Independent school (United Kingdom) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia - 0 views
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History
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Edward Thring of Uppingham School introduced major reforms, focusing on the importance of the individual and competition, as well as the need for a "total curriculum" with academia, music, sport and drama being central to education
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The Independent Schools Council say that UK independent schools receive approximately £100m tax relief due to charitable status whilst returning £300m of fee assistance in public benefit and relieving the maintained sector (state schools) of £2bn of costs
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They were schools for the gentlemanly elite of Victorian politics, armed forces and colonial government. Often successful businessmen would send their sons to a public school as a mark of participation in the elite
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the public school system influenced the school systems of the British Empire, and recognisably "public" schools can be found in many Commonwealth countries
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The Direct Grant Grammar Schools (Cessation of Grant) Regulations 1975 required these schools to choose between full state funding as comprehensive schools and full independence
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Until 1975 there had been a group of 179 academically selective schools drawing on both private and state funding, the direct grant grammar schools
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Both these trends were reversed during the 1980s, and the share of the independent schools reached 7.5 percent by 1991
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share of the independent sector fell from a little under 8 percent in 1964 to reach a low of 5.7 percent in 1978
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changes since 1990 have been less dramatic, participation falling to 6.9 percent by 1996 before increasing very slightly after 2000 to reach 7.2 percent, as seen at present.
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As of 2011[update] there were more than 2,600 independent schools in the UK educating some 628,000 children, comprising over 6.5 percent of UK children, and more than 18 percent of pupils over the age of 16
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According to a study by Ryan & Sibetia,[7] "the proportion of pupils attending independent schools in England is currently 7.2 percent (considering full-time pupils only)".
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Most public schools developed significantly during the 18th and 19th centuries, and came to play an important role in the development of the Victorian social elite
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Independent schools, like state grammar schools, are free to select their pupils, subject to general legislation against discrimination
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principal forms of selection are financial, in that the pupil's family must be able to pay the school fees, and academic, with many administering their own entrance exams - some also require that the prospective student undergo an interview, and credit may also be given for musical, sporting or other talent
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Nowadays most schools pay little regard to family connections, apart from siblings currently at the school.
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Only a small minority of parents can afford school fees averaging over £23,000 per annum for boarding pupils and £11,000 for day pupils, with additional costs for uniform, equipment and extra-curricular facilities.[2][12]
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Scholarships and means-tested bursaries to assist the education of the less well-off are usually awarded by a process which combines academic and other criteria.[13][14]
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longer teaching hours (sometimes including Saturday morning teaching) and homework, though shorter terms
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a broader education than that prescribed by the national curriculum, to which state school education is in practice limited.
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As boarding schools are fully responsible for their pupils throughout term-time, pastoral care is an essential part of independent education, and many independent schools teach their own distinctive ethos, including social aspirations, manners and accents, associated with their own school traditions
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Most offer sporting, musical, dramatic and art facilities, sometimes at extra charges, although often with the benefit of generations of past investment
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Independent school pupils are four times more likely to attain an A* at GCSE than their non-selective state sector counterparts and twice as likely to attain an A grade at A-level
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Some schools specialise in particular strengths, whether academic, vocational or artistic, although this is not as common as it is in the State sector.
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In England and Wales there are no requirements for teaching staff to have Qualified Teacher Status or to be registered with the General Teaching Council
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2014 a report from Oxford Economics highlighted the impact that independent schools have on the British economy
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independent schools support an £11.7 billion contribution to gross value added (GVA) in Britain. This represents the share of GDP that is supported by independent schools
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Independent schools support 275,700 jobs across Britain, around 1.0% of all in employment in Britain
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the report quantified the savings to the taxpayer derived from c.620,000 British pupils at independent schools choosing not to take up the place at a state school to which they are entitled. This results in an annual saving to the taxpayer of £3.9 billion, the equivalent of building more than 590 new free schools each year
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the report highlighted the additional value to Britain’s GDP that results from the higher educational performance achieved by pupils at independent schools
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many of the best-known public schools are extremely expensive, and many have entry criteria geared towards those who have been at private "feeder" preparatory-schools or privately tutored
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the achievement of pupils at independent schools in Britain results in an estimated additional annual contribution to GDP of £1.3 billion.
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Although grammar schools are rare, some of them are highly selective and state funded boarding schools require substantial fees
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Even traditional comprehensive schools may be effectively selective because only wealthier families can afford to live in their catchment area
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may be argued that the gap in performance between state schools is much larger than that between the better state and grammar schools and the independent sector
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Smithers and Robinson's 2010 Sutton Trust commissioned study of social variation in comprehensive schools (excluding grammar schools) notes that "The 2,679 state comprehensive schools in England are highly socially segregated: the least deprived comprehensive in the country has 1 in 25 (4.2 percent) of pupils with parents on income benefits compared with over 16 times as many (68.6 percent) in the most deprived comprehensive"
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The Thatcher government introduced the Assisted Places Scheme in England and Wales in 1980, whereby the state paid the school fees for those pupils capable of gaining a place but unable to afford the fees
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The scheme was terminated by the Labour government in 1997, and since then the private sector has moved to increase its own means-tested bursaries.
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Some parents complain that their rights and their children’s are compromised by vague and one-sided contracts which allow Heads to use discretionary powers unfairly, such as in expulsion on non-disciplinary matters. They believe independent schools have not embraced the principles of natural justice as adopted by the state sector, and private law as applied to Higher Education
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Nowadays, independent school pupils have "the highest rates of achieving grades A or B in A-level maths and sciences" compared to grammar, specialist and mainstream state school
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pupils at independent schools account for a disproportionate number of the total number of A-levels in maths and sciences.
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In 2006, pupils at fee-paying schools made up 43 percent of those selected for places at Oxford University and 38 percent of those granted places at Cambridge University (although such pupils represent only 18 percent of the 16 years old plus school population)
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A major area of debate in recent years has centred around the continuing charitable status of independent schools, which allows them not to charge VAT on school fees. Following the enactment of the Charities Bill, which was passed by the House of Lords in November 2006, charitable status is based on an organisation providing a "public benefit" as judged by the Charity Commission.[23]
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"ceteris paribus, academic performance at university is better the more advantaged is the student's home background".
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they also observed that a student educated at an independent school was on average 6 percent less likely to receive a first or an upper second class degree than a student from the same social class background, of the same gender, who had achieved the same A-level score at a state school
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The same study found wide variations between independent school, suggesting that students from a few of them were in fact significantly more likely to obtain the better degrees than state students of the same gender and class background having the same A-level score
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Richard Partington at Cambridge University[29] showed that A-level performance is "overwhelmingly" the best predictor for exam performance in the earlier years ("Part I") of the undergraduate degree at Cambridge
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A study commissioned by the Sutton Trust[30] and published in 2010 focussed mainly on the possible use of U.S.-style SAT tests as a way of detecting a candidate's academic potential. Its findings confirmed those of the Smith & Naylor study in that it found that privately educated pupils who, despite their educational advantages, have only secured a poor A-level score, and who therefore attend less selective universities, do less well than state educated degree candidates with the same low A-level attainment
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Independent sector schools regularly dominate the top of the A-level league tables, and their students are more likely to apply to the most selective universities; as a result independent sector students are particularly well represented at these institutions, and therefore only the very ablest of them are likely to secure the best degrees.
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In 2013 the Higher Education Funding Council for England published a study [31] noting, amongst other things, that a greater percentage of students who had attended an independent school prior to university achieved a first or upper second class degree compared with students from state schools