Election Year or Fear!

[ramAnag]

In your rush to ridicule I think you misread. Tut tut and after youd rebuked TTR for the same!

Have I? Perfectly possible but please explain.

[Andy_Faber]

Have I? Perfectly possible but please explain.

Their ethos references equitynot equality

[ramAnag]

Really? Perhaps you’re confusing schools. The online prospectus I’m looking at opens with, ‘Our ethos at Dulwich (that’s a clue) is one of EQUALITY and our values are founded on respect and support for others.’
Just to make sure there’s a picture of ‘The Master’, Dr. Joe Spence, to go with it.
Small point but, maybe in your rush to correct, your comprehension let you down again. Maybe those classes that were mentioned are still available. I’m quietly relieved really…thought I might have messed up the numbers again.

[Andy_Faber]

Really? Perhaps you’re confusing schools. The online prospectus I’m looking at opens with, ‘Our ethos at Dulwich (that’s a clue) is one of EQUALITY and our values are founded on respect and support for others.’
Just to make sure there’s a picture of ‘The Master’, Dr. Joe Spence, to go with it.
Small point but, maybe in your rush to correct, your comprehension let you down again. Maybe those classes that were mentioned are still available. I’m quietly relieved really…thought I might have messed up the numbers again.

Nope, it appears we are both right. ‘Equity’ is their primary value (synonymous with ethos)

[Andy_Faber]

But more importantly, why the ridicule? Have you got a fundamental issue with Independant schools and those who choose to use them?

[ramAnag]

So both your assertion that I’d ‘misread’ and your subsequent correction were entirely wrong, and it does clearly say, ‘our ethos at Dulwich is one of Equality…’

As for ridicule and Independent schools. It wasn’t really ‘ridicule’ was it? I was just drawing attention to the irony of a school claiming to be based on an ethos of equality charging between £26k and £56k per pupil per year when the average UK salary is, I believe, around £28k.

Do I have a problem with Independent Schools and those who use them? I recognise that any right minded parent is going to want their child to go to the best available school. It’s interesting though, as I’ve mentioned before, the level of facilities that such schools can offer and, if one reads a little further, where they ‘boast’ at Dulwich about their average class size being just 21.
Education is an area that, as you know, I do know a little bit about and I reckon that if more of the low achieving schools in Derby - or the country as a whole - could offer such reduced class sizes and vastly improved resources and facilities then we’d go a long way towards curing society of some of its ills.

So, to come full circle, I don’t have a problem with people wanting the best for their kids…I do have a problem with the huge inequality and self perpetuating nature of the current system. In ‘manifesto terms’ I’d like to see the best for ALL kids.

[MadAmster]

On the subject of private schools, who is for, and who is against, charging VAT on private school fees?

It's an option people with enough money can choose. Yes, there are some middle income families that scrimp and scrape in order to be able to pay the fees for their offspring but the vast majority of pupils at these schools come from the richer households. Should they be exempt from VAT?

[Andy_Faber]

So both your assertion that I’d ‘misread’ and your subsequent correction were entirely wrong, and it does clearly say, ‘our ethos at Dulwich is one of Equality…’

As for ridicule and Independent schools. It wasn’t really ‘ridicule’ was it? I was just drawing attention to the irony of a school claiming to be based on an ethos of equality charging between £26k and £56k per pupil per year when the average UK salary is, I believe, around £28k.

Do I have a problem with Independent Schools and those who use them? I recognise that any right minded parent is going to want their child to go to the best available school. It’s interesting though, as I’ve mentioned before, the level of facilities that such schools can offer and, if one reads a little further, where they ‘boast’ at Dulwich about their average class size being just 21.
Education is an area that, as you know, I do know a little bit about and I reckon that if more of the low achieving schools in Derby - or the country as a whole - could offer such reduced class sizes and vastly improved resources and facilities then we’d go a long way towards curing society of some of its ills.

So, to come full circle, I don’t have a problem with people wanting the best for their kids…I do have a problem with the huge inequality and self perpetuating nature of the current system. In ‘manifesto terms’ I’d like to see the best for ALL kids.

No we were both right and I’m not up for another hair splitting ruck so subject closed

Surely you can’t mean ‘the best’, it just wouldn’t be affordable, and I don’t mean a need to pay fees, I mean staffing and infrastructure. The workforce would need to at least double and that’s just an easy example.

However as you say you know more about it from the state side than I do so I won’t pretend to be in the know