Come off it. On the other thread it is accepted that private schooling will exist. I just don’t want to subsidise it. You expect me to weep because this guy won’t be able to afford to segregate but others can? That’s a strong point to you, is it?
Grinds and language trips growing exponentially? Who knows. Who cares.
I am sure the UK system has evolved in it own way with its own influences different to ours. I think they pay in full, which is proper order.
I can’t help note the irony of using the UK system as a bogeyman, given how eh, sympathetic, some Irish private school products and parents are to the UK! A woman on the radio said her son was in “Prep School” Am I paying for that charade too! His little cap and blazer and a “tuck box”!
You don’t get to carve out general tax receipts to your own projects such as segregationist education. There’s longstanding tax law on that based on a challenge around Motor tax not having to get spent on roads.
France has a similar system to ours. The UK system is horribly elitist, producing the Etonians currently running the country, totally divorced from the reality of life for large parts of the country. I think our system, and the French system, is immeasurably better than theirs
You have an ideological problem with fee-charging schools, you seem to have a chip on your shoulder about it. You’d prefer to see the education system thrown into chaos and damaged for everyone to satisfy your ideological whims. And you’re bringing some nationalistic anti-Brit inferiority complex into it as well now.
I asked in the other thread and nobody was able to answer sensibly - paint me a picture of how Ireland’s education system would be better if funding was withdrawn from fee-charging schools. I can foresee lots of losers, no winners.
Dont know anything about Ireland but the UK system is a total joke.
If youre in a bad area, you are utterly, utterly fucked. Theres no other word for it.
If youre in a good area, then you pay for it in housing and, by extension, council taxes.
Faith schools are popular and very oversubscribed.
Private (public) schools can be fairly expensive but not always as well performing as state schools, reason being that all you need is money to get in, not smarts.
That leaves the Grammar schools.
These are state schools that have entrance exams, thus there is no financial barrier to entry.
There is no geographical barrier either; only how far you want your kids to travel.
They are very controversial over here, with the left in particular trying to get rid of them.
(God forbid a child from a disadvantaged background should have the opportunity to succeed!)
A majority of kids in these schools would be from the economic middle - 3/4 bed semi land - not the kids of millionaires.
The results they produce though are orders of magnitude above the ‘open entry’ schools, even in the same area.
The UK also produce league tables of results from their exam results which can be viewed online.
Here in the UK, independent schools are obliged to allow the local state schools to use their facilities including playing fields, swimming pools etc, and an amount that is normally paid by the local council per child into the state system to educate each child, is diverted to the state system for every child that is privately educated living in that authority, to subsidise local state schools - it was around 5k per child per a mum the last time I looked. So, if I educate my 2 kids privately, the local education authority gets an additional 10k paid to it because my kids are educated privately. I live within one mile of 9 independent schools, a few of them at the top of the league tables. Our 2 local state schools are all on special measures as people move to this area for the independent schools.
Myself and my husband work in the public sector. We had no choice in schools as we are not religious and the state schools we were offered for our children were terrible. We pay over 32k in school fees per year for our kids to go to school. 16k PA is fairly typical here per child. There is no social diversity in these schools at all. They are all hedge funders kids in the local independent schools.
I have followed the IT reporting on this for years. Yes it is. For years they printed the “subsidy” given to schools with no mention of the real position of this payment. They printed 100million without mentioning that this is a payment to the Unionised teachers. They printed this as if it was unique to Ireland when it goes on all over the world. Seán Flynn as Education editor attacked fee paying schools for years in that paper. Check out the Education notes on a Tuesday for years and years and what he said. That is a fact if you want to go over the archives or ask the man himself, he does not like the places.
When Hook and the Belvedere principal was one of the first times I have ever seen a defense of these schools. They printed league tables, and used them to attack without any sound analysis of just one metric of a good school
The reason why there are less in Ireland is because of fee paying schools and grinds, there is less demand. However, with more children in the free sector demand for such Colleges WILL increase. Parents will save what they would have spent over 6 years for the final 2 years.
The IOE have permanent positions as well, just paid more money. Annually they ask those who go into their grinds to tell them of good teachers in their own schools. This will happen more and more.
It is nonsense because it says that fee paying schools are the only reason for this inequality. This is just CIRCUMSTANCES. These kids have probably been given more extra curricular activities, more early pre schooling, more money on books and just more stuff in general than kids from not as good a background all through life. Fee paying schools are just another step in the road. This inequality will not disappear. If a parent who can afford to spend 5000 a year on fees but can’t afford the new 8000 fees, sends their kid instead to a free school (WHICH THEY HAVE ALREADY PAID FOR IN TAXES, BUT CURRENTLY SUBSIDISE FREE SCHOOLS IN NOT TAKING UP THAT RIGHT) then they won’t just not spend that money.
As I said, there will be more grind schools for the last two year. There will be more language trips. With the way 3rd level fees are going they will just stuff their pockets with that cash and pay the regressive fees the Govt have currently installed (we’ll be at 3,000 per student soon, this is regressive and unfair on the poorest) The inequality will persist. ALWAYS.
Most of these schools are just as good as the Free ones. Muckross and the two Coláiste are better than most fee paying schools. Location and circumstances of the schoolgoers is the reason why they do well. This will persist.
The real question is why schools in poorer areas don’t do as well. Blaming it on fee paying ones is hilarious tbf.
The State are merely paying the taxes paid by fee paying school parents for secondary schooling for their kids to teachers. They are paying the teachers in line with Union agreements. The one good thing about Union agreements is that it is no more advantageous (teaching wise) to be a teacher in a Community School than a fee paying one. No extra salary. This helps spreads the good and bad teachers out. There is plenty of dross in fee paying ones who cannot be moved because of the Union agreements.
I think the point is that the tax money of parents would would like to send their children to that school - but cannot afford to - is also paying the teachers in that school.
Would be relevant if there wasn’t hundreds of others schools to choose from, from a teaching pool which is as good as the fee paying teaching pool.
Same parents are enjoying more money being spent on their child for teachers than fee paying ones by the State despite paying taxes. Same parents are enjoying more money than they otherwise would get if the fee paying school parents took up their places at these schools and didn’t leave that money there for the State.
So tell me how you are going to make it better. Talk me through it.
You could make it so that my kids can’t afford to go there either. Or the children of the local garda, or the children of teachers. How does that help anyone? Does your original local kid who can’t go there feel consoled?
If it makes it easier to accept the status quo you can look at the current system as the state supporting increased equality. The way the system is structured puts private education in reach of perhaps a quarter of the population, removing the state payment to fee-charging schools creates a less equal system, with true elitism for a small percentage and the state system as a whole damaged considerably
On point one in bold, I don’t think that anybody on threads here has suggested that private schools could be eliminated entirely. If people want to pay the full cost of segregating their children then as it stands they are entitled to do that.
On point two in bold, it is similar, if people want to spend their money on additional educational supports then they are free to do that.
The main issue that I have with private schools is that they promote inequality of opportunity. Children should be provided with the opportunity of an education by the state. if you want to opt out of equal access for all schooling then you should be willing to pay the cost yourself.
I find it curious that these discussions always seem to focus on money, rather than anything substantive about the nature of the education.
Almost as if nobody actually cares what happens in the school, just so long as no one else’s children are allowed to gain any sort of relative advantage.
Maybe you should try reading it another way, it is not about restricting advantage, it is about equality of opportunity. People who can afford state subsidised fee paying schools will still be able to buy their children advantage, it wont be state supported.
If you can show me any evidence that some of the tax you pay is ring fenced for education then please do. I am a relatively high-earning individual with no dependants. I put more into the system than I take out, yet I can’t ring fence any of my contributions for things that I’d like to see financed.
Nobody is denying you the right to spend your money as you please. The problem is that you want to ring fence the amount that the government is willing to contribute to your childrens education and then lock others out by adding a yearly fee that is unaffordable for many.
Do you think that in a society you should get out of the state exactly what you put in? Is that the premise you are working from?
I’ve never suggested that it is ring-fenced, as I’m sure you know. The complaint about ‘ring fencing your taxation’ and ‘state supported inequality’ are fairly technical and esoteric anyway. What do we do next, forbid Irish Rail from selling First Class tickets? Ban private health insurance and private rooms in hospitals?
The important thing is the effect in reality, the experience of children in various parts of the education sector, and the potential effects of any changes that you are proposing will have. I’ve written elsewhere that I predict lots of losers, and no winners. Tell me otherwise, explain to me how the system can be improved.
