We sent our eldest son, Isaac, to a private primary school because the only other realistic state option in our area was a bilingual school. I was on board with this option, and still now think he would have been fine – but my husband felt that alternating days where you couldn’t speak your native language might have confused him. At this stage, we also didn’t realise we would have so many other children – Isaac is one of five. If we did, we might have thought twice about sending him private (all our other children are at state school).
But we were now in the system. When we left London for the Essex/ Suffolk border, he moved to a country prep school, where he had six happy years – a very Just William existence. Then Isaac went to a senior private school relatively nearby at the age of 13. It had the option for him to flexi board, which was ideal for us as with four younger children we didn’t want to spend all day in the car stuck in traffic at what we refer to as “the snarl at Braintree”. When he reached his GCSEs in 2022 he was a weekly boarder – the days were so jam packed it made more sense.
We started to talk about switching to state school for his A-Levels. We were spending just under £13,000 per term and the Government had announced plans to impose VAT on school fees. This would raise the cost to over £17,000 per term, something we just couldn’t stretch to. We opted for the sixth form of our daughters’ brilliant comprehensive school, Thomas Gainsborough Sixth Form College.
Isaac was reluctant. He loved the rugby, which at his school was played to a very high standard, with fantastic facilities, as well as all the training and camaraderie. He had a particularly lovely housemaster who had a great way with teenage boys and was a great mentor. He was worried about leaving all his friends.
I knew of a handful of other parents doing the same thing – it’s not uncommon for children to leave private schools after GCSEs and go to their local sixth form after all, and VAT is proving even more of a motivator. A survey published this week suggests one in 10 parents at private schools have left due to the new tax, with many more making significant lifestyle changes to cope with the increased financial outlay.
Most of Isaac’s friends at his school were staying for sixth form so I did feel guilty and nervous about moving him. But I need not have worried. On the first day he came home saying he already knew lots of the students, and everyone was very friendly. He met a boy he had played football with when he was five – he went on to be one of his great mates.
The kids quickly assimilated Isaac into their gang. Isaac held a few parties in our barn for them all – to this day I am still pulling beer bottles out of bushes in the garden. The teens were all very relaxed about it and there was no “us and them” there – I think children worry about these things far less than we as parents do.
The friendly head of sixth form possessed all the brilliant characteristics of other private school teachers we had come across. The headteacher was approachable and totally adept at steering a ship of just shy of 2,000 children.
I made much stronger connections with the parents at his state school. I didn’t interact that much with those at his old school as most of them lived abroad, or had one child, or both. Though they were very nice, it was mostly a case of throwing children at each other and dealing with taxis to the airport. They were very generous and used to bring me bottles of pink champagne and Space NK candles but we didn’t have much contact beyond that. It confirmed to us how vital a school community is – which is much easier to foster when everyone lives nearby, and not commuting from miles away.
Isaac achieved good enough grades to get into a Russell Group university. We both now think he would have done well irrespective of which school he went to. “Private schools will go out of their way to accommodate students who can’t be bothered to work,” he says. “Perhaps this leads to private schoolers being less motivated after school and state school kids having a better work ethic?”
Though Isaac’s sixth-form college could not compete with the academy level of rugby he had at his old school, they did try and form a team and had a few successful matches which were by all accounts great fun. I remember my daughter sending me a few pictures of Isaac playing a friendly football match and it made me so happy, because I don’t think I had ever seen Isaac look so relaxed or content. He loved his time at TGS sixth-form college to the extent that he used to deplore the fact that it was only two years long. He would often wistfully say that he “wished he had more time there”. The punt had paid off more than I could have possibly imagined. I am so proud of Isaac who took to the change like a proper hero.
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I do credit his previous schools with instilling a certain resilience in him that we alone cannot take the credit for. I would go as far to say that it was a group effort, and I am grateful to everyone who played their role in raising him. If he had gone to the village primary he might have come home every day and promptly wired himself up to screens by 4pm, whereas thanks to his private education he played all sorts of team sports and had the benefit of the teachers who took more than a passing interest in him.
But I am now torn over the ethics of private education. It is a very British institution, and I always thought parents should be free to choose whichever school they want to send their child to. I think the VAT raid is absolutely shocking – given there are many children who simply cannot cope in a mainstream state school setting, and many parents who have made all sorts of sacrifices in order to send their child privately.
We’ve undoubtedly benefited from it, but after our recent experience I can’t help thinking that it might just be better if we were all in the same state school boat – weathering the storm that is teenagers and education.
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