Nice people thread part 4 - sugar and spice and all things

vivatifosi

PasturesNew wrote: »

Do you all live in areas that still have grammar schools? Where I grew up they were abolished in about 1973-74... it's weird when you guys mention grammar schools.

They were abolished in Hertfordshire too. Yet bizarrely some towns still have them. I went to a plain old poorly performing comprehensive. It is still a plain old poorly performing comprehensive now, even though all of the staff and the catchment have completely changed.

michaels

I think you and I and singlesue and Viva should have our own not posh not public school np thread

PasturesNew wrote: »

pfft £63.... that's my answer.

PasturesNew

silvercar wrote: »

I've also never been in a charity shop, let alone haggled in one.

I'd say, on an annual basis, I am in C shops about 150 times .... and real/new stuff shops about once (usually leaving without buying). There's never anything I like/that suits/fits in either to be honest, but I do keep an eye out in the C shops and don't mind spending £3-5 on something that might turn out to be a mistake by the 3rd wearing, rather than parting with £25-50 for something that is a mistake.

I need a petite range, but there's so little in petite ranges (and they're rarely available at all) that most clothes will never fit me to start with.

PasturesNew

zagubov wrote: »

I feel experiences are the best presents so one way to think of this is that you're giving your friends your company as a present. You'd spend that much on a group of friends (I guess):D

You can have an experience with friends with a 40p bag of bread and a £3 hot pasty at a duck pond though... and a lot of fun.

PasturesNew

fc123 wrote: »

Go earlier and hit the sales. Then you could 'save' £200 on some new shoes (or whatever) that would have cost £400 so making the net cost of the day only £150 including 3 or 4 pairs of new shoes.

It's not though is it... it's increasing the spend from £63 to £263.
£1 says she's already got more shoes than she needs/wears.

LydiaJ

PasturesNew wrote: »

Do you all live in areas that still have grammar schools? Where I grew up they were abolished in about 1973-74... it's weird when you guys mention grammar schools.

Where I grew up they'd been abolished too. Gloucestershire still has them, though. The non-grammars are now comprehensives rather than secondary moderns, though, so if you don't try for grammar or don't get in then you still end up at a school where you can do all the subjects and be entered for proper exams, unlike in the "bad old days".

Most of the state primary schools pretend the grammars don't exist, and they don't teach kids how to do the verbal reasoning tests that the grammar entrance is based on. So if you want your kid to have a chance of getting in, you either have to send them to a private primary (which all coach them for the state grammar entrance exam) or send them to some kind of tutor, or coach them for it yourself. It's a weird hotchpotch of a system.

michaels

My comprehensive (former secondary modern) streamed and setted so the brighter could be stretched but weren't treated as a class apart never seeing their peers who were not so academically focussed and all came together for PE, technical subjects and home economics etc. And no one had that precosiousness / I am better than other people sense that some seem to think is the 'benefit' of a private edcuation.

vivatifosi

michaels wrote: »

My comprehensive (former secondary modern) streamed and setted so the brighter could be stretched but weren't treated as a class apart never seeing their peers who were not so academically focussed and all came together for PE, technical subjects and home economics etc. And no one had that precosiousness / I am better than other people sense that some seem to think is the 'benefit' of a private edcuation.

That's what happened at my school too. I wasn't in the brightest set, but in a mottley crew who could try harder but actually enjoyed each other's company a bit too much and messed around more than we should (but with the brains to be in the top bunch if we applied ourselves). We used to get up to all sorts of mischief. It didn't stand us in too bad a stead though, I've mentioned before, of the 30 in my class one is now a captain of industry with a CBE and another is very highly recognised in his field with an OBE. None of them left school with a chip on their shoulder because they came from a council estate and although most of us left with just O or A levels rather than going to uni, I'd say at least a third now have some form of degree. It's all about applying yourself and making the most of the hand you are dealt.

silvercar

PasturesNew wrote: »

Do you all live in areas that still have grammar schools? Where I grew up they were abolished in about 1973-74... it's weird when you guys mention grammar schools.

We don't, but luckily live about a mile from the county border so can nip across it to access the one grammar school that that area still has.

In fact within school commuting distance we can access Hertfordshire and 4 London borough education authorities, so there is a lot of cross border traffic.

The Greenwich ruling in 1999 gave everyone access to any school that they could choose and satsify the entrance criteria of:

" The first crucial judgement, known as the Greenwich ruling, went against Greenwich Council in south west London. It established that local education authorities could not stop children travelling to their schools from outside their boundaries.

Then came Rotherham. The Court of Appeal ruled that the local education authority there had acted unlawfully by automatically allocating school places to children living in a catchment area, because that did not give sufficient choice to parents from outside the area."

So we have access to 1 grammar schools, a few schools of various religious persuasions, a few decent comprehensives, a few dire sink comps and a good smattering of private schools.

So those that want can travel; a lot don't and just choose the nearest school. Something to be said for that, if everyone did so, each school would reflect its local population and there would be a lot less traffic on the road. For us the nearest school is the sink comp, so we ain't going there.

silvercar

michaels wrote: »

My comprehensive (former secondary modern) streamed and setted so the brighter could be stretched but weren't treated as a class apart never seeing their peers who were not so academically focussed and all came together for PE, technical subjects and home economics etc. And no one had that precosiousness / I am better than other people sense that some seem to think is the 'benefit' of a private edcuation.

Grr!

More like, they have had the benefit of a decent education and should make the most of it.

My elder's state grammar school tried to compare itself to a local private academic school and work out the difference in outcome. Academically it was slightly better, but it found that the students weren't so "polished", so it instigated a series of formal dinners for the sixth formers to attend. They also invited local dignatories and former pupils. It was very successful.