Alarm bells rang on the first day of reception at my children’s West London private school as the headmistress addressed us in the gym. “If you ever want to thank me,” she smiled. “A case of Burgundy on the last day of term will be most welcome.”
Everybody laughed heartily but the nature of the request stuck in my throat. Fine wine? On top of the £50,000 a year in school fees that we were going to have to work our socks off to afford?
Other parents took her at her word, though. On the final day of that term, I watched a mum in gym kit navigating a tower of Ruinart champagne cases through the front door. There I was thinking that the £10 per family contribution to the teacher’s SpaceNK vouchers was generous. You can never be generous enough in a London private school, though.
We’re in an incredibly privileged position to be there and yet we feel we don’t give enough compared to the other parents. Over six years in the system, I’ve realised that on top of fees there are two tiers of extra cost: obligatory spends that you’d be judged for not paying and competitive spends that keep you up with the Joneses.
Obligatory spends include joint teachers gifts, leavers books and hoodies, PTA and birthday gifts and end of year parties, and have cost me more than £700 this term alone. Overseas school trips also fall into this category, such as an indulgent-sounding classics trip to Rome.
Meanwhile, competitive spends include individual teachers’ presents – a £100 bouquet of flowers or a facial, for example – mums’ sushi nights, joint holidays with other families (anyone for an Argentine gaucho experience?) and holiday camps like the residential Chelsea Football Academy camp my son’s friends are going on – at a cost of £2,295 per week. Oh, and tutors.
There are a lot of us cash-strapped fee payers who don’t get involved with second tier spends and no one ever complains or comments, particularly since Bridget Philipson added VAT to our school fees bill. I suspect the more competitive parents are relieved that they are winning the arms race. There’s no doubt, though, that the sense of haves and have nots adds pressure within a school community that is already absurdly privileged.
We’re paying tens of thousands per year in school fees and yet I find myself worrying that teachers will prefer the more generous families and that my child might miss out on being friends with children that go on holidays and summer camps that are out of our league. My nine-year-old daughter also feels it: she often asks why we’re not spending half term at so-and-so’s villa in Ibiza or why we’ve never been on a long-haul flight.
Some days, I wonder if we should admit defeat and move into the state sector. Our life would be so much more affordable. Not that we’d be considered wealthy: I know local parents who are far more affluent who have purposefully chosen the state route to keep their children grounded and unspoilt. I wouldn’t be met with shock and surprise when I admit that I haven’t booked a Mediterranean holiday this year, that we only have one car, or that we’re not going to any festivals or concerts this summer.
‘I’ve also learnt that the most glamorous-seeming parents are often the most lonely and insecure. Displaying their wealth is an attempt to belong or to get noticed’ (Photo: Corbis via Getty Images/In Pictures Ltd.)Then I remind myself that the craziness is all white noise really. Apart from a few mega brats, the other children at our school are kind, polite and well mannered. As are the teachers. Of course, they don’t rate their class in terms of whose parent gives the best gifts. A friend who is a teacher says that while it’s fun to go home with champagne at the end of term, it’s the children that she’s there for – the best present is when families tell her that she’s making a difference.
It’s the same for the parents: their chat might be a bit vulgar and they spend a lot of money, but they’re here to do the best for their children. And children are great levellers. It doesn’t follow that the richest parents have the sportiest or cleverist children; at leavers’ prize giving there was no correlation between parent wealth and awards.
As my children have moved up through the school, they’ve found their level. They’re not closest friends with the children with indoor swimming pools or ski chalets. Their parents are more like us – a shame in some ways, as it would be fun for them to get invited on a yacht.
My parent friends are also, on the whole, more like me – but I’m friends with some of the mega wealthy ones, too. I’ve also learnt that the most glamorous-seeming parents are often the most lonely and insecure. Displaying their wealth is an attempt to belong or to get noticed. A few years ago, an American mum in my daughter’s class hosted a lavish Halloween party with entertainers and party bags before promptly fleeing back to America with her children at Christmas. “I’ve never known loneliness like it,” she admitted to me. “My husband works every God given hour and I don’t know a soul in this city. I’ve tried everything to meet people but I’m spending every evening alone.”
Since then, I’ve been much less judgey about other parents’ flippant attitude to spending. Who cares that they see an anti-wrinkle doctor twice a month and spend £25,000 on their child’s orthodontics? They’re also competing to spend as much as possible at the quiz night and the PTA raffle – each year the school gives scrillions to local charities and also supports a number of local state primaries. It’s not the most grounded community but it is a community nonetheless, and there is a lot of kindness and goodwill.
While I prickle at the excessiveness of it all, one can’t complain when the goodwill comes your way. At my son’s recent seventh birthday, he was given a gift card from the class worth £300. “When we go to the shop will you let me buy a magazine?” he said.
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