Does private schooling help to get a nice career?

hamstercheeks_2

av_raje wrote: »

Didn't want to hijack the other thread, so I am starting a new one. Hope it is ok.

DD1 goes to private school (reception) and DD2 starts in the same school this september. The fees are £2500/term based in Northwest. DD1 is doing quite well and I am happy with the school.

I am generally wondering if pupils who went to private school end up in well paid jobs? If you, your kids or people you know went to private schools how are they doing? Your observation/experience in this context is much appreciated. Many thanks.

I hope this doesn't turn into a debate about private school/state school.

doubt it very much! if someone's as bright as a spark they'll do well no matter what school they attend, same as someone who is thick as mince!

it's more of a class thing with folks i think

hamstercheeks_2

Soubrette wrote: »

This is personal experience and so I do not believe holds true in the majority of cases but I was once friendly with a chap who had gone to a private boys school. We were walking in the centre of Bristol, I was listening while he was extolling the virtues of a private education in general and of single sex school in particular.

In the middle of a monologue about the career prospects to be gained by this style of education, he paused and nodded at an unkempt individual with a sandwich board on.

'Who was that?' I asked 'Oh someone I went to school with' was the airy answer.

This is not made up

Sou

:T brilliant!!:T

leiela

I think it "helps" but i think a person's success is more down to a person's indervidual drive.

I was publicy schooled, but i went to university with privatly schooled friends, and the only difference i really noticed was that i found it alot harder to get into the university i wanted to go to, and the grade requirements at A-Level where alot lower to get onto the same course. I needed 4 A's while the privatly schooled ones where accepted with C's and D's :mad: :mad: :mad:

However once into university the playing field leveled out, we all did the same course, all got similar grades and went into the working world. Out of a group of 6 of us, two where privatly schooled yet i was the only one who got a 1st .. the others got 2:1''s.

3 years later we are all still earning roughly the same (within 5k of each other) but im the one with the most impressive CV, i've been offered jobs in the last couple of months alone that would mean a 5-10k payrise even though im currently "not looking", and made the decision to say in my current role to avoid "job hoping" too quickly as it will look bad and my CV.

Actual job wise ... i've currently got the most "interesting job" in that i have quite a senior position while the others are still in very much "developer, graduate roles" doing the same boring things every day.

Granted im being DRASTICALLY underpaid for the amount of work and responsibility i have, see that as you will. Some people would say im an idiot for doing so much for so little pay, while i prefere to think of it as im doing a hell of alot, learning alot and when its time to move it will mean im able to make a bigger career jump as ill have loads of experience above someone normally at my point in my career.

All in all i think private schools do give a better start ... but at the end of the day kids/adults who WANT to do well WILL do well, and those that arn't motivated wont, regardless of which school they went too.

Personally i have two little boys, my eldest is very bright, very motivated and i would like to get him into private school, in an effort to jump start him into a good university. However my second son is no way interested in school or learning he's there because he HAS to be and for him i feel private school would be a waste of money, because tbh i don't think he's ever going to be the type who's going to be motivated enough to do well in a career infact i doubt he'll even go to university unless i force him (which i have no intention of doing)

Besides at the end of the day what is sucess?? if my eldest go's to uni and becomes a doctor or lawyer and hates it, while my youngest stacks shelves and loves it. Who would be the most sucessfull???

P.S ... both my parents where university graduates my dad was a chemical engineer earning 100k+ a year, while my mum was a reasearch scientist earning about 50k a year.

Both clever, both educated (my mum went to private school) yet about 5 years ago the both gave up thses jobs at the time i thought they where gonig though some crazy midlife crisis.

Right now my Dad works in asda bakery, and my mum is a craft co-ordinator in a nursing home, both most likely earning just alittle above minamum wage... yet in 30years i've never known either of them happier and im now VERY VERY proud of them both for making the leap and doing something which at the time would have been very scarey, not to mention risky.

Money isn't everything.

Lunar_Eclipse

av_raje wrote: »

I am generally wondering if pupils who went to private school end up in well paid jobs?

Firstly, I think it depends on many factors and there are many very successful and rich people who were state educated.

But from experience, I have found that most people who go to a good as opposed to any private school (think top of the league tables) do end up in very well paid jobs. All the doctors, lawyers, big six partners, self made millionaire entrepreneurs that I know personally all went to these excellent private schools. Maybe it's just coincidence.

I also know people who were state educated and have done well. Not equally well, but certainly in well respected middle management positions by the time they turn 40.

But putting numbers out there, everyone I know who earns 100k plus before 40 as an employee all went to private school.

I would not say this is reflective generally of private vs state, but certainly of the best private schools, of which I have experience. Sadly I married into the state sector, hence my other thread about financing private school! :rotfl:

grahamliza4

My experience;

I had a full academic scholarship to a £20,000 a year school, my mother was an alcoholic who lived on benefits and threw me out at 16 as she couldn't be bothered anymore. I had to leave the school and work to live, as I was homeless for a while. Apparently when I wasn't just there anymore one day the other girls thought I'd left because I'd upset another girl - haha. This says a lot about what kind of people they were.

Now I'm an accountant and obviously this is fairly well paid. I had to train for this through a night school/outside work type of thing as I had to be in continuous paid employment to earn the money to live on; no fast track YTS for me. The reason I was able to do this is because I have a high IQ, and nothing to do with where I went to school. I could never go to university because I had no family, no base, no support, etc. So this was the next best route to a well paid career.

When I was at the school I could never fully participate as there was no money to pay for all the millions of little extras you need, like special games kit and trainers and school trips, etc. Nobody there understood this and I used to get yelled at for my shabby shoes. My mother used to lie to the school in her more lucid moments and say she'd bought me new ones but I refused to wear them. Obviously they believed her and not me.

There were loads a different types of people there. Some were middle class having the fees paid by wealthy relatives, there was a Lady so-and-so, Major Colonel Whatnots daughter, etc. Out of about 35 in my year (small I know), I count 6 anorexics, 4 alcoholics, 1 stripper, few with serious mental health problems and a few who have had past troubles with drugs/alcohol etc. Of course there are loads of them doing well in well paid jobs, or still happy in less well paid jobs. There's a few married off to rich men about 5 minutes out of university so they can at least claim to have wanted a career.

It doesnt matter where you go to school. It's all about a much wider array of things, obviously who you are and how motivated you are and what you wanted to do anyway. The support you get from parents is crucial - I might as well have not bothered with school for the difference it made to my life. There are plenty of oppotunities to 'network', as I saw in a post here, but the people who could do such things for you are never going to invite you back to their estates for shooting weekends if you live in a 3 bed semi. That's just not how it works. Maybe in films the prince&the pauper but in reality the nobs will band together and everyone else who lacks a few acres and a range rover doesn't matter to them. I see no point in scrimping to send kids to private schools - if you can't afford the standard of living to match it your child will be 'different' - they'd be better of in a state school able to join in with talking about going to tescos with their mums rather than wondering why they don't have a 'help' at home who does this while mummy goes to the spa. Any spare cash would be well spent on books, trips to places, music lessons, etc. It's all about the experience you get growing up. Does this make sense? I hope you get my point, I struggle to put this across to other people I'm afraid.

Marcheline

You've put it across most eloquently!

olly300

leiela wrote: »

I was publicy schooled, but i went to university with privatly schooled friends, and the only difference i really noticed was that i found it alot harder to get into the university i wanted to go to, and the grade requirements at A-Level where alot lower to get onto the same course. I needed 4 A's while the privatly schooled ones where accepted with C's and D's :mad: :mad: :mad:

I don't know whether it was the same for you but when I filled in my university form I had to put the jobs of my parents down.

I then discovered the grades you had to get varied with:
1. What type of school or college you went to i.e. how many students tended to go on to university
2. What your parents did for a living

So as your parents did jobs that required higher education of some sort it's not surprising that universities expected you to get higher grades.

There as some people I know had parents who did what your parents do now and went to a school/college where it was rare for anyone to go to university so they got low offers.

I should point out I went to basically a 6th form college with a university rate of about 95% due to kicking out people at various times over the 2 years who they decided where not suitable for the A level courses, and I put my parents down as retired as my parents where drawing pensions even though they both weren't fully retired.

Edited to say:
I know state educated doctors and lawyers but their parents are all professionals i.e. teachers, university lecturers, engineers.

I also know someone who is basically a CEO of a large company and they are state educated. They didn't get support from their parents there as those with professional parents did.

Geenie

My two children went through the private school system, the youngest is finishing this summer.We chose this course not for any social climbing, but because when looking around schools whilst they were young, we were more impressed with the private sector then state 20 years ago.

We started with Montessori and then went on to single sex private. The class rooms were smaller, the teachers were enthusiastic and happy, which impacts on those they are teaching. They were not constrained. It was a finacial sacrifice for many years which meant we couldn't have many holidays, unlike some of the richer friends!

But no regerets, as having an 18 year old loving Shakespeare, science, music, sport and her school has made it worthwhile.

That said, our local states have improved no end since we first looked 20 years ago, and they have good results. The only thing I have heard from local parents is that if your child is not considered gifted and keeps the exam results up for the tables, they are side lined and not given the same treatment as those who can!

poet123

Having had children go through both systems(their own choice). I can say that their results were almost identical,and they obtained places at the same Universities. So it seems to me that it is down to the child,their background and parental involvement,rather than solely down to the kind of school.

mookiandco

I went to private school and I am a solicitor. My brother went to the same school, he went to university, he then got 1/2 way through a phd in neurology and decided that it didnt make him happy and that he wanted to work in a bar. My parents were very disappointed having paid for his education and financially supported him through university.

On a personal note, I hated my school. It was a boarding school 3 hours away from home. I started at 11. It was so pretensious and all for show. If you werent good at sport, or outstanding in art or drama or educationally then you were virtually ignored. They were quite happy to take parents money and parents assumed that for that money they would be paying for top class care and education, but that wasnt the reality of it. My parents didnt take an interest in my education after all thats what they were paying the school for. I was very institutionalised after leaving boarding school. No real idea about 'the outside world'. When I went to university I paid my own way through to qualify as a solicitor. That was my choice, as far as my parents were concerned they had done their bit.

I am pregnant with my first child. I feel that if a child is going to achieve then they will regardless of where they go to school. I would place my child's happiness above all else and would never send them to boarding school at 11. Thats my own experience of the private school system and many of my ex school friends take the same view.