students.... but it's almost always been in evidence with my daughters teachers at the private schools she has been to. I know that that the teachers all seemed to LOVE working at these schools... the class sizes were small (my DDs first teacher only had 10 girls, what teacher wouldn't be happy about that!)... the pay is better... the facilities and resources are better... happy teacher = happy kids?

On the flip side it's a different story at my DS's public school... he's had ok teachers but they seem to lack the spark... I don't like the one-size-fits-all approach... I really don't like their school reporting system! The grounds are grim and the rooms uncomfortable. The teachers talk to the kids in a way reminiscent to how I was spoken to at my public school... can't put my finger on it but it's different to how the teachers speak at the private ones... can someone help me out? Anyhow he's not returning next year. But we'll most likely try the public system again when we move... I REALLY do want to find something good to say about Australia's public system!

[Phteven]

I REALLY do want to find something good to say about Australia's public system!

I'm really happy with our local public school it's fantastic in so many ways.

[Shanti]

I think there are many great public schools and many great private schools. We as parents need to take alot of the responsibility for our kids and how they are learning too. Not just the schools.

We have a wonderful public school up the road from us and another co-ed private school up the other road near us where our DD could go. We are lucky we are in the position to be able to afford the private option if we choose to send DD there.....we will have to compare both schools and make up our mind based on what we feel is best for our DD at the time. ie school values, code of ethics etc etc

I think it's horrible that someone would judge someone based on where they went to school.

[fionas]

just to add to my previous post, if anyone was stupid enough to start carrying on about a private education in front of me, I would probably say something like, "so you made it to uni along with 90% of your private school classmates. I made it to uni along with four other people out of 300. Who d'you reckon is smarter mate?"

[krisp]

just to add to my previous post, if anyone was stupid enough to start carrying on about a private education in front of me, I would probably say something like, "so you made it to uni along with 90% of your private school classmates. I made it to uni along with four other people out of 300. Who d'you reckon is smarter mate?"

[angelaartsstudent]

My DD will be going public....well that's the decision we've made so far.

I have nothing major against private schooling, but she is not baptised/christened, so that makes it harder to get in over here. And the public primary school in our area is spoken of way more highly than the privates in the area.

Like above though, I like in an upper-middle class area now. If I was living in the suburb I did last year, there's no way I would send my kid to the local public school.

I went to 4 schools in grade 1. 3 were private, one was public.

1st - private - said I had learning problems and I was moved out bcuase we moved interstate
2nd - private - very deeply religious and ALL the kids still had to line up in the common area and march to class every morning - I was kicked out.
3rd - private - kicked out.
4th - public - I liked it. Suddenly my apparent 'learning problem' disapeared and I suddenly turned 'bright'.

Half way through Grade 3 we moved back to WA and I was put back in the original private school. On my first day back I was bullied and had the crap beaten out of me until the end of year 8. I was told that "You're not worthy, God doesn't want you" in Grade 3, becuase my family was Anglican, not Catholic. But that of course has nothing to do with it being a private school...more with it being in the country and populated by very old and old fashioned teachers.

Then my family moved to the City so my sis and I could get a "better education". I was landed at what is most likely still in the top 5 list of WORST schools in Perth (gangs, violence, major drug problem, kids getting killed from bashings etc). It's public. My sister got to go to a private school. I didn't get a choice.

I have since worked at the most expensive boy's school in the state, and also the cheapest boy's school in the state. Both are as bad as one another...just one costs parents $10000+ more a year than the other!

I am not sure if it matters whether a school is private or public....but the quality of the school does.

Let's just say that I would never send my kid to an exxy school just to look good...but especially not after working at them and seeing the inner workings of the place!

[HotI]

double post

[Junglemum]

I think the school you go to can definitely shape who you are. But i don't think it comes down to public v's private. I think it has more to do with the actual school. I went to a public primary and private secondary and my parents, like Divy's were paying off the school fees well after we finished.

Does the school you went to matter? i think so, yes.
Does private schooling afford you priviledges that would otherwise not be open to you?[/B] Absolutely. The school i went to had a big focus on general life skills as well as education. For an hour every day we would do an elective called 'activities'. Once ever 6 weeks you'd put a ballot in for what activity you wanted to do. It could be anything from cooking, tennis, scuba diving, pottery, sewing, chess, music, the options were endless. We also had two camps a year. One you got to chose the other was a general camp for the whole year level. On these camps we learnt orienterring, bush survival skills, rafting, horse rideing, rock climbing, abseiling just to name a few. For the elective one you could chose a school based camp and do a performing arts camp, sewing, lots of different sporting options, or you could go on a surfing, scuba diving, horse riding, or a city experience or central Aus type trip. You don't get those opportunities at very many schools.
Does it play a role in your future eg job selection, lifestyle choices etc? I think it is not the be all and end all, but it definitely plays a role. I went to a private school who were actually concerned about their students and not worried about keeping their grade averages high. So no one was asked to leave if they were making the school look bad. This happened at several local private schools in our area. I find it shocking. We were encouraged to be what we wanted to be, not pushed into something that didn't suit us. My schooling has definitely contributed to the person i am today.
Does it shape the person/adult you become? There are so many contributing factors, but i say yes, schooling is one of them. MY parents are the primary 'shapers' but peers, and experiences contribute too. Schooling is an experience.

I would like to send my kids to a school like the one i went to. My Dad thinks it was a waste of money, mainly due to my poor grammar and spelling skills. But English was never my strong point, i have many others.

[ladybird11]

Not sure if I'm delving off topic, but recently I was waiting to give a road safety lecture at an exclusive school and in the room was a teacher holding a student council meeting. And they were discussing how lugging heavy bags around was an OH&S issue and were brainstorming how to get around the issue. A few joked to get rid of text books then one said "why not have the school supply us each with an iPad?" - and the room fell silent. The teacher running the group said that was a great idea and would put up the suggestion to the board.
One month later the school received delivery of 2,500 iPads.....!

Information in text books can be loaded onto a iPad - and I see the use of it as more of a luxury than a need - so yeah, I would say they were privelleged. Will they gain any further advantage from that alone? I think its purely up to the indivdual to use the opportunities presented to them.

[Trillian]

I"m divided on it. I've met a lot of people who were private school educated who are absolute tools and have a huge sense of entitlement, but I've come across those same people who never set foot in a private school - just as I have known a lot of publicly and privately educated people who are truly the most amazing people you would ever meet. I was publicly educated and DH was public for primary and then private boarding for high school for 7-10 and then came back to his local high school for 11 and 12 because he couldn't live with the knowledge that his parents were paying $20k per year for his education when he knew he wanted to be a farmer. He said he got jack of the pressure from the school to change his mind and become something else that entailed a stint at Uni. He felt there was absolutely zero support for students who did not want professional careers. His brother on the other hand stayed at the school, went onto business college, then became a demolition worker before coming back to the farm. Their sister refused point blank to go to the same private school, spent 7 weeks there in year 7 and came back to the local high school and scored nearly a perfect 100 in her HSC. She became an accountant and even then still had people say she should have done medicine because of the high marks she got. There are no guarantees that private school will set your children up a certain way if they truly want to do something else.

Krisp, I think the person you met was probably just a tool in general and totally unrelated to where he went to school. Granted yes that some people do have an unhealthy obsession with where people went to school, even if it was so long ago, but if it wasn't school, the people with personalities like that would cling to something else to brag about kwim?

To answer your questions
Does the school you went to matter? Unfortunately in some cases it does. Not saying this is right, but it's the way it is. We have neighbours who homeschool their kids and one of their sons is a very handy Rugby Union player. They have aspirations of him playing for the Wallabies and make sure he gets into local rep teams in the hope that he gets spotted, but the reality is that without a private school education, this kid has buckleys and none of getting into the Wallabies. When was the last time you ever heard of a world-class rubgy player coming from public school, let alone being homeschooled?
Does private schooling afford you priviledges that would otherwise not be open to you? No. Life is what you make of it, plain and simple. It might put you in the place where you have all these opportunities available to you, but what is the point of it if you don't want to take it kwim? If you don't come from that background, there is absolutely nothing stopping you becoming whatever you want to become if you have the drive and determination to get it. And just being in private school does not mean that you will succeed either if you don't have the drive to do it. And in the case of my DH, it can possibly set you up to be something you don't really want to be for fear of 'wasting' that fancy education you have.
Does it play a role in your future eg job selection, lifestyle choices etc? Yes and no. I know that if I had of gone to private school, I would have felt very uncomfortable living that lifestyle because it just does not align with the way I choose to live my life now. And anyone can live the high life if they want to. I have no doubt that it plays a role in job selection but it works both ways - if you have a public school educated person going for a corporate job, you are likely to get dismissed as being a flannie-shirt wearing plebian just as if you are a privately educated person going for a job as a tradie, well you'd be likely to get dismissed as being a knob. Neither is right but sadly it is something that has become ingrained in our culture to think like that.
Does it shape the person/adult you become? Again, yes and no. I would have become the person I have become regardless of the school I went to. I am just too cool for school Seriously though, when I finished school I did not want to go to Uni at all and I honestly don't think that would have mattered whether I went to public school or private school, only with private school I probably would have went anyway because Uni seems to be a natural progression of private school but I would have dropped out because it wouldn't have been what I wanted to do. But look at me now - well on my way to getting a Bachelors degree because I WANT to do it.

And as for private school instilling self confidence and the ability to hold your own, in all honesty I think that isn't true. Self confidence can't be instilled in you by anyone - you have to find it yourself. In my experience, some of the most confident people I know went through public school and they can hold their own because they had to *fight* more kwim. Me included - I can kick anyone's ass if I have to and I call a spade a spade and I think I have the ability to not get people offside while I do it.

Bath, I think you would like the public school that my kids go to (and the one DH himself attended). They have an awesome attitude to education and some very successful people started their educations at this school. The teachers are amazing and totally dedicated to their jobs. It's the school I ultimately want to teach in myself when I graduate because their core beliefs align perfectly with mine. The kids have every opportunity given to them and we have many state representatives for both sport and academic persuits and our school scores pretty damn high on the My schools website too LOL.

[krisp]

Another twist to this thread.

My brother is a high school teacher and he currently teaches in Sydney. He has taught in both the public and private school systems. His opinion from a teachers perspective was really interesting.

He says teaching the boys in a public school and a private school is basically no different. In fact he preferred the public school boys as they generally had more of an interest in his subject - he is an industrial arts woodwork/metalwork teacher (has a new fancy name now apparently!). He says the girls on the other hand in the private system are much more challenging as they tend to look down their nose at this type of "physical hands on" subject. They were too polished and too cool to be bothered. Whereas the girls in the public system were keen to get in there and get their hands dirty.

Intersting huh?

[Jennifer13]

I often think if you're even asked it's so the asker can justify why they're currently spending 000s on whichever private school their children are attending.

Trill, you raise a very valid point. By the time you have 10 years working experience under your belt, all anyone cares about is who you've worked for, not where you went to school. At least, in terms of job prospects/offers, from what I've noticed.

Krisp - I think you raise a very valid point in terms of how we define success in our society.

[widdly]

My 2 cents is this

What a loser that man is!!! Grow up.

He sounds like someone I would never waste my time socialising with.

And no, i dont think it matters which school you went to, especially 22 years down the track!

[Bathsheba]

Jennifer: No, not Steiner or Montessori. My DD went to two Anglican Girls' schools in inner Melbourne. She did kinder to grade 3 at the first then grade 4 - grade 9 at the second. Her first school uses a teaching philosophy based on the Reggio Emilia method of child-directed learning. I worked at this school as a teachers' assistant and aftercare co-ordinator. They were aiming to extend the R.E philosophies to the higher grades as it was so successful. The school was small... and they were not too concerned about hot housing high achievers... but the school gets good results anyhow. When I worked their I attended professional development and toured half a dozen or so other private schools in the area (including Wesley, Lauriston etc) who also were using the R.E philosophies to varying degrees.

Here is an extract from their website: (relevant to Prep - grade 2)

We aspire to maximise the growth and development of girls across all dimensions This means the development of programs that meet the individual needs of a girl's social, emotional, physical, spiritual, moral and academic development.

Within the Junior Discovery Centre the individual learning requirements of each student is met in a challenging, responsive program. Central to the program are the assessment, recording and reporting procedures. The knowledge of the learner is central to the design of individualised programs. The individual learning pathway ensures that each girl is challenged and stimulated to grow and develop at a rate and pace which is appropriate for her. The programs cater for different backgrounds, interest and ways of learning and knowing.

Flexible Groupings

In order to ensure that we are catering for the needs of all learners and providing them with the opportunity to enhance their understandings and learning potential, a number of 'learning groups' operate throughout the day in the Discovery Centre. Across all learning areas, girls are frequently regrouped for different activities rather than being segregated by chronological age. Sometimes girls work alone, sometimes in small groups. Sometimes tasks will be readiness based or interest based and on other occasions they will be constructed to match learning styles.

Whole group instruction may be used to introduce new ideas or for celebrating learning achievements. Flexible grouping of children promotes cognitive and social growth, and encourages a spirit of co-operation rather than competition. Each child is seen as unique and is encouraged to work and make progress at her own level and pace. Social and emotional development is enhanced, intellectual skills are learned and dispositions of greater importance are acquired when children have opportunities to relate to children younger and older than themselves.

ETA: Also, we have sent our DD to 3 Anglican Girls' schools and none have required the girls to have their own laptop or ipad. It was old fashioned text books at all of them.

When I think about it... besides the extra cost of sending my DD to these schools I think the main "privilege" is smaller class sizes and individualised programs. Not that different to why people send themselves to a private hospital (as opposed to public) or drive a private car (as opposed to public transport) when you think about it.

[fionas]

I just read an interesting paper arguing that if parents want to ensure their child gets into university, financially they would be better off NOT sending their children to private school but instead purchasing them a full fee-paying place at their chosen university. The paper was written in 2004, however, and at that time the child's marks needed to be within five marks of the entrance score for that course.

TOTALLY goes against all my meritocratic beliefs but an interesting thought.