British Private Schools: Research on Policy and Practice (Woburn Education Series)

BRITISH PRIVATE SCHOOLS

Woburn Education Series General Series Editor: Professor Peter Gordon ISSN 1462–2076 For over twenty years this series on the history, development and policy of education, under the distinguished editorship of Peter Gordon, has been evolving into a comprehensive and balanced survey of important trends in teaching and educational policy. The series is intended to reflect the changing nature of education in presentday society. The books are divided into four sections—educational policy studies, educational practice, the history of education and social history—and reflect the continuing interest in this area. For a full series listing, please visit our website: www.woburnpress.com Educational Practice Slow Learners. A Break in the Circle: A Practical Guide for TeachersDiane Griffin Games and Simulations in Action Alec Davison and Peter Gordon Music in Education: A Guide for Parents and Teachers Malcolm Carlton The Education of Gifted Children David Hopkinson Teaching and Learning Mathematics Peter G.Dean Comprehending Comprehensives Edward S.Conway Teaching the Humanities edited by Peter Gordon Teaching Science edited by Jenny Frost The Private Schooling of Girls: Past and Present edited by Geoffrey Walford International Yearbook of History Education, Volume 1 edited by Alaric Dickinson, Peter Gordon, Peter Lee and John Slater A Guide to Educational Research edited by Peter Gordon The TUC and Education Reform, 1926–1970 Clive Griggs

BRITISH PRIVATE SCHOOLS Research on Policy and Practice

Editor

GEOFFREY WALFORD University of Oxford

WOBURN PRESS LONDON • PORTLAND, OR

First published in 2003 in Great Britain by WOBURN PRESS Crown House, 47 Chase Side, Southgate London N14 5BP This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2005. “To purchase your own copy of this or any of Taylor & Francis or Routledge’s collection of thousands of eBooks please go to www.eBookstore.tandf.co.uk.” and in the United States of America by WOBURN PRESS c/o ISBS 920 NE 58th Avenue, Suite 300 Portland, Oregon 97213–3786 Website: www.woburnpress.com Copyright © 2003 The Woburn Press Copyright of articles © 2003 individual contributors British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data British private schools: research on policy and practice. —(Woburn education series) 1. Private schools—Great Britain 2. Private schools—Great Britain—History I. Walford, Geoffrey 371’.02’0941 ISBN 0-203-49474-1 Master e-book ISBN

ISBN 0-203-58112-1 (Adobe eReader Format) ISBN 0-7130-0228-X(cloth) ISBN 0-7130-4048-3 (paper) ISSN 1462-2076 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data British private schools: research on policy and practice/edited by Geoffrey Walford. p. cm.—(Woburn education series, ISSN 1462–2076) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 0-7130-0228-X (cloth)—ISBN 0-7130-048-3 (pbk.) 1. Private schools—Great Britain. 2. Private schools—Government policy—Great Britain. I. Walford, Geoffrey. II. Series. LC53.G7B75 2003 371.02’0941–dc21 2002041477 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publisher of this book

Contents

Notes on Contributors Introduction Geoffrey Walford

vii 1

Part I— HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVES 1

From Labour to New Labour: Bridging the Divide between State and Private Schooling Ted Tapper

9

2

The Trades Union Congress and the Public Schools 1870–1970 Clive Griggs

29

3

Planning Enlightenment and Dignity: The Girls’ Schools 1918–58 Sara Delamont

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4

Intakes and Examination Results at State and Private Schools Alice Sullivan and Anthony F.Heath

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Part II— PRESENT-DAY PRIVATE SCHOOLS 5

Teacher Sickness Absence in Independent Schools Tony Bowers

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6

Use and Ornament: Girls in Former Boys’ Independent Schools Pauline Dooley and Mary Fuller

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7

Independent Schools and Charitable Status: Legal Meaning, Taxation Advantages, and Potential Removal David Palfreyman

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8

Muslim Schools in Britain Geoffrey Walford

154

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Part III— SCHOOL AND UNIVERSITY CHOICE 9

Parental Choice and Involvement: Private and State Schools Anne West and Philip Noden

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10

Economic Aspirations, Cultural Replication and Social Dilemmas—Interpreting Parental Choice of British Private Schools Nick Foskett and Jane Hemsley-Brown

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11

Choice or Chance: The University Challenge How Schools Reproduce and Produce Social Capital in the Choice Process Lesley Pugsley

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Index

217

Note on Contributors

Tony Bowers is a Senior Lecturer in the Faculty of Education, University of Cambridge. Before moving to Cambridge, he taught in schools for ten years. He is a Chartered Psychologist with a background in both educational and occupational psychology. Tony has worked on a range of projects involving individual and organisational development with schools, LEAs, NHS Trusts and financial services companies. He has recently managed two major research projects commissioned by DfEE (now DfES). The second of these investigated the incidence and causes of ill health retirement in teachers and examined the incidence of absence due to sickness in publicly funded schools, linking this to data drawn from other industries. His contribution to this book draws on separate research he conducted among independent schools at around the same time. Sara Delamont is Reader in Sociology at Cardiff University. She graduated from Girton College, Cambridge, and did at Ph.D. at Edinburgh. She was the first woman to be President of BERA, and the first woman Dean of social sciences at Cardiff. Her work on women’s education is to be found in Knowledgeable Women (Routledge, 1989), A Woman’s Place in Education (Ashgate, 1996), and Feminism and the Classroom Teacher (Routledge Falmer, 2000, with Amanda Coffey). Currently joint editor of Qualitative Research, and author of Feminist Sociology (Sage, 2003), she has written five entries for the New Dictionary of National Biography on Emily Davies, Sara Burstall, Louisa Martindale, Elizabeth Cadbury and Agnata Frances Ramsay Butler. Sara Delamont was elected an Academician of The Academy for the Learned Societies in the Social Sciences in 2000. Pauline Dooley is a Senior Lecturer in the School of Health and Social Sciences at the University of Gloucestershire where she teaches courses in sociology and women’s studies at both undergraduate and postgraduate levels. She held previous appointments at the University of Aston and the University of the South Pacific. Her research interests are in the broad area of gender and education and currently

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have a focus on self-harm among students in higher education, Muslim schools and the fee-paying sector of schooling. Nick Foskett is Professor of Education and Head of the Research and Graduate School of Education at the University of Southampton. His research interests are in educational policy and management with particular reference to the operation of markets in educational and training environments, and he is Director of the Centre for Research in Education Marketing (CREM) based at the University of Southampton. Recent publications include Choosing Futures: Young People’s Choices in Education, Training and Careers Markets (Routledge Falmer, 2001) (with Jane Hemsley-Brown) and Leading and Managing Education: International Dimensions (Paul Chapman, 2002) (with Jacky Lumby). Mary Fuller is Professor of Education at the University of Gloucestershire, having previously worked as lecturer and researcher at the universities of Oxford, Reading, Bristol and Bath. Originally a sociologist of organisations, she has been concerned with issues of equity and social justice throughout her career. She has researched schools as organisations, starting with a Ph.D. which documented the ways in which gender and race structured the school experiences, identities and educational outcomes of pupils in a multiracial comprehensive. Her research has also included adolescents’ ethnic identities and, currently, ways of enhancing the learning experiences of disabled students in higher education. She is the author of academic articles, chapters in books and has edited two books, most recently one on partnerships in education. Clive Griggs left school at 15 years of age and worked in a signal box on the London Underground before going to college and qualifying as a teacher. He later gained B.Sc.(Econ), MA and Ph.D. degrees from London University. He has taught in secondary modern, secondary technical and comprehensive schools in England and a language school in Bulgaria. He is Faculty Fellow in the Education Department of Brighton University and visiting lecturer at Sussex University. He was education correspondent for Tribune in the 1970s and has contributed articles to various journals concerned with education, and the labour movement. His publications include The TUC and the Struggle for Education 1868–1925 (Falmer, 1983), Private Education in Britain (Falmer, 1985), George MeekProtégé of H.G.Wells (with Bill Coxall) (New Millennium, 1996) and The TUC and Education Reform 1926–1970 (Woburn Press, 2002). Anthony F.Heath, FBA, is Professor of Sociology at the University of Oxford and a Fellow of Nuffield College. He is the Co-Director of the ESRC Centre for Research into Elections and Social Trends. His main

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research is in the area of social stratification, with a particular interest in social class and ethnic differences in education, occupational and political behaviour. His books include Origins and Destination (with A.H.Halsey and John Ridge) (Clarendon Press, 1980), Educational Standards (edited with Harvey Goldstein) (Oxford University Press, 2000), Ireland North and South (edited with Richard Breen and Chris Whelan) (Oxford University Press, 1999) and The Rise of New Labour (with Roger Jowell and John Curtice) (Oxford University Press, 2001). Jane Hemsley-Brown is a Senior Research Fellow at the National Foundation for Educational Research (NFER), having previously been based at the Centre for Research in Education Marketing at the University of Southampton. Her research interests are in the operation and impact of educational markets, particularly in post-compulsory education and training. Recent publications include Choosing Futures: Young People’s Choices in Education, Training and Careers Markets (with Nick Foskett) (Routledge Falmer, 2001). Philip Noden is a Research Officer at the Centre for Educational Research at LSE. He has also worked at the Centre for Analysis of Social Exclusion at LSE. He has worked on various research projects funded by the ESRC, European Commission and the Department of Education and Skills (DfES), focusing on parental involvement in education, school choice, evaluation in higher education and evaluations of the Specialist Schools Programme and Excellence in Cities Programme for the DfES. He previously worked as a residential social worker. He was educated at a private secondary school in Manchester, Oxford University and South Bank University. David Palfreyman is the Bursar and a Fellow of New College, Oxford. With David Warner he has edited Higher Education Management (Open University Press, 1996), Higher Education Law (Open University Press, 1998) and The State of UK Higher Education (Open University Press, 2001); they are also the General Editors of the 20-volume Managing Universities and Colleges Series. With Ted Tapper he co-authored Oxford and the Decline of the Collegiate Tradition (Woburn Press, 2000). David is a member of the editorial boards of the journals Education and the Law and Perspectives: Policy and Practice in Higher Education. He is the Studies). Lesley Pugsley is currently a lecturer in Postgraduate Medical education at the University of Wales College of Medicine. Prior to that she studied as a full-time ESRC-funded doctoral student at Cardiff University. Her research interests are centred on the sociology of

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education and include issues of education markets and choice; gender and educational achievement and the policy and practice of sex education in schools. In her current post, her research interests include undergraduate communication skills, retention issues in the medical profession in Wales, and continuing professional development. Alice Sullivan holds a British Academy Postdoctoral Fellowship at Nuffield College, Oxford. She gained her D.Phil. on ‘Cultural Capital, Rational Choice and Educational Inequalities’ at Oxford in 2000. Recent publications include ‘Cultural Capital and Educational Attainment’, Sociology 2001, 35, 4. Ted Tapper is Professor of Politics at the University of Sussex and the current Chair of the International Relations and Politics Subject Group. He has spent nearly all his academic life at the university having joined the faculty in 1968. His research has been constructed upon an analysis of the contemporary educational policy-making process in Britain. There have been two major empirical themes to his work: the British system of higher education, which focuses upon the loss of university autonomy, and the changing fortunes of the feepaying sector of schooling, which evaluates the political effectiveness of the private school lobby. His central theoretical interest is to explain the changing responsibilities of state and society for the provision of educational goods. His work is constructed upon the premise that educational institutions belong to both state and society and those that flourish have learnt the art of negotiating successfully with both forces to secure their long-term interests. In his work the dynamic of educational change is perceived as an interactive process between schooling, state and society. The outcomes of the process are determined by pluralistic political struggles that unfold within the context of economic, social and cultural parameters that do not operate neutrally. Geoffrey Walford is Professor of Education Policy and a Fellow of Green College at the University of Oxford. His books include: Life in Public Schools (Methuen, 1986), Privatization and Privilege in Education (Routledge, 1990), City Technology College (with Henry Miller) (Open University Press, 1991), Doing Educational Research (editor) (Routledge, 1991), Choice and Equity in Education (Cassell, 1994), Doing Research about Education (editor) (Falmer, 1998), Policy, Politics and EducationSponsored Grant-Maintained Schools and Religious Diversity (Ashgate, 2000) and Doing Qualitative Educational Research (Continuum, 2001). He is joint editor of the British Journal of Educational Studies and editor of the annual volume, Studies in Educational Ethnography.

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Anne West is a Professor and Director of the Centre for Educational Research in the Department of Social Policy at the London School of Economics and Political Science. Her main areas of interest are education policy, education reform and the financing of education. She has a particular interest in parental choice of school, an area which she first researched while working in the Research and Statistics Branch of the former Inner London Education Authority. Her research in this area has focused on the policy implications and equity issues. The research reported in this book was funded by the Economic and Social Research Council and was one of the few studies to have compared choice of private and state schools; other projects in this area have been funded by local education authorities and the Leverhulme Trust.

Introduction Geoffrey Walford

The British private sector is characterised by its diversity. This may seem a surprising fact to many, as it is the well-known schools within the Headmasters’ and Headmistresses’ Conference that are usually the continued focus of fascination and attention. Such schools (which used to be called ‘public schools’) have long been subjected to both criticism for their elitism and praise for their academic success, and most research and discussion of the private sector in Britain has been about these schools. One reason for such a focus is the historical relationship that the schools within the Headmasters’ Conference (and more recently the Headmasters’ and Headmistresses’ Conference) have had with the British ruling class. Entry to such schools has been seen as a passport to academic success, to high-status universities and to prosperous and influential careers. This is certainly less true than it once was, but the majority of the schools themselves would obviously wish to foster such an image. The Independent Schools Information Service (ISIS) (recently renamed the Independent Schools Council information service, ISCis) has very successfully promoted the view that private schools offer ‘highquality’ education, and successive surveys of British parents show that a high proportion would use the private sector for their children if they could afford to do so. The Independent Schools Council (ISC) is the umbrella organisation that draws together all of the major associations serving the headteachers and governing bodies of private schools. The most well known are the Headmasters’ and Headmistresses’ Conference and the Girls’ Schools Association which bring together the headteachers of boys’ and co-educational schools and girls’ schools respectively. The governing bodies of some schools are similarly members of the Governing Bodies Association and the Governing Bodies of Girls’ Schools Association. The Incorporated Association of Preparatory Schools serves the headteachers of preparatory schools for children up to the age of 14, while the Society of Headmasters and Headmistresses of Independent Schools brings together the headteachers of some of the

2 BRITISH PRIVATE SCHOOLS

less prestigious schools. Two final associations serving this less prestigious band are the Independent Schools Association and the Independent Schools’ Bursars Association. In 2002 there were 1,271 schools with membership of at least one of these associations, 1,052 of which were charities. Together they provided schooling for 500,966 children, 51.4 per cent of whom were boys. To give a very rough comparison, in 1982, 1,282 schools provided for 404,542 students. This would appear to indicate an expansion of about 24 per cent by 2002, but it is worth noting that the expansion for children aged 2–4 was 350 per cent (to 43,037), and for those aged 5–10 was 45 per cent (to 162, 088). In contrast, in what has traditionally been seen as the core of the system, the number of students aged 11–15 increased by just 5 per cent (to 215,715) over these 20 years, and those aged 16 and above actually declined by 1 per cent (to 77,372). Increases in numbers have mainly been for younger children through the expansion of nursery, infant and preparatory schools and through senior schools opening and developing their presecondary provision. In 2000, for example, there were a surprising 11 per cent of children in HMC schools who were aged 10 or under (all figures from ISC, 2002 and ISIS, 1982). Perhaps one of the greatest challenges to many people’s stereotype of the British private schools is the fact that only 13.9 per cent of these students were boarders in 2002. Twenty years ago the percentage for similar schools was nearly 30 per cent. The idea that private schools are where the rich send their children to get them out of the way is extremely dated. The heart of the system is now the day schools or those with very few boarders (sometimes just one house for overseas students and a few others). In 2002 57 per cent of these ISC schools had no boarders at all and 79.3 per cent had 20 per cent or less. Not only were there less than 2 per cent of schools that had over 95 per cent boarders, but for those who did board, boarding has changed dramatically. There are now far more weekends at home for students, flexible boarding to cater for students’ wishes, and greater contact between parents and the schools. Of the boarders, 58 per cent were boys. A further change, that is discussed in more detail in the chapter by Dooley and Fuller that follows, is that most of the schools are now coeducational. Only 11 per cent of schools are for boys only and 15.5 per cent provide only for girls. Eton and Harrow are now even more at the extreme of the private sector than they were—each being one of the very few schools for male boarders only. The slightly higher proportion of single-sex girls’ schools is in part due to cultural factors related to British Muslim parents’ desires to have their girls educated separately from boys. Within this book the terms ‘private’ and ‘independent’ (and, indeed, ‘fee-paying’) are used interchangeably to describe the whole range of

INTRODUCTION 3

schools that are not maintained by the state. In Britain, these schools are officially designated as ‘independent schools’ which encourages the idea that they are not in any way dependent upon local or central government for financial or other support. In practice, this is not the case, for while the substantial support derived from the Assisted Places Scheme is now being phased out, as Palfreyman’s chapter makes clear, most of the schools still derive considerable benefit from their charitable status. In practically every other country such schools are designated ‘private’ schools, a term that is widely accepted by the whole range of political opinion and is not open to misunderstanding. Sadly, I have been unable to convince all of the contributors to this volume of the wisdom of adopting a similar terminology, so various authors use different words to describe the schools that are the subject of this book. However, the potentially misleading term ‘public school’—which historically has been applied to the major schools and, in particular, the boys’ boarding schools whose headmasters were members of the Headmasters’ Conference—has not been used. The various private school associations have successfully tried to replace this term by that of ‘independent’ to avoid the former’s implications of elitism and privilege. But the various schools within the associations linked to the Independent Schools Council form only part of the entire private sector. While these schools do account for more than 80 per cent of the total number of students in private schools, they only represent about 53 per cent of the total number of schools. While there is diversity within the ISC schools, there is much more variety within those schools not in membership. From the percentages given above it is evident that the remaining approximately 1,140 private schools are mostly small schools. While the average ISC school had nearly 400 students, the average for the non-ISC schools was just 97. Amongst these are famous schools such as the Small School at Hartland and Summerhill School, but most are simply small schools formed by particular groups to suit their own purposes. There are schools that practise Transcendental Meditation and Buddhism; others that serve Seventh Day Adventists, Sikhs or Jews. There are more than 60 evangelical Christian schools (Walford, 2001) and more than 50 Muslim schools (discussed in my own later chapter in this book). Some of these non-ISC schools are very small indeed, and might be better thought of as parents home-schooling their children. However, when parents start to co-operate with one another, and there are more than five children not from the same family, their endeavour becomes a ‘school’ and they have to become registered. Others of the non-ISC schools are very well-organised and reasonably large schools. The

4 BRITISH PRIVATE SCHOOLS

average of 97 is the result of several schools with hundreds of students balancing the many schools with very low numbers. This range of non-ISC schools is grossly under-researched, but the private sector as a whole is also in need of greater study. The present government has reversed Labour’s traditional antipathy towards the private sector and has established several schemes designed to link schools in the maintained sector more closely to those in the private sector. Rather than attack these schools, it has assumed that they have something of value to share with the maintained sector and encouraged such a sharing. But there is little hard evidence about the quality of what the private sector offers—and the quality is certainly not homogeneous. Some of the chapters in this book offer new evidence on these important issues. The first four chapters in this collection give a historical context to the chapters that follow. In the first, Ted Tapper outlines the historical relationship between the Labour Party and the private sector of schooling, and then places Labour’s policy within the context of the general evolution of the Party’s social policies in the 1980s and 1990s. The main section of the chapter analyses the Blair government’s policies on fee-paying education, the responses to those policies and how, within the new political context, the fortunes of the fee-paying sector have fared. The analytical framework encompasses the lack of sustained interest in fee-paying schooling per se; the need to improve standards in the maintained sector; the acceptance of the need to sustain parental choice; the willingness to accept academic selection; the government’s acceptance that quality schooling may be provided more effectively by private bodies; and the government’s pragmatic approach to achieving educational goals. The chapter concludes by considering whether the Blair government has established a coherent perspective on fee-paying schools that will stand the test of time. The second chapter, by Clive Griggs, examines the particular role that the Trades Union Congress has played in the development of policy on private schools. He shows that from its inception in 1868 the Trades Union Congress showed an interest in education, however it was not until the 1940s that the whole area of fee-paying education came under the scrutiny of the TUC Education Committee when they were asked to respond to the Flemming Committee’s enquiry into public schools. From that time onwards, policy on fee-paying schools gradually developed but the principles on which it was based remained constant. For example, while committees examining fee-paying schools (such as that of Newsom in 1968) sought to preserve them through various plans to integrate them into the maintained sector, the TUC rejected such policies, arguing that such changes merely transferred associated privileges from one set of pupils to another. This chapter follows TUC

INTRODUCTION 5

policy in this area through the 30-year period to the abortive Education Act of 1970 which Edward Short intended to introduce. Sara Delamont’s chapter focuses on the goals and achievements of the private schools for girls through the depression, the Second World War and the years 1944–68. This period is characterised by some historians as an era when feminism was dead or dormant, before second wave (or social) feminism arose in the 1960s. Others choose to call this era second wave (or social) feminism and label the post-1968 era as ‘third wave’. Whichever term is used, there is no doubt that historians of women’s education have tended to concentrate on the campaigns of the pioneers (1848–1918) and ignored the years 1918–68. Equally, there is no doubt that private schools for girls faced enormous challenges in this period. Delamont uses histories of girls’ schools, autobiographies of pupils and teachers, fiction and the academic (and pseudo-academic) writings of the period as source materials for the chapter and shows how Freudian ideas became widely accepted among the intelligentsia, and how Freudianism was used to attack the pioneering girls’ schools. What had been the moral high ground (heterosexual celibacy among spinster schoolteachers) suddenly became sinister repression and unnatural perversion after 1918. The portrayals of the school mistresses in popular fiction of the time are explored alongside evidence of what schools were actually doing between 1918 and 1939. The final chapter in this section, by Alice Sullivan and Anthony Heath, investigates the educational success of students at different types of state and private schools in England and Wales. The investigation uses data from the National Child Development Study. After controlling for the characteristics of the intake to the different types of school, it is found that, for this group of students, those at grammar schools and private schools had superior examination results at the age of 16 to students at secondary modern and comprehensive schools. Significant differences persist after taking account of various school characteristics, and the only school-level variable that is found to be significant is the social composition of the school. Moving from an historical analysis, the next five chapters discuss various aspects of present-day private schooling. The chapter by Tony Bowers examines the almost totally unresearched, yet important, area of teacher sickness absence. Drawing upon telephone interviews with a large sample of headteachers of English private schools, he demonstrates that sickness absences in the private sector are lower than in the statemaintained sector but still significant. He examines management practices in the private sector designed to reduce staff absences, and classifies them in terms of their inhibitory, preventative and curative policies. By concentrating on a rather small, but important, detail of the

6 BRITISH PRIVATE SCHOOLS

operation of the private schools, the author is able to show the diversity within the sector and to examine some of the difficulties that staff and headteachers face. In the next chapter, Pauline Dooley and Mary Fuller report some of their research on the experiences of girls in what were formerly boys’ private schools. Over the last few decades many private schools that were previously for boys only have become mixed. This has occurred either throughout the school or just at sixth-form level. The authors draw on interview and documentary data to assess the extent to which girls in these schools are treated equally to the boys and find that there are many examples of their being ‘second-class citizens’ in schools that have not adjusted sufficiently to the needs of girls. The chapter also examines the view of themselves that the schools present in advertising and prospectuses and assesses the extent to which the rhetoric matches reality. Many of the private schools in Britain benefit from having charitable status. David Palfreyman’s chapter explains the current legal status of charities and estimates the fiscal advantages to private schools of such status. He examines the development of the law on the charitable status of private schools and discusses Old Labour’s views on charitable status in contrast with those of New Labour. He specifically looks at the Deakin Commission on Charities (1996), the responses to that review, and the current ongoing Charity Commission review of the Register. Finally, he discusses the likelihood of VAT being imposed on fees and charitable status being removed. Geoffrey Walford’s chapter describes the range and nature of private Muslim schools in Britain. Following an outline of the nature of Muslim immigration into Britain and the development of relevant government educational policies, the range of current options available to Muslim parents is described. While most children of Muslim parents are in statemaintained schools, some parents have started their own private schools to ensure that their religious beliefs and practices are taught and to provide separation between post-puberty boys and girls. The chapter describes the nature of the more open of these primary and secondary schools, and examines the reasons for their establishment and the nature of their curriculum and ethos. The final three chapters focus on issues of choice of school and of university. The first of these, by Anne West and Philip Noden, reports upon their considerable ongoing research into parental choice of schools in both the private and state-maintained sectors. Drawing upon largescale data sets derived from interviews with parents in London, they discuss reasons for choice of school and the involvement of parents with their children’s schools in both sectors. They present qualitative data to show how parents seek academic excellence and the avoidance of risk by

INTRODUCTION 7

choosing the private sector. The chapter shows that choices about schools are made at different times and in different ways by parents whose children attend private and state schools. Nick Foskett and Jane Hemsley-Brown examine the evidence for the process of choice amongst parents considering private education for their children, drawing principally from the findings of the Tarents’ Choice of Independent Schools’ research project. The chapter considers the process from primary and pre-preparatory school through to secondary and post16 education, focusing on the influence of parents’long-term lifestyle aspirations for their children, financial planning, peer and social pressures and schools’ responsiveness to parental demands. The authors emphasise the importance of ‘choice announcement strategies’ in constructing parents’ (and their children’s) models of social esteem and status, and show how choosing an independent school is part of the wider process of social interaction. They develop two hypotheses about private school choice which are supported by the data, but which also require further investigation. Finally, Lesley Pugsley throws some light on the process of university choice within the private sector. The chapter is based on qualitative data collected in two schools—one in the state sector and one in the private sector in south-east Wales. The data illuminate current debates about access to high-ranking universities, and begin to identify the infrastructures that are in place within some private schools to facilitate university applications. The conclusions drawn from these data are that the lack of support and guidance through the UCAS process for some state school pupils, coupled with limited cultural capital within their family units, simply serves to further exacerbate the issues associated with an inequity of access to higher education. The author then makes some suggestions about how the situation might be improved. REFERENCES Independent Schools Council (2002) Annual Census 2002, London, ISC. Independent Schools Information Service (1982) Annual Census 1982, London, ISIS. Independent Schools Information Service (2000) ISIS Annual Census 2000, London, ISIS. Walford, G. (2001) ‘The Fate of the New Christian Schools: From Growth to Decline?’, Educational Studies, 27, 4, pp.465–77.

Part I HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVES

1 From Labour to New Labour: Bridging the Divide between State and Private Schooling Ted Tapper

INTERPRETING THE TRADITIONAL RELATIONSHIP The private sector of schooling has always had an ambivalent relationship to the state. In the 1860s it was the spectre of government intervention that led to the foundation of the Headmasters’ Conference. Some of the leading headmasters felt the need to discuss in common their responses to the Victorian commissions of enquiry and, in particular, how they were to address their strictures (Tapper, 1997:21). Nonetheless, if the relationship has invariably been tense this has not prevented the schools contemplating government assistance during periods of financial crisis. In both the First and Second World Wars there were calls from leading public school figures for government aid. Crises of recruitment stimulated the demand for scholarship schemes underwritten by public monies (Le Quesne, 1970). The purpose of the opening paragraph is to make the point that the analysis of the relationship between the Labour Party and the fee-paying sector of schooling needs to be placed within a wider context. The Labour Party is within the mainstream of British political life and it has been the governing party on several occasions since its foundation. It is inevitable, therefore, that the Party’s responses to private education have been shaped by its entrapment within this broader context. The Labour Party is a governing party with all the advantages and disadvantages that entails in its approach to social change. The historical relationship between the Labour Party and the private schools can be interpreted in three different ways. For much of its history the Party’s educational policies have been driven by the desire to maximise equality of educational opportunity. Whilst the principle is sufficiently broad to encompass apparently different policy positions (for example, the acceptance of the tripartite model of secondary schooling after the 1944 Education Act and the advocacy of the

10 BRITISH PRIVATE SCHOOLS

comprehensive principle from the 1960s onwards), such a commitment makes it difficult to establish an accommodation with the fee-paying sector. The private sector offends the principle both directly, because it enables families to purchase a valued form of schooling, and indirectly because it questions the credibility of the state sector, that is, the implication by definition is that state schooling is inferior. To follow the above line of argument is to imply that the Labour Party’s policy on private schooling has never been internally divisive. Or, at least, it is one of those policy areas that united more than it divided the Party across its ideological spectrum. However, social policy is not driven forward by only one dominant impulse. The drive for equality of educational opportunity was incorporated within a debate between those who saw schooling as creating opportunities for individuals (the meritocratic impulse) and those who saw it as a force for social change (the egalitarian impulse). But both camps could agree that ‘something needed to be done about the private sector’ for its presence offended both ‘the meritocrats’ and ‘the egalitarians’. But, not surprisingly, the debate about what was to be done quickly opened up another important internal party fissure: to what extent could a governing party interfere with individual and institutional liberties (in this case the right of parents to purchase private schooling and of schools to charge fees) in order to achieve its social goals. Moreover, the Labour Party has been conscious of the need to win elections (although to both friends and critics the converse has occasionally seemed closer to the truth) and Labour governments needed to be aware of the constraints of the parliamentary process. So, even if the issue of private schooling has tended to bring the Labour Party together rather than reveal its internal contradictions (57 varieties!), the question of how to proceed has always been problematic. How else could it be in view of the desire to build brave new worlds whilst working within the constraints of established electoral and parliamentary traditions? The pragmatic compromises suggested by the above line of argument are many. Perhaps the most notable is best described as stalling tactics. After the 1966 general election the Wilson government had more than a sufficiently commanding parliamentary majority to—at least in theory— take action, and yet the outcome was the appointment of the Public Schools Commission rather than action. The Commission, which had the obvious mandate of suggesting how closer relations between the state and fee-paying sections could be established, published its first Report in 1968 (Public Schools Commission, 1968). It satisfied few of the interested parties and was swiftly buried. The second Report, advocating the phasing out of public financial support for the direct grant schools, appeared in 1970 (Public Schools Commission, 1970). By

BRIDGING THE DIVIDE BETWEEN STATE AND PRIVATE SCHOOLING 11

then the Heath Government was in place and the Report was shelved. It was acted upon several years later with the return to office of the Labour Party and ironically, and disconcertingly for the Labour Party, the consequence was to increase the size of the independent sector rather than putting another nail in its coffin. But a Labour government had learnt the art of government by prevarication from an impeccable source. This was precisely the tactic that Butler had employed to secure Churchill’s agreement to educational reform during the Second World War (Butler, 1971:120). The national government’s commitment to the 1944 Education Act was secured by Butler’s creation of the Fleming Committee, which had the task of considering ‘the public school’ question (Committee on Public Schools, 1944). The answer to the question was not forthcoming until legislation was almost on the statute book and, like the Public Schools Commission some 25 years hence, it provided an equally unacceptable answer. This is a beautiful example of very different governments, located in contrasting historical contexts but driven by similar parliamentary and societal pressures, coming up with the same solution—to stall. It illustrates the extent to which the political context creates a constraining environment within which all governments, regardless of the strength of their commitments and parliamentary majorities, have to act. And, furthermore, this is one of those issues apparently especially designed to encourage caution. The strategy of prevarication is composed of some interesting ingredients. Labour Party hostility to private schooling would be more forthcoming in opposition than in government. Moreover, there could be clarion calls to action at party conferences only for them to be sidelined by Labour ministers. An important part of the strategy has been to threaten a number of alleged privileges that the fee-paying schools enjoyed, rather than challenge directly the principle that schools had the right to charge fees and parents to pay them. One consequence has been a very protracted debate on the charitable status of the schools. Do schools, which for the most part serve the more privileged members of society, have the right to charitable status given that, at least at face value, it would seem that a charitable pursuit should benefit the poorer members of society? This is a conundrum that has exercised some of the best legal minds over the centuries, led the Labour Party to threaten action on several occasions and the schools to mount vigorous defence campaigns (Tapper, 1997:54–75). But the interpretation of charitable status remains essentially the province of the courts and we still await intrusive legislative intervention. To be given charitable status is akin to being awarded a status symbol but it would be naïve to ignore the financial benefits that also accrue. Thus we enter the murky world of possible relief from both nationally and locally imposed taxation.

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The most decisive political action against the interests of the feepaying sector has been the state’s steady withdrawal from paying the fees of privately educated pupils. This has been led mainly by the Labour Party and put in place as much at the local as at the national level. It is possible to interpret this long-term development as the manifestation of a coherent Labour-led strategy that would lead to the eventual demise of private schooling. In other words what has been interpreted as caution verging on cowardice is in fact part of a grand plan! This alternative perspective rests upon the character of the relationship between the state and private sectors and, in particular, whether that relationship incorporates a significant element of pupil movement from the state to the private sector with fees paid for by the taxpayer. Over time the British educational system has developed pragmatically, some would say haphazardly. After the 1902 Education Act, local education authorities frequently brought places in secondary grammar schools in addition to, or in place of, building their own selective secondary schools. The 1944 Education Act made at least one major concession to the Labour Party: the selective grammar schools would be required to accept only publicly funded pupils who had successfully negotiated the required entrance hurdles (a clear attempt to put into operation the meritocratic principle). Those schools that were not willing to accept these terms would either close or become wholly fee-paying institutions. In other words, there was an intention to separate two worlds that had been entwined (Gosden, 1976:301–8). The only exception to the principle was the direct grant schools, and it was not until some 30 years later that the choice was also imposed upon them. Although it is evident that in 1944 elements within the Conservative Party, and especially Members of Parliament from those constituencies within which the direct grant schools were located, were in the vanguard of sustaining the direct grant principle, it is important to note that it was a national government, within which the Conservative Party was dominant, that took the first step to unravelling the interlocking worlds of private and state schooling. Thus again the point is made that it is unwise to polarise party policy unequivocally. Of course what had been decided nationally could be undermined surreptitiously at the local level. Thus, local education authorities, if they were so minded, could find ways of channelling children who had been educated in the state sector into the private sector especially if they had persevering parents. So, accompanying the phasing out of the direct grant schools in the late 1970s was the closing of this apparent ‘loophole’ with stricter central guidelines on whose fees the local education authorities could, and could not, pay. The broad drift of the guidance was to permit payments if the child had special educational needs or talents (such as a gift for music) that could not be

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met in the local state schools. The intention therefore was to regulate and to limit the relationship, although there is a certain amount of irony in the fact that the armed services continued to pay the school fees of some of its personnel. As always, principle was regulated by pragmatism. Once the separation had been completed then the goal was to create a level playing field with the expectation that the fee-paying sector would slowly wither on the vine. There would be two complementary dimensions to this policy: to improve the quality of schooling in the state sector whilst removing from the private schools those alleged privileges (such as charitable status) that apparently gave them unfair advantages. Thus parents would have no need to opt for private schools since the state schools would offer a quality education that was as good as, if not better than, that available in the private sector. Because it was a family tradition, a few parents might continue to choose a private education for their children but these would be insufficient in number to sustain a buoyant sector. Consequently, a declining fee-paying market would be steadily eroded, to disappear forever from the educational map. It is impossible to demonstrate that many, indeed if any, within the Labour Party thought along such long-term strategic lines. However, it does provide a plausible way of analysing the developments in party policy that occurred between the 1944 Education Act and the emergence of New Labour. It most definitely helps us to appreciate the vitriolic hostility that greeted the Assisted Places Scheme (APS) in the early 1980s. Mrs Thatcher’s first government was, in the vivid metaphor of one of her Secretaries of State for Education and Science, Sir Keith Joseph, reversing the ratchet (Joseph, 1976). Moreover, it was a reversal that undermined a key stage in a strategy that presupposed the permanent separation of pupils in the private and state sectors. When returned to government it would require the Labour Party to unravel this counter-attack before it would be possible to move on to the promised land. Of course, in reality there was no master plan. The three interpretations—of a broad-based principled opposition, of piecemeal pragmatism and of apparent long-term strategic thinking—interacted, overlapped and oscillated in importance over time. How else could it be, given the conflicts of principle within the Party, the differences as to how those principles should be put into effect, the failure of the Party to secure a consistent parliamentary majority and the need to work through the parliamentary process. But regardless of the constraints against taking decisive action, it is difficult not conclude that the Labour Party’s record up to the defeat of the Callaghan government in 1979 was, to put it mildly, disappointing. It failed both to curtail the overall strength of the private sector or to create a relationship between state

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and fee-paying schools that was widely supported and could be expected to endure. Not only did integration, however it was to be understood, remain an elusive goal but by 1979 it was not unreasonable to argue that state schooling itself was on the defensive and, moreover, the attack was being led by Callaghan himself (Lowe, 1997:68–9). Thus in a comparatively short space of time the feepaying schools changed their image from socially divisive, culturally isolated and pedagogically irrelevant institutions to desirable models of good practice. THE POLICY MELTING POT Whilst Callaghan’s government (the final ‘Old Labour’ administration?) undoubtedly started to question the ability of the state system of schooling to deliver higher educational standards, it took 18 years of successive Conservative governments to persuade the Labour Party that it needed to re-evaluate more broadly its understanding of the ends and means of schooling. The Labour Party has steadily redefined its policy positions in response to its exclusion from office with the intention of making itself reelectable. In the words of Pierson: ‘Labour Party policy on education (as on many other issues) has moved significantly in the past decade as it sought to re-position itself to win back power after a generation in the political wilderness’ (Pierson, 1998:139). The consequences for the Labour Party’s relationship to private schooling have been profound. There are two key variables. First, New Labour governments are more ready to embrace the idea that they are prepared to underwrite the private provision of social goods with state monies. At least implicitly they accept the idea that sometimes the market can provide social goods more effectively than the state. But part of the definition of the effective provision of services is the attempt to achieve policy goals. Consequently, governments need to put accountability mechanisms in place that will require private sector organisations to achieve politically determined targets. The private providers therefore operate within the context of a negotiated regulatory framework. The strategy therefore is based upon the idea of a partnership between the state and the market to provide social goods. Even after five years in government, and two massive electoral successes, there is still bitter internal party controversy as to whether this is a desirable way forward but nonetheless the leadership of the parliamentary party remains determined to press ahead. Secondly, New Labour has come to embrace the idea of diversification in the provision of schooling. ‘Bog-standard’ comprehensive schools are decidedly unfashionable so they are encouraged to seek specific labels that convey their particular strengths. The purpose is easy to discern: comprehensive schools can become

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centres of excellence with strong identities and widespread support in their local communities. Although this policy initiative does not go quite far enough to support the claim that New Labour embraces parental choice as a mechanism for determining the allocation of pupils to schools, it strongly suggests that there is more differentiation and selection within the state system of schooling. Moreover, if schools are encouraged to label themselves it seems logical that parents who are attracted by those labels should at least have the right to select them as appropriate places for the education of their children. Moreover, these developments occur within a context that saw Tory governments fragment the comprehensive system through the creation of City Technology Colleges (CTCs) and Grant Maintained Schools (GMS), which have re-appeared, albeit in somewhat different guises, in the age of New Labour. These politically inspired developments of privatisation and greater differentiation within the state system, that New Labour both inherited and encouraged, have occurred within a context of a broad societal pressure that cannot help but strongly influence government thinking about the relationship between fee-paying and state schools. Whether it was justified or not, the transition to comprehensive secondary schooling generated considerable antipathy, especially amongst middleclass parents who were not fortunate enough to live in those leafy suburbs that constituted the catchment areas for the better local comprehensive schools. Either governments took seriously the fears and complaints, even if unjustified, about declining educational standards in the comprehensive schools or they risked the possibility of ‘middle-class flight’ into a private sector which had done much to refurbish its tarnished image since the 1960s. The consequence was an inevitable shift in the emphasis of educational policy away from further major structural change towards thinking about how individual schools could be encouraged to raise their educational standards. In the 1997 General Election Manifesto we read: Our task is to raise the standards of every school. We will put behind us the old arguments that have be-devilled education in this country. We reject the Tories’ obsession with school structures: all parents should be offered real choice through good quality schools, each with its own strengths and individual ethos… Standards, more than structures, are the key to success (Labour Party, 1997). While one may muse whether the Tory obsession with structures was really much greater than Labour’s, the policy implication is obvious. As Webster and Parsons reflect: To talk in terms of standards is to

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encourage the view that a school by school approach to educational improvement is best’ (Webster and Parsons, 1999:551). Within this context there was little desire to undermine further the independent sector and every incentive to investigate whether it could teach the state sector a lesson or two about how to raise educational standards. However, it should be noted that Blair’s educational guru, Michael Barber, has had very little to say about state-private relations (Barber, 1996). Just as there may have been no possibility of going back to that nostalgic ideal of a ‘grammar school in every town’ equally there was no chance of going forward to the promised land of an all-inclusive system of comprehensive education. ESTABLISHING A FRAMEWORK FOR PARTNERSHIP The argument presented so far is that by the time of the election of the first Blair government the context within which the relationship between the state and fee-paying sectors was formed had changed radically. It was now highly unrealistic to think of integrating the two sectors in a manner that meant the death of private schooling in Britain. And yet the 1997 General Election Manifesto made two promises that suggested New Labour was cut from much the same cloth as Old Labour: the phasing out of the Assisted Places Scheme and the withdrawal of vouchers to pay for nursery education. Although it was to be expected that the private sector interests would level the charge that nothing had changed, a closer inspection of the evidence reveals that it is a bogus accusation. However, what is also revealed is a major quandary that remains a long way from resolution. Educational issues appear and disappear from the mainstream political agenda. When the first Thatcher government took office the major focus was upon economic issues: the cuts in direct taxation, the increases in indirect taxation (the raising of value-added tax to 17.5 per cent) and the attempts to curtail public expenditure. However, educational issues were also closer to the centre of the political agenda and educational policy would be subjected to close scrutiny. It is scarcely surprising therefore that the decision to create the Assisted Places Scheme generated such hostility even if, as was alleged, it was financed with resources that otherwise would not have been allocated to the educational budget while public expenditure on education was cut. Even private sector interests, while naturally pleased with the APS, realised that they had a public relations disaster on their hands and called for increased educational expenditure. The Labour Party’s attack on the APS, led in Parliament by Neil Kinnock, was vociferous, and the Party pledged itself to terminate the

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scheme immediately once it was returned to office. Given this context, and given the fact that it was an unequivocal manifesto commitment, it was inconceivable that the first Blair government could do anything else but act swiftly. However, there are two critical nuances that need to be considered. First, and although there were private sector quibbles on this point, the scheme has been phased out and not terminated. We are now into Blair’s second government and there will still be a few assisted place pupils in the private sector! Secondly, it was never officially conceded that the phasing out of the APS was designed as an attack on the interests of the private sector. Prior to 1997, in order to establish its credentials as a fiscally responsible party, New Labour promised not to increase direct taxes. Officially the phasing out of the APS was to provide the resources that would enable a New Labour government to lower class sizes in primary schools. Of course, whether the sums added up is a matter of dispute! There is enough evidence, however, to suggest that the official party line needs, at the very least, to be refined. It can be reasonably maintained that the Blair government’s action was not so much an attack upon the private sector but rather a decision to end a policy that it saw as iniquitous. If ending the policy harmed the private sector then that was a price worth paying but that was not the intention. Indeed, it could be argued the APS had installed unfair advantages upon feepaying schools and its termination would remove that injustice rather than harm irrevocably private sector interests. Subsequent developments suggest that this interpretation has a measure of validity. During the years of the APS there were claims that certain fee-paying schools were becoming heavily dependent, indeed over-dependent, upon pupils with assisted places. By implication, these schools would face financial insolvency and be forced to close if the APS was terminated. But with the phasing out of the Assisted Places Scheme few schools have been so financially stretched that they have been forced to close as a consequence. The phasing out has enabled the schools to adjust over time to the new realities either by finding resources to mount their own bursary schemes or by increasing the clientele who can and are willing to pay fees. The prophets of doom have been proven wrong and the New Labour government can claim that it eliminated an unfair social policy that bolstered the private sector but was not vital to its survival. But there is more to the argument than simply robbing Peter in order to pay Paul. It is difficult to know to what extent educational research influences policy-making but it is easy to document the wide body of evidence on the social consequences of the APS and to demonstrate that this was being picked up by key figures within the Labour Party. The charges against the APS can be summarised very concisely: it transferred academically able children from the state to the private sector; it enabled

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some parents who had already selected private schooling for their children to off-set at least some of the costs on to an assisted-place award; the scheme may have benefited families with comparatively small economic resources but invariably the selected children were from socially ambitious and culturally attuned backgrounds; and, finally, it was open to abuse (Edwards et al, 1989). Moreover, in view of the fact that schools with no pressing financial needs were the recipients of such largesse it is easy to see why New Labour had to act. It was a comparatively easy way for the leadership to demonstrate that it still adhered to some of Old Labour’s policies. The essence of the argument, therefore, is that the Assisted Places Scheme formed a bridge between the fee-paying and state sectors that not even New Labour could tolerate. To phase out the scheme did not represent a principled move against private sector interests, or even hostility to the idea that the two sectors needed to be bridged, but it was rather a vote against this particular link—which raises the question of whether it is possible to create new and more broadly acceptable bridges. This is the conundrum that New Labour is in the process of trying to resolve. New Labour’s opposition to nursery vouchers can be interpreted in equally pragmatic terms. Again there was the need to redirect resources to allegedly more worthy ends coupled with the claim that the administration of the voucher system had been chaotic. To quote Power and Whitty, the nursery voucher scheme ‘had been abandoned on the grounds that it created “expensive bureaucracy instead of effective cooperation’” (Power and Whitty, 1999:537). Moreover, as with the APS, there was hostility to directing resources to parents who could well afford to pay for their private nursery education while at the same time enhancing private sector provision at the expense of state nursery schools as well as those primary schools that wanted to build up their pre-primary classes. Of course there is a clear distinction between the APS and the nursery voucher scheme: the former purposefully constructed a relationship between the state and private sectors of schooling whereas the latter was designed to enhance access to nursery education and extend parental choice. Obviously voucher schemes impact upon the state-market provision of social goods but do so in a manner that is harder to regulate centrally. Again, the abolition of nursery vouchers can be seen as a convenient concession of New Labour to Old Labour. But it also demonstrates their affinity: both accord the state a key role in the distribution of social goods. New Labour may be more enamoured of the private sector’s ability to deliver services effectively but it remains keen to regulate the terms on which delivery is made. From the perspective of New Labour, nursery vouchers had negative social consequences (resources were

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allocated to the undeserving middle class’), potentially harmed the interests of state sector institutions (nursery and primary schools) and denied the state an effective regulatory role other than the provision of financial resources. Again, however, as with the Assisted Places Scheme, New Labour knew what it was against but did it know what it was for? Webster and Parsons, quoting the 1997 Manifesto (‘We wish to build bridges wherever we can across education divides. The educational apartheid created by the public/private divide diminishes the whole education system’—Labour Party, 1997) attack New Labour for adopting a policy strategy that is designed to tinker ‘with the symptoms’ and not address ‘the underlying cause’ of the educational apartheid (Webster and Parsons, 1999:553). Be that as it may, the traditional metaphor of building bridges between the two sectors gave way in the 2001 Manifesto to the idea of establishing partnerships: ‘Pupils will be given greater opportunities through the promotion of partnerships between schools. We will build on the partnerships established between the state and private sectors’ (Labour Party, 2001). Indeed, the idea of state/private partnerships is now central to New Labour’s thinking on how the two sectors of schooling should be linked. The partnership metaphor has certain advantages over the idea of creating a bridge between the two sectors. The latter was part of traditional Conservative Party thinking from which New Labour needed to distance itself. Moreover, although bridges suggest two-way communication flows, the bridge that historically linked fee-paying and state schooling established predominantly one-way traffic: pupils were transferred out of state schools and into private schools. No matter how indirectly, New Labour could not afford to be associated with this idea. Partnership suggests common endeavour in the pursuit of mutually agreed goals. Furthermore, there could be multiple partnerships: school with school, central government with educational trusts, local educational authorities with private sector bodies and so on. The intertwining and overlapping possibilities were ideally suited to New Labour as it searched for a ‘middle way’ to emerge out of the politics of consensus. If partnership is the overarching idea, then what are the central characteristics of its development over the past five years? There are four main points to consider: 1. the range of variables that the partnerships will incorporate; 2. the possibility of continuously extending partnerships; 3. the number of partners who have a part to play; 4. the potential for interactive flows of influence amongst the partners.

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What has to be analysed is how the state-private partnership has developed in terms of these dimensions and how, in the light of that analysis, it is to be evaluated. Webster and Parsons may be correct in arguing that bridge-building strategies are grossly inadequate in resolving the question of educational apartheid but it does not follow that the partnership idea will fail to create a broadly accepted policy consensus around an issue that has historically been very divisive. Notwithstanding the reference to educational apartheid (which, significantly, did NOT appear in the 2001 General Election Manifesto), it could be argued that consensus building is a goal more in keeping with the flavour of New Labour. There has been co-operation at the local level between state and private schools for a long period of time. Invariably this has involved some limited sharing of facilities and/or schools offering lessons in some subjects to all the partnership schools. While the local education authorities and governing bodies would be party to the agreements, the critical line of communication was from school to school, invariably from head teacher to head teacher. In more recent years such schemes have received financial support from both central government and private trusts (most notably Peter Lampl’s Sutton Trust working with the Department of Education and Skills to distribute resources to the worthy causes). In the process the schemes have been finessed and extended in various ways: short-term ‘master classes’ in particular subjects, experiments in the temporary transfer of teachers, workshops to construct curricula and devise teaching strategies, and summer schools for sixth formers who aspire to enter a prestigious university with invariably Oxbridge as the target. Such schemes reflect Lampl’s belief that many intelligent children from humble social backgrounds are denied access to our elite universities and that the private sector can help to ameliorate the situation. While these initiatives may have broad ramifications for the partners, it is difficult not to come to the conclusion that their impact is more upon reshaping individual educational careers rather than redirecting institutional relationships. Schools participating in such ventures may be working with one another for their mutual benefit but whether they are in a partnership is questionable. The points of contact, at least for the present, are too specific to merit the partnership label, although one could imagine discrete co-operative initiatives developing over time into a broad and deeply embedded relationship that appears to be a future development. Of greater significance are the partnerships that have emerged out of the initiatives on inspection and teacher training. These are much broader in their scope and clearly have wide institutional significance. Following the withdrawal by the Callaghan Government of official

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inspection of feepaying schools (inspections by HMI enabled the schools to label themselves as ‘Recognised as Efficient’), the independent sector set up two inspection regimes of its own: one for schools in what is now the Headmasters’ and Headmistresses’ Conference (HMC) and one for all the other schools that were incorporated in the Independent Schools Council (ISC). In 1998 Estelle Morris, then Schools Minister, announced the government’s acceptance of these inspection regimes. Furthermore, the two regimes were to be unified in 2000 and known as the Independent Schools Inspectorate. In effect state agencies (most notably the Office of Standards in Education—OFSTED) were not only bridging institutional divides within the fee-paying sector but were also tying the sector into the state’s own institutional apparatus. It is not surprising that the Independent School Council’s General Secretary, Alistair Cooke, was moved to acclaim: This agreement is one of historic significance both for the schools within the ISC and for the hundreds of thousands of families who use those schools. From next year…parents can have the additional confidence that the accolade ‘Accredited by the ISC’ is one which enjoys the full support of the Government (ISIS, 1998). The independent sector could not help but have a distinct feeling that it was coming in from the cold. At the 1998 HMC Conference the idea of setting up a School Centred Initial Teacher Training (SCITT) scheme to involve co-operation between state and independent schools was floated. The first consortium to secure funding from the Teacher Training Agency (TTA) consisted of ten south London schools of which four were in the private sector (ISIS, 1999). Not only is there a link to a state institution that funds and approves the schemes but also there is institutional co-operation across a number of schools, which makes the partnership qualitatively different from the inter-school ventures. Of course the question is whether this remains an isolated initiative or whether it proves a harbinger of things to come. Is it a form of partnership that can be expanded? Inevitably those partnerships that involve co-operation on a broad front and necessitate institutional agreements (the Schools Joint Council/ OFSTED and inspection; the HMC/TTA and teacher training) are more difficult to construct. Consequently they will not unfold swiftly and continuously. The more local, especially school-to-school, partnerships are much easier to mount especially when there are resources (a combination of inputs from the state, the fee-paying schools and private benefactors) to oil the wheels. Conversely, therefore, they seem to appear in a never-ending sequence. But we need to keep a perspective: they are partnerships for limited goals, involve

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comparatively small sums of money and generally benefit particular individuals. However, a sense of momentum is created which gives the impression that an unstoppable social change is unfolding. In view of the nature of the partnerships the most important, certainly the most numerous, actors to date have been the schools themselves. But this is a partnership movement incorporating a range of institutional actors: government bodies up to and including the DfES; the private sector umbrella organisations in which the Independent Schools Council now plays the leading role; numerous private foundations of which the Sutton Trust is but the most important; and now—significantly—the local authorities. Historically the local authorities have been very divided in their attitude to private schooling, both quietly supportive and explicitly hostile. Therefore, for the private sector institutions it has been important to bring the local authorities on board. The ISC comments, Also noteworthy and welcome is the increasing evidence of involvement by local education authorities in partnership Schemes…To this end we have concluded a memorandum of understanding with the Local Government Association, and a joint working group will shortly be convened to examine ways in which partnerships can be further encouraged (ISIS, 2001). The critical point is the move beyond co-operation with individual local authorities to the creation of agreements at the broader institutional level. Once these are in place the momentum has a basis to sustain it. Although we may conclude that the partnership idea has developed on a number of significant fronts since New Labour came to power in 1997, that agreements are still being concluded and that the range of participants is impressive, there still remains the question of how meaningful is it to describe the agreements as partnerships. To put the issue concisely: do we have roughly equal flows of influence between the participating partners? The inter-school agreements suggest limited partnerships for very specific goals with, in most cases, the flow of influence very much from the private to the state sector. Invariably the state schools are invited to make use of superior facilities in the feepaying schools or there are agreements that lead to pupils in state schools taking lessons in private schools. The laudable desire to increase the representation of state school pupils at Oxbridge is based in part upon the premise that, because of the historically close ties of the independent sector to Oxbridge, it has a message for state school pupils and teachers on how to gain access to elite universities. It may be a realistic premise but it sets up what is essentially a one-way information

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flow. The agreements on inspection and teacher training are of a different order. Fee-paying schools benefit from an officially approved inspection scheme but this is a state-private sector partnership with little direct benefit to state schooling. The School Centred Initial Teacher Training Schemes do offer the possibility of more equal partnerships but the danger is that the state schools will end up participating in the training process but receive precious few of the new teachers. It is too soon to say that this will occur but the possibility for an interesting venture to turn sour is there for everyone to see. At present, therefore, while it is impossible to dispute that Tony Blair’s New Labour governments have adopted a very different policy perspective on the state-private educational divide from their Old Labour predecessors, it does not follow that they have yet succeeded in establishing a meaningful partnership model, let alone ending what their 1997 General Election Manifesto termed educational apartheid. But if the goal is to create a policy consensus around a traditionally divisive educational issue then it can be reasonably argued that the partnership model simply needs more time to demonstrate its potential. The current shallowness of the model may continue but with sufficient rewards for the participants to support its perpetuation. Furthermore, the momentum on this front will be sustained by the creation of the advisory group on partnerships between state and independent schools. The group’s report, ‘Building Bridges’, has been accepted by the government and there are resources, provided by both the state and the market, to sustain the momentum. Perhaps as important as these institutional developments is the evidence of parental pragmatism in selecting schooling for their children. The two sectors are ‘naturally’ linked by the fact that parents are increasingly prepared to opt in and out of the two sectors when mapping their children’s schooling. So there are no absolutes in parental thinking: they want what they consider to be the best schooling for their children and are prepared to pay for it if necessary, but it does not follow that they are abandoning the state sector permanently (Bridgeman and Fox, 1978; Fox, 1984). However, the current state of steady growth in partnerships needs to be placed within the context of two critically important ongoing developments: the attempts to revise a more acceptable assisted places scheme and the steady erosion of the traditional, that is post-1944, model of state schooling. THE FUTURE? It is evident that many interests within the independent sector of schooling do not believe that the partnership model can acquire real significance until there is in place a scheme that will lead to the transfer,

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in part at state expense, of significant numbers of pupils from the state to the private sector. The argument is that there needs to be a reconstituted assisted places scheme in place in order to put flesh on the partnership skeleton. In the words of the ISC’s chairman Ian Beer: ‘lt is not our intention to devise a new access scheme to replace the Assisted Places Scheme but to initiate debate on an important issue’ (ISIS, 2001). But, in spite of Beer’s denial, the drive is to create a new access scheme but one built on a more broadly acceptable foundation. In its consultation document, Open Access to Schools in the Independent Sector (OASIS), the ISC has enumerated the principles it feels should underlie any new scheme, which include its availability to pupils of a wide range of abilities, its confinement to those with genuine financial needs and safeguards to prevent abuses, and free places for those below an agreed income level with no obligation on the government to greater expenditure per pupil than it provides for those educated in the state sector, which would require fees to be subsidised by either the feepaying schools themselves or by other parties (ISIS, 2001). In other words the intention is to meet some of the objections levelled at the APS and thereby to secure broad-based political support. This socalled open access scheme is akin to the well-publicised proposals of the former Tory MP, George Walden—more ambitious because it would at least in theory embrace not only the academically able, but less ambitious in the sense that it would require access to be regulated by agreement. Walden is proposing meritocratic competition for school places in his proposed Open Sector of Independent Schools with the fees (determined by the schools) underwritten by a combination of personal, state and private resources with family poverty as no bar to entry (Walden, 1996: 74– 102). Given past political positions it is not surprising that a reconstituted assisted places scheme has found favour with the Conservative Party, although it is recognised there are weaknesses in reconstructing a scheme which benefits only the academically able and incurs higher per pupil costs for the government. Nonetheless, even if the Conservative Party can be persuaded to back a revamped assisted places scheme, there is little point in the private sector embracing it unless the Labour Party can also be brought on board. Without broad cross-party support any such plan is likely to face political turbulence similar to that experienced by Mrs Thatcher’s APS. So, at present there is considerable caution with few prepared to do more than embrace the partnership proposals that constitute New Labour’s current policy. George Walden’s book may have received a lot of publicity but it has been praised more for its bold statement of the iniquitous consequences of the divide in British education rather than for its policy proposals, which to apply a charitable gloss are politically naïve.

BRIDGING THE DIVIDE BETWEEN STATE AND PRIVATE SCHOOLING 25

The question, therefore, is whether a New Labour government would be prepared to support a revised assisted places scheme. Although on many policy fronts New Labour has distanced itself decisively from Old Labour, this could prove a step too far. In spite of the fact that any new scheme would undoubtedly attempt to remedy the alleged shortcomings of the old APS it would still generate considerable political hostility. It would be seen as the government using public monies to provide succour for the private sector, and give rise to the obvious riposte that if there are problems with state schools these should be tackled directly rather than by taking measures that further undermine their credibility. In effect no scheme, no matter how carefully drafted, would find it easy to escape the criticisms that enveloped the APS. Integral to the idea of assisted places is the belief that state schools are failing at least some of their pupils and, no matter how such schemes are presented, they cannot escape this implication. The ISC may authorise opinion polls that show increasing public support for an assisted places scheme (with the inference that to propose such a scheme would bring a positive electoral gain), but the problem for governments is that they have to deal with their own internal balance of interests as well as the wider electorate. New Labour would have to weigh up doubtful enhanced electoral appeal against the certainty of intense internal division. Furthermore, why should a Labour government risk internal party strife when its current partnership strategy appears to be succeeding. Moreover, success is brought at a relatively low price whereas any assisted places scheme is likely to cost several tens of millions of pounds when fully operational. As previously, the cry would go up that this would be money better spent on state schools. Of course a Blair government may come to the conclusion that the malaise within state schooling is so deeply rooted that rather than dealing with it head-on it needs to hasten the day when state schooling as we have known it in the past disappears forever, and a revitalised and enhanced assisted places scheme should be an integral part of such a strategy. But it appears to have a strategy for dealing with state schools that are deemed to be failing without needing to resort to such a move. Moreover, it is a strategy that reinforces its partnership principle. In its summary of the Education Bill 2001 the Department for Education and Skills writes: When a school is placed in special measures, the LEA draws up an action plan to submit to Ofsted and the Secretary of State setting out how the school will be turned around. Under new proposals introduced in the Bill, it would also invite proposals from external partners—including successful schools, other public sector bodies

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and the private and voluntary sectors—to help turn the school around (Department for Education and Skills, 2001:6–7). Within this context it is not surprising to learn that independent schools supported by the ISC are contemplating setting up companies both to run schools and to take over the functions performed by LEAs. It is not simply a question of fulfilling support tasks but running a core educational business, something that is already undertaken by private forprofit companies. Change in the private-public relationship is therefore occurring at both different levels (embracing both the co-operation of individual schools as well as agreements between important institutional actors) and within different arenas (the inspection of fee-paying schools comes under the auspices of the state while the core educational functions of public education are exposed to the possibility of private takeovers). Although private sector interests may believe that the further step of implementing a resuscitated assisted places scheme is required to cement the process of reconciliation, a New Labour government may feel that it has no need to take this further risky step. The 1944 Education Act instigated the separation of the private and state sectors of schooling whereas the policies of New Labour have started the process of reintegration. Furthermore, it is a pattern of partnership that, as occurred historically, is heavily dependent upon local agreements. If the state sector of schooling increasingly becomes a publicly funded set of institutions which are privately managed then the current political difficulties that surround the issue of moving relatively large numbers of pupils from the state to the private sector will be diluted. If an educational consortium manages both privately and publicly funded schools it is difficult to see on what basis one could object to its constructing avenues for the transfer of pupils between the institutions it manages. This is especially so if the state-financed schools are run with the support of increasing amounts of private capital. Moreover, in this context two-way flows of pupils become more of a reality. The movement is from privately managed to privately managed institution rather than from the private to the state sector. While the future is difficult to predict, it is evident that the Labour Party has modified radically its relationship to the private sector of schooling. A Labour Government intent on enhancing the overall quality of the education system looks to the fee-paying schools and their institutions for assistance while in turn they crave the security and respectability that state sponsorship can bring. Although the way forward cannot be plotted with any degree of certainty, we can be sure that there will not be a return to past hostilities. Obviously recent developments are not to everyone’s liking, especially those who are keen

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to defend the purity of the idea of the neighbourhood comprehensive school, but the political tide is running strongly against them. However, while the partnership model in its various guises has taken root it remains to be seen whether it will blossom. How long will it be before the inputs of the state and the market are so interwoven that it makes a nonsense to think of two different sectors of schooling with different sources of funding, different social bases, different educational missions and different links to the wider society? New Labour has instigated a significant change in how we understand the relationship between the state, the market and schooling but whether that change becomes a revolution remains to be seen. REFERENCES Barber, M. (1996) The Learning Game: Arguments for an Education Revolution, London: Victor Gollancz. Bridgeman, T. and Fox, I. (1978) Why People Choose Private Schools, New Society, 29 June, pp.702–5. Butler, R.A. (1971) The Art of the Possible, London: Hamish Hamilton. Committee on Public Schools (1944) The Public Schools and the General Educational System (Fleming Report), London: HMSO. Department for Education and Skills (2001) Education Bill 2001: Summary, London: Department for Education and Skills. Edwards, T., Fitz, J. and Whitty, G. (1989) The State and Private Education: An Evaluation of the Assisted Places Scheme, London: Falmer Press. Fox, I. (1984) The Demand for a Public School Education: A Crisis of Confidence in Comprehensive Schooling, in G. Walford (ed.) British Public Schools: Policy and Practice, Lewes: Falmer. Gosden, P. (1976) Education in the Second World War, London: Methuen. ISIS (1998) 1998 News, http://www.iscis.uk.net ISIS (1999) 1999 News, http://www.iscis.uk.net ISIS (2001) 2001 News, http://www.iscis.uk.net Joseph, K. (1976) Stranded in the Middle Ground, London: Centre for Policy Studies. Labour Party (1997) Manifesto, London: Labour Party. Labour Party (2001) Manifesto, London: Labour Party. Le Quesne, L. (1970) ‘The Headmasters’ Conference between Two Peaces’, Conference, 7, 1, pp.3–12. Lowe, R. (1997) Schooling and Social Change, 1964–1990, London: Routledge. Pierson, C. (1998) ‘The New Governance of Education: The Conservatives and Education, 1988–1997’, Oxford Review of Education, 24, 1, pp.131–42. Power, S. and Whitty, G. (1999) ‘New Labour’s Education Policy: First, Second or Third Way?’, Journal of Education Policy, 14, 5, pp.535–46. Public Schools Commission (1968) Report (Newsom Report), London: HMSO.

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Public Schools Commission (1970) Report (Donnison Report), London: HMSO. Tapper, T. (1997) Fee-paying Schools and Educational Change in Britain: Between the State and the Marketplace, London: Woburn Press. Walden, G. (1996) We Should Know Better: Solving the Education Crisis, London: Fourth Estate. Webster, D. and Parsons, K. (1999) ‘British Labour Party Policy on Educational Selection 1996–8: A Sociological Analysis’, Journal of Education Policy, 14, 5, pp.547–59.

2 The Trades Union Congress and the Public Schools 1870–1970 Clive Griggs

EARLY INTEREST OF THE TUC IN EDUCATION There is always a problem with the use of the name public school. It is utterly confusing to those foreign to schooling in Britain who find it difficult to grasp that the schools are not open to the public. The description British private schools or fee-paying school may well be more accurate today but not so suitable when dealing with the pre-1944 period. Fees were paid in elementary schools until 1891; indeed in some until 1918. They were paid for county secondary schools until 1944, the number of fee-payers in these schools slowly declining during the interwar years. For that reason the term public school is preferred here because it was in use for most of the period under discussion and for the major enquiries into these schools during both the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The Trades Union Congress (TUC), founded in 1868, is the oldest trade union organisation of its kind in the world. In some respects it can be seen as the parliament of British trade unions bearing in mind that some unions are or were not affiliated to Congress. Sometimes this was because the government of the time prohibited the link as was the case with the Civil Service Clerical Association and the Union of Post Office Workers who remained outside the TUC until the repeal of the Trades Disputes Act of 1927. At other times the union membership did not wish to be linked directly to Congress. This was true for teacher trade unions with the exception of the National Union of School Teachers (NUST) led by the formidable Miss Walsh. The NUST represented uncertificated and supplementary teachers initially denied access to other teacher unions. Her astute political move in joining the TUC meant that she was the only practising teacher at Congress and was included in deputations to the Board of Education. In 1919 the NUT Conference narrowly agreed to accept uncertiflcated teachers and 10, 000 joined the oldest teachers’union although a core remained in their own organisation in the belief their voice would be lost within the NUT.

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The NUST faded as the number of uncertificated teachers declined and ended with the death of Miss Walsh in 1945. By 1970 all of the major teacher unions were affiliated. In fact individual branches of these unions had often been members of trades councils long before then. The TUC has always been interested in education. Technical education was the sixth item on the agenda of the first Congress held in Manchester in 1868. Part of the interest in this form of education arose from the fact that most of those attending were members of craft unions with traditions of a lengthy period of apprenticeship which required technical knowledge of the craft being followed. Apart from this natural interest arising from the working lives of delegates they were aware of a national need which they would put forward to promote their support for technical education throughout the years to come: ‘[I]f continental countries excelled us in the quality of their manufactures it was because their governments had fostered technical education, which ours has not done.’1 Education policy was formed by resolutions proposed at Congress and agreed upon by a majority of delegates attending from affiliated unions. In general, until the 1914–18 War the resolutions were often formulated at the annual congress of a trade union and if passed submitted to the TUC as a possible item for its agenda. The delegates from the trade union responsible for the resolution were usually called upon to propose it at Congress. In fact, the origins of these policies were often to be found one step further back within the influential socialist groups such as the Independent Labour Party (ILP) and the Social Democratic Federation (SDF). A good example was the education policy agreed upon in the early years of the twentieth century at the TUC as advocated by J.R. Clynes, Pete Curran and Will Thorne, all members of the Gas Workers’ Union. The former two were members of the ILP whilst Thorne was in the SDF.2 This system continued in operation during the inter-war period. Upon his appointment as Assistant General Secretary (1924) then General Secretary (1926) to the TUC, Walter Citrine undertook a reorganisation which established eight departments mirroring those of government. At first, Alec Firth, was responsible for the education department but as he was also Assistant General Secretary of the TUC from 1926 to 1931 when he left to become Secretary of the Workers’ Educational Association (WEA), it was not until Jack Wray took over responsibility as Secretary of the TUC Education Department (TUCED) that it was possible to devote more time to policy concerning both education for trade unionists and that provided inadequately for the majority of children. Policy as decided by resolutions passed at Congress was taken up by the appropriate department and decisions made how best to persuade government to consider and if possible adopt their

THE TUC AND THE PUBLIC SCHOOLS 1870–1970 31

ideas. The methods pursued were numerous. They might take the form of a letter to the Board of Education (BOE) setting out their ideas or a request to the President of the BOE to receive a deputation to discuss particular items in their policy. Other methods could be the calling of a public meeting to which other organisations sympathetic to TUC education policy might be invited to attend and provide platform speakers. The network of trades councils could also be used to both gather and distribute information and bring pressure to bear locally. Gradually the prestige of the TUC increased and with the exception of the years immediately following the 1926 General Strike, when many companies and a good number of Conservative MPs were hostile to organised labour, the knowledge and experience of members was recognised and their advice sought in an official capacity as representatives invited to join government education committees. Ivor Gwynne of the Tin and Sheet Millmen was the first to do so as a member of the Haddow Committee (1924–26). The education policies pursued by the TUC for about the first 70 years of its existence reflected various aspects of education. One was adult education to allow trade unionists who had received only a limited elementary schooling to have a chance to catch up on some of the schooling denied to them when they had been obliged to leave school for work in order to supplement the family income. Ruskin College, founded in 1899 and to which the TUC contributed financially, was one of several institutions providing education for mature adults, the Central Labour College another. These colleges became training grounds for many future union representatives and researchers. A second strand of education policy dealt with demands for improved elementary schooling, free secondary schooling for all and raising the school leaving age to 15 and by stages to 16. It is worth remembering that the school leaving age was only raised slowly from ten years in 1876 to 11 in 1893, 12 in 1899 and 14 in 1918. Until 1918 exemptions permitted these provisions to be ignored. To put this into perspective it would be the equivalent today of children leaving school whilst still in junior school and there were many trade unionists who were active politically well into the early years of the twentieth century whose experience of intermittent elementary schooling ended some time between six to eight years of age; among such examples were Joseph Arch, Thomas Burt, Will Crooks, Keir Hardie and Will Thorne, all of whom rose to prominence in their respective unions, some becoming MPs later. An integral part of TUC education policy was a demand for the supportive services necessary to enable children to benefit from the schooling provided, such as school meals, medical treatment and maintenance grants. These were the educational preoccupations of the TUC because they affected the needs of the majority of the children in

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the country. For this reason the public schools patronised by the higher income groups attracted little attention. EDUCATIONAL ENDOWMENTS There was however one aspect of the public school system which did attract criticism within the Labour movement and that was the manner in which educational endowments were being altered. There was a belief among some trade unionists that in certain areas children were being cheated of a free education provided for by a benefactor to help ordinary children in a town. Such actions originated from the enquiries into public schools during the second half of the nineteenth century. Criticism of the public schools emerged in a House of Commons Committee chaired by Henry Brougham which made a preliminary survey of some of the charities associated with the old schools and found enough evidence for the Committee to continue its work for another 18 years. In spite of objections from the periodical Tory Quarterly at the exposure of fraud, information was published showing widespread corruption of teachers, often clergymen in orders, who took revenue from schools without teaching, in one case not even living in the area. Flourishing grammar schools were left to decline until they contained only a few scholars, lacking serious tuition by teachers who neglected all their duties except that of taking their salaries from the foundation.3 Misgivings arising from this information led to the setting up of two Royal Commissions: Clarendon which reported in 1864 on nine public schools (Charterhouse, Eton, Harrow, Merchant Taylor’s, Rugby, St.Paul’s, Shrewsbury, Westminster and Winchester) and Taunton which reported four years later covering the schools not included by Clarendon or the Newcastle Report of 1861 which had examined the method by which ‘sound and cheap elementary instruction’ could be provided for all classes—in reality children from working-class backgrounds. The Clarendon Report confirmed accusations of financial corruption at Eton. During the previous 20 years the Provosts and Fellows of the College had pocketed £127,000 due to the foundation for themselves, a staggering sum of money in the mid-nineteenth century. During the years they were carrying out this practice theft was punishable by transportation and only a few years earlier, before 1828, had been a capital offence. The Warden and Fellows at Winchester were also found to be taking money from the foundation thereby starving the headmaster of funds intended for the school. In spite of this evidence of fraud and corruption at these two and other schools not one person was ever required to face charges in a court of law. Although confronted by this catalogue of financial impropriety the Commission concluded with

THE TUC AND THE PUBLIC SCHOOLS 1870–1970 33

reference to the education provided in these schools that ‘these defects have not seriously marred its wholesome operation’. The Taunton Report was a massive undertaking dealing with grammar, proprietary and private schools for both boys and girls. It was composed of 20 volumes, half of which were devoted to details of hundreds of individual schools. All grammar schools were requested to complete questionnaires. Given the obsession with and frankness about social class in Victorian Britain it was no surprise to find the Commission banding schools into three grades, A, B and C, according to the proposed leaving age of the pupils, 18, 16 and 14 respectively, which in turn were related to their future occupations and the fees their parents were able to afford. This link between secondary school provision and social class reflected that developed by Canon N. Woodard, a high churchman, who established schools using differential fees to cater for the social divisions within the middle classes, the first of which was opened at Lancing in 1848. The question which needed to be faced was who would pay for these fee-paying secondary public schools for the middle classes recommended by the Endowed Schools Commission appointed under the 1869 Endowed Schools Act? Parental fees would obviously make up part of the school income but what the middle classes had their eye on were the hundreds of endowments scattered throughout the country ranging from comparatively small sums of money in some schools to thousands of pounds in others. In many cases benefactors had set out quite clearly who was intended to benefit from the endowment fund. They were often restricted to the sons and less frequently to the daughters of local people; not necessarily the very poor but neither the wealthy. They were intended in general for the sons, and occasionally the daughters, of clergymen, tradesmen, farmers; and the trustees of the endowment who could also usually offer a place to a local pupil. Two well-known examples of endowed schools will suffice. In 1567 Lawrence Sheriff, who had prospered as a hatter in London, provided endowments to establish a free grammar school at Rugby. Four years later, John Lyon, who had made a fortune as a grocer in London undertook a similar charitable act in the parish of Harrow. Their intentions were clear: free schooling for local boys with a few places reserved for fee-payers from high-income families. Yet, by the late nineteenth century, the largest and most dominant group were from the latter. This transformation had been encouraged by headmasters and staff using numerous devious means to exclude local boys. Vaughan, Headmaster at Harrow (1844–59) issued edicts that no boy could ride to school and this, accompanied by the calling of a register three times a day, one immediately after the mid-day meal, which local children took at home, made it impossible for local boys other than those living

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adjacent to the school to attend. A separate school was set up for local boys, ironically named the John Lyon School, financed from the endowments he had provided, the majority of which was now spent on boys from higher-income groups who had no connection with the town. In some areas local people fought back. William Wratislaw, a solicitor, successfully fought the trustees at Rugby in 1839 during Thomas Arnold’s reign (1828–42), a headmaster who was among the most active in his attempts to exclude local boys. However local protests brought only temporary respite for local pupils and the trend to reject them in favour of the children of wealthier families continued inexorably until by the late Victorian age these schools had become the bastions of the ruling class. The Commissioners set out to appropriate the funds of many endowed schools for the education of the rising middle classes whilst making their recommendations appear as worthwhile educational reforms or at the very least a tidying up and rationalisation of a system which had become inefficient. Having provided evidence of the poor state of many of the schools, the misuse of some endowments, the idiosyncratic qualifications for others and the small sums available in some schools, the proposal was to bring together a number of endowments in an area so that they could be used to support one school rather than attempt to finance several. The Commissioners decided that there was no point in squandering endowments on those who by their social situation did not need a good education. The scale of fees which would be introduced would also deter low-income parents from applying. With the concentration of endowments into one school, scholarships were to be offered and these would be open to all instead of being restricted to local pupils. Poorer scholars now found themselves in competition with middle-class pupils who had already received a good education. In most cases the latter gained the reduced-fee place. The idea of open competition fitted in well with the reforms brought in by Gladstone’s first ministry (1868–74) whereby entrance to the civil service, with the notable exception of the foreign office, would be by public examination (a system adopted for recruitment to the Indian civil service since 1854), whilst the purchase of commissions in the army was also abolished. In other words a move towards entry by merit whilst ignoring the fact that the opportunities for different social classes to compete were far from equal. It is unlikely that many trade unionists followed the deliberations of the Clarendon and Taunton Commissions nor the hundreds of detailed schemes proposed by the three Endowed School Commissioners within three years of their appointment following the 1869 Endowed Schools Act. Their work was to arouse so much resentment among the governing bodies of many of these schools that their functions were

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transferred in 1874 to the Charity Commission.4 On the other hand there were within the ranks of trade unions representing skilled workers men such as Potter, Odger and Howell, who were three of the early secretaries of the Trades Union Congress Parliamentary Committee (TUCPC) during the years 1869–75. These men were articulate, well read and fully aware of the findings of numerous official reports, government or otherwise. Potter was also secretary of the Council of Building Workers and publisher of the Beehive, founded in 1861, the most successful socialist newspaper of the time with an influence out of all proportion to its circulation of some 8,000 copies. This newspaper arose out of the nine-hour movement in the London building trades and was in turn the organ of the London Trades Council (LTC), the TUCPC and the London Working Men’s Association. Odger was a shoemaker by trade, a member of the LTC and President of the International Working Men’s Association during 1864–66. Howell was a bricklayer, who was in turn secretary of the Reform League and the Operative Builders’ Association. It would be from such people that protests to the changes would arise. George Odger, speaking on a National Education League platform, as early as 1870, ‘attacked the rich who had, he alleged, filched the schools from the people of England and now supported these institutions with money left for the education of the poor’.5 In the same year Robert Applegarth of the Carpenters’ Union, in a letter to the Beehive also mentioned how, ‘the middle class…had a monopoly of free education afforded by enormous and misused endowments’.6 The first mention of endowments at the TUC arose in 1881 from a reference to ‘attempts being made to confiscate the rights of the poorer classes in some of the educational institutions of Scotland’. Mr Fairburn from London supported the accompanying request by the Scottish delegates for the TUCPC to take the matter up, claiming ‘that £56,000 a year was taken away from the funds of the London charities for the benefit of the parson’.7 Four years later the matter gained greater prominence when T.P.Threlfall in his opening presidential address turned his attention to the matter of education and asked delegates: What has become of the vast sums of money which have been left in bygone times for education, for help to the poor? The records of the City companies are a sample of the uses to which this money has been put. The modern interpretation seems to be that the money was left for the poor in spirit—not the poor in worldly goods. It never would have been bequeathed if the ancient donors could have forseen its uses for costly banquets, middle class education and other foreign purposes.8

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The result of Threlfall’s statement was that the TUC Circular prepared by Henry Broadhurst, Secretary of the TUCPC, and distributed to trades councils for presentation to candidates in order to test their attitudes to TUC policy in the forthcoming General Election was a demand for ‘the restitution of educational and other endowments to the service of those for whom they were originally intended’.9 That the matter was gradually gaining attention can be illustrated by the fact that, almost immediately following the publication of the TUC Circular, the Labour Representation Association of Manchester and Salford, which had only been established in January 1885, issued their own circular just after the municipal elections outlining their aims for the consideration of parliamentary candidates intending to stand for election the following year. Among these aims was one ‘to secure that the educational endowments intended for the benefit of the working classes shall be applied to the purposes for which they were designed’.10 If the majority of trade unionists were unaware of proposed changes on a national scale they were quick to notice their own situation locally. This is born out by the objections which arose when moves were made by Commissioners to end free education in areas such as Sutton Coldfield, Kendall and Scarning in Norfolk. At the latter William Taylor, a platelayer on the railway, told the Select Committee of 1887 ‘that the people of Scarning who have a right to a free education are compelled to pay the school fee’ and that ‘the £2 exhibitions were awarded, not to the working class, but to a higher class’.11 In 1895 the Trades and Labour Councils together with the Co-operative Societies sent a memorial to the Bryce Commission signed by two ex-secretaries of the TUCPC and both now Liberal MPs stating ‘these endowments… were in most cases originally bequeathed for the education of poor children’. From 1904 a reference to endowments began to become incorporated into the TUC education programme. In that year it was just a phrase calling for the ‘proper management of educational endowments’. By 1905 the wording had changed to the ‘restoration of misappropriated endowments’; the identical phrase used by the Labour Party at their 1906 Annual Party Conference. In that same year at the Gas Workers’ Union Biennial Conference, Will Thorne, a man who had left school at six years of age and become a champion for improved schooling at the TUC, called for the ‘restoration of the educational endowments which had been stolen from the people’. Brian Simon has described the work of the Commissioners as privatisation.12 Initially this might seem to be an exaggeration. Privatisation has been associated with the Conservative governments of the 1980s and 1990s when industries which had been nationalised in the post-war era, with compensation paid to previous shareholders, notwithstanding that many of the industries were in parlous economic

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circumstances, were sold off to individual and corporate shareholders. Even allowing for the loss to the state of the true value of these public enterprises as some were sold below market price, or the high fees charged by financial institutions for organising the sales—at least some of the money from the sales went to the Treasury in what might be seen as going some way towards a compensatory payment. By contrast the educational endowments considered by the Commissioners had been provided by private philanthropists or companies and it could be argued they had not been financed by the state in the first place. However, whatever their original source of finance these educational endowments had been given to the community and to that extent were public property even if usually restricted to the citizens of a particular town or area. The taking over of these endowments was not accompanied by compensation on anything like the scale of their true value to those for whom the benefactors had originally provided the funds. If anything Simon has understated the action of the Commissioners which was in effect expropriation, or in the blunter terms of Will Thorne, theft! Not by the state from private individuals but rather by the rising middle classes from the lower-paid social classes and using the unrepresentative House of Lords as the conduit for much of the necessary legislation. During the Edwardian period Ramsay MacDonald, Philip Snowden and J.R.Clynes, all Labour MPs, attacked the government over the question of endowments and several requests were made for a Royal Commission to examine the way in which endowments had ‘gone astray’ as J.Cramp of the National Union of Railwaymen was to put it diplomatically. His fellow representative J.H.Thomas took a more critical approach: ‘today’s endowments are made class endowments…in the sense that a particular and special class benefit from them?’. H.A.L.Fisher, President of the Board of Education (BOE) was largely indifferent to such pleas. Whether the fact that his schooling had been received at Winchester, a school originally founded for ‘seventy poor and needy scholars’ together with ‘ten sons of noble and influential persons’ which had by the early twentieth century completely reversed these proportions, influenced his attitude it is impossible to know. The matter was raised again at the 1920 TUC but after that faded as the call of secondary education for all, spurred on by Tawney’s 1922 booklet of the same title, became the major education cause for the whole of the Labour movement. The endowment issue would re-surface again during the 1940s when Chuter Ede, Secretary of the BOE, in the House of Commons declared that when Labour formed a government ‘one of the things we shall have to do is to see that the ancient endowments of education are returned to the people for whom they were left’. G.G.Williams, principal Assistant Secretary Secondary Branch at the BOE, who had been educated at

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Westminster and taught at Wellington and Lancing Colleges, produced a paper on the subject for discussion within the Board which conceded ‘there is no doubt that the original intentions have been largely departed from…many of the older schools were founded with the intention of benefiting the poor’. THE FLEMING COMMITTEE Public schools became an issue once more at the TUC when they were asked to submit evidence to the Fleming Committee which published its report in 1944. G.Chester and Harold Clay, both from the TUC General Council (TUCGC) were invited to serve on the Committee. Some of the public schools had fallen on hard times during the inter-war period as the economic depression had led to a proportion of parents who had attended such schools themselves being unable to pay the required fees. The bestknown schools had fewer problems in filling their places but many small schools in seaside towns and leafy suburbs, unable to attract talented teachers or significant numbers of academically able children suffered closure. By 1941 a ‘strictly confidential’ memo prepared by Miss Goodfellow for the President of the BOE grouped public schools into four categories from A to D, with A being the most likely to survive financially. In the A group were Eton, Westminster and Winchester with no doubt as to their survival; B included Charterhouse, Rugby and Shrewsbury who had suffered a decline but were still considered to be in a healthy situation; C included Cranleigh and Harrow facing a doubtful future, whilst D, believed to be facing extinction, included Brighton and Dover. As with many organisations championing the cause of private enterprise whilst enjoying prosperity, the change in circumstances now led some to consider seeking government subsidies. The ‘old boy’ network came into play with correspondence going between Canon Spencer, Head of Winchester, Cyril Norwood, ex-Head of Harrow and Maurice Holmes (exWellington) Permanent Secretary at the BOE. G.G.Williams was also involved. It is interesting to note that whilst early questions by TUC representatives about endowments to the President of the Board had been met with the response that public schools were nothing to do with the BOE, when the schools were facing problems individuals within the Ministry were willing to help them in confidence. A Royal Commission was considered but rejected by the Headmasters’ Conference (HMC). The desire was to receive aid from the state whilst retaining complete control themselves over entry to and administration of the public schools. The most practical policy would be to offer some places to academically able pupils from elementary schools, with part of the fees

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being met by local authorities and possibly central government grants. This approach offered two benefits to the schools: financial subsidy from local ratepayers and taxpayers in general, together with academic selection which would enable them to ‘poach’ bright pupils from local education authority (LEA) schools and enhance the reputation of the public schools, albeit at the expense of the former. This has been the substance of all later offers by public schools offering places to significant numbers of non-fee payers from LEA schools in spite of variations in presentation. Finally in 1942 a Departmental Committee was established in response to a request made to the President of the BOE jointly by the Governing Bodies Association and the HMC which resulted in the appointment of the Fleming Committee, whose terms of reference were ‘To consider means whereby the association between the public schools… and the general educational system of the country could be developed and extended…’ As Gosden has pointed out in his major study of education during the Second World War, the aim was ‘not so much to “democratise” the public schools—even though that appeared to be its purpose—but rather an attempt to find a politically acceptable way of bringing state-supported pupils, and thereby public money, to the salvation of the financially unstable and threatened schools’.13 The initial response of the TUC in submitting evidence to the Fleming Committee was to forward to them a copy of their pamphlet Education After the War, drawing attention to paragraphs 12–14 dealing with feepaying schools. It was recommended that fees to Direct Grant Grammar Schools be abolished and that 186 of the 235 schools which recruited most of their pupils locally should be handed over to LEA control. Their views were shared by the WEA, the Labour Party and the Association of Local Authorities. The TUC believed this would be accepted as a majority of the Fleming Committee had come to the same conclusion. As for the remainder of the fee-paying sector, with the exception of a minority of schools which were experimental or run and fully financed by religious organisations, the remainder should not be permitted to continue: There would appear to be no reason for the continued existence of private schools. The great majority of these schools are based on class distinctions, and so far as that is their only claim to existence, they should be abolished. On the other hand, there are a number of private schools with very high educational claims. Such schools may well be brought within the State system, and it is hoped that they will be free to preserve and develop any special characteristics which they may possess. So far as entry of pupils is concerned,

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however, they would be placed on the same footing as all other schools.14 In addition they believed all fee-paying schools should be regularly inspected as to the suitability of their premises and all teachers required to be qualified as they were in LEA schools. They pointed to the existing anachronism whereby ‘anybody, whatever his or her qualifications, may start an independent school in any building’. They referred to an interwar Departmental Committee for 1931–32 which reported on ‘a number [of the schools] which were so defective, both structurally and educationally, as to be harmful to the mental and physical welfare of their pupils’. Considering the various suggestions being made to the Fleming Committee which might lessen some of the abuses of privilege associated with the public schools the TUC believed that, while the system remained whereby the schools controlled entry and set the scale of fees, they would remain socially exclusive and merely invite a comparatively small number of high-achieving pupils to join the privileged whilst doing nothing to help the vast majority of children in the country. As for the value of long-term boarding they were unconvinced believing that the best place for a child was at home with her or his parents although it was suggested that most adolescent pupils would benefit from a period of several weeks of communal living. The main conclusion of the TUC was that the ‘worst feature is that the whole system rests on private wealth and is open, in the main, only to those who can afford to pay. As for the claims made about the schools providing leaders this was believed to rest on ‘the assumption that the community consists of two pre-determined groups of leaders and led…the aim of the state should be to abolish this caste system’.15 In fact, this view was not restricted to those in the Labour movement for in 1939 Robert Boothby, an old Etonian, had written to Lloyd George, ‘lt is inconceivable that our present “caste” system of education can survive without drastic modification.’ Within the BOE it was felt that, as the TUC found the proposals of the Fleming Committee no answer to their own perception of the public school system, there was little point in discussing the matter with them. The President of the Board, R.A.Butler, was a product of Marlborough. Nearly all his family for generations had been to public schools; for example one uncle had been head of Haileybury and a grandfather head of Harrow at 26 years of age. Raised in India where his father, who had attended Haileybury, was Governor of the Central Provinces, Butler had no conception of the education experienced by the majority of British children. His loyalties were to the public schools and to all enquiries about the schools during the war years when the whole system of

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schooling was being considered for reform he replied that the Fleming Committee was dealing with this matter. In fact their report was delayed and came out only a week before the 1944 Education Act received the Royal Assent. That this was a conscious, astute political move on Butler’s part can be deduced by two remarks he made. The TUC forwarded a memorandum raising points of disagreement with the Fleming proposals and asking Butler to receive a deputation, to which he agreed. Prior to the meeting he wrote a note stating, They are of course too late. The Public Schools are saved.’ The other remark is the oftquoted railway analogy from his autobiography explaining his tactics in avoiding any discussion of the public schools; ‘the first class carriage had been shunted on to an immense “siding’” from which one is left to speculate to which class he considered the majority of the children in the country belonged. The meeting between the TUC and Butler achieved nothing; the TUC wanted all fees for secondary schooling abolished but as Butler had already rejected an earlier recommendation of the Fleming Committee to end fees in direct grant grammar schools there was no possibility that he would consider their proposal. They had to be content with platitudes from the President: ‘it was his desire and intention to ensure fairness in accessibility’ and that ‘the pupils were selected in accordance with their educational fitness and on no other grounds’. The TUC believed the key points they had raised with the Fleming Committee had been ignored, especially that of equal accessibility. The changes recommended by the Committee would result in a continuation of ‘a system inevitably accompanied by social and economic privilege. The TUC do not merely wish to transfer this privilege from one group in the community to another. They wish to abolish it.’16 In reality even without Butler’s active involvement in preventing serious discussion nationally (given that the political composition of the Coalition Government, still based upon the 1935 election results, was overwhelmingly Conservative), radical reform of the very schools which so many of these MPs had attended stood no chance of being accepted by the House of Commons. In any case the 1944 Education Act was greeted with such enthusiasm by almost every organisation and the majority of the population that it became the focus of attention and the public school question faded into the background as an area for serious discussion in the immediate post-war years. As a generalisation the major focus of attention during the 20 years following the election of the first majority Labour government in 1945 as far as schooling was concerned was the implementation of the 1944 Education Act and later the challenge to the divisive tripartite secondary school system which emerged during these years. Behind the scenes the public schools began slowly to regain their confidence as rising

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prosperity enabled a growing minority of parents to meet the school fees. A secret committee led by Maurice Holmes resulted in two circulars being issued, 90 and 120, which gave local authorities the power to finance attendance at boarding schools for ‘normal’ pupils as well as specific categories of pupils.17 George Tomlinson, who had succeeded Ellen Wilkinson at the Ministry of Education upon her death in 1947, defended the action when criticised by the WEA. Most people who came in contact with Tomlinson agreed as to his friendly nature; at the same time he was in awe of the institutions of the Establishment, including the public schools, and anxious that his party should not antagonise influential sections of opinion. Whilst the TUC were reluctant to criticise a government sympathetic to many of their aims they were preoccupied with the implementation of the Education Act, especially the fight to raise the school leaving age to 15, already postponed by Butler and only achieved after a considerable struggle by Wilkinson for its implementation in September 1947. Then there were problems of teacher supply to reduce class sizes, ending all-age rural schools, competition with other sections of the community for building materials in order to construct new schools, rebuilding those suffering from bomb damage and providing the extra accommodation required to deal with the further year of schooling planned. Compared to these problems facing the majority of the school population the public school issue seemed of little consequence. The educational concerns of the TUC were reflected in their debates at Congress annually. They were reduced employment of children, transport for children to school and reduced fares for those at school for all journeys, the provision of nursery schools, raising the school leaving age to 16, opposition to reductions in expenditure on education and increasing pressure to introduce comprehensive secondary schools. Only a few references to public schools can be found in the TUC archives at Warwick University during the post-war years until the mid1960s. In 1953 a resolution was sent from the Southern Federation of Trades Councils to the TUC Education Committee (TUCEC) requesting them to ask the Minister of Education to ‘implement as soon as possible Part 111 of the 1944 Education Act dealing with the registration and inspection of Independent Schools’. The resolution was discussed by the Committee but it was decided that no action would be taken because the first priority had to be improvements to publicly provided schools. The following year the TUC received a letter from Admiral of the Fleet Sir John Cunningham, President of the appeal for Reed’s School ‘which had developed from the school founded in the last century for fatherless children in the East End of London’. The school set in 50 acres of the Surrey countryside ‘was no longer restricted to those intended by the founder’ Andrew Reed when he established it in

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1813. Its origins were still to be seen in the minority of Foundation places still available but in other respects it had become another public school. The admiral asked the TUC for a contribution. The TUC replied regretting they could not contribute to the appeal. The most outspoken criticism of public schools came from Dame Anne Godwin, who as President of the TUC in 1962 and a member of the TUCEC for ten years, used her opening address to Congress to speak on education. Upon leaving school at 15 she had joined the suffragettes and later was to become the first woman to become secretary of a ‘mixed’ trade union, the Clerical and Administrative Workers’ Union. She told delegates:

The fact is that our educational system is riddled with class distinction and stratified by class assumptions. The influence of the public schools is all-pervasive. They have established an enclave of privilege for themselves in our midst. They have created barriers of speech, of social habits and of modes of thought that do great harm to our nation. In the same year Anthony Crosland was to express similar sentiments in his book The Conservative Enemy:

The public schools offend not only against the ‘weak’, let alone the ‘strong’ ideal of equal opportunity; they offend even more against any idea of social cohesion or democracy. The privileged stratum of education, the exclusive preserve of the wealthier classes, socially and physically segregated from the state educational system, is the greatest cause of stratification and class consciousness in Britain.18 By the mid-1960s whilst the major focus of educational debate was upon criticism of the 11-plus examination and the introduction of comprehensive secondary schools, a policy firmly supported by the TUC, public schools once more began to attract attention. In 1966 the TUC raised the issue on two occasions. The first was to ask Anthony Crosland why no mention of them was made in Circular 10/65 dealing with secondary school reorganisation. The Minister replied that he intended to appoint a Commission ‘to examine the best ways of integrating the independent schools with the State system of comprehensive secondary education’. The Commission was established in May 1966 and the TUC were invited to submit evidence to it.

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THE FRANKS COMMISSION The second reference to public schools came with their comments to the Franks Commission set up to examine the role of Oxford University in the UK. It was the admission system which was of particular interest to Congress. Statistics gathered by the Commission found that Oxford admitted a smaller proportion of maintained school pupils (41 per cent) and manual workers’ children (13 per cent) than any other British university except Cambridge. Trade unionists believed these results were influenced by a series of practices; that many public school pupils spent eight terms in the sixth form as opposed to five in maintained schools providing them with an extra year of tuition and study, the closed scholarships reserving places for pupils from certain public schools and that whether consciously or not social factors were involved in the interview process which favoured those from these schools. One result of all this was that often pupils from the maintained sector felt uncomfortable in the social atmosphere of these two ancient universities and were therefore deterred from applying. The TUC proposed admissions should be through the university rather than individual colleges, especially in the light of the admissions of Trinity and Christ Church at Oxford where nearly 75 per cent of the students were from fee-paying schools. They found it difficult to accept the view of the Commission that ‘the financial obstacle to working class children entering Oxford has entirely disappeared’. THE NEWSOM COMMITTEE The Public Schools Commission set up by Crosland was led by Sir John Newsom, consisted of 15 other members and reported in 1968. Members included Dame Kitty Anderson, ex-headteacher of North London Collegiate College for Girls, two headteachers of boys’ public schools, Mr Dancy of Marlborough and Mr T.Howarth of St Pauls, two headteachers of comprehensive schools, Mr W.Hill of Myers Grove, Sheffield and Dr H.Judge of Banbury School in Oxfordshire. There were four academics including Professor Donnison of the LSE, Sir John Davies of the CBI and Dame Anne Godwin of the TUC. Apart from seeking ways to integrate fee-paying schools with the maintained sector they also wished to assess the need for boarding education and to ‘ensure that the public schools should make their maximum contribution to meeting national education needs’ and to ‘create a socially mixed entry into the schools to reduce the divisive influence which they now exert’. It is difficult to believe the Labour Government was really serious about reform of the public schools. Crosland’s rather cynical view was that it would take two years to complete the Committee’s findings but that was

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fine because there was no money available to spend on reform. He believed the greater priority was to spend money to strengthen the state sector. The TUC submitted evidence in the belief that there was to be a genuine discussion on public schools which would arise from the evidence presented to the Committee which would in turn lead to reform. They made it clear that not one of their Education Committee had any direct experience of public schools but believed their views were valid because the schools affected the public education system and society and because they had been willing to participate in a similar manner with evidence to the Fleming Committee more than 20 years earlier. The statement they provided illustrates the principles upon which TUC education policy was formulated and provided an analysis explaining their objections to the public school system. The logic of their approach was that minor reform would make no difference; major reform would mean they were no longer public schools in the sense that parents would be willing to pay high fees for privileges no longer available. In any case the TUC rejected selection for secondary schools including the main criterion used by the schools, the capacity of parents to pay substantial fees. They wrote to the Education Minister including a copy of their evidence and suggesting little progress could be made until the government gave a clear declaration of its policy. Crosland replied that he ‘hoped that such a basis would emerge from the Commission’s report’ and he did not wish to jeopardise developments by making a statement until he had seen it. A reasonable enough reply but one which seemed to echo that of Butler years before when he had been actively scheming to protect the schools from reform. The Report was published on 22 July 1968. A week earlier it was before the Cabinet for discussion yet none took place. Tony Benn wrote that his wife Caroline ‘had done a great deal of work on this and had given me a big brief but Harold didn’t want to discuss it. It was agreed it would be published without comment.’19 He described it as ‘a ghastly document’. The Report found few friends. Wilson saw nothing but potential trouble ahead if he took any action which might adversely effect the privileges of the public schools. Knowing he would face criticism in his own Party if he gave any support to the schools, and being aware of the powerful lobby within the Establishment if he suggested serious reform, he chose to do nothing. A measure of his interest in the matter can be gauged from the fact that in the 1,000-page account he gave in his book The Labour Government 1964–10 whilst mention is made of the setting up of the Royal Commission in a list of items in the Queen’s speech there is no mention of the Report when it was published. The Labour government’s line on private schooling fitted in with their policy of inaction; a suggestion that the public schools would

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wither away when local authority schools became so good that everybody would want to send their children to them. This might be seen as naïve. More likely was the justified fear of the furore which would follow from any action perceived as detrimental to the interests of the fee-paying schools through their influential pressure groups. Wilson clearly did not think the positive gain which might be achieved was worth the divisive political battle which would be waged on Labour. The TUC was largely disappointed with the Newsom Report’s findings but they did respond with detailed comments on the points contained in the findings, commencing with a measure of agreement: They concur in the Commission’s general conclusion that independent schools are a divisive influence in society. However they regret that the doubts which they expressed in evidence to the Commission, as to whether its terms of reference would enable it to make consistent and radical recommendations concerning the public schools, are confirmed by the Report.20 In the main their comments reiterated the points contained in their initial statement of evidence. They concluded, ‘lt seemed that having established certain facts the Commission could not admit to their cause and consequences.’ Referring to the nature of the public schools the Commission had stated, That purpose is clearly the transmission of educational, occupational and social privileges from those who currently enjoy them to their children.’ The statistics supplied substantiated this conclusion. ‘Yet having accepted these facts, the Commission appears to regard them as incidental, rather than as central, to the nature of the public school system.’ On only one matter of substance could the TUC agree with the Commission: ‘the withdrawal of financial subsidies from public funds (in the form of tax relief and the like) at present available to schools for providing private education’. Even this minor reform was never acted upon. THE DONNISON COMMITTEE The Public Schools Commission was now reconstituted in 1968 under the chairmanship of Professor Donnison. There was a considerable change in membership although Dame Anne Godwin retained a place. The Commission was invited to consider how independent day and direct grant grammar schools could participate in the move towards comprehensive education. The direct grant grammar schools were somewhat of a mystery to most people including many in the educational world. Their origin lay in the 1926 Hadow Report which

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recommended all schools taking pupils over 11 years of age should be regarded as secondary. Grantaided secondary schools were given a choice in their source of funding; either by the LEA or by a direct grant from the central authority, namely the Board of Education. A minority, 235 schools, chose the latter system which meant they had to reserve 25 per cent of their free places to pupils selected by the LEA. When the 1944 Education Act was passed and LEAs abolished fees in their secondary schools an exception was made for the direct grant grammar schools, against the early advice of the Fleming Committee which Butler had rejected. The number of direct grant schools was reduced to 164. Of the 71 which lost their direct grant status, some became independent and became in effect public schools whilst some came under local education authority control.21 The direct grant grammar schools were selective schools with much in common with HMC day schools. The boarding pupils came from similar social backgrounds: 85 per cent had fathers from professional or managerial occupations, social classes I and II. For day schools the figure was 58 per cent. Those with semi-skilled and unskilled fathers were 1.3 per cent and 8 per cent respectively. In 1964 the schools received approximately 75 per cent of their income from the LEA and central government with the remaining coming from parental fees. Among the direct grant grammar schools were 57 Roman Catholic and seven Methodist. Neither of these two groups were hostile to nonselective secondary schooling. Just over half were girls’ schools. The direct grant system was largely an historical accident rather than evidence that all of the schools achieved high academic results. The bestknown was probably Manchester Grammar, but such a school was atypical. Only about ten schools were in this category, although the reputation of the best rubbed off on the rest of the schools in a similar manner to that of the top HMC schools, whereby some people thought they were typical of all feepaying schools. In some areas direct grant schools achieved better results than LEA grammar schools whilst in others the LEA school might do better, a fact pointed out by Sir Alec Clegg with reference to Bradford, Leeds and Sheffield. The question for the Labour government was how could they give funding to selective secondary schools when they supported a policy of comprehensive schooling and in addition justify spending more money on some pupils in the community than others? The Commission agreed the schools should participate in LEA reorganisation schemes and abolish fees in day schools but they could not agree on how this might be achieved. Two possible solutions were offered. Those with connections with the schools suggested they could retain full grant status receiving funding from a centrally financed School Grants Committee which would preserve their independence without giving them more influence

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than LEA schools. An equal number of the Committee, seven, suggested they should go and become ‘controlled or aided schools’ as was the case with religious schools. Professor Donnison and Lord Annan, the ViceChairman, were willing to support either scheme. Two Committee members wished to retain fees on a means-tested basis with at least some of the schools retained as selective grammar schools. It was suggested that the governing bodies should become more representative of local communities including employers and trade unions. The Labour government welcomed the Report; the Conservatives opposed it, rejecting any proposal which would integrate the schools into the LEA. The TUC saw it as contributing ‘a modest step towards comprehensive reorganisation’. In contrast to the Newsom Report they gave it a general welcome. They agreed with the analysis made of the direct grant system which provided ‘a good academic education for a minority of children (selected according to estimated academic ability and, in effect, by social class) at the expense of the majority, including most working-class children, who receive an inadequate minimum education’. They were unhappy about suggestions that direct grant schools could join the private sector because this implied ‘the continued existence of a private sector of education’. They also agreed with the conclusion of the Committee about gifted children: ‘for the sake of gifted and ordinary children alike, gifted children should be educated with their less gifted contemporaries in comprehensive schools…because there is no certain way of identifying such children’. It might also diminish the quality of the general education both of those children in ‘super selective’ schools and those excluded from them. CONCLUSION It is clear that the objectives of the public schools and their supporters were incompatible with those of the TUC. The features of these schools which made them attractive to the more affluent sections of society were the very practices to which the TUC objected—a segregated system of schooling which was overwhelmingly patronised by those in key positions of power. The validity of this claim is supported by statistics which appeared almost with regular monotony and had become so familiar as to be regarded as a part of the natural order of British society. To take only the latest figures compiled for the period under discussion, namely those from the Newsom Committee, the percentages attending public schools and fee-paying schools recognised as efficient were as follows:

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Vice Chancellors, Heads of Colleges, Professors of all English

and Welsh Universities 32.5%

Heads of colleges/Professors at Oxford or Cambridge Admirals, Generals, Field Marshals Physicians, surgeons at London Teaching hospitals on the GMC Directors of prominent firms Church of England Bishops Judges and QCs

49.3% 55% 68% 70.8% 75% 79.2%

These figures do not include ex-direct grant pupils. Nearly half of Conservative MPs had attended public schools and this was overwhelmingly true for Tory cabinets, a trend which continued so that by 1979 in the first Thatcher administration 152 of the 339 Tory MPs had been privately educated, including 51 from one school alone, Eton, whilst 95 per cent of the Cabinet had been educated outside the state sector. This was at a time when the overall percentage of public school pupils remained relatively small, about 6 per cent of the school population, although they made up a far larger percentage of pupils staying on into the sixth form. Nevertheless their positions in key sections of society in what can be referred to as the Establishment was out of all proportion to their numbers, and there is some evidence to suggest when it came to recruitment to the civil service, especially the foreign office, social as well as academic criteria played a part. The Fulton Commission of 1969 studied the trend of recruitment to the civil service and found that contrary to popular opinion ‘it has not been towards recruiting from a steadily widening social background…Overall it has been static.’ In their study they found that between 1964 and 1967 half of the applicants to the administrative class who were to get first class degrees were considered unsuitable by the Civil Service Commission and rejected whilst 12.5 per cent of those accepted were to obtain lower seconds or thirds. This was followed up after the publication date, the results appearing as a footnote in the final report. It was found that there seemed to be a strong association between attendance at public schools and Oxford and Cambridge universities. A majority of those obtaining first class degrees but rejected came from local authority schools.22 The major difference in the approach of the TUC and the Labour Party, as two of the major partners in the Labour movement could be seen in the reality of life experience, political power and influence. Most trade union leaders and prominent members of the TUC had risen through the ranks within their union which represented their occupation, be they miners, railway workers, engineers, shop assistants or clerical workers. This inevitably meant they if they had left school before the

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Second World War they had usually received only elementary education before leaving school at 14, even earlier if they had left school before 1918. Some had served an apprenticeship, others had pursued their formal education further by part-time study through correspondence courses or evening classes, an endurance test for people who have already worked a full day, especially if engaged in heavy manual work. During the inter-war period a few gained free places at secondary schools although even so there were always families too poor to allow their children to stay on at school to benefit from the extended schooling offered whilst some believed the sacrifice was not worth while if a daughter gained a place, rationalising that it might be wasted if she only worked for a few years before getting married! It would be a good many years before the post-1944 generation who had all been to secondary schools reached leading positions in the trade union world. As for a public school education it has not been possible to trace one trade unionist who took a significant role in her or his union who attended a public school from 1870 to 1970. Therefore unlike so many other sections of society most trade unionists knew from their own experience and that of their children of the constant campaigning necessary to persuade governments to provide a good basic schooling for all children. At the same time they were aware that they were often faced by people from the BOE and government ministers who were ignorant of the inadequate state education system for which they were responsible but did not patronise as pupils or parents themselves. For example, R.A. Butler at a meeting with senior officials in August 1941 asked, ‘What is an elementary school?’ By contrast the lack of direct experience by trade unionists of public schools did not prevent their awareness of the way the system worked in perpetuating an elite who dominated the society in which they had to earn their living. As the occupational base of the country began to change in the 1960s there was an increase in the number of professional workers and this was reflected in the increased number of trade unionists with formal qualifications in education, especially from white-collar unions such as the Association of Scientists, Technicians and Management Staff (ASTMS). They added to the comparatively few officers within trade unions and the TUC who were university graduates using their formal education skills in research departments producing reports and statistics to support the work of their unions and at the TUC. The arguments put forward by the TUC to abolish the numerous privileges enjoyed by the public schools became ever-more persuasive; the defence by the public school lobby increasingly exposed as a case of special pleading. It could be argued that the TUC could afford to be more objective about the educational issues in the debate over public schools. Unlike the Labour

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Party they were not called upon to introduce reforms and face the full political force of the public school lobby. The situation within the Labour Party was different. Increasingly from the inter-war period onwards the number of Labour MPs who were trade unionists with experience of unskilled or semi-skilled work declined and those from professional backgrounds increased. This trend would continue after the war as the structure of industry changed and numbers employed in primary industries decreased whilst those employed by the service sector increased. There were ex-public schoolboys in the Labour Party, especially in the Cabinet. To take a few well-known examples at random across the years, Clement Attlee (Haileybury), Hugh Dalton (Eton), Hugh Gaitskell and Richard Crossman (Winchester). All attended Cambridge or Oxford Universities. They therefore had personal knowledge of the system and could at times be critical of the schools. They also readily recognised the power of the schools with their old boy networks in the country. Whatever the injustice of the system they had to judge whether attempting reform was worth antagonising so many key figures in the community who could mount a sustained opposition to any Labour government. It was possible to take a pragmatic approach and suggest that because a comparatively small number of people were involved did it really matter so much? This attitude by-passed the difficult moral argument that there was nothing democratic about a situation in which those who in general already had many of the advantages which money could buy were able to purchase even more of a reasonable share of the limited educational resources available to the rest of the community in the form of smaller classes, better facilities and access to the higher education and career prospects which the public schools possessed through their social networks. The Labour Party had to face an electorate to gain approval for their programme in a way that the TUC did not. By contrast the Conservative Party were strong supporters of what many regarded as ‘their schools’ because this was the education experience of so many of them as pupils and later as parents. As supporters of the free market they believed most things should be available according to the ability of people to pay the required price, and above a basic minimum this should apply to education as much as to any other service. As Lord Hailsam, an old Etonian, explained in his book The Conservative Case published in 1959, ‘A man is as entitled to buy his wife the comfort of a hospital pay bed or his son a public school education as he is to buy his wife a dress or his son a bicycle.’ The public schools were in the education market with the leading HMC schools occupying the equivalent positions of Harrods or Fortnum and Mason in the departmental store trade. Hence strong support came for the schools from their patrons in the form of large sections within the

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Tory Party. On the other hand some local Conservative councillors were often strong supporters of their local schools and in certain areas pioneered the introduction of comprehensive schools. Among Conservative MPs, although the unpopularity of the 11-plus was recognised, they were less likely to be keen supporters of LEA schools. For one thing, the Ministry of Education was not considered to be an important department in which to work, except as a stepping stone to a more important ministry. Some measure of the low status in which it was held was the fact that Florence Horsbrugh who was appointed Education Minister by Winston Churchill in 1951 was not included in the Cabinet until two years later, whilst between her appointment and 1964 there were eight changes in that post with Hailsham doing two spells, one of which was for no more than six months. Edward Boyle, twice Conservative Minister of Education, was told by David Eccles, who also held the post twice, ‘You will find it difficult to get the Cabinet to understand education because so few of them have been involved in the maintained schools.’23 The Labour Party may well have agreed with the arguments concerning the public schools put forward by the TUC but Labour Cabinets were reluctant to appear hostile to these schools. Neither the special pleading of the Conservative Party for public schools to retain their privileges nor the inaction of the Labour Party fearful of the consequences of challenging the schools really faced up to the arguments of the TUC, especially that provided in the detailed evidence submitted to the Fleming, Newsom and Donnison Committees. In the long run it is doubtful whether the TUC was surprised with the lack of any serious moves to reform the public schools for their everyday lives were grounded in the political reality of pressure groups and they recognised the powerful vested interests supporting these schools only too well. NOTES This chapter is based upon research funded by a two-year Leverhulme Fellowship for which I am most grateful. I would also like to thank Professor Ted Tapper for reading this chapter and providing helpful advice. 1. E.Frow and M.Katanka (eds) (1968) 1868 Year of the Unions, p.34, London: Michel Katanka Books Ltd. 2. C.Griggs (1985) ‘Labour and Education’, pp.160–1, in K.D.Brown (ed.) The First Labour Party 1906–1914, Beckenham, Kent: Croom Helm. 3. For fuller details concerning the mismanagement of school endowments see T.W.Bamford (1967) The Rise of the Public Schools, pp.23–4, 179–80, London: Nelson; B.Simon (1960) Studies in the History of Education 1780–

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4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15. 16. 17. 18. 19. 20. 21. 22. 23.

1870, pp.319–36, London: Lawrence and Wishart; B.Simon (1994) The State and Educational Change, pp.61–72, London: Lawrence and Wishart. B.Simon (1960) Studies in the History of Education 1780–1870, p.328 W.P.McCann (1970) Trade Unionists, Artisans and the 1870 Education Act’, British Journal of Educational Studies, 18, 2, p.140. Beehive, 26 March 1870. TUC Report 1881,London: TUC, p.18. TUC Report 1885, London: TUC, p.19. R.Brown (1960) ‘The Labour Movement in Hull 1870–1900, with Special Reference to New Unionism’, p.95. M.Sc.(Econ) Hull University. L.Bather (1956) ‘A History of the Manchester and Salford Trades Council’, p. 125, Ph.D. Manchester University. B.Simon (1960) Studies in the History of Education 1780–1870, pp.329–32. B.Simon (1994) The State and Educational Change, p.71. P.H.J.H.Gosden (1976) Education in the Second World War: A Study in Policy an Administration, pp.323–33, London: Methuen and Co. Ltd. TUC Memorandum (1942), p.6. TUC Report 1943, London: TUC, p.68. TUC Report 1944, London: TUC, p.90. B.Simon (1991) Education and the Social Order; British Education since 1944, pp.136–39 London: Lawrence and Wishart. A.Crosland (1962) The Conversative Enemy: A Programme of Radical Reform for th 1960s, p.15, London: Jonathan Cape. T.Benn (1989) Office Without Power: Diaries 1968–72, p.91, London: Arrow Books Ltd. TUC Report 1969, London: TUC, p.313. E.Allsopp and D.Grugeon (1966) Direct Grant Grammar Schools, London: Fabia Research Series 256. The Civil Service, 3, 1, ‘Surveys and Investigations: Social Survey of the Civil Service (1969) see pp.51, 399 and 407, London: HMSO. M.Kogan (1971) The Politics of Education, p.90, Harmondsworth: Penguin.

3 Planning Enlightenment and Dignity The Girls’ Schools 1918–1958 Sara Delamont

INTRODUCTION This paper addresses four absences in those sections of the official histories of the girls’ schools that cover the years between 1918 and 1958. These absences are Freudianism, the great depression of 1929-39, the rise of fascism and the post-1945 cult of domesticity. The title comes from Winifred Holtby’s (1936) novel South Riding. The novel opens in 1932 in the depression with the heroine, Sarah Burton, appointed to be head of a small Yorkshire high school for girls. Her aims for the 53 day girls and 13 boarders are captured in the phrase ‘planning dignity, planning enlightenment’. The paper focuses on the goals and achievements of the private girls’ schools through the depression, the Second World War, and the Butskillite years of 1944–58. The main source material is the published histories of the girls’ schools from the whole United Kingdom. The school histories are supplemented with a discussion of the popular fiction read by the fee-paying parents, a mechanism for alerting the middle classes to fashionable ideas. Claud Cockburn (1975) explored ideas about religion, sex, race, class and the dangers of communism in 15 best-sellers published between 1903 and 1939, and the same strategy is deployed here. First wave feminism, from 1848 to 1918, produced the academic girls’ schools and universities. This feminist movement effectively ended in Britain with the vote being granted in 1918 (to women aged over 30 with property) and the Sex Disqualification (Removal) Act which opened the professions to women. Second wave feminism followed in the period 1918–68. The feminism of this period is sometimes called social feminism, because the agenda was largely one of social reform: school meals, contraception, ante-natal clinics and the peace movement. Many feminists were active in supporting the League of Nations, and trying to prevent another war. Changes in the intellectual and economic climate of Britain after 1918 threatened the girls’ schools and universities founded by the first wave

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feminists. Many historians of women’s education have focused on the pre1918 era, and neglected the era from 1918 to 1958. Following two earlier papers (Delamont, 1993a, 1993b) which analysed published histories of girls’ schools to explore how they represented the issues facing their feminist founders, this paper was designed to see how the challenges to the girls’ schools after 1918 were reflected in them. It transpired that these challenges were totally absent from the histories. The paper, therefore, could not be an analysis of how the challenges were represented; but has to be an analysis of why they were not discussed. The paper explains the four challenges briefly, presents the analysis of the histories of the girls’ schools, and then draws on other evidence about the four challenges and their threats to education. FOUR CHALLENGES TO FEMINIST EDUCATION In the period between 1918 and 1958 there were four challenges to feminism: Freudianism, the great depression of 1929–38, the rise of fascism, and the post-1945 cult of domesticity. The first and fourth challenges were ideological, the second economic and the third political. In this paper it is the threats specifically to the girls’ schools and universities that are the focus, rather than to feminism as a whole. Each of the four challenges was potentially damaging to the academic girls’ schools and to the higher education for women that first wave feminists had achieved. It would be reasonable to expect to find the nature of the threats, and the strategies developed by the institutions against them, in the published histories of the schools and universities. Freudianism became intellectually fashionable in Britain in the years after the 1914–18 war. In part, this was because of the servicemen who suffered mental illness and needed psychological help. The plight of such men is epitomised by Peter Wimsey, Dorothy L.Sayers’ aristocratic detective, and the other veterans in The Unpleasantness at the Bellona Club (1921). A modern evocation of the need for psychoanalytic therapy is one central theme in Pat Barker’s trilogy, Regeneration (1991), The Eye in the Door (1993) and The Ghost Road (1995). As a new belief system (new in English that is) Freudianism as understood among British intellectuals had many attractions. It came from Vienna, a glamorous, continental capital, the source of new ideas, progressive in the fine and decorative arts, architecture, music and politics, which were radically different from the pre-war ideas of Victorian and Edwardian Britain. There is evidence in many of the popular novels of the inter-war years that the existence of the ‘new’ psychoanalytic ideas and their cult status among progressive metropolitan intellectuals was a conversation topic. It is mentioned, scornfully, in many John Buchan novels about tough

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masculine men, and ridiculed in the frothy home counties comedies of Angela Thirkell. For example, in Summer Half, readers are invited to laugh at ‘one of the assistant masters, who was encouraging the boys to think rather of politics and the new psychology than of their work’ (Thirkell, 1937:37). In Josephine Tey’s detective story Miss Pym Disposes (1946), the heroine has used psychology to escape poverty and drudgery. Miss Pym is the product of a girls’ school and university, who hated teaching French, and has written an anti-Freudian bestseller on psychology. She read her first book on psychology out of curiosity, because it seemed to her an interesting sort of thing; and she read all the rest to see if they were just as silly. By the time she had read thirtyseven books on the subject, she had evolved ideas of her own on psychology; at variance, of course, with all thirty-seven volumes read to date. In fact the thirty-seven volumes seemed to her so idiotic and made her so angry that she sat down there and then and wrote reams of refutal (Tey, 1946:7). When her book is published: ‘the intellectuals had tired of Freud and Company. They were longing for Some New Thing’ (p.8). And thus Miss Pym becomes famous. So in the inter-war years, the sort of parents who could pay school fees were likely to have heard of the new ideas of psychology and psychoanalysis and yet, simultaneously, to have had them ridiculed as a fad among the ‘chattering classes’, or the ‘half-baked’. Apart from the potential help it could offer the desperately shellshocked, Freudianism was simultaneously attractive for intellectuals and problematic for the girls’ schools and universities. Freudianism could be used to brand the girls’ schools as unscientific: because here was a new scientific theory which was interpreted to mean that biology was destiny. Freudianism could be used to argue that women were so biologically different from men that they should not have the same education as males. Also, and equally devastating, Freudian ideas could be used to challenge the heterosexual celibacy and spinsterhood which had given the feminist pioneers the moral high ground. During the years after 1851 the feminist pioneers had created a woman-centred lifestyle with all-female institutions. Vicinus (1985) deals with five of these: deaconesses, nursing, schools, universities and settlement houses. In these all-female institutions, women lived with dignity, improving the lives of other women. What had been a morally pure alternative to marriage in the nineteenth century was rendered deeply sinister by Freudianism after 1918. The vogue for Freud allowed critics of these feminist, separatist, institutions to attack them in the inter-war years. Meyrick Booth (1927, 1932) for example, a eugenicist, deployed

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Freudianism to decry the nineteenthcentury feminists as old-fashioned. The publication of a theory, by a doctor and scientist, which made it clear that everyone was a sexual being, that repressing that sexuality was dangerous, and that directing it to the same sex was perverted, made this woman-centred way of life suspect. This sinister reinterpretation of the woman-centred life appeared in fiction most famously in Clemence Dane’s Regiment of Women (1917). The depression of 1929–39 was a very different kind of threat to feminism and the schools and higher education the feminists had founded. There was hostility to women having paid employment when men were unemployed; and the middle—and upper-middle-class families had to make economies which often included less investment in school fees and higher education expenses for daughters. These themes are common in fiction. The ‘injustice’ of spinsters having employment when married men are unemployed is a central theme in Gaudy Night (Sayers, 1936). Squire Carne’s inability to send his daughter Midge to an appropriate school is a turning point in South Riding (Holtby, 1936). In the United States, several women’s colleges came close to financial collapse after the Wall Street Crash of 1929 (Bashaw, 1999; Kendall, 1975; Solomon, 1985). The rise of fascism was also a threat to feminism and to the feminist schools and higher education. The political philosophy that wanted women back in the home was explicitly anti-feminist, and hostile to the academic education of women. As it became clearer that the fascist regimes had to be fought, the commitment of the feminist pacifists also became suspect. Winifred Holtby (1934) and Dorothy L.Sayers (1946) both wrote essays defending feminism against the ideology of fascism. The opposition between feminist ideas and fascist ones is a central theme in one detective story of the period. Georgia Strangeways, the heroine of Nicholas Blake’s The Smiler with the Knife (1939) is a feminist, who sets out to infiltrate the fascist English Banner movement led by Chilton Canteloe (a scarcely disguised Oswald Moseley), and destroy it. English Banner believe ‘Woman is for the recreation of the warrior’ and ‘Women’s place is in the kitchen’, and their anti-feminism is portrayed as distinctly un-English. After the 1939–45 War, a new threat to feminist aims, the cult of domesticity, arose. It is brilliantly described in Elizabeth Wilson’s Halfway to Paradise (1980). There was the popular understanding of the theory of Bowlby (1946, 1951) about the importance of full time motherhood (Rutter, 1972), the desire to eat good home cooking after food rationing, the New Look in fashion, and the move to send women home so men could take up their ‘rightful’ place in the workforce again. The position of the private feminist academic girls’ schools was made particularly problematic by the 1944

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Education Act. While in one way the 1944 Act was a gain for women, because it made secondary education free and compulsory for girls, in another it challenged the existence of the private schools. If a grammar school offered a free education, why would anyone pay? Many of the schools joined the state system, and ceased to be feepaying altogether, or took direct grant status after 1944. (To provide enough grammar school places, many local authorities encouraged feepaying schools to change their status and become direct grant schools after 1944. Suitable children who passed the 11-plus exam were sent at local authority expense to them rather than to local authority grammar schools.) Looking back from 2002, the survival of the academic girls’ schools despite these threats is striking. One could expect to find accounts of these threats and the schools’ defence strategies in their histories. The next section describes the sample of books, and summarises the previous research done on the representations of the earlier period in 37 other school histories. THIS SAMPLE AND THE PREVIOUS RESEARCH A decade ago I used some histories of girls’. schools to explore the selfpresentation of those schools. In Delamont (1993a) I used 20 books about 11 schools to explore how they presented their histories. In a second paper (Delamont, 1993b) I analysed a further 27 books about ten schools to explore how far they explained, ignored, or ridiculed the feminist agenda of their nineteenth-century pioneering founders to their readers in the 1960s. For this paper I have drawn a third sample of 41 volumes of girls’ school histories. The volumes chosen for all three papers are shown in Tables 1, 2 and 3. The left-hand column in each of these tables shows the schools chosen for an analysis of their coverage of 1918–58. A list of the authors, titles and the name of the school covered is given in Appendix A. Those histories cited or quoted in the text also appear in the references. They include schools in Northern Ireland, Wales and Scotland, as well as England. There are day and boarding schools, famous institutions and obscure ones, schools across England from Penzance to Newcastle, some urban and some rural. For this exercise, where multiple histories of the same school exist, only the most recent was chosen. Thus for Wycombe Abbey, Flint (1989) is analysed not Bowerman (1966). Before the analysis could begin a selection of 41 books was made from the large, but indeterminate, universe of such books. The total size of the population is unknown. It is not entirely clear how many histories of girls’ schools in the United Kingdom have been published to date. Barr (1984) is the most comprehensive list published, but is by no means complete. Barr compiled her hand-list from information supplied by 27 librarians in charge of education collections in universities. It lists books about 152 different schools in the UK and Eire, along with sources of information for about as many more schools which were included in general works on education and biographies of individuals. There are at

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TABLE 1: HISTORIES ANALYSED IN THREE PAPERS: SCOTLAND, WALES AND N. IRELAND

TABLE 2: HISTORIES ANALYSED IN THREE PAPERS: ENGLAND (DAY SCHOOLS)

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TABLE 3: HISTORIES ANALYSED IN THREE PAPERS: ENGLAND (BOARDING SCHOOLS)

Note: The boarding schools include several intended for girls of a specific religious denomination. St Mary and St Anne is a Woodard School for Anglicans, St Mary’s Ascot for Roman Catholics, Polam Hall is for Quakers, Goudhurst for Methodists, and Walthamstow Hall was set up for the daughters of missionaries.

least 26 such school histories published before 1984, which none of the 27 education libraries owned, and so are not in Barr. Since 1984 other histories have appeared. Peter Cunningham (1976) had earlier produced an alternative list but there are two problems associated with using it as a source to try and define the total number of histories of girls’ schools. It is out of date especially because many girls’ schools celebrated their centenaries in the 1980s with new volumes. It is not clear from the name of any particular school whether it is mixed, or for boys only, or for girls. Getting hold of all the ambiguously titled volumes to check their clientele would itself be a major piece of research. The concept of a private, or fee-paying school is also a complex and shifting one. Girls’ schools often started as ‘private’ in the sense of being owned by one woman, or a small number of women. Subsequently they often became ‘public’ in that they became charities, or limited companies, with a Board of Governors, Trustees or Directors. Some moved in and out of local education authority control several times: joining a local authority as a grammar school, leaving it, becoming a direct grant school, becoming independent and so on. See for example the shifting status of two girls’ schools in Bedford described in Westaway (1932, 1945, 1957), Godber and Hutchins (1982), and Broadway and Buss (1982). I have therefore treated as ‘private’ for this paper any school that charged fees at any time between 1900 and 1960. The schools studied vary a good deal in their costs to parents and their social exclusiveness. Girls’ schools which exist today (which can be traced from the Local Authorities Year Book and the Public Schools Year Book) are not a guide to the range of schools which have existed since 1850. There are

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histories of schools which have closed down, gone co-educational, or merged with other schools, which should be in the population. In Edinburgh, for example, two schools of 1945 have vanished: St Trinnean’s (Lee, 1962), and Lansdowne House which merged with St George’s, leaving separate histories (Hale, 1959; Welsh, 1939) and, eventually, generating a joint one (Shepley, 1988). Very small, very new, or very private schools will not be listed in the published guide books at all, and their histories are most likely to be missed by libraries. There is a need for a regularly updated, complete annotated listing of the histories of girls’ schools in order to reduce these complications. In the light of these difficulties in establishing the total universe of girls’ school histories, there was no ideal way to choose a sample for this analysis. Table 1 shows the school histories sampled from Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, Table 2 shows the day schools chosen from England and Table 3 shows the English girls’ boarding schools. Table 1 shows that only two schools from Wales were analysed. There are few elite girls’ schools in Wales, and a shortage of histories of those that do exist. Howells in Cardiff, for example, has no history covering the period since 1890: there is only McCann (1972) on its early years. Lansdowne House merged with St George’s in 1976, so the ‘five’ Scottish Schools in Table 1 became four. Delamont (1993a) was based on detailed study of 20 volumes, listed in Tables 1, 2 and 3, to explore their self-presentation: (1) who wrote them, who published them, and their intended audience (2) their internal structure (3) the use and content of illustrations and (4) their coverage of six key issues which were potential barriers to their success (dress and deportment, sport, class and religion, chaperonage, curricula and feminism). Delamont (1993b) compared volumes about ten schools which had been chronicled both in a book published before 1939 and again in one produced after 1945 to see whether the coverage of six key issues (games and gym, dress and deportment, chaperonage, mixing social classes or religious denominations, the ‘male’ curriculum and suffrage) differed in the ‘older’ and the ‘younger’ books. Tables 1, 2 and 3 show the ten schools studied. From that analysis, I concluded that most histories of most girls’ schools failed to deal with the big issues that faced the feminists who founded them, and certainly failed to explain to an audience reading the books a century after their foundation why the threats were threats, and how the feminists defended their schools against them. The histories of 41 schools chosen for this analysis covered a similar range to the 37 analysed in the two previous studies. For this analysis, the focus was on the text rather than illustrations: the coming of lacrosse can produce a picture, the threat of Freudian ideas could not be expected to do so. In the next section the coverage of the four threats is

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discussed, and their absence contrasted with what the books actually focus upon. FOUR ABSENT THREATS AND THE ACTUAL COVERAGE The four threats to the very survival of the girls’ schools, Freudianism, the depression, the rise of fascism and the post-war domestic ideology, are all ‘absent’ from the bulk of the school histories. The authors and editors could have dealt with these threats and discussed how the schools triumphed over them. They do not. Table 4 shows how little coverage of the four threats there is. They are remarkably silent about all four. After this absence is demonstrated, there is a discussion of what they do cover in this period. TABLE 4: FOUR FEMINIST THEMES

The depression of the inter-war years does feature in the histories: 25 of the 41 histories mention the impact of the depression on the school, on parents, or on the girls themselves. At Benenden, a relatively young school (founded in 1924) the bank withdrew the overdraft and the staff took a pay cut (Titley, 1974:34). Similarly St Swithun’s faced a financial crisis and the staff took a pay cut (Bain, 1984:35–6). Beaumont and Maginnis (1993:99) report that teachers’ salaries were cut at the Princess Gardens School in 1931–32. The Perse School faced ruin (Scott, 1981:75) as did Walthamstow Hall (Pike, Curryer and Moore, 1973:50– 3). St Mary’s, Calne had been in financial crisis from 1911 to 1915 and tried to join the Woodard organisation: its survival to its Golden Jubilee in 1923 and Diamond Jubilee in 1933 is described as a minor miracle (Stedmond, 1986). Green (1991:70–1) reports that at James Allen’s Girls School the enrolment dropped during the depression, when the school was in fierce competition with Dulwich for pupils. Talbot Heath (1986:79) mentions the middle classes being effected by The Slump’, as does St Edmund’s Liverpool (Goodacre, 1991:83). However, no history suggests that the whole existence of all the fee-paying schools for girls was threatened by economic factors, and none discusses that many such schools had financial problems. Each case is treated as if it had been a problem unique to that school.

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A few histories mention refugees from fascism (mainly the Nazis, or Mussolini, not Franco and Salazar). At Nottingham High School for Girls (Boyden, 1975:126) we learn that: ‘One brilliant character was another German-Jewish refugee, Lotte Calmsohn, daughter of a dentist who had settled in Nottingham.’ At the Perse (Scott, 1981:101–3) ‘Leave was granted for the children of Dr Frankel, a refugee from Germany, to come into the school…without a fee.’ Similarly at City of Worcester Grammar School for Girls (1958:43): ‘We welcomed to School Edith Gulyas, a refugee from Hungary, and she stayed with us for three years.’ There is no general discussion of fascism, and its ideological threat to women’s education, only mentions of ‘gathering war clouds’. Not one of the histories mentions the ideological challenge of Freudianism and only one hints at the moral panic about spinsters and lesbians. There are a few passing comments about the cohorts of celibate ladies who made up the majority of the teaching staff and dominated the schools in their first 50 years, but many such comments are positive. Nottingham High School, whose ‘history’ is entirely a collection of remi-niscences by former pupils, does contain a couple of comments on crushes (Boyden, 1975:91) and spinsters (115). Redland mentions spinsters (Bungay, 1982:83). One teacher from Nuneaton High School for Girls remembers the school buying a house (The Briars) where a group of single women could live together (Talbot, 1960:36) in some comfort and gentility. Nothing is said about any aspersions being cast on such a community. Only Sylvia Harrop’s (1988:104–9) history of Merchant Taylors’ School for Girls, Crosby discusses the issue, albeit without mentioning Freudianism or using the word lesbian. Harrop is an academic, and she discusses how Miss Fordham (headmistress 1922– 39) lectured girls who had ‘crushes’, promoting her favourites even when they were not the top of the stream, and having her ‘long term friend and companion, Miss Rose’ (83) on the staff as a domestic science teacher. Miss Rose ‘gave one girl the honour of darning Miss Fordham’s woollen combinations’ (107). Given the long-standing tensions around careers versus marriage, celibacy versus sexuality, chaperonage and domesticity (see Delamont, 1978a, 1978b, 1989, 1993a, 1993b), this issue is discussed more fully later in the paper. The domestic ideology of the post-1945 era is also generally absent from the school histories. The era from 1944 to 1958 was problematic for the girls’ schools because of a cult of domesticity (Wilson, 1980). The average age of first marriage dropped, and there was enthusiasm for a new role for women in an age of full employment and a celebration of consumption. In this climate, was it sensible to educate clever girls from either affluent or poorer families ‘like boys’: that is to give them a curriculum of Latin,

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Greek, physics and chemistry in an atmosphere of house colours, hockey and debating societies, when their futures were to be in early marriage, motherhood and homemaking. As Wolpe (1977) showed in her revisionist analysis of the official English reports on secondary and higher education in this period, there was a strong body of opinion that girls’ schools should abandon the male curriculum, and instead teach all girls to cook, clean, sew, care for children and look beautiful. The wives of both the marriages and the affluent workers would, it was argued, need skills in homemaking. The Norwood Report of 1943, the Crowther Report of 1959 and the Newson Report of 1963 all attacked the feminist, equality-based curricula, regime and mission of the girls’ schools. We know, from research, that the schools did not abandon their goals. The studies by Wober (1971) and Ollerenshaw (1967) make it clear that they did not. Wober explicitly attacked the girls’ boarding schools because they were not preparing girls for full time homemaking in a book that appeared just as third wave feminism was becoming known and was therefore instantly anachronistic. Given that, one could expect that the histories would chronicle the attacks, and explain why the schools resisted them. This might be found particularly in books written in the last 20 years, when third wave feminism had changed the agenda so that views like Newsom’s were totally unfashionable again. However, the histories, when describing the years from 1944 to 1958, focus on the retirements of elderly teachers, the new buildings, the updating of the uniform and the freedoms given to the sixth formers. If the four threats are absent, then what do the histories discuss? Table 5 shows four themes which are regularly covered. Additionally, the schools address their own jubilees, and, strangely to the modern eye, royalty. The jubilee and death of George V, the coronation of George VI, his death (but not the abdication crisis) and, if there were any, royal visits to the school loom large. Harrop (1988) even features a royal visit by Prince Andrew and his then wife to celebrate the school’s centenary. Nichol (1978) combines the two in the history of Northampton. The whole account, including the words of the song takes five pages. ‘Charles Laing composed the music for the Jubilee Song, written to celebrate the High School’s fiftieth anniversary in 1928. Various functions were planned to mark the occasion…most exciting of all, a Golden Jubilee Speech Day, attended by H.R.H. Princess Mary, Viscountess Lascelles (Nichol, 1978:127). The history of the King’s High School Warwick (Anon., 1979:53–4) gives more space to its Golden Jubilee in 1929 than to any of the three threats of that era. St Mary’s Calne (Stedmond, 1986:66, 88) covers its Golden and Diamond Jubilees, Roedean allocates two pages to its Golden Jubilee in 1935 (de Zouche, 1955). Henderson (1977:75) for

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TABLE 5: FOUR THEMES PRESENT

example writes about Westbourne: ‘During 1946 and 1947 we were preoccupied with projects to commemorate the 70th Anniversary of the School.’ Bradbeer (1973:288) dwells on the Golden Jubilee of Bishop Blackall School, which included a party ‘with a conjurer, games and dancing, supper and ice creams’. The school also celebrated with a new uniform. Unwin (1976:91) reports that the headmistress of the Royal Naval School was planning the centenary celebrations for 1940 when war broke out. The 1939–45 war is discussed in many of the histories, even though the rise of fascism was not. For many of the schools, evacuation is a major theme: either because the school was evacuated (e.g. Roedean away from Brighton to Keswick or St Edmund’s from Liverpool to Chester) or because it received an evacuated school as a ‘guest’. Tranter (1980) reports that Penzance received the Devenport High boys. Then too, many schools had their buildings requisitioned and when they returned found extensive damage and vandalism (see Avery, 1991 for a full account). The desecration of Charles Ryder’s murals at Brideshead (Waugh, 1945) is a fictional example of the damaged state of many buildings after the war, and similar vandalism happened to many of the girls schools. A few schools were actually bombed: Walthamstow Hall for example. Some, such as Queenswood, never returned to their old, pre-war premises and locations. These dislocations, and the girls’ war work in the potato fields, figure largely in the histories. For example at Warwick: Tart of the field was ploughed up for potatoes…it did not make games easier’ (Anon., 1979:80). Detailed analysis of the contents of 41 school histories of the period 1918–58 shows that they focus on achievements, such as building a new science block, on staff changes, on games and music, on anniversaries and on royal events. A comparison of Table 4 and Table 5 shows how common coverage of buildings is compared to any of the four threats. If any parents removed girls’ from school for fear of lesbians, because they had adopted fascist ideas about women, or because they wanted their daughters to learn more cookery and less chemistry, the school histories ignore their views completely. If the four threats actually threatened the 41 schools, there was little sign of it in their official histories. Exploring

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all the inclusions and exclusions would make an unwieldy paper. In this last section I have focused on two absences—Freudianism before 1939 and domesticity after 1945—and explored their importance in more detail, given the longstanding tension inherent in feminist educational institutions. MARRIAGE, SEX, HOUSEWORK Henderson (1977:32) includes a pupil at Westbourne from 1909 to 1921 whose mother told the owner ‘she hoped I would go on to the University when I left school, to which Mrs Levack commented “Mrs Kerr, My girls marry”’ (32). A fellow pupil (1923–34) remembers: ‘I was taught to open a bazaar and to write a reference for my cook.’ Despite this head, many girls left Westbourne for career training and higher education. The changing patterns of work, marriage and sexual behaviour for middleclass ladies first from 1850 to 1918 and then from 1918 to 1958, deserve further elucidation. The mission of the schools after 1918 was complicated by the feminists’ successes in opening up two new lifestyles in the years from 1850 to 1918. During the years from 1851 onwards the feminist educational pioneers had created two respectable middle-and uppermiddleclass life-styles as alternatives to the traditional marriage (Delamont, 1978a, 1978b, 1989). One, available only to a minority, was a new type of marriage to a man who cherished a scholarly wife. Such couples courted over Hesiod or Horace, and celebrated a shared high culture. Agnata Frances Ramsay Butler, who took a first in classics and then married the Master of Trinity College, Cambridge (Delamont, 2004) is a well-known example of this new type of marriage. The second, much commoner, alternative was the woman-centred lifestyle. Here ladies chose to set up homes or communities with other ladies, and focused their lives around women (Vicinus, 1985). We cannot know how far these women were totally celibate, heterosexually celibate, actively lesbian, or indeed anything about their sexualities and sexual behaviours. We do know that they made choices to live with dignity among other women and to improve women’s lives and life chances. The alternatives, such as working as a governess dependent in a family with a poverty-stricken old age ahead, or living as a spinster dependent or a marriage for economic reasons, were all seen as demeaning and highly insecure. George Gissing’s (1893) novel, The Odd Women, is a sympathetic portrait of two such ladies, Rhoda Nunn and Mary Barfoot, whose happy and productive lives are contrasted with the loveless marriage of Monica Madden, the degrading toil of shop work, the alcoholic poverty of Alice and Virginia Madden, and the descent into prostitution of Bella Royston and Miss Eade. Rhoda Nunn turns

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down a marriage offered by a man with ‘advanced’ ideas, preferring to stay with Mary Barfoot training ladies for useful occupations. Many of the educational and professional pioneers lived this way. Emily Davies (founder of Girton College), the headmistresses Dorothea Beale, Frances Mary Buss, Sara Burstall and Louisa Lumsden; the surgeon Louisa Martindale, and many like them chose such heterosexual celibacy. In the United States the women who founded Hull House and pioneered social science teaching and research at Chicago, led by Jane Addams and Marion Talbot (Deegan, 1988; Delamont, 1992), were woman-centred women. So too was Carey Thomas of Bryn Mawr. The phrase, Boston Marriage, is a useful shorthand for the relationships these women cultivated as their choice. During first wave feminism, the feminism of the long nineteenth century, career and marriage were generally oppositional. Widows might work, such as Sophie Bryant, the second headmistress of North London Collegiate, but married women with careers were rare. (Elizabeth Garrett Anderson and Milicent Fawcett are the best-known exceptions.) The first wave feminists paid public respect to, and seem to have believed in, the sexual double standard. Men were morally inferior to women, who needed to strive to raise men to their levels of sexual and other abstinences (Jackson, 1994; Jeffreys, 1987). The next generation of feminists, those who were young during the 1914–18 War, who had the vote by 1929, and who created second wave feminism, had totally different attitudes to marriage, to sexual behaviour, and to the double standard. Dora Russell, Naomi Mitchison, Vera Brittain, Winifred Holtby, Edith Summerskill and Dorothy L.Sayers rejected celibacy, and the theory that women were asexual, pure, morally superior creatures. Naomi Mitchison’s (1979) autobiography deals explicitly with this paradigm shift. Vera Brittain (1933), too, explains how her mother’s view that an engaged lady should only agree to marry a man who was himself ‘pure’, seemed to her and her contemporaries destined to lead only to sexual disaster in marriage. This generation of feminists included many women who wanted to be heterosexually active, perhaps to marry, to have children and to campaign for a set of causes that can be glossed as ‘social’ feminism. These included school meals, maternal welfare measures, contraception, child health and so on. One of this generation’s campaigns was pacifism: revolted by the 1914–18 war they were energetic activists for a variety of peace campaigns, especially for the League of Nations. Dale Spender (1983) deals with this generation, whose writings are anthologised in Spender (1984). The issues of celibacy, of the end of the woman-centred life, of how marriage is to be conducted after emancipation all figure in the detective stories of the Golden Age written by women, especially in those by Dorothy L.Sayers,

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Ngaio Marsh, Margery Allingham and Josephine Tey. This argument is developed in detail elsewhere (Delamont, 1996, Chapter 11) and is only summarised here. In the detective stories by Sayers about Peter Wimsey and Harriet Vane, by Marsh about Rory Alleyn and Agatha Troy, and by Allingham about Albert Campion and Amanda Fitton, a new kind of marriage is being negotiated. The women have careers and continue them both after marriage and after motherhood. Vane writes, Troy paints, Fitton is an aeronautical engineer. The men refuse pleasures and preferments which would impede the careers of their wives. The women are not expected to be virgins at marriage, and the men explicitly reject the sexual double standard. Sexual pleasure is explicit, and men have emotional weaknesses. In these bestselling novels, new types of marriage are being explored. The issues are also present in serious novels by feminists of the period, in entirely frivolous fiction and in books by some thoughtful men. Alongside these fictional explorations of new styles of marriage, the future of the girls’ schools and of women’s high education is another theme in the fiction of 1918–58. It is not as noticeable as the future of marriage, but still apparent. Josephine Tey’s Miss Pym Disposes (1946) is set in the 1930s in Anstey PE College, a pioneering feminist institution. Dorothy L. Sayers, Gaudy Night (1936) is centred on whether celibacy, traditional marriage or modern marriage is ‘best’ for educated ladies. Winifred Holtby’s South Riding (1936) focuses on whether a headmistress should be celibate and whether a clever workingclass girl should have an academic education. The existence of lady PE teachers, Oxbridge graduates, and of high schools is not challenged in these books, although they do address tensions around class, heterosexual celibacy and female sexuality. Beyond the feminist novels, the girls’ school with a powerful headmistress had become a stock feature of the entirely frivolous novels of Angela Thirkell. Bestsellers in the period 1930–50, set in Trollope’s Barsetshire, there are regular appearances for a boys’ public school, Southbridge, and for the Barchester High School for Girls, with its formidable head, Miss Pettinger. There are two headmistresses in Thirkell’s work: Miss Pettinger appears in many of the books, Miss Sparling in only a couple. Miss Sparling, the head of the Hosiers Foundation Girls School which is evacuated to Barsetshire, (Thirkell, 1944) is contrasted with Miss Pettinger to that latter’s discredit. Miss Sparling is a true classical scholar with publications, she is tactful with governors and parents, does not have favourites, has excellent dress sense, and supports the Dean of Barchester. Miss Pettinger is a poor scholar, is tactless, has favourites, dresses poorly, and is a friend of the Bishop. (Readers of Trollope would, of course, get the joke that a

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century after the original novels, the county would still be divided into Bishop’s supporters and Dean’s supporters.) While readers are invited to mock Miss Pettinger, she is not a lesbian, she is not a danger to the girls, and all the middle-and upper-middle-class families continue to send their daughters to the High School to learn classics and play hockey. There is no reflection of the hostility to the girls’ schools found among Freudians like Meyrick Booth in Thirkell’s novels. Indeed, throughout all the novels the positively portrayed characters are anti-Freudian: the purveyors of and believers in psychology and psychoanalysis are all portrayed as cranks, communists and misfits. The academic education of women is seen as traditional, like the Church, Oxford and land ownership. Miss Pettinger and Miss Sparling are part of tradition: as is Miss PitcherJukes of St Mildred’s College, Oxford. The official histories of the 41 girls’ schools suggest a world between 1918 and 1939 more like Thirkell’s than that conjured up by any lesbianobsessed Freudian. Governors raise funds and build, royalty visit, hockey is played, choirs sing, uniforms change, old girls marry and reminisce, and there is still honey for tea. The fee-paying parents are undisturbed by the big ideological issues, and go on paying for a product. Why are the histories silent about the ideological pressures of the cult of domesticity? Perhaps because those calling for a domestic curriculum were seen as making the same points as the social Darwinists of the 1890–1920 era (Dyhouse, 1977). Perhaps because the discourse was seen as aimed at working-class and dim girls: and not really ‘about’ academic schools for which parents paid. APPENDIX A Benenden (Kent), Titley, E.D. (1974) Portrait of Benenden 1924–1974, Canterbury: Elvy & Gibbs. Berkhamsted (Herts), Williams, B.H.Garnons (1988) Berkhamsted School for Girls: A Centenary History 1888–1988, Aylesbury: Hazel, Watson and Viney. Camden (London), Burchell, D. (1971) Miss Buss’ Second School (1871–1971), Ipswich: Cowell Ltd. Clapham (London), Freeth, E. (1959) Clapham County School, London: O’Callaghan and Co. Dame Alice Harpur (Bedford), Broadway, C.I. and Buss, E.I. (1982) The History of the School: BGMS-DAHS, 1882–1982, Luton: White Crescent. Enniskillen, Malone, A. (1981) Enniskillen Collegiate School: Golden Jubilee 1931– 1981, Enniskillen: William Trimble. Exeter, Maynard School (The Exeter High School for Girls) and Bishop Blackall School . Bradbeer, D.M. (1973) Joyful Schooldays: A Digest of the History of the Exeter Grammar Schools, Exeter: Sydney Lee.

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Goudhurst (Kent), Kendon, M. (1963) Ladies College, Goudhurst, Ashford: Privately Printed for the School. Hitchin (Herts), Douglas, P.M. (1988) The School on the Hill: A History of the Hitchin Girls’ (Grammar) School 1889–1989, Lavenham: Lavenham Press. James Allen’s (London), Green, B. (1991) To Read and Sew: James Allen’s Girls’ School 1741–1991, Lavenham: Lavenham Press. Lansdowne House (Edinburgh), Hale, E.M. (1959) Lansdowne House School 1878– 1950, Edinburgh: Mitchell & Sons. Laurel Bank (Glasgow), Cuthbert, E.M. (1953) Laurel Bank School 1903–1953, Glasgow: John Smith. Merchant Taylors’ Crosby (Liverpool), Harrop, S. (1988) The Merchant Taylors’ School for Girls, Crosby, Liverpool: Liverpool University Press. Newcastle upon Tyne, The Newcastle Upon Tyne Church High School (1935) The Newcastle Upon Tyne Church High School 1885–1935, Newcastle: Reid. Northampton, Nichol, P.D. (1978) The First 100 Years: A History of Northampton High School, Wellingborough: Skelton’s Press. Nottingham, Boyden, B. (1975) Call Back Yesterday: Nottingham High School for Girls 1875–1975, Nottingham: Derry & Sons. Nuneaton, Talbot, M. (1960) Nuneaton High School for Girls 1910–1960, Nuneaton: The School. Penzance, Tranter, G.M. (1980) The Human Spring: The Story of Penzance Girls’ Grammar School 1913–1980, Penzance: Headland Printers. Perse (Cambridge), Scott, M.A. (1981) The Perse School for Girls: The First Hundred Years, 1881–1981, Cambridge: Privately printed for the School. Polam Hall (Darlington), Davies, K. (1981) Polam Hall, Darlington: Prudhoe and Co. Princess Gardens (Belfast), Beaumont, P. and Maginnis, H. (1993) Princess Gardens School: A Goodly Heritage 1862–1987, Belfast: MW Publications. Queenswood (Herts), Stafford, H.M. (1954) Queenswood: The First Sixty Years 1894–1954, St Albans: Staples. Redland (Bristol), Bungay, J. (1982) Redland High School 1882–1982. Bristol: The School and Shaw, M.G. (1932) Redland High School, Bristol: Arrowsmith. Roedean (Brighton), Zouche, E.E. de (1955) Roedean School 1885–1955, Brighton: Privately Printed. Royal Naval School (Bath), Unwin, P. (1976) The Royal Naval School 1840–1975, Haslemere: The School. Rutherford (Newcastle), Horsley, P.M. (1967) The Years Between: The History of Rutherford College Girls’ School and Rutherford High School, Newcastle: The School. Sherborne (Dorset), Sherborne School (1949) Sherborne School for Girls 1899– 1949, Sherborne: The School. St Edmund’s (Liverpool), Goodacre, K.A. (1991) A History of St Edmund’s College, Liverpool, Oxford: Alden Press. St. George’s (Edinburgh), Shepley, Nigel (1988) Women of Independent Mind, Edinburgh: The School also Welsh, B.W. (1939) After the Dawn, Edinburgh: Oliver and Boyd. St Mary’s, Ascot (Berkshire), Wake, Roy (1994) St Mary’s School, Ascot, London: Haggeston.

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St Mary’s, Calne (Wiltshire), Stedmond, K. (1986) St Mary’s School, Calne: 1873– 1986, Nailsworth: Hathaway. St. Swithun’s (Winchester), Bain, P. (1984) St Swithun’s: A Centenary History, Southampton: Phillimore. St Winifred’s, (Llanfairfechan, N.Wales), Roberts, N. (1937) S. Winifred’s, Llanfairfechan: The Story of Fifty Years 1887–1937, Shrewsbury: Wilding and Sons. Sunderland, Bowling, H.G. (1964) The First Eighty Years: A History of Sunderland Church High School, Sunderland: The School. Swansea, Cameron, H.H. (1948) High School for Girls, Swansea: Diamond Jubilee 1888–1948, Swansea: The School. Talbot Heath (Bournemouth), Bournemouth High School (1946) Talbot Heath 1886–1946 The Jubilee Book, Cheltenham: Burrow’s Press. Walthamstow Hall (Kent), Pike, E., Curryer, C.E. and Moore, U.K. (eds) (1973) The Story of Walthamstow Hall 1838–1970, Oxford: Longmore Press. Warwick, The King’s High School Anon. (1979) The King’s High School, Warwick 1879–1979, Kineton: Published by the Governors. Westbourne (Glasgow), Henderson, E.K. (1977) Westbourne School for Girls 1877– 1977, Glasgow: The School. Worcester, City of Worcester Grammar School for Girls (1958) City of Worcester Grammar School for Girls 1908–1858, Worcester: Trinity Press. Wycombe Abbey (Bucks), Bowerman, E. (1966) Stands There a School. Brighton: Privately Printed, also Flint, Lorna (1989) Wycombe Abbey School 1896–1986. Oxford: Privately Printed for the School.

BIBLIOGRAPHY Anon. (1948) High School for Girls, Swansea: Diamond Jubilee 1888–1948, Swansea: The School. Anon. (1979) The King’s High School Warwick 1879–1979: A Portrait, Kineton: Private Printed by the Governors. Avery, Gillian (1991) The Best Type of Girl, London: Andre Deutsch. Bain, P. (1984) St Swithun’s: A Centenary History, Southampton: Phillimore. Barker, Pat (1991) Regeneration, Harmondsworth: Penguin. Barker, Pat (1993) The Eye in the Door, Harmondsworth: Penguin. Barker, Pat (1995) The Ghost Road, Harmondsworth: Penguin. Bashaw, C.T. (1999) Stalwart Women, New York: Teachers College Press. Bain, P. (1984) St Swithun’s: A Centenary History, Southampton: Phillimore. Barr, Barbara (1984) Histories of Girls’ Schools and Related Biographical Material, Leicester: School of Education. Beaumont, P. and Maginnis, H. (1993) Princess Gardens School: A Goodly Heritage 1862–1987, Belfast: MW Publications. Blake, Nicholas (1939) The Smiler with the Knife, Glasgow: Collins. Booth, Meyrick (1927) Youth and Sex, London: Allen and Unwin. Booth, Meyrick (1932) ‘The Present Day Education of Girls’, The Nineteenth Century and After, 102, pp.259–69. Bowerman, E. (1966) Stands There a School, Brighton: Privately Printed.

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Bowlby, John (1946) Forty-Four Juvenile Thieves, London: Balliere, Tindall and Cox. Bowlby, John (1951) Maternal Care and Mental Health, Geneva: World Health Organization. Bowling, H.G. (1964) The First Eighty Years: A History of Sunderland Church High School, Sunderland: The School. Boyden, B. (1975) Call Back Yesterday: Nottingham High School for Girls 1875– 1975, Nottingham: Derry & Sons. Bradbeer, D.M. (1973) Joyful Schooldays: A Digest of the History of the Exeter Grammar Schools, Exeter: Sydney Lee. Brittain, V. (1933) Testament of Youth, London: Victor Gollancz. Broadway, C.I. and Buss, E.I. (1982) The History of the School: BGMS-DAHS, 1882–1982, Luton: White Crescent. Bungay, J. (1982) Redland High School 1882–1982, Bristol: The School. City of Worcester Grammar School for Girls (1958) City of Worcester Grammar School for Girls 1908–1858, Worcester: The Trinity Press. Cockburn, Claud (1975) Bestseller, Harmondsworth: Penguin. Cunningham, Peter (1976) Local History of Education in England and Wales: A Bibliography, Leeds: Museum of the History of Education, University of Leeds. Dane, Clemence (1917) Regiment of Women, London: Heinemann. Deegan, M.J. (1988) Jane Addams and the Men of the Chicago School, New Brunswick:Transaction. Delamont, S. (1978a) ‘The Contradictions in Ladies’ Education’, in S. Delamont and L.Duffin (eds) The Nineteenth Century Woman, London: Croom Helm. Delamont, S. (1978b) The Domestic Ideology and Women’s Education’, in S.Delamont and L. Duffin (eds) The Nineteenth Century Woman, London: Croom Helm. Delamont, S. (1989) Knowledgeable Women, London: Routledge. Delamont, S. (1992) ‘Old Fogies and Intellectual Women’, Women’s History Review, 1, 1, pp.39–61. Delamont, S. (1993a) ‘The Beech-Covered Hill Side’, in G. Walford (ed.) The Private Schooling of Girls, London: The Woburn Press, pp.79–100. Delamont, S. (1993b) ‘Distant Dangers and Forgotten Standards’, Women’s History Review, 2,2, pp.233–51. Delamont, S. (1996) A Woman’s Place in Education, Aldershot: Avebury. Delamont, S. (2004) ‘Agnata Frances Ramsay Butler’, New Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford: Oxford University Press. Dyhouse, Carol (1977) ‘Good Wives and Little Mothers’, Oxford Review of Education, 3, 1, pp.21–35. Flint, Lorna (1989) Wycombe Abbey School 1896–1986, Oxford: Privately Printed for the School. Gissing, G. (1893) The Odd Women (reprinted by Virago, London, 1980). Godber, J. and Hutchins, I. (1982) A Century of Challenge: Bedford High School 1882–1982, Bedford: The School. Goodacre, K.A. (1991) A History of St Edmund’s College, Liverpool, Oxford: Alden Press.

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Green, B. (1991) To Read and Sew: James Allen’s Girls’ School 1741–1991, Lavenham: Lavenham Press. Hale, E.M. (1959) Lansdowne House School 1878–1950, Edinburgh: Mitchell & Sons. Harrop, S. (1988) The Merchant Taylors’ School for Girls, Crosby, Liverpool: Liverpool University Press. Henderson, E.K. (1977) Westbourne School for Girls 1877–1977, Glasgow: The School. Holtby, Winifred (1934) Women and a Changing Civilisation, London: Bodley Head. Holtby, Winifred (1936) South Riding (reprinted by Fontana, Glasgow, 1974). Jackson, M. (1994) The Real Facts of Life, London: Taylor and Frances. Jeffreys, S. (ed.) (1987) The Sexuality Debates, London: Routledge. Kendall, E. (1975) Peculiar Institutions, New York: Putnam’s. Lee, C. Fraser (1962) The Real St Trinnean’s, Edinburgh: W. Brown. McCann, J.E. (1972) Thomas Howell and the School at Llandaff, Cowbridge: Brown & Sons. Mitchison, N. (1979) You May Well Ask, London: Gollancz. Nichol, P.D. (1978) The First 100 Years: A History of Northampton High School, Wellingborough: Skelton’s Press. Ollerenshaw, K. (1967) The Girls’ Schools, London: Faber and Faber. Pike, E., Curryer, C.E. and Moore, U.K. (eds) (1973) The Story of Walthamstow Hall 1838–1970, Oxford: Longmore Press. Rutter, M. (1972) Maternal Deprivation Reassessed, Harmondsworth: Penguin. Sayers, D.L. (1921) The Unpleasantness at the Bellona Club, London: Gollancz. Sayers, D.L. (1936) Gaudy Night, London: Gollancz. Sayers, D.L. (1946) Unpopular Opinions, London: Gollancz. Scott, M.A. (1981) The Perse School for Girls: The First Hundred Years, 1881– 1981, Cambridge: Perse School. Shepley, Nigel (1988) Women of Independent Mind, Edinburgh: The School. Solomon, B.M. (1985) In the Company of Educated Women, New Haven: Yale University Press. Spender, D. (1983) There’s Always Been a Woman’s Movement This Century, London: Pandora. Spender, D. (ed.) (1984) Time and Tide Wait for No Man, London: Pandora. Stedmond, K. (1986) St Mary’s School, Calne: 1873–1986, Nailsworth: Hathaway. Talbot Heath (1986) The Centenary Book, Ringwood: Brown and Son. Talbot, M. (1960) Nuneaton High School for Girls 1910–1960, Nuneaton: The School. Tey, J. (1946) Miss Pym Disposes, London: Peter Davies. Thirkell, A. (1937) Summer Half, London: Hamish Hamilton. Thirkell, A. (1944) The Headmistress, London: Hamish Hamilton. Titley, E.D. (1974) Portrait of Benenden 1924–1974, Canterbury: Elvy & Gibbs. Tranter, G.M. (1980) The Human Spring: The Story of Penzance Girls’ Grammar School 1913–1980, Penzance: Headland Printers. Unwin, P. (1976) The Royal Naval School 1840–1975, Haslemere: The School. Vicinus, M. (1985) Independent Women, London: Virago. Volpe, A.M. (1977) Some Processes in Sexist Education, London: WRRC.

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Wake, Roy (1994) St Mary’s School, Ascot, London: Haggeston. Waugh, E.A. (1945) Brideshead Revisited, London: Chapman & Hall. Welsh, B.W. (1939) After the Dawn, Edinburgh: Oliver and Boyd. Westaway, K.M. (1932) History of Bedford High School, Bedford: Hockliffe. Westaway, K.M. (1945) Old Girls in New Times, Bedford: Hockliffe. Westaway, K.M. (1957) Seventy Five Years: The Story of Bedford High School 1882–1957, Bedford: Diemer and Reynolds. Wilson, Elizabeth (1980) Halfway to Paradise, London: Tavistock. Wober, M. (1971) English Girls’ Boarding Schools, London: Allen Lane. Wolpe, M.A. (1977) Some Processes in Sexist Education, London: Women’s Research and Resource Centre.

4 Intakes and Examination Results at State and Private Schools Alice Sullivan and Anthony F.Heath

INTRODUCTION The question of whether private education is superior to state education has been fiercely debated in Britain and elsewhere. School examination results and figures on entry to elite universities suggest that pupils at private schools in Britain perform considerably better educationally than do those in the state sector. For example, whereas less than 10 per cent of the age group attend private schools, nearly half the student entry into Oxford and Cambridge universities comes from the private sector. Advocates of private schooling have claimed that, since the British private sector is a highly competitive market-based system, and since private schools must respond to parental demands in order to survive, private schools will be better run and more effective than state schools. Opponents of private schooling sometimes seem torn between the view that private schools give an unfair advantage to the children of the rich, and the claim that the academic success of these schools is entirely due to their intake of able students from affluent backgrounds (Griggs, 1985). Yet there is surprisingly little research in Britain to answer the question whether the private schools actually achieve better results than the state sector once students’ individual and family characteristics have been taken into account. There has been much more work on this topic in the United States. The major US study carried out by Coleman, Hoffer and Kilgore (1982a) found that students in private schools, particularly in Catholic private schools, achieved higher test scores than those in public schools. They put forward a ‘social capital’ explanation in terms of inter-generational social closure. This generated much debate at the time (see for example Goldberger and Cain, 1982; Noell, 1982; Coleman, Hoffer and Kilgore, 1982b and c; Cain and Goldberger, 1983; Alexander and Pallas, 1983; Alexander and Pallas, 1985). The case for the educational benefit of Catholic schooling has been given recent support (Gamoran, 1996; Lee et al, 1998) although debate on Coleman’s findings and their

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interpretation has continued (Witte, 1992; Morgan and Sorensen, 1999a and b; Sampson, Morenhoff and Earls, 1999; Carbanaro, 1999; Hallinan and Kubitschek, 1999). The issue remains largely unresolved. American evidence on private schooling cannot be applied directly to other countries, and the status of private schools in Britain is quite different from that of private schools in either the United States or continental Europe. Whereas in the United States, and in most other developed countries, private schools are primarily religious and often highly subsidised (by church or state), British private schools are in the main socially and (often) academically exclusive institutions, which, being unsubsidised, are far too expensive for the bulk of the population.1 Because Britain managed to incorporate most denominational schools within the state sector, its private sector is relatively small. As Hillman (1994:403) puts it: ‘In most countries private schools provide for religious, ethnic and cultural diversity. In Britain they provide an often highpowered preparation for a significant proportion of the future members of high-status occupations.’ The domination of elite occupations by alumni of the top private schools (often, for historical reasons, termed ‘public schools’) has long been apparent (Boyd, 1973). This makes the British case particularly interesting. It provides a test case of the operation of market forces on educational outcomes. British private schools operate within a competitive market place where parents pay considerable fees, presumably in the expectation that they will be achieving some benefits that would not be available to them in the rival free state schools. Despite the level of public interest in this question, the last systematic study of the effectiveness of different types of school in Britain was carried out by Halsey, Heath and Ridge (1980, 1984) using the 1972 Oxford Mobility Study. This study related to a period when British state education was still organised along selective lines: that is to say, within the state sector pupils were allocated, on the basis of a competitive examination at age 11, either to a grammar school (with a strong academic curriculum preparing students for entry to university), to a technical school (with a more vocational curriculum) or to a secondary modern school (with a much less academic curriculum and preparing students for early entry into the labour market). This was often referred to as the ‘tripartite’ system. Many private schools at this time catered for pupils who had failed the ‘11-plus’ examination and were destined for secondary modern schools if they remained within the state sector. Halsey, Heath and Ridge suggested that boys at the major private schools fared little better than those from similar backgrounds at the grammar schools, but that the minor private schools provided much better chances to less able boys than did the secondary moderns. However, Halsey and his colleagues were unable to control for pupils’

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ability on entry to the schools and their results must therefore be regarded as, at best, provisional. Moreover, there have been important changes in the nature of the British educational system since the time of Halsey and his colleagues’ work. In particular in 1965 the Labour government began a process of abolishing selection at age 11 and of replacing the tripartite system of grammar, technical and secondary modern schools with comprehensive schools. By the late 1970s the majority of British state secondary education was organised along comprehensive lines. There has been a great deal of analysis of this reform (Steedman, 1980, 1983a and b; Cox and Marks, 1980; Marks, Cox and PomianSrednicki, 1983; Fogelman, 1983; Kerckhoff and Trott, 1993; Kerckhoff, Fogelman, Crook and Reeder, 1996; Heath and Jacobs, 1999). Analyses have focused on whether the selective ‘tripartite’ system was superior or inferior to the comprehensive system that was replacing it. However, these studies have not examined the effects of the reforms on the private sector. The competitive environment that private schools face is now very different from that which they faced during the era of selective state education. The demand for private education from parents whose less able children had failed the ‘11-plus’ examination has now largely vanished. Instead, private schools have to compete with Comprehensive schools. The affluent parents who can afford private school fees will often have the choice of a free suburban comprehensive school with a socially advantaged intake which their children could attend. Despite these changes, British private schools regularly top the ‘league tables’ of educational success at the public examinations for the General Certificate of Secondary Education (GCSE), which most pupils take at the end of the period of compulsory schooling at age 16. EXPLANATIONS OF SCHOOL SECTOR DIFFERENCES IN ACHIEVEMENT A number of explanations have been offered for the overall differences in educational outcomes between pupils in state and private schools. These explanations have focused on differences between state and private schools in their student and parental characteristics, differences in school financial resources, differences in the nature of home/school social relationships, and differences in the social composition of peer groups. First, apparent sectoral differences may simply be due to the characteristics of the students. Schools with superior educational outcomes often have socially or academically privileged intakes, and so it is clear that controls for background variables such as social class, parental education and students’ cognitive skills on entry to the school are

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necessary. Moreover, additional controls are likely to be needed in order to deal with the selection bias inherent in the parental choice of school. Parents can marshal a host of resources to get their children into the schools that are perceived to be best. Money, cultural capital, social capital and sheer pushiness all seem to be relevant (Carroll and Walford, 1997; Fox, 1986; Gewirtz, Ball and Bowe, 1995; Glatter, Woods and Bagley, 1997; West, Varlaam and Scott, 1991; Woods, Bagley and Glatter, 1998). For example, parents who have high aspirations for their children are likely to make more effort to get them into an academically successful school than are parents with low aspirations. Parents who are well-educated and possess high levels of cultural capital are likely to have an advantage in gathering and interpreting information about schools, and in finding out about opportunities such as bursaries and scholarships at private schools, which may not be widely publicised. As well as being associated with parental choice of school, factors such as these are likely to be directly associated with educational outcomes for students. Secondly, many private schools have greater resources than do state schools (although, there is great variation within the private sector and some of the lesser private schools may even have poorer resources than some state schools). In general, the high fees charged by private schools allow them to provide relatively well-maintained buildings, smaller classes, better equipment and facilities. Walford (1984) argues that the private schools are also advantaged in the teachers they attract, as they are better paid and more highly qualified than teachers at state schools, and are encouraged by their schools to pursue their academic subject. However, it is not clear that financial resources do actually make a difference to schools’ performance. Coleman et al. (1966) found no impact of school resources on academic performance. Debate on this question has continued in the United States (for a good summary see Burtless, 1996). Studies using school-level data have tended to find only small effects, if any (Betts, 1995; Grogger, 1996) and, in general, studies examining overall school resources have not found large, significant effects on outcomes for students (Hanushek, 1986,1989).2 Whether specific types of expenditure, such as expenditure directed at classroom teaching and class sizes, can make a difference is also debatable (Hoxby, 2000; Wenglinsky, 1997). Experimental evidence on class sizes suggests that only large cuts in class size in the earliest years of school make a difference (Hanushek, 1999; Prais, 1996). One positive finding from this literature is that teachers’ characteristics seem to matter. There is evidence that teachers’ assessed verbal abilities (Ehrenberg and Brewer, 1995), their knowledge of the subject (Rowan, Chiang and Miller, 1997) and the selectiveness of the institution where teachers obtained

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their degree (Ehrenberg and Brewer, 1994) have an effect on students’ performance. Thirdly, Coleman and his colleagues (1982a) accounted for the success of Catholic schools in terms of social capital, which they understood as inter-generational social closure. For Coleman, social capital consists of social norms and networks. It exists in the community surrounding a school where parents know each other (and possibly also know the teachers). ‘A child’s friends and associates in school are sons and daughters of friends and associates of the child’s parents’ (Coleman, 1990:318). This, it is claimed, affects the relationship of parents to the school. Parents are able to get more information about what is going on in the school, and about the behaviour of their own child. Parents who talk to each other can establish strong norms of behaviour for their children. According to Coleman, this enables private schools to place high demands on students, both in terms of discipline and academic attainment. Coleman argues that the community around Catholic schools, which is created by the church, fosters and enforces strong norms against dropping out of high school, and that this explains the lower drop-out rate in Catholic schools than in other private schools. Interaction and communication between parents and teachers can be seen as a further aspect of social capital. Schools that maintain close personal links with parents may be able to exert more effective control over students. However, children often travel long distances to attend private schools in Britain (and some private schools are residential establishments), so it may be that there is less inter-generational social closure among parents and pupils at these schools than at state schools, which are more likely to take the majority of their pupils from the local area. Fourthly, there is a consensus that peer group processes are important and that schools with a high proportion of students of low social status or low academic ability are at a disadvantage (Coleman et al, 1966; Summers and Wolfe, 1977; Henderson et al., 1978; Rutter et al, 1979; Willms, 1986; Mortimore et al, 1988; Smith and Tomlinson, 1989). The desire for a peer group that will have a positive effect on the child seems to be an important factor in school choice (Carroll and Walford, 1997), and may be a partial explanation for any ‘private school effect’. However, Evans, Oates and Schwab (1992) strike a note of caution, pointing out that since peer groups are chosen to some degree, apparent peer-group effects may be due to unmeasured family characteristics and should not therefore be regarded simply as exogenous explanations of school success. Peer-group processes may account for the belief that private schools provide a better ‘ethos’ or ‘atmosphere’ than state schools. This is often given as a reason for why parents choose private education for their

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children (Gewirtz et al, 1995; Walford, 1994). For instance, Elgin (1984: 94) quotes a headteacher who explains the appeal of the private sector as follows: This is a place where a sensitive boy can flourish. A boy can walk here carrying a violin without ridicule.’ The fear that comprehensive schools sometimes provide socially problematic environments for able children may be justified. For example, Power, Whitty, Edwards and Wigfall (1998) find that, whereas academically able pupils at a grammar school were likely to worry about not being able to keep up with the work, academically able pupils at a comprehensive school were much more likely to worry about other pupils thinking they were too clever. One could argue that, in this sense, the social norms among school students may vary according to the social and academic composition of the school. The aim of this paper is to investigate these explanations for the overall differences in educational outcomes between state and private schools in Britain at the time of the National Child Development Study (NCDS), which we study because of the importance of using longitudinal data with prior measures of students’ ability and other characteristics. This study has data on students and their families at ages 7, 11, 16, 23 and 33. It contains measures that enable us to control for prior pupil characteristics and various selective processes; it also contains measures of various school characteristics, of some variables that proxy for social capital, and for measures of school composition that proxy for peer-group processes. Performance in public examinations has real-world consequences for pupils in gaining access to higher education and for success in the labour market (see for example Heath and Cheung, 1998). We aim therefore to answer the following questions: • How did the various types of school attended by the NCDS children vary in terms of student intake, in school resources and other school characteristics, and in students’ examination performance? • To what extent are differences in academic outcomes for students at the different types of school explained by differences in the characteristics of the children who attended the schools? Were parents right to believe that, by paying fees for private education, they achieved better results for their children than they would have obtained in a state school? • Are the better results, if any, obtained at private schools to be explained by the schools’ financial resources, social capital or peer group processes? We recognise that, even with longitudinal data, it is never possible to control fully for selection biases. Furthermore, more direct measures of

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social capital and peer-group processes would be preferable to the proxies that we have available. The interpretation of any remaining ‘school effects’, after controls for intake and school characteristics, will always be problematic: we can never be sure that such ‘school effects’ are not simply a product of unmeasured selection processes. Our focus instead is on whether there are any measurable school characteristics that account for the sectoral differences in students’ educational outcomes after the most rigorous possible controls for student characteristics. Moreover, the NCDS is by far the richest British dataset currently available for exploring these questions, and it enables us to study in some depth an important example of private schooling. DATA AND MEASURES The National Child Development Survey (NCDS) is a longitudinal study of a single cohort born in England and Wales in the week of 3–9 March 1958. Data were collected at six time points: • 1958 (shortly after birth), • sweep 1—the first follow-up in 1965 when the studied children were aged 7, • sweep 2 in 1969 at age 11, • sweep 3 in 1974 at age 16, • sweep 4 in 1981 at age 23 and • sweep 5 in 1991 at aged 33. The initial sample was designed to be nationally representative of all children in England and Wales and achieved a sample size of 17,414 (Shepherd, 1995). By the third follow up (sweep 3), when the children were aged 16, 14,761 respondents remained in the study. In the present paper we draw on sweeps 1, 2 and 3. We exclude Scottish students (n=2, 703) from the sample, as the Scottish education system is different from that in England and Wales. Our effective sample size is reduced since data on type of secondary school attended was missing for 1,472 respondents. We also exclude the small number of students who attended technical schools (n=65) from our analyses, along with those students who attended schools classified as ‘other’ (n=284). This leaves us with a sample of n=10,237. The sample size for the analyses is further limited by missing data for the outcome variable, examination results (valid n=9,549). The NCDS cohort experienced a state secondary education system that was in transition from the tripartite system to the comprehensive system. After 1965, local authorities started to transfer to the comprehensive system. However, as the reorganisation had not been

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TABLE 1: FREQUENCIES

completed, some of the NCDS respondents attended comprehensive schools, while others attended grammar, technical or secondary modern schools. In addition, many of the new comprehensives were simply renamed secondary moderns, which still shared catchment areas with selective grammar schools. Private schools at the time were quite diverse, varying in their social and academic prestige; some had demanding entrance examinations taken at age 13 (the ‘common entrance’ exam) while others were essentially non-selective. We shall refer to fee-paying schools not in receipt of state support as ‘independent’ schools in order to distinguish them from a second, hybrid type of school, termed ‘direct grant’ schools. The direct grant schools charged fees to some students, who may have failed the 11plus, but also received state funding in return for accepting non-fee paying pupils selected on the basis of the same ‘11-plus’ examination as was used for grammar school recruitment. The direct grant schools were generally highly selective academically and had a lot in common with the grammar schools. In 1975, the Labour government required the direct grant schools either to join the state sector or to become fully independent. However, at the time when the NCDS cohort were completing their secondary education, they remained a significant force. We therefore retain this category in our analysis. Table 1 shows the distribution of students according to type of school attended. We distinguish between the three main types of state school (grammar, secondary modern and comprehensive) and the two main types of private school (independent and direct grant). We exclude technical and specialist schools. As we can see from Table 1, the private sector accounted for only 7 per cent of the sample respondents at age 16. The majority of the cohort attended comprehensive schools. About twice as many students attended secondary modern schools as grammar schools. The major public examinations open to the NCDS cohort were the General Certificate of Education at Ordinary level (GCE O-level) and the Certificate of Secondary Education (CSE). These examinations took

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place at the end of compulsory schooling, at age 16. O-levels were more academically demanding than CSEs. Originally, the O-level curriculum was designed with Grammar school students in mind, while CSEs were designed for the students at Secondary Modern schools. A top CSE pass (grade 1) was deemed to be equivalent to an O-level pass. The NCDS gives exceptionally rich information on various aspects of the respondents and their parents. The parents were interviewed at the first three data collection exercises of the study, providing information on social background, age when parents left full-time education, sparetime activities of the parents, parents’ interest in the child’s education and so on. Data were also collected directly from the children through tests and questionnaires administered at school at the ages of 7, 11 and 16. In addition, teachers were asked for information, for example, on whether the parents of the NCDS child had visited the school, and how interested they seemed to be in their child’s education. Extensive information on examination results was also collected directly from the schools in 1978. From the age of 16 onwards, the respondents themselves were also interviewed. For a descriptive report on the test results and examination results achieved by the NCDS students see Steedman (1980, 1983a and b). The variables (and the sweeps in which they were measured) that we have selected for analysis from this dataset are described in an appendix. SCHOOL AND STUDENT CHARACTERISTICS Table 2 shows descriptive frequencies for the characteristics of the student intake to each of our main types of school. The different types of school clearly varied in terms of the cognitive skills of their intake. Table 2 shows the percentage of students who fell into the bottom, middle and top thirds of the distribution of test scores at age 11. As we described earlier, entry to the grammar schools was by examination (the ‘11-plus’), and this is reflected in the performance of the grammar school students in the NCDS tests administered at age 11. Less than 1 per cent of the Grammar school students fell into the bottom third of the distribution, while 86 per cent were in the top third. The distribution for the direct grant schools was close to that of the grammar schools, but the independent schools had a considerably less able intake (although a majority were nonetheless in the top third of the distribution). The comprehensive schools had a fairly even distribution, but with highly able pupils slightly under-represented. As one would expect, the secondary moderns had the least able students, but a significant minority who were in the top third on the NCDS tests were consigned to these schools.

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TABLE 2: SCHOOL DIFFERENCES IN INTAKE

Table 2 also shows summary statistics of the social backgrounds of the students at the different types of school. In general, students at the independent schools, followed by the direct grant and grammar schools, had the most advantaged social origins both in material and cultural terms. Thus they had the highest proportion of fathers in managerial and professional occupations, the highest proportion with one or other parent leaving full-time education at age 19 or later, and the highest proportion of mothers reading books regularly. Private and grammar

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school students also came from smaller families on average, and their mothers had higher levels of interest in their education (as reported by the child’s primary school teacher). At the other extreme were the comprehensive and secondary modern schools. These two types of school were very similar on average, although we must remember that there would have been considerable diversity between individual comprehensive schools given their geographically diverse catchment areas. Both these types of school scored relatively poorly on the measures of parents’ material and cultural circumstances. In general, then, we can say that the grammar schools were more academically selective than the independent schools, while the independent schools were more selective in social and cultural terms than the grammar schools. The direct grant schools in a sense had the best of both worlds, matching the grammar schools with respect to the cognitive skills of their intake and coming close to the independent schools on many of the sociocultural measures. All three outstripped the comprehensive school students on every single measure. Finally, secondary modern school students were the most disadvantaged on both academic and socio-cultural criteria. We turn next to the characteristics of the schools. In general, the fees charged by private schools allowed them to provide relatively good resources. In addition, grammar schools received greater funding per student than secondary moderns. Table 3 shows that pupil-teacher ratios were highest at the secondary moderns, which had the lowest levels of funding. Comprehensive schools had rather more favourable pupilteacher ratios, reflecting their higher level of state funding.3 Grammar schools had even more favourable pupil-teacher ratios, while the direct grant schools’ ratio was very similar to that of the grammar schools (reflecting the fact that the funding formula for pupils funded by the state would have been the same as that for grammar schools). However, independent schools had substantially more favourable pupilteacher ratios than did any other type of school. The teacher turnover rate (that is, the proportion of teachers leaving the school in the last year) can be seen as a proxy for teacher quality, since schools that have trouble retaining teachers are unlikely to be able to be as selective about who they recruit. Table 3 shows that the secondary modern schools had the highest teacher turnover, followed by the comprehensives. In contrast to the findings for pupil-teacher ratios, the direct grant schools had considerably lower levels of teacher turnover than did independent schools. It is not altogether clear why this should be the case. Table 3 also shows our measures of parent/school social capital. First, we show the proportions of each type of school that had a Parent-Teacher

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TABLE 3: DIFFERENCES IN SCHOOL CHARACTERISTICS

Association (PTA). PTAs encourage parental involvement in the running of the school and may be important in fostering home/school links. However, independent schools were much less likely to have PTAs than other school types while grammar schools were the most likely to have PTAs. Table 3 also shows the proportion of schools in each category that organised meetings between parents and teachers at least once a year. The majority of schools in all categories did this, but independent schools were the least likely to do so, while grammar and direct grant schools were the most likely to. These measures of parent/school social capital will not be entirely exogenous. It is quite likely that having large numbers of interested parents makes it easier to run a PTA. However, the relative lack of PTAs and other meetings with parents in the independent schools means that these measures cannot be straightforwardly reduced to the characteristics of parents. This may be because many independent schools lacked the neighbourhood catchment areas of the other types of school, as students often travelled in order to attend them. The fact that about 30 per cent of the independent schools were residential establishments

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TABLE 4: SCHOOL DIFFERENCES IN OUTCOMES

with parents who lived considerable distances from the school may have made it difficult for them to organise an effective PTA or close home/ school links. We can also see from Table 3 that our measure of the social composition of the school (the percentage of students from non-manual class origins at the respondent’s school) follows the same pattern as the individual social class measure, as one would expect. Independent schools reported the highest proportions of students from non-manual backgrounds, with 84 per cent of schools stating that four-fifths or more of their students were from non-manual backgrounds. Over 50 per cent of the direct grant schools stated that four-fifths or more of their intake were from non-manual backgrounds. Only 23.4 per cent of grammar schools fell into this category, and the comprehensives and secondary moderns typically had a far greater proportion of students from manual backgrounds. Table 4 gives the examination and test results achieved at age 16 by students at each type of school. The maths test scores at age 16 show that students at grammar and direct grant schools performed best with the independent schools only a little way behind. The comprehensive schools’ performance was substantially lower and only slightly better than that of the secondary modern schools. Turning next to the number of passes obtained at GCE O level, we see that the grammar, independent and direct grant schools had very similar success rates. All three types of school had over 60 per cent of their students gaining five or more O-levels or CSE grade 1s. (Recall that CSE grade 1 was seen as equivalent to an O-level pass). The direct grant schools had the highest proportion of students achieving 8 or

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more Olevels or equivalent. The secondary moderns were the least successful in securing any passes at all for their pupils. Overall, Table 4 shows that the academically selective schools all achieved an average of over five passes, while the comprehensive students gained 1.8 passes and the secondary modern students gained one pass on average. ANALYSIS OF EXAM RESULTS As a first, simplified overview of the data, Table 5 shows the association between examination outcomes and type of school attended, controlling for measured ability at age 11. We show the average O-level (or equivalent) scores for children of high, medium and low ability at each type of school. Children of high-tested ability at age 11 (that is in the top third of the distribution) gained on average about one and a half more O-level passes if they attended a comprehensive school (4.6) than if they attended a secondary modern school (3.0). High-ability children at grammar schools obtained on average about one and a half more O-level passes (6.0) than similar ability students at comprehensives. Another way of looking at these data is to note that a medium-ability student at a grammar, independent or direct grant school obtained a similar number of O-level passes as a high-ability student at a comprehensive, and a greater number of passes than a high-ability student at a secondary modern school. These are real and consequential differences. However, one must treat these comparisons with caution, as the mean age 11 test scores for pupils in each third of the ability range varied according to school type. The total number of O-level and CSEl passes was taken as the outcome measure for the linear regression (OLS) analysis shown in Table 6. The GCE O-level was an examination that was designed for pupils of higher ability, such as students at grammar schools, and few pupils at secondary modern schools would have been entered for these examinations. In the sample as a whole, therefore, the distribution of Olevel and CSEl passes is very highly skewed. It is therefore appropriate to restrict our sample, when analysing success at O-level, to students of high ability (that is, in the top third of the ability distribution measured at age 11). This corresponds to educational practice at the time these NCDS data were collected. In the analyses that follow, therefore, the sample is restricted to the top third of the ability distribution (measured at age 11). Our primary concern is how far these gross differences can be explained by our various measures of the characteristics of the pupils and their families and by the characteristics of the schools. We therefore introduce successive blocks of predictors, corresponding to the

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TABLE 5: ABILITY AND O-LEVEL AND CSEl PASSES

theoretical ideas outlined above, and check to see by how much each block reduces the estimated coefficients associated with each school type. Broadly speaking, we introduce blocks of factors according to their temporal order in the life cycle. Thus we begin with a block of ascribed characteristics and characteristics of the parents. We then move on to the respondents’ measured ability at age 11 before finally turning to the characteristics of the schools that the students attended after the age of 11. Since a wide range of background controls are used, we do not show these parameters, but simply show the effect their inclusion has on the school parameters. Model 1 shows the school sector effects without controls. Therefore, these parameters correspond to the means shown for the top third of the ability distribution in Table 5. There are substantial positive effects for grammar, direct grant, and independent schools (with comprehensives as the contrast parameter), and a significant negative effect of attending a secondary modern school.

Note: Significance levels (p) are denoted by *=0.05, **=0.01, ***=0.001.

TABLE 6: O-LEVEL AND CSE1 PASSES

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Model 2 includes a fairly standard set of social background measures; sex, father’s occupational class, parents’ age on leaving education, family structure and number of siblings. The school sector effects are reduced in this model. The independent school effect also shows a particularly strong reduction. We saw earlier that schools’ intakes varied not just in terms of the standard social background measures such as social class and parental education, but also in terms of parental interest and reading. Since these factors may influence the students’ educational success, and may also be associated with parents’ choice of school, it is crucial to control for them if we are to minimise unmeasured selection biases. Model 3 demonstrates that the inclusion of these additional controls leads to a further reduction in the school sector effect. Model 4 includes students’ tested ability at age 11, and a teacher’s assessment of the child when at primary school. This reduces the selective school effects to about half their original size. The reduction in the independent school effect is smaller than the reduction in the effects for the more academically selective direct grant and grammar schools. These school type estimates in Model 4 give us an idea of the maximum effect that schools might be having on their students’ progress while they are at secondary school. While there are almost certainly additional controls for social background and parental attributes that it would be desirable to include, it is unlikely that any background measures that are constant over time could successfully explain the estimated school differences in student progress that we see in Model 4. We now turn to consider whether any of our measures of school characteristics can explain these estimates of progress. Model 5 shows that teacher turnover and pupil-teacher ratio are insignificant, as are the existence of a PTA and the frequency of meetings between parents and teachers. However, Model 6 shows that the proportion of children in the school from non-manual backgrounds is significantly associated with exam passes. The school parameters are further reduced in this model, and the independent and direct grant school parameters are reduced in significance. This shows the importance of the social composition of the school, which may act in part as a proxy for the academic composition of the school. The private school parameters are not significantly different from the grammar school parameter in this model. CONCLUSIONS This paper has provided an exploration of some of the key differences between British private schools (both the independent and the hybrid direct grant) and the state schools (comprehensive, grammar and

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secondary modern) in terms of intake, school resources and examination results. We found clear differences in the schools’ intakes, which show the importance of including adequate controls in any analysis of schools’ results. Private schools had privileged intakes in terms of students’ cognitive skills and parents’ social class, education, reading behaviour and interest in their child’s education. However, there were some differences between the independent and direct grant schools. The direct grant schools had a lower proportion of parents from the employer and managerial classes but a greater proportion of very able students than the independent schools. This may reflect a trade-off between high fees and high entrance requirements; schools which set fees very high may not have been able to afford to make the entrance examination too demanding. The grammar schools’ intake was similar to that of the direct grant schools in terms of the cognitive skills of the students, but the grammar schools had a broader social class distribution, with a lower proportion of professional parents and a higher proportion of manual workers. The comprehensives, and especially the secondary moderns, had a relatively deprived intake in terms of both students’ cognitive skills and family characteristics. As one would expect, private schools were also privileged in terms of their resources. Independent schools had the lowest average pupilteacher ratios, while direct grant schools had similar pupil-teacher ratios to grammar schools. This almost certainly reflects a higher level of financial resources at the independent schools. The independent schools were the least likely to encourage parent-teacher interaction through meetings and a PTA. In contrast the secondary modern schools had the highest teacher turnover and highest pupil-teacher ratios, unsurprisingly as they were the least well-funded schools. The secondary moderns were also less likely than other state schools to have PTAs and regular parentteacher meetings. The analyses of O-level passes showed that test score at age 11 was the most powerful predictor of educational success at age 16, and the inclusion of measures of cognitive skills at age 11 and of students’ social backgrounds accounted for a substantial proportion of the school differences. However, the private and grammar school advantage and secondary modern disadvantage remained highly significant. One important finding is that the staff-student ratio, on which independent schools were especially advantaged, appeared to have no effect on examination results. This is in line with the growing body of literature suggesting that school resources do not have major impacts on school outcomes. To be sure, our results apply only to differences between types of school, and it is possible that variations in school resources between individual schools might have a significant impact.4

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However, given the financial advantages that independent schools have on average over the other types of school, it is noteworthy that neither staff-student ratios nor teacher turnover could account for independent school educational success. It is also noteworthy that our measures of home/school social capital failed to account for the differences in outcome. While our measures are far from ideal, there are also good practical reasons for suspecting that home/school social capital will not account for the success of the independent schools since these schools do not tend in Britain to have locally based catchment areas. It is in fact likely that independent schools have the most geographically diverse catchment areas, while the selective grammar and direct grant schools will also have drawn on pupils from quite a large geographical area. It is likely that home/school social capital, if it can account for variation in school outcomes, will largely do so within the comprehensive school sector since these schools typically have local catchment areas giving more scope for frequent social interaction between parents and between parents and the school. The sole school-level factor that appeared to explain sectoral differences in educational outcomes was the social composition of the school. This might operate through peer group processes, for example through norms regarding the social acceptability of academic effort and success as suggested earlier, although other mechanisms, such as teachers’ expectations are also possible. The superiority, therefore, of the independent, direct grant and grammar schools as compared to the comprehensives is partially but not entirely, explained in our analyses. It may be that our controls for individual and family characteristics are inadequate, although they are more thorough than the controls used in many analyses of school effects. It could also be that our measures of school resources were excessively limited and that unmeasured differences in resources could explain the school differences. Measures of teacher quality, such as teachers’ test scores or educational qualifications for example, may be expected to make a difference. Another possibility is that the need to attract feepaying parents has acted as a pressure on private schools to achieve good exam results. Once again, however, given that the success of the independent schools was shared by the academically selective but nonfee-paying grammar schools and by the hybrid direct grant schools, we suspect that explanations relying on market forces are unlikely to be successful. We need instead to look for explanations that might in principle apply to these three types of school but not to the comprehensive and secondary modern schools. One possibility is that the academic composition of the school would help to explain the remaining school differences. Certainly the grammar and direct grant schools share a high

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degree of academic selectivity, although the independent schools are not quite so selective academically. Other possibilities are that these three types of school may have some shared educational practices. For example, students at these schools would routinely be required to undertake homework in the evenings in addition to their regular schoolwork during the day. This would have been less common in comprehensive schools, and unusual in secondary modern schools, with their less academic orientations. Regular homework might also be expected to be accompanied by other less tangible aspects of school culture, such as an academic ethos and high teacher expectations. The effective implementation of homework also implies a degree of teacher authority and discipline. Grammar, direct grant and independent schools also probably shared an emphasis on extra-curricular activities that would have been less widespread in the comprehensive or secondary modern schools. Extracurricular activities such as school sports teams, school orchestras or drama productions were standard features of the former three types of school, and might well have indirect effects on student’s academic performance by fostering a degree of social solidarity and an ethos integrating students with teachers and developing a sense of shared purpose between staff and students. In that sense it would be an aspect of school social capital of the sort that Coleman described. Unlike Coleman, however, we see this as being largely internal to the school rather than involving parents closely. Finally, further research is needed to examine the effects of private schooling, and there is a need for new data to examine this question in the contemporary context. The data we use here is nearly 30 years old, and the British education system has changed substantially in the meantime (Smith, 2000). A key challenge for researchers will be to develop clear measures of such often vague notions as ‘academic ethos’ and ‘social capital’. APPENDIX: VARIABLES Student Characteristics Sex Test scores at age 11 (sweep 2). The children were given multiplechoice tests in reading comprehension, mathematics and tests of ‘general ability’ (both verbal and non-verbal). The reading comprehension test was a sentence completion test, designed to be parallel to the WattsVernon test of reading ability (see Start and Wells, 1972). All the tests were compiled by the National Foundation for Educational Research

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(NFER). The ranges of possible scores on the tests were as follows: Reading, 0–35; Mathematics, 0–40; General Ability, 0–80. Steedman (1980, 1983a and b) gives technical details. For reliability measures, see the statistical appendix in Steedman (1983b). Following the standard practice of other researchers who have used these data we have constructed a single scale from these tests. We have standardised this scale with mean of zero and standard deviation of one. Primary school teacher’s assessment of child’s ability (sweep 2). Teachers gave ratings from 1 (exceptional) to 5 (very limited) for the child’s use of books, number work, general knowledge and oral ability. Although this measure is associated with the child’s test score at age 11 (Pearson’s correlation coefficient 0.80, significant at the 0.01 level), it nevertheless explains additional variance in age-16 outcomes and we have therefore retained it in the analysis. Family Background Father’s social class (sweep 3). Father’s class is used as mother’s employment was less common at the time the data were collected. The official government measure of socio-economic group (SEG) is used. Following previous British research on social class, we have grouped the 16 categories of SEG into seven classes: employers and managers in large establishments, employers and managers in small establishments, professionals, own account (non-professional) workers, other nonmanual workers, skilled manual workers and manual foremen, and semi-and unskilled manual workers. We retain a category for missing data, since (as is not uncommon with data on social origins) substantial numbers did not report their father’s class (for example because they had no contact with their father at the time). Family structure (sweep 3). NCDS records whether the respondents had two original parents throughout their childhood. Single and stepparent families have consistently been found to be associated with lower levels of educational performance for children than ‘intact’ two parent families, although the reasons for this association are debated (Painter and Levine, 2000; Biblarz and Gottainer, 2000; Boggess, 1998; Downey, 1995; Elliott and Richards, 1991; Kiernan, 1992). We simply distinguish those who had lived with their two original parents throughout from all other family types (the latter consisting of a number of small and somewhat heterogeneous groups). Number of children under age 21 in the household (sweep 3). Research has consistently found a negative effect of larger family size on children’s educational attainment and test scores (Nisbet, 1953; Blake, 1981, 1985, 1989; Powell and Steelman, 1990). This is likely to be because both parental attention and economic resources are spread

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more thinly in larger families (Downey, 2001; Van Eijck and de Graaf, 1995). NCDS presents family size as a categorical variable, which we collapse into three categories: respondents in households with 1 or 2 children, those with 3 or 4 children, and those with five or more. The data refer to numbers of children living in the household at the time of the survey rather than to completed family size (which is less relevant to our present concerns). Age at which parents’ left full-time education (mother’s or father’s, whichever was higher) (sweep 3). We distinguish three categories. The minimum legal school-leaving age for the parents would have been age 15. We can think of this as elementary education only. Parents who stayed on until age 16, 17 or 18 would have had some schooling beyond the minimum. Those who stayed on in full-time education beyond the age of 18 would typically have received some tertiary education. Mother’s book reading (self-reported at sweep 1). Reading can be seen as a measure of ‘cultural capital’ (Bourdieu and Passeron, 1977), and parents’ reading behaviour has been shown to be associated with children’s educational success (Crook, 1997; de Graaf, de Graaf and Kraaykamp, 2000; Sullivan, 2001). The NCDS distinguished whether mothers read ‘most weeks’, ‘occasionally’ or ‘hardly ever’. The NCDS also asked a similar question about father’s book reading, but there is a high degree of collinearity between the two sets of answers and we have found that including a control for father’s book reading as well as mother’s adds very little to the variance explained. We therefore restrict ourselves to mother’s book reading. Mother’s interest in the child’s education (reported by primary school teacher at sweep 2). Parental interest has been shown to be a major factor in children’s success in the ‘11-plus’ examination, and may well have influence at later ages too (Douglas, 1964). The NCDS distinguishes whether mothers were ‘over-concerned’, ‘very interested’, had ‘some interest’ or ‘little interest’ in the child’s education. We collapsed the ‘overconcerned’ and ‘very interested’ cases, as the former category was small. As with book reading, we have not included father’s interest in the models. School Resources Pupil-teacher ratio (collected from the school at sweep 3). This measure serves as a proxy for class size. It is likely to reflect a school’s level of funding and may be one of the crucial ways in which funding can affect student outcomes. Teacher turnover (collected from the school at sweep 3). This is measured by the proportion of teachers who left the school in the previous year. This can be seen as a proxy for teacher quality, but

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teaching stability may also be beneficial in its own right. Again it may reflect funding. Parent/School Social Capital Whether the school has a parent-teacher association (PTA) (collected from the school at sweep 3). This is simply a binary variable distinguishing schools that had a PTA from those that did not. Frequency of meetings between parents and teachers (collected from the school at sweep 3). This variable had four categories: termly, at least yearly, ad hoc, or none at all. These variables reflect parent-teacher interaction, which may be thought of as one aspect of a school’s social capital. Unfortunately, no data on relationships between the parents of students attending the same schools, which would provide a better test of Coleman’s hypothesis, are available in the NCDS. Peer Group Processes Proportion of children from non-manual backgrounds at the school (collected from the school at sweep 3). We treat this as a proxy for the social character of the individual student’s peer group. Student Outcomes Number of O-level passes or passes at CSE grade 1 (collected from the school at sweep 3).5 Test scores at age 16 (sweep 3). The NCDS administered the same test of reading comprehension at age 16 as was administered at age 11. This probably led to ceiling effects in measuring the improvement of those students who scored highly at age 11. However the pupils also took a test of mathematics attainment which was designed to be appropriate for the full ability range of 16-year-olds. It is the latter measure, therefore, which we use. The range for this variable was 0–31. NOTES 1 According to the Independent Schools Council Information Service (figures for September 2000), fees range from £1,700 per term for the cheapest private day school place to over £5,000 a term at an elite boarding school. (There are three terms in a British school year). A place at Eton College costs £5868 per term. 2 Some researchers have examined school resources at the state or district level, rather than the level of the individual school (Card and Krueger, 1992, 1996;

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Sander, 1999). Although these studies show significant effects of school resources on students’ outcomes, it can be argued that these results reflect other state and district level factors, rather than just school resources. 3 . In essence, there was higher funding for students staying on to take advanced courses after age 16, and comprehensive schools had higher proportions of such students than did secondary modern schools. However, it is likely that the benefits of such funding would have been spread to some extent among all students at the school and not restricted solely to those taking the advanced courses. 4 . In supplementary analysis we tested for interactions between type of school and staff-student ratio. In the case of comprehensive schools we found that higher ratios were associated with superior outcomes whereas in the other types of school there appeared to be no significant association between staffstudent ratios and educational outcomes. This probably reflects the fact that popular and successful comprehensive schools tend to be oversubscribed, and hence have less favourable staff-student ratios while less popular comprehensives would have falling school roles and less favourable ratios. These processes would not however apply to the other types of school. In the case of grammar and secondary modern schools, students were simply allocated by the Local Education Authority on the basis of the 11-plus examination, whereas in the case of independent schools market mechanisms would tend to prevent overcrowding. 5 . At the time these data were collected, O-level examination boards did not have consistent grading policies (some giving only informal grades and some giving percentage scores rather than grades) so the O-level results are analysed in terms of numbers of passes, rather than grades.

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Part II PRESENT-DAY PRIVATE SCHOOLS

5 Teacher Sickness Absence in Independent Schools Tony Bowers

ABSENT TEACHERS Teacher absenteeism can be a vexed issue. It arouses the interest of employers and the passion of teachers’ unions. It can be expensive to schools and—in the state sector—to the public purse. Even where its incidence is accurately measured, its causes are easily disputed. One reason for this is the difficulty of disentangling the notion of an illness which prevents the individual from attending work from that of ‘stress’ brought on by the pressures of the job or engendered by the management of the school. It seems intuitively obvious that teachers who are satisfied with their jobs and who work in a climate of trust and collaboration with colleagues will be less likely to take time away from work than those who are dissatisfied or whose schools offer difficult working climates. Although there is no unequivocal evidence that this is so, the idea persists. It has been around for some time. More than half a century ago, Pennington (1949) suggested that motivational and attitudinal factors were crucial in determining rates of attendance at work. A quarter of a century later another physician (Simpson, 1976) suggested links between some teachers’ frequent absences and what he termed ‘the morale structures of the organisation’ (15) rather than their actual physical health or personalities. Illness and individuals’ innate inclinations to attend or absent themselves, it seems, were of less significance than the way that head teachers and governors structured schools and defined roles. Recent work in the Netherlands (Imants and van Zoelen, 1995) appears to back up this environmentalist assumption. According to them, ‘strictly medical grounds’ (78) account for under 20 per cent of teacher absences in that country. There is certainly evidence to suggest that ‘stress’, whether or not it is engendered by the job, is a frequent companion of chronic illness in teachers. In our study of teachers who were granted early retirement on the grounds of ill health during 12 months at the end of the 1990s

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(Bowers and McIver, 2000), we found that in 48 per cent of all cases, mental health problems were instrumental in the Teachers’ Pensions Division’s decision to grant retirement. Stress is not an official category of illness, but depression, which appears to have been the term applied in nearly all of the cases examined, was recounted as stemming from stress-related experiences. Mental health difficulties constituted more than twice the figure for the most frequently reported physical condition leading to ill-health retirement. On the other hand, when we looked generally at teacher absence in the public sector, there was less to indicate a direct link between stress and absenteeism. For example, the area in which the lowest number (59 per cent) of teachers took any time off at all from work (the East Midlands) was also the area where the overall time lost by teachers (nearly 3.6 per cent) was among the highest in the country. Yet in outer London, where 75 per cent of teachers were away from work at some point during the year, the average time lost (2. 5 per cent) was the lowest in the country. From this we might infer that teachers who take a small amount of time off when necessary may be better able to cope with the demands of the job than those who report unremittingly for work. How such data sit with notions of motivation, attitude and morale is unclear. What is patently obvious, however, is that different ways of measuring absenteeism can often yield very different results. In England, the government appears to take the view that teacher absences in the public sector can be decreased by the application of suitable management practices. Shortly after it came to office in 1997, a report on absence in the public sector (Cabinet Office, 1998) emphasised the economic consequences of non-attendance at work; it also implied that increased quality of service would flow from lower rates of absenteeism. With one of the first of what was to become an avalanche of government targets, the report recommended that teacher absence rates should be reduced by 30 per cent by the year 2003. Surprisingly, up to that point there had been little systematic recording of teachers’ attendance at work, even though local education authorities (LEAs) still employed the majority of teachers. Plans were made to monitor the extent of teacher absenteeism and each May since 2000, figures for teacher absences in England have been issued by the Department for Education and Employment or Department for Education and Skills. They tend to be confusing, with press releases looking not at overall absence rates but at average absence rates for those teachers who have taken time off. Close scrutiny of the sample from which they are derived also shows that a substantial number of LEAs have submitted no returns. But if we look just at the flgures so far, it seems very unlikely that this particular target will be achieved.

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THE ‘PRIVATE SECTOR’ As I write, the relative merits of the public and private sectors are being hotly debated. Much of the spotlight falls currently on the ability of National Health Service organisations to provide services which are as efficient and cost-effective as those offered by organisations in private hands. A similar, if more muted, debate has arisen from time to time about schooling. It tends to have centred upon the ability of private (‘for profit’) organisations to run publicly funded schools or even, as exemplified by Islington, entire local education authorities. Other forms of privatisation of the education services have gone almost unremarked. Most OFSTED inspections, for example, are now conducted by independent contractors; most supply teachers are now provided (and employed) by profit-making companies. The focus of concern seems not at present to lie with the wellestablished independent school sector. Yet if the cost-effectiveness of publicly funded schools is to be assessed in terms of teachers’ rates of absence from work, it would seem reasonable to look to find a benchmark in those schools which not only exist but generally thrive in a commercial and competitive environment. As we might expect, no central body collects statistics on teacher absences in independent schools. Indeed, there appear to be no industryspecific figures for absenteeism in any part of the commercial world. Companies may keep their own records, but these tend to be commercially sensitive and therefore unavailable to outsiders. The Institute of Personnel and Development’s periodic survey of its members provides some guide to the amount of working time lost through absence in particular broadband industries. Interestingly, though, its reports offer no data relating either to teachers or to the broader category of ‘education’, perhaps indicating that it has yet to penetrate the management of schools. A STUDY OF INDEPENDENT SCHOOLS In the autumn of 1999, my colleague Malcolm Mclver and I set out to rectify this information gap. We approached a randomly drawn sample of 300 schools, all of them listed by DfEE as ‘independent’, asking them to provide us with details (suitably anonymised) of staff absences through the academic year 1998–99. After following up non-responses we eventually received replies from 224 of them: a response rate of nearly 75 per cent. However, 87 of those schools told us that their records of staff absences did not enable them to provide details of teacher absences over the previous 12 months. Some, it seemed, could not accurately offer any information relating even to the term which had just passed. Pupil absences were recorded, staff absences were not. This

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was not a surprising finding. The Institute of Personnel and Development (IPD, 2000) found that around 25 per cent of its members’ organisations kept no systematic records of staff sickness absence, so our figure of 29 per cent of the sample was consistent with that. However, while we could only surmise about the 25 per cent of schools which, despite prompting, did not reply to our survey, it may well be that their silence was stimulated by an inability to offer data. If so, it could be that as many as half the independent schools approached did not keep records of individual teachers’ absences. We were left with 137 independent schools which could provide records of teachers’ absences over the previous three terms. We asked only for details of full-time teachers’ absences, in part because part-time teachers’ contracts vary so widely but mainly because of the distorting effect of part-timers’ absences on overall time lost. For example, somebody who is expected to work for two days a week and misses one of them will actually appear as a 50 per cent absentee, even though he or she might have been perfectly fit for the other three days. This effect probably accounts for Bowers and McIver’s (2000) finding that a greater amount of time was lost by part-time teachers (3.7 per cent) in state schools in England than by full-time teachers (3.3 per cent) in the same schools. Indeed, when a smaller sample of 126 state schools was closely scrutinised, it was found that even though part-time teachers were less likely than full-time teachers to take any time off during the year, part-timers actually lost more time (4 per cent) than full-timers (3 per cent). In looking at the data below, it should be remembered that the actual number of teachers employed by many of the independent schools in our sample will have been higher than the figures reported. Our analysis relates solely to teachers employed full time by the 137 independent schools who provided staff absence information. It is not always easy to fit an independent school into a particular category; despite this, we tried to do so. We ended up with four. The classification ‘preparatory’ embraced any school which ceased to provide education for children by the time they had reached a maximum age of 13. ‘Secondary’ schools were those which admitted no children younger than 9 years old and kept them until they were 16 or 18, while ‘all-age’ schools catered for children whose ages spanned those defining the first two categories. Finally, there were ‘special’ schools. Such schools are formally recognised by the Department for Education and Skills and admit only children with statements of special educational need. Although there are now many state special schools, the very first schools for children with disabilities were independent schools (Department of Education and Science, 1978) and independent special schools set many examples which were subsequently followed by LEA provision (Bridgeland, 1971). Although we might usefully have done so,

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we did not differentiate between day and boarding schools within any of the above categories. MEASURING RATES OF ABSENCE Any attempt to calculate the average time lost by full-time teachers in these schools first requires knowledge of the number of days a teacher would normally be expected to work during the year. That work, of course, might not include pupil contact or even be on days when pupils are present. DfES statistics assume that a working year for teachers in maintained schools consists of 195 days, yet children attend such schools for a maximum of 190 days. The other five days are expected to be set aside for training and associated purposes. We found a wide variation in the number of days which teachers in our sample of independent schools were expected to work. The lowest was 162 and the highest 220. When we excluded special schools from the analysis, on average teachers were expected to work for 178 days. When special schools were included, this average rose to 181. We can only speculate on whether this figure equates more closely to the 190 days of pupil contact expected of state schools or the 195 days of actual attendance which the government (though not necessarily all heads and governors) expect of them. Table 1 sets out the details of the different categories of schools, together with numbers of full-time teachers employed by schools in those categories. The table also shows the number of teachers within each group who were recorded as having any time at all away from work due to sickness during the 12-month period. A discordant note is struck by the substantially higher proportion of teachers in independent special schools who take time away from work due to illness when compared with those in other independent schools. The difference is not simply due to chance; it is highly statistically TABLE 1: FULL-TIME TEACHERS IN 137 INDEPENDENT SCHOOLS DURING THE ACADEMIC YEAR 1998–99

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significant ( 2=80.2, d.f. 3, p<.0001). Two comments from heads of such schools may offer some explanation for the marked discrepancy between this set of independent schools and the others: The most common cause of absence due to sickness here is accidents and injury at work. These injuries result from assaults by pupils or (are) sustained whilst restraining pupils for their own safety. Absence rates continue to rise amongst all staff who work directly with children (because of) the massive increase in pressure created by education and social work legislation (and) the increasingly violent and disturbed behaviours by children deemed to need education in special schools such as this. When we remove the special schools from consideration, leaving 125 schools, there are still substantial differences in the numbers of teachers who took any time off sick from the three categories of school. In secondary schools, significantly less teachers reported sick than those in all-age schools ( 2=11.2, d.f. 2, p<.01). We did not have sufficient information about the population of teachers in those schools (staff ages, levels of qualifications, gender mix, and so on) to determine whether any such factors were at work in affecting the results. The figures here are, though, consistent with Scott and McClellan’s (1990) findings in the United States. Looking at teachers between the ages of 21 and 39 they found that elementary school teachers missed school far more often than those in secondary schools. They also found that across all schools, men teachers had significantly less absences than their female counterparts. However, women teachers may take comfort from a recent occupational health study in Finland (Ilmarinen et al, 1997). It seems that on the whole they last longer and are better in the job. Is it possible to benchmark the overall figure of 21.2 per cent of teachers in independent schools who took any absence at all that year? I have made it clear elsewhere (Bowers, 2001a) that I see this as a very flawed measure of sickness absence. That a caveat should be borne in mind when noting that during a similar, though by no means identical, time period, around 60 per cent of teachers in state schools in England (Bowers and Mclver, 2000) recorded one or more incidences of absence due to illness. As I mentioned earlier, whether or not a teacher takes some time away from work is not necessarily connected with the actual amount of time lost by that teacher. The latter measure is usually found in official statistics, although many head teachers (Bowers, 2001b) consider the number of spells of absence, not the number days away, to be a better indicator of the disruption which teacher absence can cause to the management of a school. So how much time was lost by teachers in

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TABLE 2: TIME LOST THROUGH SICKNESS AS A PROPORTION OF AVAILABLE TIME IN INDEPENDENT SCHOOLS, 1998–99 ACADEMIC YEAR

Note: The figures above are based on 697,417 available teacher working days during the 12-month period.

these 137 independent schools? Unlike government-sponsored surveys of state schools, which work to a uniform annual attendance expectation, it was not possible to express independent school teachers’ lost time in days, since these schools’ working days within the year varied considerably. Table 2 below therefore shows average time lost as a percentage of available time. We need to be aware that percentages can easily distort the picture of sickness absence. If just one teacher is away from a school for several months, the percentage of overall time available for teachers to work which is ‘lost’ will be quite considerable, even if everyone else reports unremittingly for duty. Similarly, if one or two schools have a very high level of sickness absence, this can disproportionately skew the average for the sector as a whole. An alternative measure of central tendency is the median or middle score. Therefore Table 2 also presents the median of each category’s schools’ average lost time. Using this measure, we can reduce the effect of extremes on our picture of the ‘average’. How do these figures compare with those found in the state sector? We have no comparative data spanning exactly the same time period. There are, though, figures for the calendar year 1999, which overlaps the independent school data-gathering period by two terms. It should be borne in mind that comparisons are not always easy to make when different time periods are involved because epidemics of such things as influenza, which appear in bursts, can distort patterns of staff attendance. During 1999 (Bowers and McIver, 2000), the average time lost by full-time teachers in state schools in England was 3.2 per cent. The Department for Education applies an ‘adjustment formula’ to such statistics, intended to compensate for staff movement during the year; this has the effect of lowering the final figure. Applying that adjustment, percentage time lost during 1999 by state school teachers was 2.9 per cent. For closest comparison, this should be set against the 2 per cent of overall time lost shown in the left-hand set of figures in Table 2.

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On the whole, state school teachers’ absence rates are low. Independent school teachers’ rates are lower still. What do I mean by ‘low’? At about the same time that these data were gathered, the Institute of Personnel and Development’s (IPD, 2000) survey of its members found the average time lost by central government workers (civil servants) to be 4.6 per cent; local government workers lost 4.3 per cent of time through sickness. Our analysis (Bowers and Mclver, 2000) of National Health Service data revealed that qualified nurses, midwives and health visitors took an average of 5.2 per cent of time away from work through illness, while the sickness rate of ‘professions allied to medicine’ (physiotherapists, radiographers, speech and language therapists, pharmacists, and so on) was 3.1 per cent. MANAGEMENT PRACTICES: POLICIES ON SICKNESS ABSENCE We asked all the independent school heads in our sample a simple question: did their schools have any policies or implement any practices which were intended to reduce or restrict the incidence of staff absence? Sixtyfour (47 per cent) of them answered ‘Yes’. This response was lowest (36 per cent) from preparatory school head teachers and highest from the special school heads (92 per cent). Forty-five per cent of independent secondary schools and 50 per cent of the all-age schools, it seems, had staff sickness absence policies of one kind or another. It appears that more than half our respondents felt it unnecessary to have any formal policies in their schools which were linked to staff absences. It is highly likely that this proportion would have been increased if we had included the schools which kept no enduring records of staff absence; policies tend, I have found, to be linked to recordkeeping. Yet according to the Cabinet Office (1998) report, policies lie at the heart of any attempt to manage sickness absence, and this is certainly borne out by studies in other countries and other industries (Allegro and Veerman, 1998). It seems difficult to criticise this apparent lack of managerial rigour, given the very low overall rates of teacher sickness absence in the sector. It may not be by chance that the school category recording the highest level of sickness absence also had by far the highest incidence of policies on the topic. THE ELEMENTS OF POLICIES Where a school had some form of policy on teacher absence, follow-up questions were asked about its type and content. The areas they covered are among those laid out in the 1998 Cabinet Office Report. Policies are classifiable within one or more of three basic elements (Allegro and

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Veerman, 1998; Bowers, 2001a). Those of the first type—inhibitory policies—are designed to reduce the likelihood of absenteeism by restricting the individual’s readiness to report sick. We asked about returnto-work interviews (a health-related discussion with a senior manager immediately after a spell of absence) and incentive schemes designed to reward the teacher for attending work consistently. Preventive policies aim primarily to assist the individual to greater health or to modify working conditions. We asked about ‘health education’ and ‘health promotion’, both elements of preventive policies. The former involves raising levels of awareness about healthy lifestyles (exercise, diet, and so on), while the latter entails some form of action intended to improve health or well-being, perhaps by providing regular medical checks or offering opportunities for recreation and exercise (for example, membership of a gymnasium). Finally, curative policies have the primary purpose of ensuring absent individuals’ earliest possible return to work. Some LEAs, for example, offer counselling sessions to state-sector teachers suffering from stress, with the hope that these will hasten their return. We asked about three policy elements which might be classified as ‘curative’. The first was referral of a sick teacher to a source of medical advice (doctor or occupational health nurse) retained by the school. The second involved the opportunity for a returning teacher to take on an initially lighter workload to facilitate his or her reentry to the school. Finally, visits to the home of an absent teacher were seen as part of the curative process. These feature as a part of many LEAs’ policies and are intended to show concern, offer support and maintain a line of contact between the absent teacher and the school. The classification offered above is not, of course, entirely watertight. For example, it is possible that the prospect of the implementation of a policy element intended to be ‘curative’ might actually serve to inhibit a teacher from reporting sick. Nor is the list by any means complete. Formulae which take account of the number of spells of absence and ‘triggers’ for managerial intervention both feature in many local authorities’ policies (Bowers and McIver, 2000). Private health insurance, intended to shorten waiting times for treatment or to make hospitalisation more predictable, may also be a feature of some policies. We did not ask about any of these. So what were the elements of the policies on sickness absence? The three bar charts in Figures 1, 2 and 3 set them out, indicating the extent to which each occurred in those schools which had any explicit policies at all. What do these charts reveal? Of the schools which had policies, it seems, the most frequently occurring components were interviews on the return of a previously sick teacher to work, referral for medical advice other than that provided by the teacher’s GP, and planned-for visits

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FIGURE 1: PROPORTION OF ‘INHIBITORY’ POLICY ELEMENTS IN THE 64 SCHOOLS’ POLICIES, SHOWN AS A PERCENTAGE OF SCHOOLS IN EACH CATEGORY

FIGURE 2: PROPORTION OF ‘PREVENTIVE’ POLICY ELEMENTS IN THE 64 SCHOOLS’ POLICIES, SHOWN AS A PERCENTAGE OF SCHOOLS IN EACH CATEGORY

(sometimes by colleagues other than the head teacher) to the home of a teacher FIGURE 3: PROPORTION OF ‘CURATIVE’ POLICY ELEMENTS IN THE 64 SCHOOLS’ POLICIES, SHOWN AS A PERCENTAGE OF SCHOOLS IN EACH CATEGORY

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who was ill. Health education and the promotion of healthy lifestyles came well behind these; preventive measures appear to have been given less prominence in most schools’ policies than those designed to inhibit absence or to deal with it when it occurred. Very few schools had a formal policy which would enable a teacher recovering from illness to be gently reintroduced to his or her duties. It seems reasonable to infer that in most cases a teacher is expected either to be present and working to full capacity or at home and not working at all. Of course, some of the schools which had no policies might claim that they followed some of these practices when the occasion demanded it. The existence of policies, though, indicates that something will be done in a systematic way rather than in an ‘ad hoc’ fashion. Yet schools without explicit policies on staff absence might take some comfort from a detailed survey of 126 state schools reported by Bowers and McIver (2000). Over half the head teachers who responded considered that their LEAs’ policy guidelines were not always appropriate and only a third of them systematically applied the policy guidance when a member of staff was absent. TEACHER APPOINTMENTS We looked at a related matter which I have chosen not to include under the heading of policies on sickness absence. In selecting people for jobs, some organisations take account of a candidate’s previous absence history, so we asked heads if their schools explicitly sought to know— and took account of—a potential teacher’s absence history. Such selection considerations might have been included within the ‘inhibitory’ category; after all, they are designed to reduce the probability of absences. Emboldened by a quote from Parker (1995:156)—‘If you get rid of employees with absentee problems, you’ll have less absenteeism’— I was tempted to place selection guidelines within Figure 1. However, sickness absence policies are generally supposed to apply to existing staff and not to the hypothetical future behaviours of applicants for a post. Biographical data of varying kinds will inform the decision to shortlist a candidate for a job, so a policy of obtaining information about a person’s previous sickness record is perhaps better treated as something different. In all, 51 schools (37 per cent of those replying to the survey) told us that they took account of a candidate’s absence history in appointing new staff. It seemed to be of most concern to the special schools in our sample and of least concern to those classified as ‘secondary’. That category of school, of course, recorded the lowest level of sickness absence, so it may be that avoiding appointments which might increase staff absences was less of a priority than in schools where it was manifestly more of a problem.

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I am unsure quite how easily a decision to select or reject an applicant on the basis of his or her record of sickness absence sits with current disability discrimination legislation, or even with that on human rights. Most of the head teachers who gave us further details indicated that this was just one of several other matters which they would take into account when making an appointment. Some indicated that referees were asked about a teacher’s sickness record; medical declarations were asked of some teachers before an appointment was confirmed, and two respondents indicated that successful candidates were expected to undertake a medical examination commissioned by the school. Yet as I remarked at the beginning of this chapter, the link between the actual illness of teachers and their preparedness to report sick is at best tenuous. According to Allegro and Veerman (1998), employees, not doctors, generally decide whether or not they are capable of working. In their European study they found no medical diagnoses attaching to 70 per cent of all spells of sickness absence. Individual differences in what they term ‘thresholds of absence’ or willingness to report sick can more colloquially be interpreted as attitude being more significant than illness. WHAT ELSE WAS DONE? Several other management strategies were revealed by our head teacher respondents in the entire sample of 137 schools. Among those which fall within the ‘inhibitory’ category can be included the school which expected persistently absent teachers to produce a medical certificate to explain even individual days of absence. Regular telephone calls to an absent teacher (or to a relative) were mentioned by three heads; one of these told us that the calls would be made daily for the first two weeks of an absence and then, should it persist, an individual judgement would be made about the necessary level of contact. Two other schools regularly sent each staff member a record of his or her absences over the past term, with this forming the basis for discussion with the head teacher if it was thought necessary to do so. One head teacher told us that regular prayer limited staff absences; another cited twice-daily meditation sessions held by the staff. All the above strategies must be seen in the context of a very low overall sickness absence rate in the independent school sector. This rate cannot be entirely ascribed to policies; after all, the majority of the schools which replied to our survey had no explicit policies on staff absence. Research in the United States led Jacobson et al (1993) to identify a set of beliefs and practices among a school’s staff concerning what duration and frequency of absence is acceptable, both to the individual and the organisation. These constitute the ‘absence culture’ of

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the school and are, in those authors’ view, of more importance than the nature or individual health of those teaching there. Workplace norms which tolerate high levels of absence will maintain those levels, irrespective of who works there. This is the stance taken by Imants and van Zoelen (1995). The school’s head teacher, they suggest, has a crucial role to play in establishing and maintaining those norms, or—if they are to be changed—in disconfirming and challenging them. Within their framework a supportive leader is also a directive one who shows little tolerance for those who, through unwarranted absence, cause extra work for colleagues. If hard-to-determine elements of the school’s climate are important in maintaining low levels of absenteeism, perhaps Pennington (1949) and Simpson (1976), mentioned at the start of this chapter, had something useful to say all those years ago. Head teachers may not always be the right people to ask about a school’s climate or the impact of its leadership upon morale. What they say and what their staff might tell you are not necessarily the same. However, the low absenteeism rates in the independent school sector indicate that some notice should be taken of what heads say happens in their schools. Broadly speaking, two themes arose from the comments sent to us by heads responding to the questionnaire. The first of these relates to what I have termed ‘collegiality and commitment’. It involves a sense either of ‘give and take’ on the part of the school’s management, with normally high expectations being matched by understanding when things go wrong, or of shared responsibility aimed to deter staff from taking undue leave of absence. A few sample quotes may illustrate these matters. The school takes the view that if staff are well treated and there is a generous attitude to necessary absence then teachers will respond fully. (Preparatory school head teacher) We have a staff which is predominantly women with families. We allow staff to bring sick children into school if they are not highly infectious. They are looked after in sick bay. We allow staff time off to follow normal parenting duties and encourage everyone to ask rather than take the day off. Colleagues are then much more likely to arrange work and often cover. Peer pressure not to abuse this generous support and understanding prevents the staff from taking advantage from any situation. Staff are rarely absent unless really ill in this school. (Preparatory school head teacher) Senior staff and houseparents are provided with private health insurance. Although they do not act formally, our school counsellors and medical officer are available on a casual basis. A physiotherapist visits the school and the school will pay if staff are

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involved with coaching or similar activities. INSET on stress management is provided. (Secondary school head teacher) I have never had any problems in over 20 years. My staff never want to be off, so our record is exemplary. (‘All-age’ school head teacher) Many of the staff may feel a little under the weather but come into school as cover is done amongst ourselves and therefore we feel the need not to overload our colleagues. (‘All-age’ school head teacher) The staff are supportive of each other both in time and cover, and emotionally. There are regular times when staff ‘celebrate’ together and socialise. There are no formal procedures to avoid sickness but the ethos contributes to the well-being of staff. (Special school head teacher) In a school of less than 150 pupils, the staff are very committed to the work ethic and struggle in to work frequently when they should not. Part of my role is to monitor the levels of stress in the staff to ensure they are working at full capacity…Encouraging the staff to feel appreciated, valued and part of a team is vital to the well-being of all. (Preparatory school head teacher) The second theme engaged in one way or another with the economic consequences (or their prospect) of absence. Within the ‘economic’ bracket I have not merely included financial consequences stemming from absence, there are also costs in terms of others’ energies and the potential loss to pupils whose academic progress may be restricted when their regular teacher is away. Not surprisingly, comments within this category arose from those managing smaller schools. We did not ask whether schools took out insurance against staff absence; larger schools, even without such insurance are likely to be better able to absorb the consequences caused by the loss of a teacher than smaller schools. Small schools cannot cope with many staff off sick. This is openly said at interview and discussion of sickness absence invited. We very rarely use supply staff, so absence has to be covered by using non-contact time. When this is made clear to candidates, the fainthearted withdraw their applications. (Preparatory school head teacher) In a small school with 3 full-time staff and 12 part-time, sickness is always a problem. We do not find it difficult to cover illness as parttimers will often work extra hours happily but with only one teacher per year there is no one to work parallel with the person covering. In the past 4 years we have had 2 teachers off for a term each. I am satisfied that academically there was little disruption

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but it threw the financial management of the school into chaos in the short term. (Preparatory school head teacher) Different schools offer different conditions of service. In the state sector, a sick teacher will typically receive full pay for the first six months of absence. One independent school in our sample cited a teacher’s entitlement to pay for the first 100 working days lost, and this appears to be at least as generous as that found in publicly funded schools. The comment from another school indicated that the cost of absence would be mitigated much more quickly: Staff are paid for 3 days’ absence. After that they are on social security payments. (Preparatory school head teacher) Interestingly, a similar situation existed in one of the special schools—the only school in our sample to claim that it offered incentives for staff to report regularly for work. Certainly the prospect of an early cut in pay may operate as a disincentive to be away from school, just as a speed camera on the road will offer a disincentive to drive faster than the permitted speed. It appears less clear that a potential loss of pay actually qualifies as an ‘incentive’ or reward. Another respondent, perhaps mindful of the actuarial distinction between insurance premiums levied on smokers and non-smokers, simply told us: We do not appoint smokers. (Preparatory school head teacher) POLICIES AND PROBLEMS Finally, I have included a quote from a special school head which does not fit easily into either of the themes identified above. It does, though, indicate some of the frustrations which can accompany attempts to apply a policy in a rigorous way. Her school, part of a group of a schools with a central administration system based elsewhere in the country, had adopted a quite detailed policy on the management of sickness absence. The policy belonged to the group and was expected to be implemented in all the schools belonging to it. Sometimes I feel that we have ended up with piles of paper and resentment from staff whilst making no difference to the minority who may be less professionally committed. However, it is useful to keep records—small leaves of absence mount up more than you realise. It is also good to require staff to complete paperwork attaching evidence for appointments, etc. and to be asked for permission so that staff know it is usually expected that

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appointments are made outside school hours. Sickness interviews are held to try and identify underlying causes/need for support/ specialist help as well as to identify patterns of absence. Where there have been persistent and unacceptable levels of absence I have been frustrated from [sic] the lack of response from personnel for further action. If I am doing all the paperwork it should be so that action can be taken in the rare instances it is warranted. In practice it seems difficult to pursue. Any effective policy will be staged, so that if earlier parts have not proved effective, disciplinary procedures can be undertaken in the knowledge that the necessary help and support has been made available to the teacher. In her view, it seems, insufficient support was forthcoming when she had exhausted the earlier measures laid down in the group’s policy. The message appears clear: for policies to work, they have to backed up throughout an organisation. INCENTIVES TO ATTEND I have already questioned whether the reported ‘incentive’ element of one school’s policy actually qualifies as an incentive scheme. Incentive schemes which reward teachers for good attendance are not found at all in the state sector in England and as far as I can tell are rarely encountered in independent schools. Schools’ managers and governors show a not unnatural reluctance to establish systems which reward people for doing the job they are already paid to do. Yet incentive schemes are found in other industries in Britain; the Institute of Personnel and Development (2000) reported that 15 per cent of its members’ organisations used bonuses or financial incentives as part of their strategy for absence management. Teacher incentives are commonly found in Australia and in many parts of the United States, usually linked to a pre-specified sickleave entitlement. It is possible for a teacher to accumulate such leave at times of full attendance or to receive an ‘advance’ of leave to use for a range of purposes, repaying the advance by working through his or her leave entitlement at a later time. In Ohio, for example, 96 per cent attendance earns a teacher an additional day’s entitlement, while unused sick leave can be accumulated on an unlimited basis. ‘Buy back’ arrangements in many states enable the employer to purchase the unused time, so a range of incentives, financial and otherwise, is available to the teacher who meets attendance targets. From their extensive study of 381 school districts in New York State, Ehrenberg et al (1991) concluded that incentives do make a difference to the amount of sick leave taken by teachers. Somehow, though, the idea of

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encouraging people to attend work when they ought not to be there, or paying them extra to do what they are supposed to do anyway, sits uneasily within the English education system. Although some readers will doubtless be familiar with more, I have come across only one genuine attendance incentive plan in a school in England. The school was not part of our sample, but I was directed to it by a former teacher there because of what he saw as its unique system. It bears some relation to the system described above, which is founded on retrospective ‘payments’ of one kind or another when pre-specified attendance targets are met. The difference in this school, a large preparatory school in London employing 120 full-time teachers, is that each teacher is guaranteed payment for regular attendance through a thrice-yearly bonus scheme. The school’s salary scale is based on the variable hours (between 25 and 37.5) which particular teachers are contracted to work in the course of a week; additional salary (not bonus) payments are made for early hours and late preparation duties. The bonus payments increase annually for the first six years of a teacher’s service, to a point where they can constitute about a third of the teacher’s basic salary. But deductions, based on the number of days missed or number of late arrivals at school in the foregoing period, are made from each bonus payment. Legitimate illness, even when supported by a medical certificate, still leads to daily deductions. Basic salary is never subject to deductions for absence. Does the system ‘work’? The school’s founder and owner believes so, although no extensive records of staff absences were available for us to examine when we studied this policy. Teachers’ accounts suggest that the prospect of losing any of their promised bonus acts as a powerful motivator for attendance and good timekeeping. The scheme essentially relies on what behaviour modifiers term ‘response cost’, or the knowledge that a particular course of action will lead to some unpleasant result. Attendance is therefore negatively rather than positively reinforced. This is in contrast to a system in which ‘unused’ sick days are rewarded by their cash equivalent (see, for example, Fowler, 1995), where positive reinforcing conditions prevail. On the whole, most behaviourists consider positive reinforcement more likely to sustain desirable behaviours. But since I have yet to come across the idea of a teacher’s entitlement to a certain number of sick days in a British. school, it remains to be seen which will work better here. IN CONCLUSION In this chapter I have tried to share much of what I have learned both about independent schools’ practices in managing staff absences and about the extent of full-time staff absenteeism during one 12-month

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period. Such schools take many shapes and their style of ownership or governance will vary considerably from school to school. Because of this, the picture presented here may or may not chime with readers’ experiences. As far as I am aware, there are no other studies of the issues encountered by independent schools when planning for or confronting staff absences. The one reported here is far from perfect. We failed to ask a number of pertinent questions. Did these schools insure against absence? If so, after what period of absence did their insurer pay? Did the school purchase personnel services from an outside organisation? If so, in what ways did the service facilitate (or even hinder) the process of managing or minimising teacher absenteeism? We obtained no age or gender profile either of absent staff or of each school’s staff as a whole. It might also have been informative to conduct case studies of particular problems which certain head teachers had encountered, perhaps along the lines of those we reported in state schools in our research for DfEE (Bowers and McIver, 2000). We still know insufficient about why some teachers get sick and others, apparently similarly placed, appear to stay well. Research in Cambridge by Craig Hargate of the Faculty of Education is beginning to engage with this issue by using closely matched pairs of teachers in both conditions, but we still have a great deal to learn. Each spell of absence comes at a price, not only for the school and quite possibly for the teacher, but for the pupils or students whom he or she would have taught in that time. The time can never be properly recovered and substitutes, however good, rarely compensate for the scheduled teacher. In general, teachers in independent schools have a good record when set alongside those in the state sector or workers in comparable industries. Yet it would be very unwise to let that lead to complacency. A sector and a school are very different things; it seems sure that the extent to which staff absences occur in the latter has a great deal to do with the way that school is managed and with the policies—explicit or implicit—which prevail there. REFERENCES Allegro, J.T. and Veerman, T.J. (1998) ‘Sickness Absence’, in P.J.D. Drenth, H.Thierry and C.J. de Wolff (eds.) Work Psychology, Hove: Psychology Press. Bowers, T. (2001a) ‘Teacher Absenteeism and III Health Retirement: A Review’, Cambridge Journal of Education, 31, pp. 135–57. Bowers, T. (2001b) ‘Perspective: Tony Bowers on Managing Absenteeism’, Human Resources Management Update, 3, pp.9–10.

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Bowers, T. and McIver, M. (2000) ‘III Health Retirement and Absenteeism Amongst Teachers’ (DfEE Research Report RR235), Nottingham: Department for Education and Employment. Bridgeland, M. (1971) ‘Pioneer Work with Maladjusted Children: A Study of the Development of Therapeutic Education’, London: Staples Press. Cabinet Office (1998) Working Well Together: Managing Attendance in the Public Sector, London: Cabinet Office. Department of Education and Science (1978) ‘Special Educational Needs: Report of the Committee of Inquiry into the Education of Handicapped Children’ (The Warnock Report), London: HMSO. Ehrenberg, R.G., Ehrenberg, R.A., Rees, D.i. and Ehrenberg, E.L. (1991) ‘School District Leave Policies, Teacher Absenteeism, and Student Achievement’, Journal of Human Resources, 26, pp.72–105. Fowler, D. (1995) ‘Ten Ways to Control Absenteeism’, Early Childhood News, 7, 5, pp.36–7. Ilmarinen, J., Tuomi, K. and Klockars, M. (1997) ‘Changes in the Work Ability of Active Employees Over an 11-year Period’, Scandinavian Journal of Work and Environmental Health, 23(supplement 1) pp.49–57. Imants, J. and Van Zoelen, A. (1995) ‘Teachers’ Sickness Absence in Primary Schools, School Climate and Teachers’ Sense of Efficacy’, School Organization, 15, pp.77–87. Institute of Personnel and Development (2000) Employee Absence: A Survey of Management Policy and Practice (Survey Report 13), London: IPD. Jacobson, S.L., Gibson, R.O. and Ramming, T. (1993) ‘Toward a Reconception of Absence in the School Workplace: Teacher Absenteeism as Invention and Social Exchange’, Paper presented to the American Education Finance Association, ERIC Document 357 502. Parker, S. (1995) ‘Performance Indicators: Sickness and Absence Rates as Indicators of Staff Morale’ (Part of an international conference report on performance indicators), ERIC Document 405 874. Pennington, A.W. (1949) ‘The Chronic Absentee’, Industrial Medicine, 18, pp.213– 14. Scott, K.D. and McClellan, E.L. (1990) ‘Gender Differences in Absenteeism’, Public Personnel Management, 19, pp.225–53. Simpson, J. (1976) ‘Stress, Sickness Absence and Teachers’, in NASUWT (ed.) Stress in Schools. Hemel Hempstead: National Association of Schoolmasters and Union of Women Teachers.

6 Use and Ornament: Girls in Former Boys’ Independent Schools Pauline Dooley and Mary Fuller

Britain’s independent schools are a subject of controversy but even their most hostile critics would grant that the schools have an extraordinary capacity for survival (Rae, 1981:11). SETTING THE SCENE When Rae wrote these words he was thinking of particular political and financial challenges experienced during a period of Labour government in Britain. That capacity of fee-paying schools to survive, or more accurately, the impact of one of their more ‘extraordinary’ and radical solutions to threats to survival, forms the focus of this chapter. As the demand for boarding education and the number of traditional consumers of feepaying education both declined, some of the most prestigious as well as many lesser-known fee-paying boys’ schools in Britain took the step of recruiting girls as part of their survival strategy. With a few exceptions, (see Burgess, 1990; Cresser, 1993; Price, 1993; Walford, 1983, 1986), this significant change in fee-paying schools has attracted little research interest, particularly in the last decade, even though the process continues and increasing numbers of former boys’ schools now accept girls and describe themselves as co-educational. British fee-paying schools are not alone in adopting radical solutions to challenges that threaten their survival. In other English-speaking countries, such as Australia (Pallotta-Chiarolli, 1990) and Canada (Maxwell and Maxwell, 1995), girls and pupils from social classes not normally associated with fee-paying education have been recruited as schools attempt to keep themselves in business. What these studies show is that schools cannot remain the same once they have recruited nontraditional pupils and that in some instances school traditions are challenged to such an extent that school culture is permanently altered. In an earlier study we wrote about independent boys’ schools that had recruited girls but where girls remained in a minority even, in some

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cases, 30 years after the initiative began (Fuller, Dooley and Ayles, 1997). We located 67 fee-paying secondary schools with pupils up to the age of 19 in which boys significantly outnumbered girls on the school roll. We requested a 1995 prospectus from each school. The 67 schools included some with international reputations while others were relatively obscure. They varied in size: some were day schools, others offered mainly or totally boarding education. Using each of the 63 school prospectuses obtained in this way as a source of visual and textual information, we analysed this public version of the schools’ declared values, provision and organisation, in other words, their cultures, with a particular focus on gender, coeducation and equal opportunities. Having earlier been boys’ schools, many now implied that they had made a successful transition from being single-sex to being co-educational, including schools that had a handful of girls or girls in the sixth form only. We established that, according to their own representation of their practices, these schools did not make equal provision for girls in the areas of boarding, pastoral care and sports facilities, for example. In some cases girls were subject to distinctly different admissions procedures. Analysis of information about staff contained within the prospectuses revealed that there were few women teachers and senior positions were disproportionately held by men. Governing bodies were virtually exclusively male domains. The study led us to conclude that, despite schools’ claims ‘prospectuses paint a picture of boys’ schools which happen to have girls in them rather than of schools whose policies and practices have become genuinely co-educational’ (Fuller, Dooley and Ayles, 1997:405). When writing up the research, to illustrate the general themes and conclusions from our analysis of all 63 available prospectuses, we selected 22 schools that represented the diversity of size, provision, status and co-educational practices to be found in the larger sample of schools. We have also conducted research interviews with teaching and support staff who worked in, and young women who attended, such schools, to gain a greater qualitative understanding of the schools and more specifically of the young women’s educational and social experiences while at school. From the 15 interviews analysed so far we have gained considerable insight into the young women’s lived experience of being in a very small minority in a male school (Dooley and Fuller, 1998, 1999; Fuller and Dooley, 1999). Such qualitative material is valuable in its own right, adding detail and depth to the themes that emerged from analysis of prospectuses. Undertaking these interviews has confirmed our view that analysing prospectuses is a valuable and sensitising activity in understanding gendered educational institutions in their own terms as well as in ours.

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We are now returning to an analysis of the current prospectuses of those schools on which we focussed in our earlier study. Neither the schools nor their clientele have remained the same in that period. We will document changes in schools’ provision for and recruitment of girls as a means of understanding more about discourses of co-education and gender. It seems a reasonable assumption from our previous work that any developments towards full ‘co-education’ within these former boys’ schools would show in their prospectuses. Additionally, we will set out the main reasons why prospectuses are important, to independent schools, to potential clients or consumers and to researchers. But before doing that, we contextualise the particular schools on which this chapter is based. Fee-paying schools are diverse. They vary in ethos, size, age, prestige and degree to which they are academically selective. Some serve a relatively local clientele, while others recruit from virtually anywhere in the world. Schools may offer boarding of various kinds or only provide for day pupils—yet others have a mixture of day and boarding pupils. We are interested in all these aspects of culture in the schools in our study, since they have an impact on girls’ experiences within them and contribute to the school as a gendered institution. A particularly relevant element in the school’s profile, as far as our research is concerned, is its history of educating girls and boys together. In the 20 years since 1980, fee-paying schools in England ‘maintained their share of the market’, in terms of the proportion of school-age pupils they recruit (www.iscis.uk.net). Nevertheless there were significant fluctuations in market share during that period. ISIS reports that independent schools had 5.9 per cent of the market in 1980, 7.4 per cent in 1990 and 6.9 per cent in 2000. And the sector is even more subject to change than these fluctuations might suggest. For example, the statistics quoted above do not reveal some important changes in the schools’ clientele. ‘First-time buyers’ of fee-paying education now make up a considerable proportion of the schools’ customers, but this is not a picture of steadily increasing permeation of the sector by non-traditional users: first-time buyers constituted 41 per cent in 1989, 54 per cent in 1993, 50 per cent in 1997 and 39 per cent in 2001 (ISIS, 2001; Garner, 2002). Boarding education has come under threat at a number of points in the past two decades and demand is still declining. The only increase in boarding, which still does not stop the overall decline, is among girls (ISIS, 2001). Spare boarding capacity has, in some instances, been the motive for schools opening up recruitment to pupils, such as girls, who had previously been excluded or not actively recruited. This somewhat wider recruitment base almost certainly poses a challenge to the very existence of some schools and to the culture of the rest. Fluctuations in market share, clientele and demand for boarding

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could provide the means and/or the motive for developing institutional culture in new directions, or could, just as easily, make the retention of ‘traditional school values’ seem all the more urgent. We expected that the prospectuses would, in some measure, reflect schools’ responses to the challenges and dilemmas we have described. But the relationship between schools’ practices in a changing environment and their selfpresentation in the prospectus is not straightforward—cultural change may be under—as well as over-played. For these reasons and others outlined below, we do not read prospectuses as though they were a simple barometer of change.

PROSPECTUSES AS RESEARCH TOOLS It is understood by those responsible for creating prospectuses that ‘several different types of audience displaying different levels of understanding of the educational world read the document’ (Davies and Ellison, 1997:148). While not specifically written with researchers in mind, prospectuses nevertheless have been used by researchers other than us as part of research projects with a variety of concerns (Copeland, 1994, 2001; Gewirtz, Ball and Bowe, 1995; Knight, 1992; Maguire, Macrae and Ball, 1994). As research documents, prospectuses have both advantages and limitations. In one sense their purpose is quite transparent—they are marketing documents self-evidently targeted at parents who are potential buyers of the services they advertise; are possibly aimed at potential pupils and produced with competing schools in mind. Their overt promotional nature means that the researcher can legitimately read the document as a statement of what the school considers its strong selling points. Whatever they include—text, visuals, headings, juxtapositions, tone, sequence of information—is all part of the way the school presents itself in its own terms. Whatever is absent that might be thought normal to include may alert the reader to areas that the school does not consider a strong point. Idiosyncrasies in the prospectus may be read as more or less conscious attempts to convey the uniqueness of the school. But if it is the case, as Gewirtz et al. (1995:135) conclude from their research that ‘schools are increasingly concerned to attract rather than inform parents’, then the reader (whether parent or researcher) must be alert to what this means for prospectus content. It particularly suggests that attention to what is not included, as well as what is, may be valuable in understanding the school’s culture. Comparing school prospectuses enables the researcher to become aware of silences in some. Furthermore, comparison of an individual school’s prospectus at two points in time yields fruitful insights into its changing perspectives.

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READING AND INTERPRETING PROSPECTUSES In 2001, we again contacted the 22 schools whose prospectuses had illustrated our earlier study, to obtain their current prospectus. Seventeen schools sent prospectuses; two had ceased trading; and three failed to reply although we know that they are still in business. We subjected the text and visual material in the 17 prospectuses for 2001 to the same systematic quantitative and qualitative content analysis as we had undertaken earlier for the 1995 prospectuses. Working separately we calculated the amount and kind of space given to girls and to women staff in the prospectuses, and documented statements about coeducation, equal opportunities and the adaptations schools claimed to make for girls. In this way, we were able to examine schools, as they present themselves in the prospectus, as gendered communities. Interpretation of prospectuses is not straightforward and their meaning cannot just be read off because readers bring their own agendas to interpreting them. In approaching the prospectuses as researchers, we acknowledge that the lens through which we view them will be different from that of potential buyers. Visual and textual material in prospectuses is difficult to interpret for other reasons, too. As Gewirtz et al. (1995:136) remind us, there is inevitably some manipulation of the truth. Prospectuses comprise ‘a collection of freefloating signs which appear to be only weakly associated with the actuality of school provision’. This is especially true of the visual material where the pictures of pupils conquering mountains, performing music in foreign locations and engaged in charitable activities in Third World countries give the impression of the school as having a worldwide presence. Schools, in other words, are presenting an idealised version of themselves and they are doing so using the power of photography in particular. Independent schools have long practised the art of summing up a great many messages in one photograph. Two pupils, a boy and girl in traditional uniform, textbooks under the arm, standing in front of the school chapel would represent the school as follows: uniform—standards and discipline; textbooks—academic standards and study; the chapel—traditional values and approaches; and a boy and a girl—a mixed school. (Davies and Ellison, 1997:146) In one prospectus in our sample there are many photographs of little boys in white shirts, ties and grey school shorts. Virtually no state school (primary or secondary) now has this kind of school uniform for boys, so

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we interpret such a uniform as a clear denoter of fee-paying and perhaps as a hint at not only standards and discipline, but also of a school with traditional values. For these reasons one needs to beware of treating information in prospectuses as unproblematically reflecting actual practices and provisions, though they may be indicative of aspirational culture. Whatever the caveats to using documents as signifiers, a multi-layered approach to analysis is justified. WHAT THE PROSPECTUS COMPRISED IN 2001 The overall first impression of the prospectuses is that they are of high quality, expensively and professionally produced. At least half the space is allocated to visual material, mainly photographs. With a single exception (St Benedicts, Ealing), where new photographs are placed within an essentially unaltered text, the prospectuses looked very different in 2001 from their 1995 versions. So far we have referred to ‘the prospectus’ as though it were a single document, which may be misleading. In reality, the schools sent out a substantial package of materials in response to our request for a prospectus. The package contained either an A4 booklet (the most usual format) or an A4 folder, both with a pocket for inserts. The single sheet, leaflet and booklet inserts present information that requires annual or at least, frequent, updating and are commonly more cheaply produced than the prospectus proper. In most cases these inserts are not as lavishly illustrated, if illustrated at all, and have a more dense written content. They commonly include such matters as academic achievements, a list of governors and staff, fees, scholarships, admissions and application, terms and conditions, recent leavers’ destinations, a map, access by transport and school contact details. In contrast to the inserts, the text of the prospectus is less dense, commonly in a bigger typeface and organised thematically, with bold headings. Messages are amplified by a proliferation of colour photographs, frequently in a montage without captions. Although these may be presented in a different sequence, the following themes normally appear in the main body: school ethos, history and tradition, grounds and buildings, spirituality and the chapel, the school as a community, pastoral and (where relevant) boarding arrangements, sporting achievements, extra-curricular activities such as outdoor pursuits, combined cadet force, voluntary service, visual and performing arts, ICT facilities, academic departments and curriculum, a letter from the Head and something distinctive about the school. We have mentioned the relevance of noting what is not included, for what it might say about the school’s strengths and weaknesses as

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perceived by itself. There are schools which give no list of staff or governors, where entry requirements are not included or are unclear if present, where the reader has no way of knowing about pupils’ academic achievements and where the curriculum is not discussed. It is worth noting that virtually no school gives clear information about number and sex of pupils in its prospectus. Many prospectuses display their visual material accompanied by short text under headings (such as ‘nurture’ and ‘spirituality’) which are perceived as desirable qualities and outcomes. Consequently, there is little, if any, hard information on key aspects of education such as curriculum content, staffing, quality of staff or pedagogy. This absence is all the more telling since readers can make no assumptions about what is or is not taught; fee-paying schools, for example, have no obligation to follow the National Curriculum so that they may vary considerably in the curriuculum offered. Prospectuses vary in terms of whom they address as their primary audience, but we infer that prospectuses are aimed predominantly at parents rather than at pupils. Some schools speak about ‘your child’ or ‘your son or daughter’; others speak about ‘our pupils’, ‘our young men and women’; sometimes former or current parents’ views about the school are quoted, with messages addressed to other parents rather than to potential pupils. The text concerning curriculum, activities and provision implies an adult reader. For example, we note schools’ common assertion that boarding will bring moral, spiritual and/or social gains, a justification that is less likely to appeal to teenagers than that it is ‘fun’ or like ‘living with friends’, which appears in a few. On the other hand, in relation to boarding, the schools prioritise benefits over detail about provision, which may be more of a pitch to the potential pupil, so it should not be thought that the implied readers are exclusively parents. Nevertheless, we note the lack of overt attempts to speak to the potential pupil, particularly given the age of pupils concerned (11 years or older). The very few examples of schools which do address potential pupils, such as Lancing, are especially striking. As most prospectuses do not include any information about pupil numbers, we established the number of girl pupils and the year groups in which they are found using the ISIS (Independent Schools Council and Information Service) database. Those parts of our analysis that examine pupil rolls are based on information in the public domain. This enables us to include current data on 20 of the 22 schools that were discussed in depth in our 1997 article. The ISIS database describes our individual schools as either ‘co-educational’ or ‘boys (some girls)’. Schools in our sample described as having ‘some girls’ have girls in the sixth form only, while those labelled ‘co-educational’ have girls throughout the school.

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On the basis of a school’s categorisation in 1995 and in 2001, we can say which schools have changed their status. A quarter (five) retained the same status as in 1995—two day and three boarding, including three that had declared in 1995 that they had no plans to go fully coeducational. Fifteen had become ‘co-educational’—eight day and seven boarding, more than had, in 1995, declared plans to do so. From these simple indicators it would appear that our original 1995 sample had become two separate groups: a small group of five that remained boys’ schools recruiting girls only into the sixth form and a larger group of schools now defined as co-educational. Schools that did not change status between 1995 and 2001 were those that continue to have girls in the sixth form only. These are Charterhouse, Queen Elizabeth’s Grammar School Blackburn, Reed’s, St Benedict’s Ealing and Wellington Berkshire. In these five schools girls range from 9 to 27 per cent of the sixth form total (with a mean of 19 per cent). As a proportion of pupils in the whole school, girls ranged from 4 to 12 per cent (with a mean of 7 per cent). One school now recruits fewer girls, with the others recruiting more than in 1995, but over the period 1995 to 2001 the proportion of girls has altered by only one percentage point in any school. These are, indeed, schools that have remained the same in respect of the presence of girls. The number of fee-paying schools recruiting girls to the whole secondary age range has increased since 1995. These are the schools that have changed status between 1995 and 2001. In the 13 schools that had become co-educational in this way by 2001, girls range from 10 to 36 per cent (with a mean of 23 per cent) of the whole school, and from 3 to 53 per cent of the sixth form (with a mean of 25 per cent). The presence of girls outside the sixth form (that is, aged 11–16), even in schools that claim to be ‘fully co-educational’, is much smaller than the foregoing statistics would suggest. Girls outside the sixth constitute between 7 and 33 per cent of the whole school population, with a mean of 19 per cent. Classifying a school as co-educational because it recruits girls throughout, hides a variety of circumstances and does not usually mean that girls are evenly spread throughout the school. Only three of our schools (Haileybury, King’s Bruton and Plymouth College) have similar proportions of girls to boys in the sixth, in the whole school and in the non-sixth. This would be the nearest approximation to being ‘fully coeducational’ that we encountered in our sample of schools, though with boys still outnumbering girls by about two to one; it would be more accurate to conclude that they were on their way to becoming coeducational rather than having achieved that status.

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Two schools (Batley Grammar and Emanuel) have recruited far more girls under 16 years than into the sixth form. In the case of Emanuel, this is as a result of a declared plan to recruit girls into the sixth form in 1995 and to start taking girls at age 11 in 1996. In both cases numbers of girls are still small throughout the school. But the most common picture is of schools whose claim to being coeducational rests on having a much larger proportion of girls in the sixth form than in the rest of the school: Bearwood, Cranleigh, Lancing, Princethorpe College, Rugby and Yarm and to a lesser extent, Cheltenham College and Mill Hill. At Rugby, with a large sixth form relative to the size of the school and girls being 53 per cent of the sixth form, girls make up 36 per cent of the whole school. Closer attention to the figures shows that outside the sixth form only 13 per cent of the pupils are girls. In terms of pupil numbers, Rugby’s plan, stated in the 1995 prospectus to have become ‘fully co-educational by 1997’, has been achieved in the sixth form but not elsewhere in the school. Rugby is an extreme example of the general picture among these schools: large numbers of girls in the sixth form and rather few outside the sixth. In our earlier article (Fuller, Dooley and Ayles, 1997) we observed an apparent quota operating in former boys’ schools that were recruiting girls, whereby no school had more than one-third girls. In 2001 we noted that this still operates, so that all of these ‘co-educational’ schools contain at least two-thirds boys. Despite a number of changes, then, in terms of pupil numbers most remain boys’ schools. They have certainly changed since 1995 albeit not having become fully co-educational as many claim to have done. Though the change of status did not involve a move to full co education, it is still possible that in more subtle, qualitative ways, the schools now recruiting girls from age 11/13–16 as well as into the sixth form, could be distinguished from the others. How different were the schools that changed from those that had not, and how different was each school in 2001 from its earlier self? Do the prospectuses provide evidence of claims to have developed or to be in the process of developing their institutional culture as a result of their increasing recruitment of girls throughout the school? What evidence is there of a wish to retain the traditions and values of the original (boys’) school? We do not know whether the schools have actually changed, we only know how they present themselves and whether this has altered over time. Consequently, we address the questions raised above by comparing the 2001 prospectuses with their 1995 counterparts. Since we undertook systematic analysis of both sets in the same way, we are able to comment on the nature and extent of change in self-presentation over time.

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GENDERED INSTITUTIONS Slightly more pupils are seen on the cover of the current than of the 1995 prospectuses, but girl pupils appear much more frequently than before—nearly half of pupils shown are girls (as compared with less than a third in 1995). Inside the prospectuses, in both 1995 and 2001, almost one third of illustrations include girls. Nearly all schools overplay the female presence in the sense that the proportion of girls to boys in photographs is greater than their proportion in the school. While that was also true in 1995, the gap between presence and representation is smaller in 2001. The gap is smallest in those schools with very few girls, including schools that recruit only into the sixth form. In contrast, there is a bigger gap between girls’ visual representation and their actual presence in schools that have developed their recruitment of girls since 1995. Examples where this is particularly marked are Emanuel and Mill Hill, where the proportion of girls in photographs is twice their actual proportion in the school. Female pupils would appear to be an important element in the schools’ drive for recruitment. In 1995, we noted that girls were rarely shown in classroom activities but featured largely engaging in music and drama. The visual material continues to depict gender-stereotyped activities—the almost statutory depiction of boys (only one girl) playing snooker, for example. Girls are shown in a variety of circumstances, traditionally feminine (cooking, chatting in all-female groups) as well as less obviously so (active outdoor pursuits). We are struck by the frequent inclusion of a close-up photograph of a girl with a Combined Cadet Force uniform and tastefully muddied face, denoting that girls are included in this erstwhile all-male pursuit and, by extension, that girls are eligible for anything offered by the school. This is as near to an equal opportunities statement as many schools get. Generally, there is silence on girls’ academic achievements. This does not enable a parent or other reader to assess the likely value to her academic profile of a girl attending one of these schools. Only 60 per cent of our schools in 1995 and 77 per cent in 2001 reported any information on examination results, publishing consolidated lists of GCSE and A level results. Just one school, Forest, where girls and boys are educated together in the sixth form having had separate schooling until then, reports academic achievements separately for girls and boys, with results consistent with the national trend for girls to achieve more highly overall than boys. More schools now include a staff list. Although in 1995 20 per cent gave no information about the number, qualification or sex of staff, by 2001 this was down to 12 per cent. The number of women teaching staff has risen in those schools for which we have information. Whereas

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in 1995 a quarter of staff (including some who were not teachers) were women, by 2001 nearly a third of teachers were women (with a range of 15 to 55 per cent across the sample). Women made up 2 per cent of senior staff (defined as head of department or higher) in 1995. In 2001, the situation had changed markedly with 18 per cent of senior staff being women. Nevertheless, three schools had no women in senior positions (Cranleigh, Kings and Queen Elizabeth’s Grammar School). In 1995 all headteachers were male; in 2001 Emanuel School had a female headteacher. Where there is a staff list, qualifications, alma mater and subject taught are not always listed, yet in most cases the marital status of women continues to be indicated. This traditional and sexist way of listing people concentrates on a somewhat irrelevant quality in women teachers at the expense of more valid, informative details about all staff as professionals. Ten per cent of covers in 1995 showed staff but only one female; by 2001 nearly a quarter (4 of the 17) of covers had pictures of members of staff, showing two females and four males. Women staff, mainly but not exclusively teachers, constituted about 30 per cent of all staff shown inside the 2001 prospectuses, a representation about equal to their overall number in the schools; this is in contrast to 1995 when they had been markedly under-represented. Looking beyond the overall trend, however, to whether an individual prospectus visually represents women staff in line with their numbers at that school, more prospectuses (ten) underrepresent women than over-represent them (four). The photographs tend to show women teachers with individual pupils or small groups whereas men, more commonly than women, are shown in formal classroom settings. Non-teaching staff are rarely shown, and when they do appear their roles conform to gender stereotype—female nurses, laundrywomen, male chef and groundsmen. Every school in 1995 included a mention of governors, but in 2001 two (Bearwood and Rugby) neither mentioned nor listed their governors. Where governing bodies are listed, women made up oneeighth of governors in 1995, and about a fifth in 2001 (ranging from 10 to 30 per cent). Schools with the lowest proportion of women governors in 2001 were those that had remained boys’ schools, taking girls into the sixth form only; the proportion of women governors had changed very little in these schools since 1995. In contrast, all those schools described in 2001 as coeducational had increased the presence of women governors by at least 50 per cent. Governors are influential in a school’s success as a business, so the increase in women governors is noteworthy, reflecting the increasing importance of women to these schools as they re-market themselves.

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CHANGING PROSPECTUSES, CHANGING SCHOOLS? Some prospectuses and supplementary materials mention organisational changes such as adapting and auditing provision in relation to increasing numbers of girls. In 2001 fewer than in 1995 said something explicit about equal opportunities or had a rationale for co-education. Teaching and learning receive less attention in the prospectuses than extracurricular activities, particularly in boarding schools. The common absence of staff lists, pupil numbers, information about the curriculum, pedagogy and the learning day is in marked contrast to the plethora of visual and textual reference to the ‘world of opportunities’ as one prospectus calls it. Having noted this discrepancy in the 1995 prospectuses and encountered it again in 2001 we would suggest that it is a continuing part of the schools’ culture. In all 2001 prospectuses the text and visual material sent out similar messages about girls, whereas in 1995 text and visuals were frequently at odds. It is impossible to tell whether this indicates an institutional change whereby girls are more fully integrated into the school or whether it is a cosmetic change. Sexist language had largely disappeared, with all using the inclusive ‘boys and girls’ or ‘scholars’ with only a single slip in any of the prospectuses. The ‘old boys’ associations’ that we noted in our 1997 article have also apparently been renamed in line with more inclusive language. We compared the two groups of schools, those that continue to recruit girls into the sixth form only and those that have wider recruitment of girls, to find out whether they were observably different from each other. We conclude that though there are differences between schools, the two groups are not distinct in terms of these numerical indicators of a gendered culture. Nevertheless, the culture that the school wishes to convey can be inferred from other more qualitative aspects of the prospectus. A school’s culture can be denoted in terms of its history as well as its current practices. All the prospectuses incorporate a variety of signifiers of tradition, such as crests, ancient buildings, school histories, honours boards and historical photographs. At the same time most schools want to suggest that they are also at the cutting edge in educational provision computers and high-tech sports and science equipment are commonly referred to. Schools draw on these two aspects in varying degrees according to how they wish to market themselves. Some schools have ancient foundations, venerable buildings and a long ‘tradition’ to which they can refer in their publicity material. Others, more recently established or with less photogenic architecture or settings, must indicate the solidity and worthiness of what they can offer in other

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ways. It seems from our study of their prospectuses that none of the schools in our sample feels able to ignore completely the selling power of tradition. Former boys’ schools have made a significant break with tradition by recruiting girls. We sought evidence of schools creating a narrative to provide a rationale for their action. In considering schools as gendered communities we noted whether they referred to this change in their prospectuses; whether they presented themselves as maintaining an unbroken tradition or recognised a shift in culture as a result of the presence of girls. Specifically we looked for statements relating to the presence of girls, co-education and equal opportunities. Although girls are by no means hidden away in the prospectuses, nevertheless there was little space given to discussing issues and practices of co-education. There was even less on equal opportunities in the 2001 prospectuses than there was in 1995. Very few prospectuses made reference to this at all and none gave a policy solely addressing issues of sex discrimination. Five schools stood out as giving some attention to co-education in their text: Emanuel, Haileybury, Lancing, Mill Hill and Queen Elizabeth’s Grammar School. The first four have all recently moved, since 1995, to recruiting girls throughout the school. Interestingly, in 1995 neither Haileybury nor Lancing had public plans to extend their recruitment to girls in the 13–16 age group. Emanuel and Mill Hill had declared their intention to include more girls, Emanuel claiming that it would be ‘fully co-educational by the end of the 1990s’. Of these four schools, Mill Hill has four lines on girls in the school and the challenge provided by coeducation, Emanuel rather fewer. Haileybury and Lancing announce that their goal is to have a school with roughly equal numbers of boys and girls, an unusual and bold statement. No other schools in our 1995 or 2001 samples announced targets of this kind. Given the apparent quota of onethird girls, which we have already mentioned, an ambition to have equal numbers of girls and boys, means they could become the first in this group to become genuinely coeducational. Both Haileybury and Lancing provide rather more of a rationale for co-education. Haileybury’s prospectus raises the question ‘Until recently Haileybury was mainly a boys’ school, now it is fully coeducational. Why the change?’ The answer provided is as follows: ‘We believe that girls throughout Haileybury will make for a more balanced and natural community. Parents too want equal opportunities for their children. In an age of increasing equality, parents expect the best school for their children regardless of gender.’ Lancing’s prospectus asserts that: The move to full co-education in 2000 is a reflection of modern society, the expectations of parents and the success of girls in the Sixth Form. To our pupils it is natural.’ The school recognises the likely impact on its culture when it describes the

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effect of recruiting more girls and more day pupils as a ‘transformation’ of the school. There was nothing in the 1995 prospectus to indicate that Queen Elizabeth’s Grammar School had plans to expand their recruitment. While at the time of writing it is still a school with girls in the sixth form only, (unlike Emanuel, Haileybury, Lancing and Mill Hill), its 2001 prospectus declares that it intends to recruit girls all through: The decision to move to full coeducation stems from our conviction that equal opportunities bring out the best in both boys and girls and that this is right for education in the modern world.’ The newsletter which accompanies the prospectus explains that the ‘Co-education Implementation Committee has done sterling work to ensure that we’re all well prepared for development that will enrich life at QEGS.’ Thus we are given an indication of planning, training and preparation for events that will change the institution. All these schools attempt to reassure the reader that the school will retain its traditions even as it moves to ‘full co-education’. The following quotations indicate the flavour of these attempts: ‘a long and distinguished history and an exciting, adventurous future’ (Emanuel); ‘Fresh ideas, traditional values’ (Haileybury); ‘founded in a time of rapid change and social progress and still exists to equip its pupils to make the best of the world they inherit’ (Lancing); ‘proud of its non-conformist traditions and yet aware of the need to change and adapt to meet the challenges of the 21st century’ (Mill Hill); ‘wears lightly its five hundred years of history. Traditions are sustained only if they remain serviceable. Change is the norm’ (Queen Elizabeth’s Grammar School). These messages are reinforced in prospectuses where a variety of subtle appeals to tradition (especially through photographs or drawings of buildings and crests) are presented within a particularly fresh and modern design. DISCUSSION Discourses of co-education and equal opportunities are conflated, as we demonstrated in quotations above from Lancing and Haileybury’s prospectuses. Schools slide from one concept to the other without making a distinction between them. Recruiting girls is the same as providing equal opportunities. Equal opportunities are the justification for offering coeducation. Co-education is then only worth discussing if the school is undergoing particular change and overtly recruiting young women. Part of the discourse of co-education is that it is ‘natural’ and consequently needs no further elaboration, an extraordinary dismissal of their own histories as single sex institutions.

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We noted in the 1995 prospectuses that ‘co-education’ as a term was used ‘flexibly and artfully’ (Fuller, Dooley and Ayles, 1997:411). The same is true for their 2001 counterparts. Schools declare themselves to be ‘co-educational’ or even ‘fully co-educational’ from the date when they start to recruit girls all through or when they have girls throughout the school age range, however few. Schools that have a maximum of one-third girls and no declared plans to alter that proportion still consider themselves to be fully coeducational. Incomplete co-education is commonly confused with being co-educational: declaring an intent to become coeducational seems to be a sufficient condition to be described as co-educational. Adults as part of the gendered community of the school are remarkably absent from the prospectuses. When we reflect on change in institutional culture, it is clear that in 2001 the proportion of women teaching staff had increased overall and in every school, in comparison with 1995. Senior women staff were more numerous than in 1995 in most schools, although three had no women in senior positions. These are significant changes yet nothing is made of them in any prospectus and women staff are visually under-represented in most. From this we can only assume that teaching staff in general, and women in particular, are not seen as a major selling point in the marketing of former boys’ schools. The presence of girls in former boys’ schools increased between 1995 and 2001, although the picture is patchy. In our small sample of 17 schools, five remained essentially as they were in 1995, that is boys’ schools with girls in the sixth form only and with no increase in recruitment even into the sixth form. They represent themselves as mainly boys’ schools that have retained the traditional values of boys’ independent schools to which small numbers of girls may have access but which they do not significantly alter. Five schools that had already begun the process of recruiting girls in the year groups before the sixth form would appear to be actively seeking to recruit more girls into the whole school and wishing to be coeducational. While the remainder may have increased their recruitment they make nothing of this in their prospectuses. They tend, rather, to consider that they are already ‘fully co-educational’ and would appear to be content to remain schools which are predominantly boys’ schools. The majority of schools, therefore, give no indication in their prospectuses of a desire to develop their institutional culture in new directions, nor do they reflect upon any possible changes to their culture brought about by recruiting girls in the first place. However, these boys’ schools are not hesitant to place girls centrally in their marketing strategy.

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REFERENCES Burgess, A. (1990) ‘Co-Education: The Disadvantages for Schoolgirls’, Gender and Education, 2, pp.91–5. Copeland, I. (1994) ‘The Secondary School Prospectus and the Challenge of Special Educational Needs’, Educational Studies, 20, pp.237–50. Copeland, I. (2001) ‘The Independent School Brochure: A Sample Analysis’, Research in Education, 65, pp.88–97. Cresser, R. (1993) ‘Take Three Girls: A Comparison of Girls’ A Level Achievement in Three Types of Sixth Form Within the Independent Sector’, in G. Walford (ed.) The Private Schooling of Girls, pp. 174–86 (London: Woburn Press). Davies, B. and Ellison, L. (1997) Strategic Marketing for Schools: How to Integrate Marketing and Strategic Development for an Effective School (London: Financial Times/Prentice Hall). Dooley, P. and Fuller, M. (1998) ‘No Place to be Private: Experiences of Girls Educated in Former Boys’ Independent Schools in the UK’, Paper given at conference ‘Sexing the Nation: Interdisciplinary Perspectives on Belonging’, Cheltenham and Gloucester College of Higher Education. Dooley, P. and Fuller, M. (1999) ‘lt Takes Your Breath Away: Issues of Empowerment among Girls Educated in Boys’ Schools’, Paper presented at Voices in Gender and Education conference, University of Warwick. Fuller, M. and Dooley, P. (1999) ‘Educating Boys at Girls’ Expense: The Experiences of Girls Educated in Elite Boys’ Schools in Britain’, Paper presented at Seventh International Interdisciplinary Congress on Women, Tromsø. Fuller, M., Dooley, P. and Ayles, R. (1997) “‘A Revolution now Absorbed”: Girls in Former Boys’ Schools’, Educational Studies, 23, pp.405–16. Garner, R. (2002) ‘Girl Boarders Help Private Schools Post Rise in Numbers’, Independent, 24 April, p.7. Gewirtz, S., Ball, SJ. and Bowe, R. (1995) Markets, Choice and Equity in Education, Buckingham: Open University Press. ISIS (2001) www.iscis.uk.net Knight, P. (1992) ‘Secondary Schools in Their Own Words: The Image in School Prospectuses’, Cambridge Journal of Education, 22, pp.55–67. Maguire, M., Macrae, S. and Ball, S.J. (1994) ‘Open Days and Brochures: Marketing Tactics in the Post-16 Sector’, paper presented to the annual conference of the British Educational Research Association, Lancaster. Maxwell, J. and Maxwell, M. (1995) ‘The Reproduction of Class in Canada’s Elite Independent Schools’, British Journal of Sociology of Education, 19, pp.309– 26. Pallotta-Chiarolli, M. (1990) ‘The Female Stranger in a Male School’, Gender and Education, 2, pp. 169–83. Price, J. (1993) “‘We’re Just Here to Make Up the Numbers Really”. The Experience of Girls in Former Boys’ Public Schools’, in G. Walford (ed.) The Private Schooling of Girls, London: Woburn Press. Rae, J. (1981) The Public School Revolution: Britain’s Independent Schools, 1964– 1979, London: Faber and Faber.

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Walford, G. (1983) ‘Girls in Boys’ Public Schools: A Prelude to Further Research’, British Journal of Sociology of Education, 4, pp.39–54. Walford, G. (1986) ‘Girls in a Male World’, in G. Walford (ed.) Life in Public Schools, London: Methuen.

7 Independent Schools and Charitable Status: Legal Meaning, Taxation Advantages, and Potential Removal David Palfreyman1

INTRODUCTION This chapter considers the legal history and meaning of ‘charitable status’ within English law and explores the taxation and financial advantages which it brings. It also discusses the possible removal of charitable status for independent schools. The reader is referred to the major texts on charity law.2 An independent (‘public’) school is usually a charitable trust, and very often is incorporated to give a degree of legal protection against personal liability for those individuals serving as governors; the school is a public trust providing education for the community; as such the school is an educational charity and has charitable status; it is, in US terms, ‘a not-for-profit’ organisation. That education need not be provided especially or even just partly for the poorer members of the community: the advancement of education is independent in charity law from the relief of poverty; there is no strict need for the school to have bursaries to enable poorer pupils to attend, although many schools do fund such bursaries from fee income and/or from endowment income; rich and poor can each benefit is the theory, even if in practice the poor are unable to afford the fees (just so long as they are not explicitly excluded or barred: as asserted in Halsbury (Vol. 5 (2), Reissue, 2001: para. 10), ‘An object may be charitable in the legal sense notwithstanding that it will benefit the rich as well as the poor, but it is difficult to believe that a trust would be charitable if the poor were excluded from its benefit’ See also para. 24, ‘The advancement and propagation of education and learning generally are charitable purposes, even in the absence of any element of poverty in the class of beneficiaries’). Moreover, ‘education’ has a wide meaning, including not only schools and universities or colleges, but also students’ unions, museums, art galleries, public libraries, botanical gardens and the carrying out of research.

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A LITTLE LEGAL HISTORY The definition of a charity is to be found in case-law, not in statute. That said, the Statute of Elizabeth 1601 (aka Charitable Uses Act 1601) sets out in its Preamble a list of charitable objects, as also summarised by Lord Macnaughten in the case of Income Tax Special Purposes Commissioners v. Pemsel [1891] AC 531: the relief of poverty, the advancement of religion, the advancement of education and other purposes beneficial to the community (for example, orphanages; but not sport generally or anything too political!). For the activity to gain charitable status it must be for one of these four purposes in that it must fit ‘within one or more of these four divisions’ of charity (see Halsbury, para. 13); and it must exist to provide ‘public benefit’ which needs to be for a ‘sufficient section of the community’ (Halsbury, paras 6 and 8); and it must be wholly and ‘exclusively charitable’ (Halsbury, para. 4, and hence not, say, also involving the private benefit of trustees or creating a profit/surplus for disbursing to ‘investors’). THE PRESENT MEANING OF CHARITABLE STATUS Once an institution has charitable status, having met the above three tests, it will become one of the 160,000 or so charities registered with the Charity Commission (s3, Charities Act 1993). An institution need not be registered, however, if it is an exempt charity as defined in the Charities Act 1993 and as listed in its Schedule 2 (for example, universities and Oxbridge colleges, Winchester and Eton as public schools, the national museums, the Church Commissioners, some ‘quangoes’). Such exemption from registration with the Charity Commission also provides exemption from many aspects of the Charities Act 1993, including the direct supervision or policing of, and potential investigation or control by, the Charity Commission. Exempt charities, however, are still subject to general charity law, to parts of the Charities Act 1993, and to the jurisdiction of the High Court.3 Maintained schools are also exempt charities, as established by s21 of the School Standards and Framework Act 1998. Exemption from the obligations imposed by the Charities Act 1993 and from the powers of the Charity Commissioners is given on the basis that exempt charities are already subject to other means of supervision. The continuation of such exemption is currently under review by the Performance and Innovation Unit within the Cabinet Office. For example, the National Council for Voluntary Organisations (NCVO) Report, For the Public Benefit: A Consultation Document on Charity Law Reform (2001), calls for the review of exempt charity status on the basis that ‘different,

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less stringent, regulatory rules for some [charities] reduce confidence in charity as a whole…[and that] some exempt organisations with significant charitable funds are not adhering strictly to charity law principles’. TAXATION OF EDUCATIONAL CHARITIES Among the privileges of charitable status is relief from liability for certain taxes (there is not a general exemption from taxation). These key tax benefits are: (a) Income Tax—s505(1), Income and Corporation Taxes Act 1988 (ICTA) exempts charities from income tax providing the income is used only for charitable purposes. Income covers rent from land and property, interest and dividends, and the proceeds from certain fundraising activities or the profits from a trading activity linked to the charity (for example, catering in schools and colleges). (b) Corporation Tax—s832 (1), ICTA 1988 provides exemption for charities from corporation tax as for income tax: this applies where the school is run as a charitable company rather than as a charitable trust. (c) Capital Gains Tax—s256 (1), Taxation of Chargeable Gains Act 1992 gives charities exemption from capital gains tax. (d) VAT—under Schedule 9, Group 6, Item 1 of the Value Added Tax Act 1994 educational charities have to pay VAT on ‘inputs’ (purchases made to provide their service), but they do not need to levy VAT on the ‘outputs’ (the sale of the education for school fees); similarly, under Items 4 and 5, nor on goods and services supplemental to the provision of education (for example, the sale of meals, stationery and school trips to pupils). It is this exemption from VAT on school fees that is clearly the major benefit for independent schools. (e) Stamp Duty—s129, Finance Act 1982 gives charities exemption from stamp duty. (f) Rates—s43 (5) and (6), Local Government Finance Act 1988 provides 80 per cent rating relief for charities.4 This tax benefit is, after VAT exemption, probably the next most advantageous for the average independent school which neither has a sizeable endowment nor is regularly in receipt of generous donations and legacies. (g) Donations and Legacies—donations (usually via Gift Aid) to charities are exempted from income tax (the charity will recover the income tax paid by the donor: s339 (1)-(4), ICTA 1988; and s587B, ICTA 1988), and from the capital gains tax due on a gift of shares

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to a charity (s257 (1), Taxation of Chargeable Gains Act 1992). Legacies to charities are exempted from inheritance tax due on the Estate of the deceased (s23 (1)(a), Inheritance Tax Act 1984). Some have argued that the favourable taxation treatment which arises from having charitable status should be available only to charities which ‘genuinely benefit poor people’.5 Similarly, the NCVO 2001 Report referred to above calls for the public benefit test to be firmly applied, recognising that:

The spotlight inevitably falls on the charitable status of public schools. The proposed reform will mean that the indirect public benefit of education will no longer be seen as a trump card when it comes to deciding charitable status. Other factors to be considered might include the extent of public access to educational facilities, set against educational segregation and social divisiveness.

A Fabian Society Report, A Level Playing Field: The Reform of the Private Schools (Brighouse, 2001), makes much the same point. The key issue here for independent schools would be whether the charity falls not only within the advancement of education test but also meets the first test of the Pemsel list: the relief of poverty. A Treasury review of the taxation of charities is underway (HM Treasury, Review of Charity Taxation: Consultation Document, 1999, HMSO), and the occasional kite is flown as to whether independent schools (or even Oxbridge colleges) will survive such a review with charitable status in place and hence still be the beneficiary of favourable tax treatment. See also Morris6 and Robson and Walford.7 The latter calculate the cost to the Exchequer for the annual value of the key tax exemptions bestowed on independent education at about £200m in the early 1980s, and with VAT at about £150m as the largest element. This figure of £200m is in the context of a 1997 Treasury estimate that tax reliefs for all charities amount to some £1.75 billion a year.8 ISIS argues that the independent sector, on 1991 figures, pays out more (£55m) in scholarships and bursaries than it gets in tax benefits (£41m). Morris notes, however, that there are also tax benefits arising for parents from complicated fee payment schemes (‘covenants, insurance policies and other devices’) as ‘knock-on advantages’ of schools having charitable status and the related tax reliefs, and that these indirect tax benefits ‘have received rather less attention’ and hence ‘it is impossible to establish how much taxpayers’ money is redirected to the private sector in this way’ (106–10).

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FINANCIAL ADVANTAGES OF CHARITABLE STATUS AND ITS POSSIBLE REMOVAL As a result of the taxation benefits referred to above, the financial advantage for ‘the bottom line’ of the independent school revenue account is, essentially, that the income arising on invested assets as endowment is drawn across in full while the school gets the full value of any capital gains amongst investments. The school also gets an Inland Revenue topup to any Gift Aid donations and avoids inheritance tax on any legacies added to endowment. Similarly, the school’s trading surplus is untaxed, especially if the trade is run through an arms-length trading company and then the profits donated to the charity. The other big gain is that the school pays only 20 per cent rates. Finally, the biggest advantage is not having to levy VAT at 17.5 per cent on the average school fee of, say, £6,500 per annum: a saving of some £1,400 for the parent. Thus, my £25 per month standing order to my children’s school (The Cherwell School, Oxford), as an exempt charity maintained sector school, is inflated by the school reclaiming tax at the standard rate that I have paid on the £25. Similarly, if I donate a lump-sum to the £50,000 fund it needs to bid for specialist status as a science comprehensive, the school can also reclaim tax. The same if I direct my donation instead to my old school (North Manchester High School for Boys) as it seeks special status as an ‘art college’ comprehensive. Yet, applying the debate referred to above concerning the degree of public benefit and the relief of poverty element in reviewing charitable status, is the latter school serving a deprived innercity area more eligible for charitable status than the former serving the middle-class children of prosperous North Oxford? Similarly, in terms of universities and colleges, is a legacy to New College, Oxford, where only about 25 per cent of the undergraduates are means-tested to be eligible for a government contribution in full or in part to their University of Oxford annual tuition fee of £1,075, less for the relief of poverty than the same legacy to, say, the University of East London, where perhaps some 80 per cent of the undergraduates do get such a government contribution? Can charitable status be anything other than awarded in full or not awarded at all? Can it be allocated in portions, and, if so, by what possible criteria? If a legacy to New College is only for the support of ‘poor’ students should it be entirely free of inheritance tax, yet partly taxed if made in support of academically strong students whether poor or not, and fully taxed if in support of merely the New College Choir or conservation of its antechapel fourteenth-century stained-glass? Does the Science Museum deserve charitable status more than, say, the Victoria & Albert Museum because the latter perhaps has a more

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middle-class and financially wellheeled type of visitor? The National Trust provides a clear public benefit in sustaining ‘the national heritage’, but exactly whose poverty does it relieve? Is the Royal Opera House really accessible to enough people so as to provide the appropriate level of public benefit, given its ticket prices? (And, if one responds that some of its tickets cost much the same as a good seat at Old Trafford, it needs to be noted that ‘Man U’ does not have (need?) charitable status!) Back to the direct financial advantage for independent schools of charitable status and what might the addition to ‘the bottom line’ be worth? Clearly, much will depend on the size of the independent school’s endowment (assuming, of course, it has any at all), on the school’s trading activities, on the rateable value of its premises. If private school fees are between, say, £5,000 and £12,000 per annum, and up to £15,000 per annum for boarding, what would the loss of the financial benefits of charitable status add to the annual fee? The answer seems to be between 5 and 10 per cent, according to the independent schools lobby-group (ISIS, Independent Schools Information Service; renamed ISCis, ‘Independent Schools Council information service’, from 2001). Then the next question is whether such a hike in the cost of private schooling, over and above the usual well-ahead-of-RPI annual increases, would really result in empty desks and some schools collapsing financially? Given the trouble ISIS takes to defend charitable status for the private schools, the answer seems to be that its loss would cause significant financial problems at least for some such schools. The issue of charitable status for independent schools has cropped up every decade or so for the last half-century: opponents of private education propose its removal; the proponents of private schools rally to its defence; pamphlets are printed, the opinion of eminent QCs is sought, committees and commissions meet and report, and in the end nothing is changed! Hence the Mr Fixit of the Wilson/Heath era, Lord Goodman, presided over a committee on charity law and voluntary organisations which reported in 1976,9 concluding that, while in extreme cases charitable status might not be warranted where ‘the facilities offered by an educational establishment were so expensive or in some other way so exclusive that only a tiny fraction of the community could enjoy those facilities’, the general proposition to end charitable status was ‘unacceptable’ given that ‘the private system at the present day makes a very considerable contribution in the field of education’. Hence the ISIS 1983 pamphlet (Independent Schools and Charitable Status: Why they Deserve to Retain it) duly quoted the Goodman Committee as it contemplated a possible Labour Party victory in the forthcoming general election. Similarly, the authors of another ISIS document (1987) on independent schools used the European Convention on Human

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Rights (ECHR) to defend their existence against ‘a TUC-Labour Party Liaison Committee’ call for their abolition. In 1991 that Opinion, duly updated, was again circulated by ISIS, now with a ‘Foreword by The Rt. Hon. The Lord Scarman’: this time the Opinion helpfully went on also to contend that the removal of charitable status or the imposition of VAT would ‘probably’ breach the ECHR, since it could be interpreted as a back-door route to abolish private education. In fact, the independent schools have had automatic and blanket charitable status only since the late nineteenth century, and this charitable status has brought with it the current full range of taxation privileges only during the twentieth century. The story of this evolution to the present day financially advantageous position, where, arguably, the independent schools now occupy potentially unstable and shifting ground ‘on the frontier of charitable status’ as ‘an aberration within the law of charity’ given ‘the virtual absence of altruistic or redistributive elements in the operations of independent schools’10 is well told in a variety of works.11 Martin Jones recounts the lengthy legal saga of Brighton College seeking from the Inland Revenue tax exemption for those schools seen by the latter as being businesses trading in education, a battle which culminated with the Conservative Government in 1927 (reluctantly) yielding: Brighton College v. Marriott (1924) 40 TLR 763–5, High Court, the College wins; then ditto [1925] 1 KB 312, Court of Appeal, the Inland Revenue wins; and finally ditto [1926] AC 192, House of Lords, the College loses its appeal; leading to s24 Finance Act 1927, when exemption was granted. This 1927 legislative victory completed the process: • begun in 1807 (Attorney-General v. Earl of Clarendon (1810) 17 Ves. Jun. 491: the admission of fee-paying boys at Harrow and Rugby was no bar to the schools maintaining their historic charitable status; cf. Attorney-General v. Hewer (1700) 2 Vern. 387, where it was ruled that only free schools fell within the ambit of the Statute of Elizabeth 1601); • speeded up in 1827 (Attorney-General v. Lord Lonsdale (1827) 1 Sim. 105: a school charging fees did not mean it was necessarily a business and that hence charitable status was thwarted); and then • sealed in 1882 (Goodman v. Mayor of Saltash (1882) 7 AC 633: the beneficiaries of a charity need not also be poor for there to be public benefit; cf. Jones v. Williams (1767) Amb. 652, which decided the precise opposite). Thus, as Jones comments: ‘Charity law had been turned on its head. The way was open for the old endowed grammar schools to shed their foundations for paupers and for the new Victorian public schools to

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claim the benefit of charitable status’ (and this was, of course, especially convenient and financially advantageous as the state began from the 1900s to increase its activities and hence needed to tax more heavily its citizens and companies, and so schools of the Brighton College ilk were all the more anxious by the 1920s to board the charitable status/tax exemption gravy train). Chapter 4 on The Legal Meaning of Charity’ in Francis Gladstone’s Charity Law and Social Justice and his Part Two on The Frontiers of Charity’ provide an interesting analysis. He sees the 1601 Preamble as about ensuring charitable assets were properly used in support of those who could not otherwise afford, say, schooling or hospital; and he notes how since then various organisations have gradually, and especially during the nineteenth century, slid under the charitable status hurdle. This was despite attempts (mixing metaphors!) to seal the charity frontiers: for example, W.E. Gladstone, as Chancellor of the Exchequer, sought in 1863 to enact legislation abolishing all tax exemption for all charities as ‘an undiscriminating public subsidy’ (and the ‘elite schools’ were seen as especially ‘undeserving’ given that they ‘had little or nothing to do with educating the poor’). While this attempt at radical legislation failed, it did result in the tax commissioners being more restrictive on granting exemptions unless the activities of the charity concerned included a significant element of relief for the poor. Or rather it did so until the 1891 Pemsel case (see above) brought the criteria for tax exemption into line with the wider legal definition of charity. Francis Gladstone goes on to examine whether public schools deserve ‘today’s generous tax concessions’. He cites the 1382 Charter for Winchester College as having the key object ‘free education in Latin for the sons of poor people’: fees at Winchester are currently approximately £15,000 per annum! At Westminster School, fees were expressly ruled out at the time of creation: they have since crept in (as also at Manchester Grammar, albeit at a rather lower level)! Yet ‘free’ did not always mean at no charge; in the case of ‘Free Grammar School’ it usually meant ‘free’ of church control. In most schools there have always been some fee-payers, ‘but by 1816 Harrow [for example] had only three free scholars among several hundred fee-payers’ (hence the 1810 Clarendon case referred to above). Thus, Gladstone comments: ‘School after school was allowed to abandon any remaining pretence of catering for the poor or even of providing more than a handful of free places’ (63). Indeed, the misappropriation of school endowments became a public scandal by the 1860s, leading to the Clarendon Commission and the Taunton Commission investigating such abuses and eventually to the (fairly weak) Endowed Schools Act 1869. By 1982, then, only some 6 per cent of the 6 per cent of children privately educated (that is, approximately 0.3 per cent) ‘come from the working-

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class families that make up 55 per cent of the population’ (63). Moreover, although for the vast majority of private schools endowment income is only around 5 per cent of total income, some use that charitable income to reduce fees for all parents, ‘most of whom are not poor by any means’ (64); while most utilise it to provide bursaries which reduce fees by up to 50 per cent of the, say, average of approximately £6,000 per annum. As Gladstone notes, it is unlikely that this fee reduction means significant numbers of ‘poor’ children attending such schools (if by ‘poor’ we take families living on the average UK salary at 2000 of around £20,000 per annum, for whom even £3,000 by way of school fees would represent around 20 per cent of their disposable income). He concludes that ‘the charitable status accorded to all nonprofit-making private schools is markedly regressive in its distribution of charitable resources and privileges’ (65). (There is the added complication that some independent schools now have fairly sizeable proportions of overseas pupils, whom they very actively recruit via visits abroad or local agents: do their fees subsidise the rest, or do such overseas pupils also receive a subsidy to their fees from tax-free charitable income?) Gladstone next speculates that, if independent schools generally (and there are honourable exceptions) no more pass the public benefit test of providing for the poor than does (as he puts it) the Park Lane Hilton simply by being in theory open to the poor but in practice charging for Bed & Breakfast rather more than they can afford, why do not the Inland Revenue or a Local Authority enforcing rate collection challenge the tax/rates exemption of certain schools on the basis that their charitable income is not being exclusively applied for charitable purposes because too much is being used to subsidise the fees of well-off parents. He bases his fictional legal pleadings (68–73) for London Borough of Bennville v. Hayek Foundation Trustees on what he terms the Macduff test and the Metal Box test: citing Lindley LJ in the former (R v. Macduff [1896] 2 Ch. 451, at 471, CA) commenting ‘I am quite aware that a trust may be charitable, and yet not confined to the poor; but I doubt very much whether a trust would be declared to be charitable which excluded the poor’; and referring in the latter (IR Comrs v. Educational Grants Association [1967] Ch. 993) to the ruling that, when more than 75 per cent of the income of a charity created by the Metal Box Company was used to pay the private school fees of the company’s employees, this was not income applied to charitable purposes since there was too little public benefit. Gladstone would see any such challenge, if successful, as taking us back to the true spirit of the 1601 Preamble and its concern for the ‘aged, impotent and poor’: a phrase to be read as ‘aged or impotent (sick and/or disabled, or in need of education) and, whether aged or impotent, also poor’.

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CONCLUSION Whatever may be the legal obstacles to the ending of charitable status for independent schools, and leaving aside all the politics of private education together with the complexity of distinguishing between the claims of public schools to charitable status and those made by state schools in prosperous areas or by the universities with their very variable intakes of ‘middle-class’: ‘working-class’ students (compare Oxford and Durham with, say, Luton or North London) or by not-forprofit private hospitals, the financial impact of a successful attack on the charitable status of independent schools would be a one-off 5–10 per cent increase in fees (perhaps phased in over several years if tax exemption were being progressively removed over time). Such levels of annual fee increases are not unknown in a service industry where fees have gone up at well above inflation year on year, and, however reluctantly, parents seem to cope. Indeed, in the context of the evermore lavish sporting, drama and IT facilities deemed to be ‘essential’ in independent schools (thereby everwidening the Galbraithian privateaffluence-public-squalor gap with state schools, as also, of course, found in medical care), and to the extent that the losses arising from the removal of the tax benefits could not be eventually passed on in full to parents, then perhaps the degree of educational damage would be little more than the delay in the medium-term of the development of some of these ‘essential’ facilities. That said, the financial impact of the loss of tax exemptions might be rather more difficult to deal with if it occurred during an economic recession and when over the next few years the effect of the ending of the government Assisted Places Scheme will be felt in terms of some schools being able to sustain pupil numbers. Much more damaging in financial terms to independent schools than the loss of charitable status would be the imposition of VAT on school fees. Since, however, this issue of VAT is if anything even more tangled up with other areas (university fees, private nursery provision, private health care, books and newspapers—does The Times provide less public benefit than the Sun because its readership is more prosperous?!), the imposition of VAT seems much less likely than the ending of charitable status. Yet perhaps the real concern over charitable status is not financial; it may be more that its loss would represent, as Salter and Tapper argue, a symbolic victory for the opponents of private education, since charitable status also gives political, legal and social status and hence something which lifts the independent school above a mere money-grubbing business. Its loss could be the beginning of the end for what, back in the days of Old Labour, the extreme critics of the alleged social divisiveness fostered by private education called an

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‘indefensible obscenity’ (Willie Hamilton MP, Hansard, 16/4/1981, col. 455). So, what might independent schools offer as proof that they do provide the requisite degree of wider public benefit, and particularly for the less well-off in the community? Certainly, ISIS makes much of the schools: allowing locals to share playing-fields (especially helpful after so many state schools were obliged to sell off their own during the past 20 years as government funding reduced), providing scholarships and bursaries for truly poor children (as notably in the case of Christ’s Hospital), ‘minding’ local ‘failing’ state schools, offering free intensive summer schools for gifted (but poor) state school kids…Yet Batey warns against independent schools snuggling up too closely to government (even a New Labour one, as opposed to 1980s ‘unreconstructed’ Old Labour): The absorption of the independent schools into “the system” undoubtedly puts the autonomy of the [private] sector under threat.’12 Could New Labour be just as threatening to the viability of private education, but in a much more subtle way, than the overt confrontation favoured by 1980s Old Labour? Batey’s article refers to Trojan Horses; it might also be expressed as the danger of supping with, as some would see it in this case, a ‘control-freak’ and centralising devil. Any moderately objective assessment of the case for independent schools retaining charitable status, or at least their full range of tax exemp tions, will recognise its weakness. If the case has to appeal to history, the 1601 Preamble and subsequent case-law until the early nineteenth century is not helpful to the cause: by the standards of the Preamble modern independent schools do not provide sufficient public benefit for ‘the poor’, as opposed to assisting the already better-off by the allocation of a bursary to reduce fees by at most 50 per cent. If we go further back in history, some schools will be hard-pressed to account to their founders and endowers why they now admit so few ‘poor’ children. If the case for the defence is to be based on the dire effect on the financial viability of schools, then the problem is that the 5–10 per cent fee increase resulting from the removal of the tax benefits can in all probability be passed on to the customers and also to an extent absorbed by the schools looking closely at just how ‘essential’ certain proposed expenditure really is. If there is to be reliance on the wider community benefits provided by independent schools, here the difficulty is that the evidence is patchy. If the strength of the case is in the assertion that anyway the cost of the tax exemptions is less than what the State would otherwise need to spend on providing school-places for the 6 or 7 per cent of children now in private education, the awkwardness is that this is not a line of argument relevant to the arcane character of charity law and the historical vagaries of charitable status but more a simple matter of the political horse-trading appropriate when any

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industry seeks a taxpayer subsidy, whether it be farming, car-making, coal-mining, the railways or armaments. Thus, a debate which centres on charitable status as a purely legal issue and thereby confines to the courts the question of tax exemptions arising as the concrete benefits of having such status serves the independent schools well, for it disguises the raw politics of resource allocation and of clearly identifying just who subsidises whom within society. (Here the analogy must be with the massive subsidy provided to the middle-classes in the form of state-dictated low tuition fees in UK higher education and the related low-interest student loans, as explored in Barr13 and, as with charitable status, also currently ‘under review’.) Perhaps, however, the quality of the argument matters not: there will be no change at the end of yet another review because the decision is to be reached not on the basis of fine points of law, nor is it likely to be a case of careful evidence-based policy formulation; it is more likely to be a fudge and all to do with the sheer complexity of disentangling independent schools from other entities which with varying degrees of justification also possess charitable status and enjoy tax exemption benefits: as Tapper (1997:62) comments, it is ‘the messy business of drawing boundaries across difficult terrain’. Moreover, tax reliefs for the independent education sector at perhaps £100m a year (excluding the VAT benefit) are not significant in Treasury terms. The prediction, therefore, is that inertia will prevail, as it has for decade after decade, review after review, and especially since the lobbygroup ‘Friends of Independent Schools’ will articulate middle-class vested interests to a listening New Labour and especially now that New Labour has anyway been purged of such radicals as Willie Hamilton’ NOTES 1. New College, Oxford, OX1 3BN, UK; www.newox.ac.uk/oxcheps. I declare an interest as follows: Bursar (and a Fellow/quasi-Trustee) of New College as an exempt charity; Trustee of the New College Development Fund as a registered charity; Trustee (and Chair of the Endowment Committee) of the Bedford Charity (Harpur Trust) as a registered charity. 2. Halsbury’s Laws of England, Vol. 5(2) on Charities, 4th edition (Reissue) 2001, London: Butterworths; P.Luxton (2001) The Law of Charities, 2001, Oxford: OUP; H.Picarda (1999) The Law and Practice Relating to Charities, London: Butterworths; and J.Warburton (1998) Tudor on Charities, 8th edition, London: Sweet & Maxwell. See also: Chapters 17 and 18 of R.Boyd (1998) Independent Schools: Law, Custom and Practice, Bristol: Jordans. 3. See J.Hill and E.Hackett (1992/93) Exempt Charities 1 CL & PR 209. 4. In the case of New College Choir School, for example, the saving on rates payable to Oxford City Council is around £15,000 per annum (in the

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5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11.

12.

13.

context of a turn-over of around £600,000); for New College itself the figures are £55,000 (£6m); and for the Harpur Trust running five schools in Bedford the annual benefit of rates relief is around £450,000 (in a turn-over of some £30m). M.Chesterman (1999) ‘Foundations of Charity in the New Welfare State’, Modern Law Review, 62, pp.333–7. Debra Morris (1996) Schools: An Education in Charity Law, Dartmouth Publishing. M.H.Robson and G.Walford (1989) ‘Independent Schools and Tax Policy under Mrs Thatcher’, in Journal of Education Policy, 4, 2, pp. 149–62. HM Treasury, news release, ‘Charity Taxation Reviewed’, 2 July 1997. Charity Law and Voluntary Organisations: Report of the Goodman Committee (1976), London: Bedford Square Press. Michael Chesterman (1979) Charities, Trusts and Social Welfare, London: Weidenfeld & Nicholson, pp.337–8. For example: Chesterman, Charities, Trusts and Social Welfare; Francis Gladstone (1982) Charity Law and Social Justice, London: Bedford Square Press/NCVO; Martin Jones (1983) ‘Brighton College v. Marriott: Schools, Charity Law and Taxation’, in History of Education, 12, 2, p. 121; and Brian Salter and Ted Tapper (1985) Power and Policy in Education: The Case of Independent Schools, Lewes: Falmer Press. See also G. Moffat, ‘Independent Schools, Charity and Government’, in Alan Ware (1989) Charities and Government, Manchester: Manchester University Press; and Ted Tapper (1997) Fee-Paying Schools and Educational Change, London: Woburn Press. Elizabeth Batey (2001) The Labour Government and the Private Sector of Education’, in Education and the Law, 13, 3, p.199; see also her related articles: (1996) The Assisted Places Scheme: Crossing the Public/Private Divide’, Education and the Law, 8, 3, p. 191 and (1998) ‘The Merging of the Sectors: R v. Cobham Hall School ex parte S’ , Education and the Law, 10, 4, p.237. Nicholas Barr (2001) The Welfare State as Piggy Bank: Information, Risk, Uncertainty, and the Role of the State, Oxford: OUP.

REFERENCES Brighouse, T. (2001) A Level Playing Field: The Reform of the Private Schools, London: Fabian Soiciety. H.M. Treasury (1999) Review of Charity Taxation: Consultation Document, London: HM Treasury). Independent Schools Information Service (1983) Independent Schools and Charitable Status: Why they Deserve to Retain it, London: Independent Schools Informaiton Service. Lester, A. and Pannick, D (1987) Independent Schools: The Legal Case. A Joint Opinion, London: Independent Schools Information Service. National Council for Voluntary Organisations (2001) For the Public Benefit: A Consultation Document on Charity Law Reform, London: NCVO.

8 Muslim Schools in Britain Geoffrey Walford

INTRODUCTION—IMMIGRATION AND EDUCATION POLICIES England is a land of immigrants. From the invasions of the Romans, Danes and Normans, through to modern-day refugees from Bosnia, Eastern Europe and Afghanistan, England has received a wide diversity of political and economic immigrants. But most educational discussion of immigration forgets this long history and is usually concerned with the black and Asian ethnic minorities who first came to England following the Second World War. The 1950s and 1960s were a time of economic boom coupled with severe labour shortages, such that many employers actively encouraged workers from the so-called New Commonwealth to come to England to fill low-paid jobs. London Transport, for example, advertised in Jamaica and the Caribbean for staff for the London Underground and busses and provided a recruiting office in Kingston itself to speed their passage. A little later, many more immigrants came from Pakistan and India again destined to take lowpaid jobs not wanted by others. Originally those from the New Commonwealth came on British passports, but the Commonwealth Immigration Act of 1962 began a process of limiting the inflow— especially of black immigrants. These policies were racially explicit as there was growing fear of being ‘overrun’ by people of other ‘races’— England has remained open to all (white) Irish immigrants throughout the twentiethth century. There are now tight controls which limit the entry of those from India, Pakistan and the Caribbean but borders are completely open to those from the European Union. During the 1950s and early 1960s, the usual pattern was that men from the New Commonwealth initially came alone with the intention of returning to their country of origin once sufficient money had been accumulated. While some did return, many others stayed and gradually brought over wives and other dependents. During the 1960s children of these immigrants first had a significant impact on schools.

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Government policy at this stage was broadly assimilationist. This is usually taken to mean cultural assimilation rather than physical assimilation, such that blacks should not be seen by themselves or others as a discrete group other than in terms of skin colour (Troyna and Williams, 1986). Schools were thus seen as having the principle goal of transmitting the dominant culture and socialising black children into that culture. The potentially disruptive effects of having culturally and linguistically different children in schools were to be minimised by trying to eradicate both. Different cultures were assumed to be deprived cultures that needed to be compensated for by additional English language teaching and other special measures. One of the most important ‘special measures’ of the mid-1960s was the acceptance of bussing of black children from areas of particular concentration such that black immigrant children were always in a minority in any one school. The pattern of immigration was such that immigrant groups tended to cluster in particular areas of England’s large cities. It was argued by government that, for assimilation to take place, it was necessary for black children to be bussed such that they were always in a school that was dominated by the white mainstream culture and the English language. This was intended to help these children loose the ‘disadvantages’ of their own language and culture, but also to placate those white parents and teachers who feared the effects of large numbers of black children in any one school. Troyna and Williams (1986) have argued that this policy of dispersal was neither a legitimate nor logical response to perceived educational needs, but was a surrender to racism for it attempted to overrule the rights, identity and culture of a minority within what was a multicultural society. In practice, bussing did not last long and was not widespread. By the end of the 1960s and beginning of the 1970s there was no longer a general acceptance of the idea of assimilation, and policy gradually moved towards integration and then multiculturalism. The 1970s have been caricatured as the era of ‘saris, samosas and steel bands’ as teachers sought to find elements of the various immigrants’ cultures that could be valorised within a dominant white culture. One particularly important aspect of multiculturalism was the changes made to religious education, such that Christianity (while still dominant) became only one of several religions about which children were given information. Islam, Sikhism, Hinduism and Buddhism were frequently added to the curriculum—so much so that right-wing apologists decried the ‘multicultural mish-mash’ that they claimed resulted. Multi-faith teaching was partly reversed through the 1988 Education Reform Act that gave a special place to Christianity within religious education and acts of worship in schools, but children are still expected to have knowledge of at least one other faith in most religious education examinations.

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During the 1980s and 1990s there were also many who called for a move beyond multiculturalism to anti-racist teaching in schools. Troyna (1993), for example, strongly believed that it was insufficient for children to simply know about other faiths and cultures and advocated that schools should explicitly teach anti-racism in an attempt to reduce the disadvantage that many black and Asian children experience in schools. Such policies have only been partially implemented, and it is undoubtedly true that perceptions of racism within existing statemaintained schools are one of the reasons why some Muslim parents have opened their own private schools. EDUCATION SYSTEM AND OPTIONS FOR MUSLIMS There is no such thing as a British state educational system. Scotland has an educational system that differs in many ways from that of England and Wales. In the context of Muslim schooling, however, it is reasonable to just discuss England and Wales as the vast majority of children of Muslim parents are to be found within English and Welsh schools. Within England and Wales in 2000 about 20 per cent of pupils were educated within religiously based state-maintained schools. This is the result of a long history of schooling being provided by the churches centuries before the state became involved in what it originally considered to be a ‘private matter’. It was as late as 1870 before the state started to provide ‘additional’ schools to ‘fill the gaps’ in church provision. By 2000 there were still almost 7,000 state-maintained schools with an explicit religious affiliation; there being some 4,800 Church of England, 2,140 Roman Catholic, 55 Methodist (some in association with the Church of England) and 23 Jewish schools. What is very evident from this list is that it reflects the predominant religious affiliations of the population of 1944 rather than that of the far more religiously and ethnically diverse population at the turn of the millennium. The pattern of religious schools available within the statemaintained sector takes little account of the increased religious diversity within England that resulted from immigration (and subsequent births to second and third generations) since that time of families from such countries as India, Pakistan, Kenya and the Caribbean. While there are obviously no direct linkages between the country of origin, ethnicity and religious adherence, many of the immigrants from Pakistan and Bangladesh were Muslims, while many from the Punjab were Sikhs and most from the rest of India were Hindu. However, the situation is complex, with Muslims in Britain having significant numbers from eight different countries of origin—Pakistan, Bangladesh, India, Kenya,

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Malaysia, Egypt, Libya and Morocco—as well as many from the various countries of the Middle East (Parker-Jenkins, 1995). There is now a range of Muslim communities based not only on country of origin, but also on the various groups within Islam. People from each of these groups tended to settle in particular urban areas within such cities as Birmingham, Blackburn, Bradford, Coventry, Dewsbury, Leicester, London and Manchester. Such a pattern of local concentration is of obvious benefit in their desire to maintain and practice their religion and build Mosques. It also allowed the development of specialist shops and services designed to meet the social and cultural needs of particular ethnic groups. It is estimated that by the mid-1990s there were about 1 million Muslims in England, with about 75 per cent having origins in the Indian subcontinent (Peach and Glebe, 1995), and about 400,000 children of Muslim parents of school age in England (Sarwar, 1994). While many of these children’s parents are content for them to attend local education authority (LEA) or voluntary schools, others would wish them to be in specifically Muslim schools. It is important to recognise this diversity within those who follow Islam. There is no single Muslim voice on issues of schooling, and some groups (for example, Ismaili Muslims) are strongly opposed to separate Muslim schools. Most of the original immigrants to England were financially and educationally poor and were content to send their children to secular LEA schools or to the existing Christian voluntary schools. In practice, parents did both according to the pattern of locally available provision, and the vast majority of Muslim children still currently attend LEA or Church of England schools. It might seem particularly anomalous that these children attend Church of England schools, but the Anglicans have long seen their task as one of serving the inhabitants of the entire local parish (Chadwick, 1997). Being the Established Church, the Church of England has provided certain services for atheists as well as believers of various religions, so that it is now possible to find Church of England schools that have a majority of Muslim children in attendance. In the early 1990s it was estimated that there were about 60 schools with a Muslim intake of 90–100 per cent and over 200 with over 75 per cent (Parker-Jenkins, 1995:86). Where this has occurred, these schools typically have made significant adaptions to meet many of the particular cultural and religious needs of these children. In contrast, the Roman Catholic Church has usually seen its mission in schooling as being that of providing a Catholic education for Catholic children. While significant numbers of non-Catholic children do attend such schools, fewer concessions are usually made to their lack of faith or alternative faith.

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As the various ethnic minorities became increasingly financially wellestablished, and as second and third generation children entered school during the 1980s and 1990s, it became more possible for Muslim parents to consider establishing their own private faith-based schools. There has been considerable debate about the desirability of separate Muslim schools (see, for example, Halstead, 1986a and b; Hiskett, 1989; McLaughlin, 1992) but this option has been increasingly taken up. During the late 1980s and 1990s Muslim, Sikh and Seventh Day Adventists established their own schools in what has come to be known as the ‘reluctant private sector’ (Walford, 1991). By 2002 there were more than 50 fulltime private Muslim schools, several of which would ideally wish to become state funded. The growth of private Muslim schools was not only linked to a rising ability of parents to pay for such schools (indeed, many existing schools still survive on very low fees and serve poor families), but also a growing dissatisfaction with the state-maintained schools that their children attended. This dissatisfaction had several causes. One aspect was that some parents felt that their children were not achieving academically as well as they might. The inner-city schools that many Muslim children attended did badly on test scores. Here some Muslim parents might have initially drawn on their own experience of schooling in British schools, but as these scores became more publicly available during the 1990s, parents became more concerned that these schools might be failing their children. They were also concerned that the standards of discipline and respect for adults found in these schools was often lower than they wished. But the main reasons for the growth in these schools was related directly to religious beliefs. As Muslims became more established and developed a variety of distinct Muslim communities, they became more religious in their outlook. There has been a growth in religious observance and Lewis (1994) describes the Islamic disposition of South East Asian British Muslims as ‘a communal consciousness that is far more religious than secular’. As Mustafa (2001) points out, a significant majority of British Muslims attach special importance to their faith. A Policy Studies Institute survey showed that 73 per cent of Pakistanis and 76 per cent of Bangladeshis consider Islam to be important in the way they live their lives in Britain (Modood et al, 1997:308). As they became more religious, their concerns about both the structure and content of the statemaintained system grew. Concern about the content of the curriculum focus mainly on religious education and sex education. In England and Wales all statemaintained schools are required to teach religious education. During the 1970s and 1980s many schools adopted a multi-faith approach that involved a very general description of the nature and practice of a wide

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range of religions. The religions were treated as interesting aspects of the activities of various groups and as a result, it was argued, none of the religious was taken seriously. Many Muslims (and many Christians) saw this as a ‘multi-cultural mish-mash’ which denied the validity of all religions. While most Muslim parents wanted Islam to be given a special place in the teaching provided for their children, others went further than this and wished the entire curriculum to be embedded within an Islamic understanding of the world. While some were content to have a modified curriculum in areas such as art and music (such that children did not make any representations of human beings, or be involved in music or dance), others wished all subjects to reflect an Islamic understanding. Sex education and aspects of sexuality are also areas of concern as, it is argued, the values that lie behind much of the teaching in these areas are anti-Islamic (Halstead, 1997). All schools are required to teach sex education and to follow a syllabus that is the responsibility of the board of governors. In many schools it is taught in a way that emphasises individual choice and responsibility, and recognises that many young people will have sexual relationships outside marriage. It covers such areas as contraception, abortion and extra-marital relationships that are seen by many Muslims as inappropriate to discuss with young people. Homosexual relationships and behaviour are also often treated as an individual matter of preference. While parents are able to withdraw their children from sex education lessons if they wish, this does not prevent their children’s peers telling them what may be a distorted version of what the lessons contained. Concerns about the structure of state schooling have both withinschool and within-LEA aspects. Within schools, some Muslims see the need for special arrangements to be made for regular prayers, for special food, for the acceptance of particular clothing and for an early finish to Friday school. Many LEA schools do, in fact, take account of most of these needs. However, the main problem perceived within LEAs relates to a cultural preference rather than a strictly religious one—many parents do not want co-educational schools for their post-puberty girls. A survey (Modood et al., 1997:323) found that 59 per cent of Pakistani respondents and 46 per cent of Bangladeshis preferred single-sex schools for their daughters, yet many LEAs have gradually closed their singlesex schools or refused to re-designate schools to meet the demand. In Britain much of the demand for separate Muslim schools is linked to a desire for singlesex education. THE NATURE OF MUSLIM SCHOOLS The private Muslim schools in England exhibit a great diversity. It is estimated that the private Muslim schools provide for a total of about 7,

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000 children—about 2 per cent of Muslim children in England. They range from one expensive London-based school with nearly 2,000 pupils, which is predominantly attended by children of diplomats, industrialists and professionals from the Far East to small one-room schools for five or more children based in domestic houses. Indeed, estimates of the number of private Muslim schools vary as many are simply parents schooling several children together in their own homes. When the number of children reaches five (not all from the same family), it officially becomes a school. The total number of private Muslim schools can thus change markedly from year to year. While the range in size is thus from five pupils to nearly 2,000, the average is about 120. Separate schooling for boys and girls is an important feature of British Muslim schools, especially for children beyond puberty. Thus there are more schools serving secondary age children than primary and there are no co-educational secondary schools. There are about 22 girls’ secondary schools (three with some boarding provision) and 16 boys’ secondary schools. The majority of these boys’ schools are boarding schools which are linked to seminaries whose purpose is to train future religious leaders (Runnymede Trust, 1997:47). Apart from the very small home-based schools, there are only about 12 schools that serve primary age children only (most being co-educational) and the remaining schools serve both primary and secondary children, some being co-educational at primary and for girls only at secondary. Technically, it has always been possible for Local Education Authorities to support various religiously based schools through voluntary aided status. Although the 1944 Education Act was designed to protect the interests of the various Christian denominations, the legislation was such that other religious groups could also benefit. Support for some Jewish schools has been longstanding. During the 1980s and 1990s several existing Muslim private schools applied to their LEAs to become voluntary aided, but all such requests were turned down. I have written elsewhere about the political campaign which led to a change in legislation such that it became easier for existing private religious schools to enter the state-maintained sector and become fully funded (Walford, 2000a and b). The 1993 Education Act gave the chance for such schools to apply to the Department for Education to become a new type of grant-maintained school. In practice, very few schools were allowed to take this route and it was only on a change of government from Conservative to Labour in 1997 that the first decision was made to allow any religious minority schools to become statemaintained. The new Labour government made positive decisions on two Muslim primary schools and one Seventh Day Adventist secondary school. Since then the School Standards and Framework Act of 1998

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has changed the framework under which schools operate and abolished grant-maintained schools. However, it is still possible for private religious minority schools to enter the state-maintained sector as voluntary schools and one Sikh and one Greek Orthodox school have since made this transition. A further Muslim secondary school converted in September 2001, and another has been given permission to do so. The Labour government elected in 2001 used its election manifesto to argue for an increase in schools supported by all faiths (Labour Party, 2001:19). It was stated above that there is great diversity in the nature of private Muslim schools. While some simply wish to be ‘good’ schools that have a clear Islamic foundation, others have more specific tasks in mind. The secondary boys’ boarding schools that are linked to seminaries, for example, have the primary purpose of training future religious leaders. While the first group of schools would ideally wish to have state funding and be prepared to accept most of the national curriculum, the second group would not see the associated control that comes with funding as desirable (Walford, 2001). Partly as a result of their lack of desire for funding, and perhaps partly as a result of possible mutual suspicions, this second type of school is much less open to researchers than the first. We thus know far more about the Muslim schools that wish to, or have, become state-funded than we do about those that have no such desire. One such school I visited is Al-Furqan school in Birmingham that became grant-maintained in September 1998. At the time I visited in 1999 it was still in its former buildings and was clearly much as it had been as a private school. It can thus be seen as an example of those private schools that are most similar to LEA schools. This Muslim primary school started in 1989 as a drop-in centre for families who were home-schooling their girls rather than sending them to non-Muslim schools. It was originally a self-help organisation for parents, several of whom had been teachers in state-maintained schools. The group quickly developed, and started to run a small primary school in 1992. For the first year, this school took girls only as it had been girls who had been most frequently home-schooled. However, parental demand was such that, in the second year of its existence, the school was persuaded to take boys as well as girls. Parents believed that their sons should also be able to benefit from what they perceived to be a high level of general schooling as well as the Islamic ethos of the school. The drop-in centre continued, catering mainly for home-schooled senior girls. Al-Furqan is situated in a poor neighbourhood of Birmingham and it serves a largely poor clientele. In 1998, the fees were nominally set at £1, 050 per year, but this was hardly ever actually paid. The Muslim community paid the difference to ensure that the school survived. Fairly quickly, the school established a charitable trust to ensure its continued

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existence, and it looked for ways by which it could be financially supported. Initial discussion with the local education authority made it clear that voluntary aided status would not be possible for many years but, by that time, the new legislation on sponsored grant-maintained schools was imminent. In 1995 a meeting of parents and teachers decided that it wished the school to apply to become state-maintained. When I visited the school in 1999 there were seven classes. The reception class included some of the Year 1s, the second class had the remainder of the Year 1s and all of the Year 2s, and the other five classes were double-age, single-sex groups. There were less than 100 children in all, who spent their time largely in small crowded rooms with poor furniture and facilities. The boys were dressed in a similar way to other ‘uniform schools’ with black trousers and socks, white shirt and either a red or blue pullover (with school logo) according to age. The girls, on the other hand wore a black pinafore with trousers, white shirt and socks, with a red or blue pullover and hijab according to age. The staffing of the school at this time is indicative of a wider problem that the schools face—there were seven full-time teachers four of whom were Christian and only three Muslim. There were also three classroom assistants and the headteacher who were Muslim. The school recognises that there are still few trained Muslim teachers who wish to work in private Muslim schools and they thus recruit teachers who they feel are good at their job and are prepared to recognise the religious character of the school. These female Christian teachers all wore headscarves while at the school. While Britain still has a low number of trained Muslim teachers, an additional reason for the difficulty in recruitment is that most of these private schools pay less than the national pay scales. The curriculum of the school was based on the national curriculum with the addition of Koranic Arabic Language. Most of the children did not speak Arabic at home, so had to be taught it if they are to be able to read the Koran. This was taught by a separate teacher as, I was told, most second generation Muslims in Britain are self-taught in Arabic and have very bad pronunciation. The school aimed to teach the standard Saudi Arabian pronunciation. Most of this teaching appeared to be aimed at learning and reciting sutras from the Koran, and the children were involved in this for about a half hour per day. The curriculum was also modified in several other smaller ways. In English, for example, several books had words cut out or deleted with a felt-tip pen because the content was not deemed appropriate. This included references to ‘magic’ in the Oxford Reading Tree and to such things as drugs and sex in a document on ‘being healthy’. (It is worth noting that some evangelical Christian schools that I studied earlier had similar concerns (Walford, 2000b).) In music stringed and blowing instruments are not allowed, and even drums are somewhat suspect. PE

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is done in a limited way with the children fully clothed throughout. Art often focuses on patterns and the children should not draw images of living things. I saw one startling example of this in the Year 1 and 2 class which had a row of named drawings of the children drawn by themselves stuck to the windows. When I asked about them, it was pointed out to me that each drawing was of a person with a red scarf round its neck. The scarf indicated that the head and the body were not actually attached—these were thus children’s drawings of themselves dead! But the majority of the time spent in the school would have been familiar to many British children. The formality of the classroom, the literacy hour, the arithmetical examples to plough through, the chatting to friends, mark-grubbing with teachers, the waiting for teachers to sort out problems, and being told off and shouted at if they did anything wrong—all were present here as in many schools. What might be a little more unusual here was the number of children who took a taxi home at the end of the school day. It was not that they came from affluent families, but simply that so many of the fathers were taxi-drivers or had Muslim friends who were taxi-drivers and the school drew its intake from the whole city. The process of applying for grant-maintained status was far from straightforward. The school needed a larger site to expand to 210 pupils. It negotiated with the Funding Agency for Schools, the local planning authority, their own architects and those of the Department for Education and Employment, and was eventually able to publish proposals in late 1996. An important aspect to the application was that the Trust was prepared to pay 50 per cent of the costs of the new buildings and renova tions. Although the legislation allowed sponsors to provide as little as 15 per cent of the capital costs, it had become clear by that stage that the higher the percentage of the capital costs the sponsors could provide, the greater was the likelihood that the proposal would be successful (Walford, 1997); 50 per cent offered good ‘value for money’. It was January 1997, following the statutory objection period when only minor objections were lodged, before the case could start to be considered by the Secretary of State for Education and Employment. With a general election on its way in May, he made no quick decisions, and it was left to the new Labour government to announce in January 1998 that it would support the application. The school was jubilant, as was Islamia School in Brent which had its acceptance into the statemaintained system announced on the same day. But Al-Furqan’s problems were not quite over, for they found that another round of further negotiations over the site and buildings was still required. Although the school became grant-maintained in September 1998, it had

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to remain in its existing building for two years before a new building opened. The case of Islamia School in Brent, north-west London, is wellknown and well-documented (see for example, Dwyer and Meyer, 1995), in part, perhaps, because of the close involvement in the school of Yusuf Islam who was formerly the pop singer Cat Stevens and is now Chairman of the Association of Muslim Schools. But the case is also well-known because it became a legal test case. Islamia was established in 1982 under a private foundation, the Islamia Schools Trust, and has tried many times to obtain state funding through Voluntary Aided Status. The first application was made in 1986 and, after eventually being accepted by the LEA, was rejected by the Secretary of State for Education. The basis for rejection at this point was that the school was too small to be viable. A change of politics to Labour in Brent led to a lack of support for the school on appeal, and the application was again formally rejected in 1990. This time, the reason for rejection was that there were surplus places in other local schools. The school applied for a judicial review and in 1992 the High Court ruled that there was ‘manifest unfairness’ in the decision (Dwyer and Meyer, 1995:45). The decision was thus referred back to the Secretary of State, but in August 1993 the application was once again refused on the basis of surplus places. This was a particularly strange decision since the 1993 Education Act which encouraged ‘choice and diversity’ had become law in July, and it had been stated that ‘denominational need’ would be taken into account in making decisions about sponsored grantmaintained schools. The next step was to try to take advantage of this 1993 legislation, and full proposals for a grant-maintained primary school were published in January 1997. Following the 1997 May general election, the Labour government made a rapid decision to start funding Islamia from April 1998. The third Muslim school to be considered here is Feversham College in Bradford. This is a school for Muslim girls aged 11–18 years, and is an example of a private school designed for parents who wish their girls to be educated separately from boys. The college started with 26 girls in September 1984. The founding body was the Muslim Association of Bradford, and the school was formerly known as the Bradford Muslim Girls Community School. The school outgrew its original cramped premises, and expanded by leasing a redundant Victorian school building on Feversham Street near the city centre. The school operated on a split site for a year then completed the move to the Feversham site in 1995. In 2000 it had just over 200 girls and a two-form intake of 60 girls in years 9, 10 and 11. From September 2000 it also took 30 girls in years 7 and 8. At the time I visited it offered 10 GCSE subjects, 4 A-level subjects and a GNVQ

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course. The subjects offered at A-level in 2000 were, however, highly limited—English literature, religious studies, sociology and Urdu. At GCSE level, in 2000, the subjects offered were: English, mathematics, science, art and design, design and technology, religious studies, Islamic studies, Urdu, Arabic and history, with additional non-examination courses in physical education and personal social education. Religious observation is also an integral part of the timetable and each day time is given for reading the Koran, studying Hadith and learning the Shariah. The college prospectus emphasised that the school ‘aims to provide a caring environment that is secure, stable, consistent and fair’. It ‘gives the highest priority to discipline in both moral and general behaviour’, which the college hoped will ‘help our students to enhance their selfesteem, build their confidence, and motivate them to pursue excellence in all their endeavours’. The school had a compulsory uniform that included the shalwar-kameez, jilbab, and head-covering. Flat shoes were to be worn with no make-up or jewellery allowed. The aim was for a ‘simple and modest’ form of dress. The school has a very good relationship with the Local Education Authority such that, when I visited in late 2000, an ex-deputy (nonMuslim) headteacher was being paid by the LEA (through a special grant) to act as an advisor during the transition to state-maintained status. She was actually acting as the headteacher while the real head was away on maternity leave. The LEA has given some limited support to the school throughout its existence. At first this was simply because, before the school opened, there had been some 400 girls in Bradford not going to school at all as there was no single-sex provision. Parents were illegally keeping these girls at home (or sending them to Pakistan) rather than using co-educational secondary schools. Support from the LEA was initially not of a Muslim school as such, but of a school which offered some schooling to girls who would otherwise have had none. Of course, with such a large Muslim community in Bradford, it is also true that any local politician would be wise to consider offering some support to the school. The LEA also gave direct support to the school once it moved to the Feversham site as this was rented by the school from the LEA at a peppercorn rent. There are also links with the LEA-controlled Bradford College that some students eventually go on to. Some of the girls at the school were actually registered at Bradford College while at the school and taught in the school. Bradford College had also given furniture and equipment to the school. Such support helped keep the fees low, but the major contribution here came from the teachers who were on salaries far lower than those available in the state sector. One result of this was that the school had several newly qualified teachers who were prepared to accept low salaries, but was lacking in more experienced teachers. Even so, while the school fee in June 2000 was only £930 per year, this

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was a considerable sum for many of the poor families that the school served. The desire for state support was thus longstanding, and it hoped that the range of teaching staff would improve as a result. With the support of Bradford Local Education Authority the school applied for Voluntary Aided Status and this was eventually granted as part of a wide-ranging reorganisation of schooling in Bradford. The whole LEA moved in 2000 from a scheme with primary, middle and high schools to the more usual English system of just primary and secondary schools with a break at age 11. Feversham School expanded to a full secondary school taking girls from age 11. In many ways the old system had suited this Muslim school well, as parents were generally prepared for their girls to mix with boys until they are mature and were thus ready to use the middle schools in most cases to cut down on the expense of private schooling. At the time I visited there were obvious problems relating to the school’s ability to cover the National Curriculum. The interpretation of Islam that is followed by the school prohibits the use of any musical instruments apart from the voice and drums—a feature that also make aerobics difficult. The racist way in which the National Curriculum favours European languages means that the children’s Urdu is down graded. To become voluntary aided the school has to offer a modern European language as the first choice of second language and then have Urdu as another choice. While it is not technically necessary within the National Curriculum, the school’s interpretation of Islam which prohibits any representations of people or animals does make art teaching limited. In addition to Arabic, which at that point was taught by a non-trained teacher, students also had Islamic Studies for three periods each week and religious education where they studied one Christian Gospel in addition to Islamic texts. Of course, there is nothing odd about Muslims reading the Gospels as Islam accepts most of the Christian story and teaching. Again, some of the teachers were nonMuslims as no Muslim teachers could be found to teach particular subjects. As with all schools, parents chose this school for a variety of reasons. Some girls were refugees from the state system—having either actually been failed by the system or because they were being bullied. No doubt some of these problems were racist in nature. Other girls had been playing truant from their state sector schools and parents had moved them to this school because they thought they needed more control. As a result, my impression was that some of the parents (and some of the girls) did not so much want a Muslim education, as such, but chose the school to discipline their girls and to ensure that they were separated from boys. Some parents and girls, for example, wanted the uniform changed so that they did not have to wear the shalwar-kameez and hijab.

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Conclusion The vast majority of Muslim children attend schools that are fully funded by the state and are provided by local education authorities, the Church of England or the Roman Catholic Church. Within this range of schools there is a wide diversity of accommodation to the needs of Muslim students. Where there are many Muslim students, schools often take account of the need for halal food, offer prayer times and a prayer room, allow the wearing of particular clothing, and take account of prohibitions on certain aspects of art, music, physical education and sex education. As with followers of any other religion, Muslim parents vary in their orthodoxy and in the centrality of their faith in their lives. While some desire no special treatment for their children in schools, it would appear that most are satisfied if schools are prepared to make some degree of accommodation to the needs of their faith (Parker-Jenkins, 1991). Others are not. For a variety of reasons, some of which may be related to the failure of some schools to effectively challenge racism (Troyna and Carrington, 1987), a small proportion of parents have become so disillusioned with state schooling that they have started their own private Muslim schools and been prepared to pay fees to ensure that their children receive the Islamic education that they desire. While there will still be variation between the parents who use these private schools, it is inevitable that they will tend to be more orthodox or fundamentalist in their views of the faith than those who remain using the state sector (Osler and Hussain, 1995). This obvious tendency towards orthodoxy is the main reason why there has been criticism of such schools. Separate secondary schools for girls has been a particular issue as such schools have been seen by some feminists as a way by which male dominance over women can be reproduced (see Haw, 1994, 1998). Such schools are seen as trying to inculcate a deeply conformist and repressive idea of the role of women. While it is recognised that girls may resist as well as accept such ideas, it is argued that they would have a better chance of breaking away from this repression if they attended a co-educational non-Muslim school (Basit, 1996, 1997a and b). Similar arguments have been made about the possible detrimental effects on gay teenagers of schools which teach that homosexual practice is an ‘abomination’ (Halstead and Lewicka, 1998). But the further significant issue is that, in England, the Muslim minority is largely an ethnic minority as well. These separate Muslim schools reduce ethnic mixing of children. The recent riots between Asian and white English youth in Bradford (June 2001) and other northern English cities emphasise the need for greater knowledge and

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understanding between the ethnic groups if we are to have a stable society. When weighed in the balance, probably the best solution is for all statemaintained schools to take account of the religious needs of all of their students, so that all can attend the same schools. Failing that, bringing some existing private Muslim schools into the state sector does at least ensure that all students follow the bulk of the National Curriculum and that issues of equity and equality of opportunity are brought to the fore. However, many of the existing Muslim private schools do not wish to enter the maintained sector because they value the independence to teach what they wish that private status brings. Very little is generally known about such schools, and this is certainly one of the areas where there is a clear ‘need for further research’. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS The research reported here was made possible by a grant from the Spencer Foundation for which I am most grateful. The data presented, the statements made, and the views expressed are solely the responsibility of the author. REFERENCES Basit, T.N. (1996) ‘“I’d Hate to be a Housewife”: Career Aspirations of British Muslim Girls’, British Journal of Guidance and Counselling, 24, 2,pp.27–242. Basit, T.N. (1997a) “‘I Want More Freedom, But not too Much”: British Muslim Girls and the Dynamism of Family Life’, Gender and Education, 9, 4,pp.425– 39. Basit, T.N. (1997b) Eastern Values; Western Milieu: Identities and Aspirations of Adolescent British Muslim Girls, Aldershot: Ashgate. Chadwick, P. (1997) Shifting Alliances: Church and State in English Education, London: Cassell. Dwyer, C. and Meyer, A. (1995) ‘The Institutionalisation of Islam in The Netherlands and in the UK: The Case of Islamic Schools’, New Community, 21, 1, pp.37–54. Halstead, J.M. (1986a) ‘To What Extent is the Call for Separate Muslim Voluntary Aided Schools in the UK Justifiable? Part One: Why the Call for Separate Muslim Voluntary Schools Must be Taken Seriously’, Muslim Education Quarterly, 3, 2, pp.5–26. Halstead, J.M. (1986b) ‘To What Extent is the Call for Separate Muslim Voluntary Aided Schools in the UK Justifiable? Part Two: Underlying Issues in the Justification of Separate Muslim Voluntary Schools’, Muslim Education Quarterly, 3, 3, pp.3–40. Halstead, J.M. (1997) ‘Muslims and Sex Education’, Journal of Moral Education, 26, 3, pp.317–30.

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Halstead, J.M. and Lewicka, K. (1998) ‘Should Homosexuality be Taught as an Acceptable Lifestyle? A Muslim Perspective’, Cambridge Journal of Education, 28, 1, pp.49–64. Haw, K.F. (1994) ‘Muslim Girls’ Schools—a Conflict of Interest?’, Gender and Education, 6, 1, pp.63–76. Haw, K. (1998) Educating Muslim Girls, Buckingham: Open University Press. Hiskett, M. (1989) Schooling for British Muslims: Integrated, Opted-Out or Denominational?, London: Social Affairs Unit. Labour Party (2001) AmbitionsforBritain. Labour’s Manifesto 2001, London: The Labour Party. Lewis, P. (1994) Islamic Britain, London: Tauris. McLaughlin, T.H. (1992) ‘The Ethics of Separate School’, in M. Leicester and M. Taylor (eds) Ethics, Ethnicity and Education, London: Kogan Page. Modood, T. and Berthoud, R. et al (1997) Ethnic Minorities in Britain, London: Policy Studies Institute. Mustafa, B. (2001) ‘Public Education and Muslim Voluntary Organisations in Britain’, Westminster Studies in Education, 24, 2,pp. 129–36. Osler, A. and Hussain, Z. (1995) ‘Parental Choice and Schooling: Some Factors Influencing Muslim Mother’s Decisions about the Education of their Daughters’, Cambridge Journal of Education, 25, 3, pp.327–47. Parker-Jenkins, M. (1991) ‘Muslim Matters: The Educational Needs of the Muslim Child’, New Community, 17, 4, pp.569–82. Parker-Jenkins, M. (1995) Children of lslam, Stoke-on-Trent: Trentham Books. Peach, C. and Glebe, G. (1995) ‘Muslim Minorities in Western Europe’, Ethnic and Racial Studies, 18, 1, pp.26–45. Runnymede Trust (1997) Islamophobia: A Challenge to Us All. Report of the Runnymede Trust Commission on British Muslims and Islamophobia. Chaired by Gordon Conway, London: Runnymede Trust. Sarwar, G. (1994) British Muslims and Schools, London: Muslim Education Trust. Troyna, B. (1993) Racism and Education, Buckingham: Open University Press. Troyna, B. and Carrington, B. (1987) ‘Anti-Sexist and Anti-Racist Education—A False Dilemma: A Reply to Walkling and Branningan’, Journal of Moral Education, 16, 1, pp.60–5. Troyna, B. and Williams, J. (1986) Racism, Education and the State, London: Croom Helm. Walford, G. (1991) ‘The Reluctant Private Sector: Of Small Schools, Politics and People’, in G.Walford (ed.) Private Schooling: Tradition, Change and Diversity, London: Paul Chapman. Walford, G. (1997) ‘Sponsored Grant-Maintained Schools: Extending the Franchise?’, Oxford Review of Education, 23, 1, pp.31–44. Walford, G. (2000a) ‘A Policy Adventure: Sponsored Grant-Maintained Schools’, Educational Studies, 26, 2, pp.247–62. Walford, G. (2000b) Politics and Policy in Education. Sponsored GrantMaintained Schools and Religious Diversity, Aldershot: Ashgate. Walford, G. (2001) ‘Funding for Religious Schools in England and the Netherlands. Can the Piper Call the Tune?’, Research Papers in Education, 16, 4, pp.359–80.

Part III SCHOOL AND UNIVERSITY CHOICE

9 Parental Choice and Involvement: Private and State Schools Anne West and Philip Noden

INTRODUCTION This chapter examines parents’ choice of school for their child, their aspirations and their involvement in their child’s education. It focuses in particular on parents with children in private schools, although in so doing makes comparisons with parents who have children in state schools. Comparatively little work has been undertaken either on why parents choose private schooling for their children or on how they are involved in their children’s education. The material reported here is based on interviews carried out with parents of children who had recently started state primary or private pre-preparatory school and with parents whose children were in the process of transferring to state secondary or private senior schools (see also West et al., 1998a, 1998b). We address several questions here, in particular, are there differences between parents with children in state and private schools in the way they choose schools? When do they make their choices? What factors do they take into account? In addition, we examine parents’ involvement in their children’s education and the extent to which schools may be seen to drive particular types of involvement and discourage others. The rest of this chapter is made up as follows: Section 2 provides some background information about parental choice of private schools and Section 3 examines parents’ choices and aspirations for their children. Section 4 examines some aspects of parents’ involvement in their children’s education whilst the final section summarises and discusses the key findings to emerge. BACKGROUND Private schools in England are used primarily by middle-class families. Most of the senior schools are academically selective and, because they charge fees for all age ranges, they are also socially selective.1 In a survey

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carried out on behalf of the Independent Schools Information Service (MORI, 2001) it was found that three-quarters of the parents were ‘upper middle class’, being in professional or higher/intermediate managerial or administrative occupations. In London around 10 per cent of the school age population is educated in this sector. The MORI (2001) survey examined parents’ reasons for choosing the private2 rather than the state system. A postal survey of around 1,578 parents from 63 schools was carried out during the spring term of 2001. Respondents were asked to complete the questionnaire with reference to their child who had most recently entered a private school. Of the 723 parents who returned questionnaires, it was found that around half considered a state education for their children; working-class parents (2 per cent of the sample) and those with no previous experience of the private sector were the most likely to consider state education as an option. ‘Smaller class sizes’ was the factor cited most frequently (by 36 per cent of parents) as a reason for choosing the private sector. This was followed by ‘a better standard of education’ (21 per cent). Interestingly, in surveys carried out by MORI in 1993 and 1997, a ‘better standard of education’ was cited most frequently—by around a third of parents. The survey by MORI (2001) found that other frequently mentioned factors were: that state education was poor/unsatisfactory (21 per cent) and that there were better facilities in private schools (15 per cent). Class sizes, discipline and good quality teachers were the key reasons in the final choice of a particular private school, each cited by at least eight out of ten parents. Other studies have looked at choice of private and state schools. Edwards, Fitz and Whitty (1989) in their evaluation of the former government-funded Assisted Places Scheme, designed to provide access to private schools to children from low-income families, examined the factors influencing parents’ choice of secondary school. They compared parents with children in the state and private sectors and found that a widespread importance was attached to the academic aspects of school choice, to examination results and also to the ‘ladder of opportunity to higher education and “good” jobs. That orientation was relatively weaker among comprehensive parents, who were correspondingly more inclined to mention social aspects’ (Edwards et al, 1989:190–1). In the following sections we examine the findings from a research study carried out in the London area, which involved both state and private schools (for full details see West et al, 1998a, 1998b). The study involved interviews with a total of 231 parents—63 parents of children in private schools and 168 parents of children in state schools (see Annex for details of the methods).

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PARENTS’ CHOICES AND ASPIRATIONS Parental Choice of School One of the key differences to emerge was that decisions about schools appear to be made at different stages depending on whether children are to go to private or state schools. Parents with children in private prepreparatory schools reported considering the education of their children at a much earlier stage with 86 per cent of them first starting to think about schools, before the target child was 1 year old compared with only 26 per cent of parents of children in state schools.3 In terms of choice of secondary/senior schools, significantly more parents with children in private than in state schools started thinking about this issue when their child was 9 years old or younger (57 per cent versus 36 per cent). In general, parents with children in state schools started thinking about this issue at a later stage. These findings again indicate that the process of considering schools begins at an earlier stage for parents with children in private schools. This may of course reflect the substantial financial commitment implied by using the private sector. Parents of children who had recently started state primary/private prepreparatory school were asked about factors that they considered to be essential in their choice. They were given a list of factors and those mentioned most frequently are presented in Table 1. As can be seen, the two factors considered essential by the highest proportion of parents with children in private pre-preparatory schools were the quality of education and the belief that their child would be happy at the school. Nearly seven out of ten parents mentioned that the school should suit their child’s needs and that the atmosphere/ethos was an essential ingredient. We found that more parents with children in private than in state schools rated small class size as essential (65 per cent versus 19 per cent). We also asked parents about the ‘top three’ essential factors when choosing their child’s school. For parents with children in private prepreparatory schools, the factors mentioned by the highest percentag of parents were very similar to those shown in Table 1, with ‘quality c education’ again being mentioned most often (by 65 per cent of parents In the case of these ‘top three’ factors, we found that significantly more parents with children in private than state schools made reference t quality of education (65 per cent versus 41 per cent) and to the schoc suiting the child’s needs (46 per cent versus 11 per cent). Factors considered essential in relation to secondary/senior school choice were broadly similar to those considered essential at the primary/ preparatory stage, as shown in Table 2.

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TABLE 1: FACTORS CONSIDERED ESSENTIAL BY PARENTS OF PUPILS IN PREPARATORY/PRIMARY SCHOOLS

*This difference is statistically significant. TABLE 2: FACTORS CONSIDERED ESSENTIAL BY PARENTS OF PUPILS IN CHOICE OF SECONDARY/SENIOR SCHOOLS

*This difference is statistically significant TABLE 3: ‘TOP THREE’ FACTORS FOR PARENTS IN CHOICE OF SECONDARY/SENIOR SCHOOL

*Differences are statistically significant.

As can be seen, nearly nine out of ten parents with children in private schools mentioned as an essential factor the belief that their child would be happy, with around eight out of ten mentioning the atmosphere/ethos and the school suiting their child’s needs. The only statistically significant difference between parents with children in private and state schools was that more parents with children in private schools made reference to quality of education (70 per cent versus 45 per cent).

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We also asked parents about the ‘top three’ essential factors when considering secondary/senior schools for their child. The factors mentioned by the highest percentage of parents are shown in Table 3. Once again, we found that significantly more parents with children in private than state schools made reference to quality of education (51 per cent versus 25 per cent) and, in addition, the atmosphere/ethos of the school (46 per cent versus 25 per cent). Similar proportions of parents indicated that one of the ‘top three’ factors was the belief that their child would be happy at the school concerned or that discipline/behaviour was a key concern. Thus, broadly similar issues emerge when choosing both primary and secondary schools and, in particular, parents with children in private schools were more likely than parents with children in state schools to mention quality of education at both pre-preparatory/primary and senior/secondary stages. Parents’ Aspirations for Their Children We also wanted to examine parents’ aspirations for their children’s future; our focus here was on the parents of children who were about to transfer to secondary/senior school. Differences between the parents of children in the state and private school sectors again emerged. Fewer parents of children in private rather than state schools expected that their child would get less than six GCSEs. In addition, when we asked parents if they would like their child to get a vocational (or prevocational) qualification (such as a General National Vocational Qualification) significantly more of the private than state school parents said that they would not like their child to get such a qualification (68 per cent versus 33 per cent). In terms of entry to higher education, nearly nine out of ten parents in the total sample said that they thought their child would go in to higher education—and significantly more parents of pupils in private than state schools (100 per cent versus 83 per cent). In summary, the parents in our study with children in private schools had higher expectations in terms of academic achievement and progression than those with children in state schools and clearly placed a lower (or even negative) value on vocational qualifications. Similar or Different Underlying Reasons? The quantitative analyses revealed some apparent similarities and differences between parents with children in private and state schools. However, an examination of the qualitative interview data illuminates parents’ responses on two issues—first, the notions underpinning the factors that parents cited as essential in their choices and, second, the

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extent to which these factors can account for the choices made in relation to the education of their child in the private as opposed to the state sector. The meanings of essential factors The quantitative data revealed some differences between parents in state and private sectors in terms of those factors that were considered essential and those that were the ‘top three’ in their choice of school. However, it is not possible to tell from the quantitative data whether or not their conceptions of a given factor are the same. One factor that was frequently cited as essential by parents with children in private and state schools at both the primary and secondary stages was the child’s happiness. On close examination of the responses made by the parents we interviewed, it became clear that our quantitative figures obscured marked differences in the notion of happiness used by the parents. For example, the mother of a 5-year-old boy who attended a private school in north London explained that the school had been chosen as it provided a tried and tested route to a prestigious boys ‘public’ (private) school—a school which both the father and grandfather had attended and thereafter to university, ‘possibly a postgraduate degree’ and a job, ‘which requires an academic background—a profession’. The mother also explained that this school had been chosen before her son had been born. However, when asked what the most important factor had been in choosing this particular school, she replied:4 That Luke be happy… suiting Luke’s needs.’ Thus, Luke’s happiness was paramount. However, his school had been selected before his birth—his happiness and needs appeared to arise from a predicted career path rather than from his own individual characteristics. In short, while happiness was identified as the key issue, the overriding factor appeared to be that her child should have the advantages that his father and grandfather had had. This notion of happiness differed from that of a state school mother whose son was transferring from a state primary school. She explained her top priority in choosing a school was that: ‘Mario’s happy there. He is important to me…I don’t like to see him upset.’ For this mother, happiness was more closely related to her son’s present experiences and current psychological well-being. Indeed, his happiness in this case was not subordinated to his future. This, the mother acknowledged, was a future which would be in his rather than her hands. In short, while the happiness of the child is a very important factor for many parents, deciding what makes a particular child happy is negotiated in different ways in different households. These two conceptualisations of happiness indicate that it is important not to assume that one person’s notion of a particular factor is the same as

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another. Also of interest is the focus on the child’s future by one mother and on the child’s current psychological well-being by another. Reasons for choosing the private sector We now move on to what we might view as more fundamental reasons for choosing private as opposed to state schools. Whilst our quantitative data provide an overview of the factors that parents consider essential in relation to school choice, they alone cannot explain some of the other issues that result in parents making the choices that they do. In particular, there are strong socio-cultural factors that result in choices between the state and private sectors of education. An analysis of the responses of the private school parents was made with a view to establishing what might be considered underlying factors that result in choices being made as they are. An issue raised by the use of quantitative data is that, although they may highlight factors that parents consider to be essential or those that they consider to be the most important, they are not sufficient to enable explanations to be made about why parents consider private as opposed to state schooling. For high percentages of parents in both sectors, an essential factor is for their child to be happy, but as we have seen the concept of happiness used by parents may vary considerably. Other factors are also considered essential by high proportions of parents with children in both private and state schools. Whilst some of these are perhaps more straightforward to interpret than others—for example small class size—others are less tangible in terms of what parents actually mean. Thus we asked, to what extent are other, less tangible, factors that quantitative analysis has not been able to shed light on affecting the decisions that parents make? In the following sections we examine two particular themes—academic excellence and avoiding risk. Academic excellence The quantitative findings indicated that parents with children in private pre-preparatory/preparatory schools made more reference to ‘quality of education’ than parents with children in state schools. The parents interviewed were clearly keen to try and ensure that their children succeeded academically: ‘Well I would like him to achieve his full potential…’. Reference was frequently made to private schools maximising children’s potential and stretching them; one mother noted that the school of her choice should suit her son’s needs: ‘So that it will stretch him and stimulate his interest and that he will enjoy his work…[he will feel] the challenge [of] other able pupils, but not feel pressured and not feel crammed.’ Others were concerned very explicitly with academic ‘excellence’ or results: Academic excellence, a possibility that she could, if she really did well, she would be stretched…She’s good at English, she’s good at art, she’s not great at maths, but she’s kind of good at most things like that…I think that she will do well, she doesn’t like exams but she seems to be able to pass them all right.

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Private education appears statistically to produce better academic results ve Overall the quality of state education [leaves] room for improvement. Avoiding risk Frequently references to ‘quality of education’ were closely associated with presenting private schools as a ‘safe’ choice and, concomitantly, the state sector as implying risk. As one parent put it: ‘I think…that private schools…some offer an absolutely excellent education…in a way you’ve got a guarantee of a good education.’ For another parent, despite starting the child off in the state sector, even the infant school was perceived to be placing his education at risk: I think [private schools are] wonderful. If the kind of education that we’ve been privileged to have was available to all…Our own children began in state education…and though we’ve both been privately educated at least we hoped it would work. But they were both unhappy and we both felt they were underachieving. My oldest son went to infants and nursery…and we withdrew him from the infant school. Another parent meanwhile wished to stick with a ‘winning formula’. ‘An ideal world wouldn’t need [private education]…Some private schools offer very good education and this [is] what [we] chose. People are happiest with what they know and if there is no undue criticism then prefer to keep to winning formula.’ It is interesting that this parent suggested that the private school would not be needed in ‘an ideal world’. Similar comments were made by several other parents—if only the ‘quality’ education of private schools could be offered to all then there would be no need for the private sector: I kind of wish there weren’t any, I wish that the state provided you know for a reasonable education…If [Emily] had been [the first child], it’s hard to know what would have happened actually. Maybe we would have stayed [in the state sector], I just don’t know…but you’re much more precious with your first child…But my view of private schools is that they fill a need, an obvious need, and that if the state system were filling it then people wouldn’t go to private schools. However, the remarks of some other parents implied that the ‘quality’ of education on offer was not simply a matter of teaching quality and educational ethos. It also involved the peer group to which their child would be exposed. Some parents appeared to find it difficult to

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acknowledge their concerns regarding the pupil group with whom their child would be educated. For example, one parent explained: If we had lived in [an] area with [a] good education authority out of London [we] wouldn’t have felt pressure to opt for private education. I don’t see my children in inner city state [schools] as [we] would have to fight to get decent education. I want to feel safe and want [the] children to go to school and be friends with people I feel comfortable with…[It] is not that I think they are better but I feel more comfortable. In this case, the explanation of using the private sector is couched, perhaps surprisingly, in terms of the quality of the Local Education Authority. But the respondent goes on to express, perhaps more apposite concerns about wanting to feel safe and secure with the children with whom the child would be educated. Similarly, another respondent initially suggested the comprehensive sector was problematic owing to the size of such schools. However, it appears that the underlying fear, referred to later, relates to the negative peer pressure from other pupils likely to thrive in these schools: I feel it should be a parental choice, if we have the choice we would prefer not to have to pay…I don’t think that comprehensive schools work very well, because of their size basically…It leads to a much happier atmosphere in a small school, you can’t achieve the right mix in a comprehensive school because it’s so large, you can’t offer the curriculum like in a small…school, it’s just not possible…I would tend to go back to the old selection either vocationally or academically…I just think my children wouldn’t achieve very much because the peer pressure mainly in the large comprehensive schools so I think they sink, and fortunately we have a choice, we can afford to send them to private schools, if we couldn’t, I think we would have moved out of London. While the examples cited above perhaps only hint at concern about the pupil group rather than, for example, the quality of teaching, another mother was more explicit: ‘Not the riff raff. [I] wanted a similar peer group, similar viewpoints, nice backgrounds [where it’s] normal for parents to work with children at home. Big decider of private: deprived backgrounds.’ Another mother also commented on the need for similar values to be espoused at school as at home: ‘I think the school needs to reflect the values he has at home so there isn’t a real conflict between the two.’ Quality of education, or even of peer group, was not however perceived to be the only advantage of the private sector. One black

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mother, with a son in the state sector, suggested that a direct financial relationship was itself a means of assuring a better quality service: Mother: If I had the money I would send Leroy to one… Researcher: What is it that you like about them? Mother: Well, you know generally when they say you pay for something you get your money’s worth, and we go back onto the black issue. If I was sending Leroy to an all black private school you wouldn’t have that problem of the teachers having this attitude towards black children…this cop out kind of attitude, so then I wouldn’t mind sending him to like, an all black school, 100 per cent black, 90 per cent black it really wouldn’t matter because I’m paying for it and I expect results. Similarly, in an African Caribbean family in which both parents were qualified to teach in the state sector, a decision had been taken to educate their children at private school because ‘the colour of our money’ would take priority over ‘the colour of our skin’. Nevertheless, for some parents use of the private sector was simply anathema. They would not countenance use of private schools in any shape or form. One mother wanted her child to attend a school that was: ‘mixed socially and ethnically…I want my child to be able to operate in any social environment out there…I would abolish [private schools] quite certainly. I would certainly abolish all boarding schools tomorrow.’ In summary, by examining the responses made by parents, we are able to gain an insight into the values underpinning those choices and in particular into issues that are difficult to identify using quantitative methods alone. In relation to choice of private schools, for some parents it may well be argued that some of the factors that are reported to be essential, such as ‘quality of education’, ‘suits the child’s needs’, ‘atmosphere’ and the child’s happiness reflect underlying views on social and academic selection. PARENTS’ INVOLVEMENT IN THEIR CHILDREN’S EDUCATION Whilst parental choice of school is one form of involvement in the education process, there is yet another more enduring form of involvement, namely the ways in which parents interact and negotiate with the school system. In this section we focus specifically on this issue. Recent government policy clearly supports the notion of ‘parental involvement’, but there is a paucity of information about the ways in which parents are involved in their children’s education. This section

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derives from interviews with parents of children aged 10–11 years of age. The sample for this part of our study was thus a sub-set of the sample of parents with children transferring to secondary/senior school and related to 107 children (see Annex). We examine a number of issues —help in the classroom, homework and the use of private tutors. Help in the Classroom In terms of parental help in the classroom, we found clear differences between mothers and fathers with children in private and state schools. Overall around half of the parents reported that they had helped in class, but parents of children at private schools were significantly less likely to report having helped in this way than those with children at state schools (41 per cent versus 71 per cent). This difference appeared to arise from differing school policies. In this sample, the private schools did not encourage parents to help in class. In one case the researcher asked if parents came into the classroom, the headteacher responded: ‘No, not into the classrooms. They help on outings. Reading help is not encouraged in school. I think that the school should do this and we already have lots of classroom assistants.’ For some parents of children at private schools, the absence of strong home/school links was also a source of discontent, with one mother of a boy at a private school commenting: ‘I feel that [the school] has done a bad job at involving parents. Parents don’t feel involved. There is a strong feeling of disconnectedness. The Head is not there to meet. [I] have to push to come on outings.’ In contrast, some schools in the state sector strongly encouraged such parental involvement. School brochures also illustrate this commitment to parental involvement, for example: Any help that parents can give is always greatly appreciated. Tasks such as hearing children read, helping with outings, cooking and any other skills that can be shared with children are always welcomed…Parents are always welcome in the school…(state primary school). Homework Another clear area of divergence was in terms of homework with children in private schools receiving more formal homework than children in state schools as can be seen in Table 4. All the children in the private schools received at least half an hour of homework a night compared with just under a quarter of those in state schools; over three-quarters (77 per cent) of the parents with children in

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TABLE 4: TIME SPENT ON FORMAL HOMEWORK BY YEAR 6 PUPILS IN PRIVATE AND STATE SCHOOLS

state schools reported that their children had no homework or hardly any. Moreover, whilst over half of those in private schools received an hour or more a day, only 4 per cent of those in state schools had this much. Parental expectations in private schools appear to be a clear driver—as a headteacher of one of the private schools commented: Tarents expect homework and like homework set from a young age. Children take reading books home between 5 and 7 years and from 7 to 8 they start to have written homework every night.’ This is reinforced by school brochures—for example, one private school brochure notes: Homework is expected to take priority over social events and out of school activities during term time. Younger girls may take home a reading book or poem to learn and preparation is set from the third year, up to a maximum of one hour for older girls. A timetable of homework is taken home at the beginning of each term. Parents are asked to co-operate by keeping television viewing to a minimum during weekdays, by seeing that homework is done with concentration in a quiet room and that the time taken is appropriate. Use of Private Tutors Another area we examined was the use of private tutors by parents to support their children’s school work. Just over a third of the parents in our sample (36 per cent) reported that their child had had a private tutor. Most parents had employed a tutor for a combination of English, mathematics and Verbal reasoning’ (50 per cent), just under a fifth (18 per cent) had employed a tutor for English, and just over one in ten (13 per cent) for mathematics (the remainder had employed the tutor for other areas). The main reasons given for employing a tutor were to prepare the child for examinations, because their child was felt to be falling behind, and to supplement what was being taught at school.

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Perhaps somewhat surprisingly, there were no significant differences between parents with children in state and private sectors in terms of employing a private tutor. However, we did find that among parents hoping that their child would go on to a selective grammar school that state school parents were significantly more likely to have employed a private tutor (65 per cent versus 26 per cent). It is likely that fewer parents with children in private schools considered that such tuition was necessary, perhaps because the private school was already felt to be preparing the children for entrance examinations to private senior schools. CONCLUSIONS This chapter has revealed that choices about schools are made at different times and in different ways by parents whose children attend private and state schools. The process of choosing a school begins earlier for parents with children in private than in state schools; this may be related to the admissions policies in private schools and to the financial planning that is likely to be required to meet the costs of school fees. In relation to factors that are considered essential when choosing a school, there were some differences between the private and state-school parents and between choices at the primary and secondary stages. At the primary stage, small class sizes were rated as being ‘essential’ by more parents with children in private than state schools and ‘quality of education’ was cited significantly more frequently as one of the ‘top three’ essential factors. At the secondary stage significantly more parents with children in private schools also indicated that ‘quality of education’ was an essential factor, and this again was cited more frequently as one of the ‘top three’ factors. Notwithstanding these differences, at both the primary and transfer to secondary stages, very high percentages of parents considered it essential that their child should be ‘happy’. However, this clearly begs the question as to what parents imagined would make their children happy and perhaps over what timescale. We have suggested that the child’s ‘happiness’ may refer, in some families, to the child being content on a day-to-day basis whilst in others it may be more linked to the child being able to fulfil parental expectations and ambitions. This ties in with the quantitative findings showing that the aspirations for the parents with children in private schools were much higher than for those with children in state schools, particularly in relation to the child’s public examination results and progression to higher education. Although the quantitative data can provide indicators of factors important in the choice process, the qualitative findings relating to

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academic excellence, to risk and to safety suggest that there are perhaps overarching issues that determine whether or not the private sector is chosen. A key factor is the parents’ perception of safety and comfort in the private sector as opposed to taking risks in the state sector. In the case of our samples of parents with children in private schools in London, one of the key issues is that the London state sector is perceived to be risky. The private sector on the other hand is perceived to be safe. It offers safety in terms of: academic achievement—the raw examination results tend to be better; social composition—the children are likely to be from families with similar social backgrounds and aspirations; and personal safety—in general, private schools are unlikely to tolerate disruptive or anti-social behaviour and are able to exclude (or not admit) pupils deemed to be undesirable. In relation to parental involvement, we found differences between parents with children attending private and state schools. Parents with children in private schools were less likely to have helped in class. This seems to be because the private schools in our sample did not encourage this type of involvement. Whilst they clearly encouraged some forms of involvement by the parents, this was often restricted to help at home and to supporting out-of-school activities such as school trips. This may be related to higher funding levels in the private sector— as a result class sizes are generally smaller and more teachers and teaching assistants employed, so reducing the need for parental support. In addition, it may be that, owing to the direct financial relationship between private schools and parents, the schools prefer to keep their potentially demanding paying customers, who are seeking academic excellence, at arms length from the school and teachers. The demarcation between school and home may thus be clearer in the private sector. There were also marked differences in relation to homework between children attending private and state schools, with all the children in the private schools receiving at least half an hour of homework a night compared with just under a quarter of those in state schools. Although private tutors to supplement school work were used by parents of children in both state and private schools, parents of children in state schools who had applied to selective schools were more likely than those with children in the private school sector to employ tutors. It seems likely that private preparatory schools were preparing children for entrance examinations in a way that state schools were not. Nevertheless, it is perhaps surprising that a significant minority of parents with children in private schools—as in the case of parents with children in state schools—felt that their child’s school was not meeting what they perceived to be their child’s educational needs and were prepared to invest more resources to try and maximise their child’s

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academic potential. Perhaps unsurprisingly, given this group of parents’ high aspirations and expectations, the choice of a private schools cannot therefore be seen as a guarantee of parental satisfaction; and indeed this was found in the MORI (2001) survey where eight out ten were found to be ‘totally’ or ‘very satisfied’, with the remainder being mostly ‘fairly satisfied’. In conclusion, the ways in which the choice process is negotiated by parents with children in private and state schools differs. The reasons for these differences are likely to be related to socio-cultural factors; for parents with children in private schools this may be tied in with, on average, higher aspirations for the child’s academic future and progression, and what we might call a ‘cultural security’ with the child being educated and socialised with peers from similarly advantaged social backgrounds and with similar values. Involvement by parents in their children’s education also varies depending on whether the children attend state or private schools. Whilst some of these differences may be related to differential funding of private and state schools, for example, in relation to parents helping in the classroom, other differences may well be driven by parents’ desire for children’s attainment to be maximised—as, for example, with homework. The similarities in terms of employing private tutors are of interest in that they suggest that choice of a private school does not necessarily guarantee that parents will feel satisfied that their children’s academic potential is being fulfilled. Expenditure on private school fees in these cases is clearly not felt to be sufficient for the child’s academic potential to be fulfilled. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS The research on which this chapter is based was funded by the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC). Their support is gratefully acknowledged. We would also like to thank the research team involved in the original study—Professor Miriam David, Ann Edge and Jackie Davies. Although much of the material reported here has been derived from two previously published papers (West et al., 1998a, 1998b) additional analyses have since been carried out, funded by the Centre for Educational Research at the London School of Economics. Thanks are due to the LEAs and schools that assisted with the research, the Independent Schools Council information service, and the parents who agreed to be interviewed. We would also like to thank Matthew West for his help with transcribing and Laura Bracking and John Wilkes for administrative support.

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ANNEX: STUDIES OF PARENTAL CHOICE Two separate but related research studies were carried out, one focusing on choice of primary/pre-preparatory school and the second on choice of secondary/senior school. For the study of primary school choice, 18 schools in the Greater London area, three of which were private, were involved. For the study of secondary school choice, 20 schools were involved (17 schools involved in the study of primary school choice, plus one additional private school and two additional state schools) located in five LEAs (one outer and four inner London). Full details of the methods used are provided elsewhere (West et al, 1998a, 1998b). The study of primary school choice comprised the parents of 111 children. Just over threequarters (77 per cent) of the children attended schools in the state sector with just under a quarter (23 per cent) attending schools in the private sector. Nearly half of the target children were boys (49 per cent) and just over half (51 per cent) were girls. The children were mostly aged five (78 per cent) but some were four (19 per cent) and a small proportion were six (3 per cent). In over eight out of ten cases (83 per cent) the mother was interviewed (in 8 per cent both parents were interviewed, in 6 per cent the father alone was interviewed and in 3 per cent other carers were interviewed). The study of secondary school choice consisted of the parents of 120 children from 20 schools. Just over two-thirds (69 per cent) of the children attended schools in the state sector with under a third (31 per cent) attending schools in the private sector. About half of the target children were boys (52 per cent) and just under half (48 per cent) were girls. The children were mostly aged 11 (64 per cent) but some were 10 (25 per cent) and a small proportion were 12 (3 per cent) or 13 (8 per cent). This is because transfer to boys’ private schools is sometimes at 13 not 11 years of age (especially where there are boarding places). In twothirds of cases (65 per cent) the mother was interviewed (in 23 per cent both parents were interviewed, in 10 per cent the father alone was interviewed, and in 2 per cent another adult was interviewed). The study of parental involvement was based on a subset of 107 parents with children aged 10 to 11 years who were involved in the study of secondary school choice. Over three-quarters (78 per cent) of the families had children at primary schools in the state sector and around a fifth (22 per cent) had children in private preparatory schools. The overrepresentation of the private school sector was a deliberate decision made in order to allow for comparison between parents using the private and state sectors. The sample, cannot, however, be considered to be representative of the overall school population.

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NOTES 1. This is not necessarily the case in some of the private religious schools, but these are not the focus of this study. 2. The Independent Schools Council information service and MORI both use the term ‘independent’ in preference to ‘private’. In this chapter, as in the book, the term ‘private’ is used. 3. All differences reported as being significant are statistically significant at or beyond the 0.05 level (using chi-squared analyses). 4. All names have been changed to preserve the anonymity of respondents.

REFERENCES Edwards, T., Fitz, J. and Whitty, G. (1989) The State and Private Education: An Evaluation of the Assisted Places Scheme, London: Falmer. MORI (2001) Why and How Parents Choose Independent Schools, Research study conducted for the Independent Schools Information Service (now the Independent Schools Council information service), London: MORI West, A., Noden, P., Edge, A., David, M. and Davies, J. (1998a) ‘Choices and Expectations at the Primary and Secondary Stages in the State and Private Sectors’, Educational Studies, 24, 1, pp.45–60. West, A., Noden, P., Edge, A. and David, M. (1998b) ‘Parental Involvement in Education In and Out of School’, British Educational Research Journal, 24, 4, pp.461–84.

10 Economic Aspirations, Cultural Replication and Social Dilemmas— Interpreting Parental Choice of British Private Schools Nick Foskett and Jane Hemsley-Brown Independent school education in the United Kingdom has a longestablished tradition, and a brand name in both British and international markets based on high status, academic excellence and the preparation of young people to play significant roles in the economy and society. Unlike state schools, private schools have always been at the mercy of market forces and parental choice for their survival. Meeting the needs, wants and aspirations of parents and pupils, therefore, has to be a long-term strategy for private schools, and understanding the processes by which choice is exercised is an important priority. Research into the nature and process of school choice has had a high profile during the last decade in those states where markets based on parental choice have been established by government imposition. In the United Kingdom, New Zealand and Israel, for example, studies have sought to identify both the range of factors that impact upon choice and the processes by which choices emerge over time, and Gorard (1999), Foskett and Hemsley-Brown (2001), and Foskett and Lumby (2002) provide comprehensive reviews of school choice. In the United Kingdom the factors that influence choice and the broad characteristics of the choice process are similar in the state and independent school markets. In relation to choice factors Gorard (1999) has identified five groups of influential elements in choice—academic criteria (for example, GCSE results); locational criteria (for example, accessibility of the school); organisational criteria (for example, an emphasis on ‘setting’ or on mixed ability teaching); selection criteria (for example, single sex or mixed schools, or faith-based schools); and security criteria (for example, bullying and discipline reputation). In relation to the process itself, research (for example, Gewirtz, Ball and Bowe, 1995) has recognised choice as complex, individualistic and entwined with the values, culture and life experiences of families and individuals, with specific choices emerging from a lifetime of experiences and interactions of parents and (for decisions on secondary and post-16 education) the child. It is also clear, though, that despite the growth of choice in education most parents choose not to be choosers, and their children

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attend the nearest local school without any consideration of other options. Set against this picture of substantial research into school choice in government schools, it is perhaps surprising that the decision to choose private education and the processes of choice within the private sector have not been a focus of interest. Intuitively we might believe that the priority accorded to the different influencing factors, and the detail of the choice process will be different for those choosing private schools than for the majority of parents who ‘choose’ schools in the maintained sector. This lack of research may, of course, reflect the relatively small size of the private school sector, since even in the United Kingdom only some 7 per cent of children are educated in private schools, although in some localities such as London this may be as high as 10 per cent. In the grand picture of educational research, therefore, it might seem not to be a big concern. A number of other factors may have limited research, too. First, the competitive nature of the marketplace means that collaborative research to identify the generic characteristics of choice would not be acceptable to most schools. The desire to keep market insights confidential has traditionally been strong and, indeed, there may be a perception that seeking to undertake such research is a sign that all is not well with the school. Research may be seen as the last resort of the desperate and a sure indicator of impending demise! Secondly, in some sectors of the private school market and in some localities (for example, secondary day schools in south-east England) demand has been increasing, although elsewhere recruitment issues have been significant (for example, in preparatory boarding schools). In many localities the demand for independent day school places exceeds supply, and hence the pressure to undertake market research has not been significant. Thirdly, research has tended to be commissioned market research for a specific school focused on a particular suite of issues. It is rarely if ever public domain research and in any case has limited generalisability to the sector as a whole. The picture we have of private school choice, therefore, is limited and is based on a number of small-scale research projects undertaken by individual researchers (for example, Fox, 1985; Johnson, 1987; Edwards et al, 1989; West, 1992; Falconer, 1997), and a few externally funded projects which have used larger sample sizes (for example, MORI, 1989; West et al., 1998). This evidence base suggests that there are significant commonalities between state and independent school choice, and, indeed, many parents are engaged in choice within and between the sectors. However, there are a number of components of private school choice that emerge as significantly distinctive, and these can be summarised in a number of general perspectives.

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Importantly, we must recognise that choice between private and state schools is for many simply not part of their consideration, for they have such a strong commitment to the idea of independent education that they do not consider state schools as an option. Fox (1985) suggests that in the most high-status schools the parents of up to one third of pupils do not consider a choice outside the private sector, perhaps because of strong traditions within the family or the social groups to which the family belongs or aspires. Many private schools have strong links to particular families through the generations and the families have strong allegiances to specific schools. Those who do choose between the two sectors, though, are an important part of the overall school choice field, for they comprise a substantial proportion of the active choosers (Carroll and Walford, 1997) in education markets. These are the 10–30 per cent of parents who engage actively in the choice process, and consider more than one school for their child. Most importantly, they are the parents with the greatest cultural capital who high-aspiration state schools seek to attract through the school ethos and culture they choose to adopt and promote. The ‘circuits of schooling’ (Gewirtz, Ball and Bowe, 1995) that they engage with for choice include private schools, state grammar schools and high-performing comprehensive schools. By operating across this state/private boundary in the school market these parents shape both sides of the line, yet frequently they are then lost from the state system through their choice of the private sector. Perhaps ironically, the legacy of private sector choice is writ large in the culture and organisation of Britain’s maintained schools. So what differences between choice in private school markets and choice in state school markets can be identified? First, research suggests that the timing of the process of choice is different for those parents who eventually choose the independent sector, for ‘the process of choosing a school begins earlier in the private than in the state sector’ (West et al., 1998:58). Although there are many potential entry points into private schools, most children enter either at age 4 or at age 11, and the number of pupils who subsequently transfer out of the independent sector is very small. West et al. (1998) have shown that for those choosing state primary schools the modal timing of choice is at age 3, whereas for those choosing the independent sector for primary education the mode of choice time is at or before birth. Furthermore, almost two-thirds of these parents indicated that they had begun the process of choice before their child was born, and that two-thirds had made an application for their child to be admitted to the school of their choice before their son or daughter’s first birthday. This suggests that planning a long-term educational pathway for their children is an important element of parenthood for those who choose the independent sector.

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Secondly, that process of planning appears to be set in the context of distinctive priorities amongst the factors influencing choice and a clear vision of the ultimate goal of schooling. Choice of independent school seems, for most parents, to reflect their belief in the value of high academic achievement as a requirement for entry into the more prestigious universities and then into careers in business or the professions. The payoff is clear. At 18, although only 25 per cent of students are educated in independent school ‘sixth forms’, these pupils achieve two thirds of the highest A-level grades (A-C) that are awarded. At age 19, 18 per cent of undergraduate students are from an independent education background, which compares very favourably with the 7 per cent of all pupils who start their education in such schools. At the most prestigious universities (the 20 ‘Russell group’ institutions) this proportion rises to lie in the range 15–48 per cent (figures for 1999). It is in the perception that maintained schools cannot offer levels of academic success that are as high as in private schools that the justification for independent school choice is often found. MORI (1989) found that most parents choosing the independent sector commented favourably on the academic achievement of private schools. This commitment to academic achievement explains in part the early engagement of parents considering the independent sector. As Gewirtz, Ball and Bowe (1995:26) suggest, ‘choice of primary school is often the first of several strategic decisions involved in the careful construction of their children’s school career’, in which the ultimate goal of university entrance and a high-status job for their children are prime motivators. Hence the desire to access a good secondary school with high academic achievement and excellent university entrance results will shape the choice of primary or preparatory school. It must be emphasised, though, that academic achievement is a relative rather than absolute concept. While selective independent schools will have a pupil profile strongly positively skewed in relation to academic achievement, within the independent sector there are many schools whose only selection criteria is parental ability to pay, and which may therefore have a wide range of ability across their pupil profile. Even for such schools, though, the prospect of relatively higher achievement for pupils of all abilities appears to be a key motivator in choice. While academic achievement is important, however, it is by no means the only factor in private school choice. The second key factor that emerges from the research evidence in private school choice is the desire to place a child in a well-disciplined school environment that will foster the development of what are perceived as high standards of behaviour and appropriate attitudes and values. This, of course, is both academic and social engineering, in that parents perceive that in a well-disciplined environment academic achievement for children of all abilities will be

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optimised. Similarly, possession of key personal social attributes adds value to academic achievement in accessing higher education and ‘better’ jobs. This prioritisation of the social and learning environment is significant. Where, for example, parents perceive that an ‘academic’ education is available through maintained sector selective grammar schools, the social environment factor is more strongly expressed in explaining the reasons for choosing independent education, for the key factor of academic achievement in choice of school can be taken as read. A final generalisation is one that has emerged from the work of West et al. (1998) and which examines the ‘child centredness’ of parental choice in the state and private sectors. West et al show how a concern for the child’s happiness is an important factor in all active school choice, but that the notion of happiness may be differently constructed by state and independent school parents. Specifically, happiness in school choice appears to have two elements—the child’s contentment/ freedom from social stress, and the fulfilment of parental ambitions and expectations. For parents choosing independent schools the assumption that such a school will provide an environment in which the first of these is ‘guaranteed’ enables them to emphasise the second to a greater degree than do state-school parents. Herein is an indication that choice of independent school may have significant elements of satisfying parental needs as a priority, and must be viewed in the context of parental planning for the economic and socio-cultural success of their children. This analysis of the existing research evidence raises two important hypotheses about independent school choice. First, the prima facie evidence suggests that for many parents independent school choice is an active process in a context of long-term planning for their children by parents, with the clear aim of securing higher education entry and subsequent entry to high-status/high-reward careers. Secondly, private school choice is a process through which parents seek to enhance the cultural capital of their children and of themselves in the context of the social groupings to which they belong or aspire. These hypotheses have been a key focus for the Parental Attitudes to Independent Education research project. THE PARENTAL ATTITUDES TO INDEPENDENT EDUCATION (PAIE) PROJECT The Parental Attitudes to Independent Education (PAIE) Project was established to examine in depth the processes of private school choice. The research was undertaken in 1999/2000 at the Centre for Research in Education Marketing (CREM) at the University of Southampton, using a mixed methods approach incorporating both survey-based

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quantitative analysis and interview-based qualitative work, but in the context of a multi-site case study comprising three schools (Foskett and HemsleyBrown, 2000). The three schools chosen for the study each had all four stages of independent education-pre-preparatory (3–7), preparatory (7–11), senior school (11–16) and sixth form (16–18) sections. All were located in south-east England, but in contrasting settings and market places—one north of London with mixed pre-prep and prep schools, and sixth form, but a boys only senior school; a girls’ school in outer suburban Surrey; and a mixed school in Hampshire. All three operate in very competitive arenas, with a number of strong independent schools serving similar catchment areas. The sampling frame adopted within the schools was to send questionnaires to the parents of each pupil in each school. Some 900 questionnaires were returned, representing the parents of 1,145 children, a return rate of 74 per cent. The qualitative element of the study involved interviewing the heads of each part of each school, and a sample of ten parents from each school, selected from those returning the questionnaires. We shall examine below the key findings from the PAIE project in relation to parental planning and social engineering in the context of parental choice of private schools. Parental Planning The evidence from earlier studies is that the majority of those choosing private schools do so as a deliberate choice as part of the implementation of an educational strategy for their children. Such parents are active choosers, making decisions on the basis of a process of information gathering and, to at least some extent, vigilant decisionmaking (Janis and Mann, 1977). The PAIE Project investigated how far this notion of educational pathway planning was present in the choice process at each stage of transition in the private school sector—at entry to pre-prep, at transfer to prep school, at transfer to senior school, and on entry to the sixth form. At each stage there is strong evidence of educational pathway planning amongst parents, with choices made to accommodate three key concerns—the benefits of the educational phase the child was about to enter, the potential for securing entry to the subsequent educational phase within the independent school sector, and the contribution of both the immediate and subsequent phase experiences to the ultimate goal of social and career success. Amongst parents with children in the pre-prep phase of the schools the key factors influencing choice emphasised the academic dimension of this planning, in that a concern that their child should be ‘better prepared for entering preparatory school’, should ‘make an early start on learning’ and ‘be better prepared

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for gaining better qualifications in subsequent phases of education’ were the most frequently cited reasons for choice. Even at this stage of choice, the long-term perspective on the destination at the end of school was an important concern, with the contribution to career prospects, and of enhancing the opportunities to enter a professional career or go to university cited as very important factors in choice by 25–30 per cent of parents. At each of the subsequent points of choice these concerns appear to change in their relative balance, with the creation of a strong and supportive environment for learning and developing good academic work habits emerging as a stronger concern, and the pre-eminence of university entry as an educational goal. This appears to reflect the growing confidence of parents in their child’s potential achievements. On entry to prep school the child’s abilities and aptitudes are still a relatively unknown quantity, but by the time the child is entering senior school or the sixth form the likelihood of university entrance is clearer. Aspirations are raised to the extent that 46 per cent of parents of children in the senior schools, and 49 per cent of those with children in the sixth form have as a key priority ‘entry to a top university’. The university entrance goal that has been present from pre-prep entry is now within the young person’s grasp, and the emphasis on career and social achievement stresses the need to make the choice of the best available within the Higher Education (HE) system. Academic and career aims are only one side of the process of private school choice, though. Earlier research has shown how a concern for social engineering is significant, particularly in choice at the point where the child enters the private school system. The evidence from the PAIE study suggests that this has two important components, though. First, parents are concerned about the supportive dimension of the school, in the provision of good levels of pastoral support by teachers and the maintenance of an orderly environment of good behaviour. This is both a protection for the child and an important element in establishing an effective learning environment. One of the parents at the Surrey pre-pep school, for example, explained how her daughter was particularly quiet and shy, and that she had chosen the private school therefore as an alternative to state primary schools with large classes. A parent with a daughter in the sixth form of the same school illustrated that this perspective continues throughout school, in emphasising that ‘they work them jolly hard here, and the people she mixes with have high aspirations too’. Secondly, however, parents are concerned about who their child will mix with and make friends with. Ball, Bowe and Gewirtz (1995:70) for example, have stressed that ‘part of choosing and not choosing is concerned with who your child will go to school with’. This has both

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positive and negative dimensions—the desire that the child should not be with disruptive and difficult fellow pupils, and the desire for the child to form friendships that are deemed suitable to the social aspirations of the parents. Within the PAIE study the importance of mixing with the ‘right sort’ of children emerged as a strong theme both in questionnaire responses and through parental interviews. Almost a quarter of parents identified it as one of the most important factors in their choice of a private school, and for almost all parents it had been a factor of some significance within their choice. Choosing independent schooling is a decision to invest a substantial sum of money into education provision. At 2002 prices, a private education from 4–18 costs, typically, £100,000 in fees for a day school and perhaps twice as much for a boarding school. A key element in the planning process must be for the provision of finance, and the PAIE study considered the process of financial planning that parents engage in alongside educational pathway planning. The data from the study suggest that most parents, however, do not engage in significant longterm financial planning to support private education, for some 80 per cent pay school fees from current net annual income and a further 10 per cent have fees paid by another family member, typically a grandparent. This may reflect the relatively high income of those choosing independent education. An analysis of parental income showed that the profile of parents was strongly skewed towards high-income families, with a bi-modal distribu tion—one peak at around £60,000 family income per year, and one at £100,000 plus. Choices are made, therefore, about education as a consumer good alongside other major areas of family expenditure each year, although no parents who were interviewed believed they were making substantial personal sacrifices to pay for private schooling. Most parents were aware that they had made choices about how to spend disposable income though Something has to give. We tend to have an older car, or a holiday in the UK instead of going abroad. But its what we want to do. We hope to see the results from our children doing well (Mrs Munday, Hampshire). We are not well off. We don’t spend money on our house. When it comes to the pinch you give everything you can to get the best education for your children (Dr Spring, northern school). Perhaps surprising is the relatively small number of families in which a second income was provided with the express purpose of supporting children through private schooling. An assumption made by the schools, and revealed through interviews with headteachers, was that where fees were a problem for a family this was addressed by mothers taking

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parttime work to earn the fees. The PAIE study showed little evidence that this was occurring, with most two-income families comprising two established professional careers. A second income may be a requisite for private schooling but there is little evidence that a second income is initiated in response to the need to pay fees. Overall, the evidence from the PAIE study is that choice of private schools is part of a long-term economic and social planning project by parents in pursuit of their ambitions for their children. It might be asserted that this is true of all parents in all sectors, of course, but the distinctive feature of private school choice is the clarity of the long-term aims, and the early expression of that planning process. In particular it seems to be an explicit plan of social replication, for the pathway sought by these parents is frequently the pathway they followed themselves. Within the PAIE study, very high proportions of parents had attended independent or state grammar schools themselves (34 per cent and 37 per cent of fathers, 30 per cent and 36 per cent of mothers respectively) and were subsequently in professional careers (91 per cent of fathers, 61 per cent of mothers). Social Aspirations and Social Dilemmas We have alluded above to the social aspirational aspects of school choice and the long-term pursuit of school experiences, social mix and career destination that will support a strong financial and cultural lifestyle base. Simply put, private school choice is a project of social replication with a primary aim of enhancing the cultural capital of both child and parent. These motivators for private school choice are clear, yet these aims can present considerable dissonance and hence dilemmas for parents, both in making the choice and in announcing the choice to their peers. The PAIE study identified two important dimensions of the psychology of choice in the private school marketplace that provide important insights into the processes at work—the range of external influences on choice decisions, and the processes of choice announcement. External influences on choice are those factors other than price that impact upon consumer behaviour in markets. They relate specifically to those processes which link closely to actual, perceived or aspirant social status, and to the individual consumer’s preservation of self-image and status. Our analysis of this in the context of private school choice is based on the model of external effects developed by Bain and Howells (1988), and identifies four significant and inter-related processes at work —the bandwagon effect; the social norms effect; the elitist effect; and the Veblen effect.

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The bandwagon effect can be identified where parents choose to send their child to a particular school because it becomes fashionable to do so amongst their peers and the social groups to which they belong or aspire-and as more from those social groups choose the school, so it becomes more attractive as the social norm. Even where objective information about the school’s performance is not used, the school becomes accepted as the best school because other parents have chosen it, and they are assumed to have privileged information about the school’s qualities. The social norms effect is the inverse of the bandwagon effect. Where particular schools are not within the choice arena of peer parental groups they will be rejected as a choice option simply because nobody else is making that choice. Local maintained schools may become unacceptable choices not because of the quality of their provision, but because nobody else chooses to go there. Within the catchment of the Hampshire school in the PAIE study, for example, is one primary school that serves a high socio-economic status suburb, and which is close geographically to a maintained comprehensive school with excellent performance indicators and league table results. Nevertheless, almost none of the parents at the school choose the local state comprehensive because it is the norm to send children to the private sector senior school. The elitist effect is the process by which parents seek to distinguish themselves from others by choosing the fee-paying school, and aligning themselves with the elite group that can choose to use the independent sector. This is particularly apparent where local state schools provide strong competition for private schools in terms of quality and performance, and was found amongst parents in two of the three casestudy schools in the PAIE study—the Surrey school and the northern school. The ability to pay for schooling rather than having to use free schooling enhances the effect, but it is also apparent in some independent school markets where higher fees may be seen to make a school more attractive. Linked conceptually to the elitist effect is the Veblen effect, or as it is more commonly known, the process of conspicuous consumption (Bain and Howells, 1988). This concept recognises that some will choose to purchase a product or service simply because it is more expensive than the alternatives, and not because of any necessary objective measure of quality. The price is part of the attraction—and, indeed, an increase in price may produce an increase in attractiveness and hence demand. Parents may choose to pay for private-sector schooling because they believe others think it expensive and will perceive that participating in the sector is an indicator of wealth and hence of personal success.

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The four external effects appear from our study to have a clear presence in the shaping of choice by private school parents. Making the choice is only the first part of the process, however, for studies of choice both in the education, training and careers sectors (Foskett and HemsleyBrown, 2001) and in commercial markets identify the significance of the public announcement of choice within that process. Choice is socially situated and is subject to the scrutiny of family, peers and social contacts. Choice announcement confronts the views and attitudes of those groups. As a result, choices will be made that either objectively and implicitly invoke the desired response from those target groups or which can be justified explicitly in terms that produce the right response. Preservation of selfimage and status within those groups is critical to that process, and the source of significant social dilemmas for choosers. Three aspects of this process can be identified in the PAIE study. The first is common to all aspects of choice in that ‘post hoc justification’ involves identifying objective and rational reasons for choice after the choice has been made. Choice is typically a complex, subjective, emotional and attitudinally driven process that is hard to see inside. Post hoc justification enables simple cause and effect explanations to be provided and socially acceptable choice justifications to be used. It may even involve some degree of self-deception or selfappeasement. In the PAIE study, the parental interviews identified the justification of choice in selfless and positive terms, and through simplistic explanations—for example, through a commitment to educating an especially bright child, whatever the cost, an explanation that the child (at senior level) had made the choice contrary to the parents’ ideological position, or a strident defence of the school’s excellent teachers and teaching. Rarely was there objective evidence to support the perspective and some of the explanations were of limited credibility. The second is the use of denouncement as a justification process in the context of moral dilemmas. This is identifiable in the denouncement of alternative state schools as inferior or having poorer achievements than the private school when this is demonstrably not true, where there may be some moral pressure to explain why the state system has not been chosen. Mrs Munday, whose sons attended the Hampshire private school in the PAIE study, illustrated this process, for the school local to their home achieved excellent GCSE results and had been designated as a ‘beacon school’ because of the quality of its provision. Nevertheless, Mrs Munday explained that Ideally we would send our children to state schools. We looked at every sort of school. We live near so we did know the school. The state schools are so poor, the standard of achievement is low and

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the quality of teaching very poor. If we hadn’t had very able children they might have been OK, but I wasn’t impressed…I chose the school because of the high academic standards. I disagree with private schooling on principle, but my children are doing exceedingly well. Thirdly, we can identify a process that we have termed ‘conscience salving’. Parents may have reached a decision to choose private sector education with great difficulty after taking into account their political and social conscience. Indeed, almost all the parents interviewed in the study expressed a principled objection to private education and wished that they did not find themselves in the position of having to consider this as a choice. Specifically, they expressed moral concern at the fact that they were privileged by affluence in being able to make choices not open to most parents. Having made the choice of independent education, therefore, parents may seek to promote strategies, policies and practices in the school that seek to reduce selection or social elitism. Examples included the enthusiastic promotion of scholarship and bursary schemes to facili tate participation by pupils from less affluent backgrounds, and strident views on the need to keep fee levels low, not for their own sake but for the sake of encouraging other parents to choose private schooling. This is well illustrated by the concern parents expressed about the demise of the government’s Assisted Places Scheme (APS) in which pupils from less affluent backgrounds were provided with ‘free’ places at independent schools. Parental concern was that the demise of APS now excluded some parents from considering private education. In contrast, the evidence from PAIE was that APS made no difference to the socio-economic profile of the schools, in that none of the parents still benefiting from APS indicated that the scheme was significant in their choice of independent education—it simply reduced the cost to them of a choice they had already made. The confirmation or enhancement of social status and cultural capital that is inherent to private school choice, therefore, is clearly expressed in both the external effects on choice and issues in choice announcement. In particular, choice announcement is the process of confirming the cultural and moral validity of both the principal of choosing a private school and the detail of the precise choice of school that is being made. It is clear that such choice is not simply a planned but functional process of parenthood but an intimate component of parents’ engagement with their own and their children’s social and cultural existence.

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IN CONCLUSION The PAIE study has provided both confirmation of the broad understandings of private-school choice that had emerged from earlier research, and a detailed insight into the emphases, aims and processes of school choice in particular socio-economic groups. More specifically it has enabled us to move closer to accepting the two emergent hypotheses about private school choice: (a) private school choice is an active process of long-term planning with the primary aim of securing higher education entry and subsequent entry to high-status and high-reward careers; (b) private school choice is a process through which parents seek to confirm or enhance the cultural capital of their children and themselves. There is still scope for further research to enhance this understanding, however. In particular, we know little of the process through which parents consider but reject independent schools, and the factors that might influence such a decision beyond financial consideration. We know little of the ‘choice process’ amongst those parents who only choose within the private sector and do not look outside. We also know little of the differences between those parents from an independent or grammar-school background who are replicating their own educational and career pathways for their children, and those who are not from such backgrounds but aspire to such a pathway for their sons and daughters. Research in these areas will provide valuable insights not just for the private sector, but also for the state sector, in understanding better how schools can engage in the markets of parental school choice. REFERENCES Bain, K. and Howells, P. (1988) Understanding Markets, London: Harvester Wheatsheaf. Carroll, S. and Walford, G. (1997) ‘Parents’ Responses to the SchoolQuasi Market’, Research Papers in Education, 12, 1, pp.3–26. Edwards, T., Fitz, J. and Whitty, G. (1989) The State and Private Education: An Evaluation of the Assisted Places Scheme, London: Falmer Press. Falconer, A. (1997) ‘A Buyer’s Market: Parents’ Views on What is Wanted in the Independent Sector’, Management in Education, 11,1, pp.21–2. Foskett, N.H. and Hemsley-Brown, J. (2000) Changing Parental Attitudes to Independent Education: Project Report, Southampton: Centre for Research in Education Marketing, University of Southampton.

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Foskett, N.H. and Hemsley-Brown, J. (2001) Choosing Futures: Young People’s Choices in Education, Training and Careers Markets, London: Routledge Falmer. Foskett, N.H. and Lumby, J. (2002) Leading and Managing Education: International Dimensions, London: Paul Chapman. Fox, I. (1985) Private Schools and Public Issues: The Parents’ Views, Basingstoke: MacMillan. Gewirtz, S., Ball, S. and Bowe, R. (1995) Markets, Choice and Equity in Education, Buckingham: Open University Press. Gorard, S. (1999) ‘Well, That About Wraps it up for School Choice Research: A State of the Art Review’, School Leadership and Management, 19, 1, pp.2–47. Janis, I.L. and Mann, L. (1977) Decision Making: A Psychological Analysis of Conflict, Choice and Commitment, New York: Macmillan/The Free Press. Johnson, D. (1987) Private Schools and State Schools, Milton Keynes: Open University Press. MORI (1989) How and Why Parents Choose an Independent School, London: MORI. West, A. (1992) ‘Factors Affecting Choice of School for Middle-Class Parents’, Educational Management and Administration, 20, 3, pp.212–22. West, A., Noden, P., Edge, A., David, M. and Davies, J. (1998) ‘Choices and Expectations at Primary and Secondary Stages in the State and Private Sectors’, Educational Studies, 24, 1, pp.45–60.

11 Choice or Chance: The University Challenge —How Schools Reproduce and Produce Social Capital in the Choice Process Lesley Pugsley

INTRODUCTION Over the past four decades there have been considerable changes in the structure and governance of the university sector in the United Kingdom where the elitist concept of higher education has been re-examined. The expansionist policies, which commenced post Robbins (1963), continued to gain momentum throughout the 1970s and 1980s, culminating in the removal of the binary divide in 1992 (Wagner, 1995). This created the framework necessary for the provision of mass higher education, moving from only 6 per cent participation in the 1960s to 35 per cent by the 1990s. However, within the restructuring of the university system, the language of competition and marketisation was also introduced (Williams, 1997). Parents and pupils were recast as consumers as institutions were placed within a competitive framework, and research has indicated the impact of class in the choice process (David et al, 1994; Gewirtz et al, 1995; Ball et al., 2000). Clearly, initiatives to increase levels of participation overtime have been successful, as evidenced by the University Central Admissions Service (UCAS, 2000) statistics that showed 83 per cent of comprehensive school pupils received and accepted offers of university places. This compares favourably with the 86 per cent figure for pupils from the independent sector in the same year. Nevertheless cause for concern remains, since statistics also indicate that students from the lower socioeconomic groups are still under represented. Of the total number of students accepted in higher-education institutions in 2000, only 23 per cent were from social classes IV and below (UCAS, 2000). In consequence, access issues need also to be examined within this context of under representation. Universities across the United Kingdom have exerted considerable efforts in order to target students from a wide range of educational, regional and social backgrounds. Many have established Schools Liaison and Access Teams, appointing staff with

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special responsibilities for visiting schools and colleges throughout Britain. The universities of Oxford and Cambridge have been particularly anxious to address charges of elitism levelled against them, and overcome the perception of bias against pupils from particular social backgrounds or schools. The Oxbridge Target Schools Scheme, which has been in operation since 1982 encourages first—and second-year undergraduates to visit state schools in their local areas during the Easter vacations. Liaison teams organise one-day regional conferences, and the Oxford Access Scheme, established in 1991, runs a programme of skills training days and summer school events aimed at inner city and ethnic minority pupils. Other initiatives include the Access Cymru programme begun in 2000; it is aimed at encouraging applications from pupils in the state sector in Wales. Nevertheless, media headlines such as ‘privilege is still the passport to university’ (THES, 2000) continue to sustain the perception that schools in the independent sector are more able to facilitate access to higher education for their pupils. But if this is the case, what support networks do these schools provide? Moreover, can any of these strategies be incorporated across the sectors in order to assist non-traditional applicants? It would be of considerable interest to research the university applications process from the perspective of the private sector per se. However, whilst there is much to be gained from such a consideration, within the discourses of value systems and access to specialist knowledge, it is also useful to offer a comparison of schools in both the private and the state sectors. This allows for an analysis of the kinds of knowledge delivered by each, which enable pupils to engage successfully, or otherwise, with the highly competitive and highly differentiated university sector. Drawing on qualitative data generated from a study of sixth-form pupils engaged in this choice process in south-east Wales (Pugsley, 1998a), enables an exploration of the various ways in which highereducation guidance is provided within the school curriculum. These data form part of a larger, longitudinal study that tracked pupils from ten different types of schools throughout their sixth-form careers. The study determined the impact which each of these schools, in their role as facilitation agent, has on the choice process. It illustrates how the university sector in the United Kingdom functions as a ‘quasi market’ (Le Grande and Bartlett, 1993) and how choices are socially constructed, in many instances predicated on and facilitated by class-based competencies. In an attempt to explore some of these issues, I have taken as exemplars, one independent and one comprehensive school in south-east

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Wales. ‘Brangwyn Hall’ is a pseudonym for the single-sex, independent school and ‘Llanover High’ is that of the coeducational comprehensive school. These two schools have been selected since they provide snapshots, which serve to illustrate some of the bi-polarities that the study identified. There were differences both in terms of institutional structures and attitudes towards the choice process. Brangwyn Hall is an ‘elite’ school for girls, located in a rural setting on the Welsh/English borders. There are distinct advantages for girls attending such a ‘posh’ school as Delamont (1989) has illustrated. In comparison, Llanover School is an inner city school, mostly working class in terms of its social composition. The earlier parts of the chapter consider the data in the form of four pupil vignettes. Time lines of the ways in which both these schools prepare their pupils to make their university applications are provided. The results identify the differential levels of support experienced by each of these pupils. They highlight elements of good practice, which are integral parts of the independent schools’ commitment to university and careers guidance. However they also indicate the potential that exists for tensions to occur within the state sector, where curriculum crowding, and budgetary constraints impact on organisational processes. The second section of the chapter discusses a highly successful initiative in San Diego, the ‘Advancement Via Individual Determination’ (AVID) programme (Mehan et al., 1999). This educational reform aims to prepare students from lower-income and ethnic minority groups (nontraditional applicants) for college entry. The successful outcomes of this programme are considered and it is suggested that the strategies that the AVID initiative adopts parallel the support structures which are utilised so effectively by staff at Brangwyn Hall. It develops this theme further by suggesting that there is the potential for mechanisms similar to these to be adopted in the United Kingdom in order to address highereducation access issues and non-traditional participation. Such an initiative would help pave the way for a more inclusive engagement with higher-education markets and choice. Choosing a school has been shown to be a complex process, heavily mediated by factors of social class (Gewirtz et al, 1995). Traditionally in most schools in England and Wales, Career and Higher Education Guidance was provided as part of the Personal and Social Education (PSE) curriculum. However, the 1988 Education Reform Act brought about pressures both in curriculum crowding and budgetary control. As a consequence, PSE became marginalised with the quality of provision across the sector becoming increasingly ad hoc, very much dependent upon the commitment of individual tutors within schools (OHMCI, 1997). Focusing on these vignettes, it is possible to look at the lived realities of individual students, mapping their progress through the sixth

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form and identifying the various level of information and guidance provided for them by each of their schools. JOANNA AND AMY: CASES OF PRIVILEGED CHOOSING? For Joanna and Amy entry to the sixth form at Brangwyn Hall, an Independent Day and Boarding School for Girls ensured that they came under the wing of Mrs Ellis, who has full-time responsibility for careers guidance and higher education. In the study, Brangwyn Hall demonstrated the very best practice in terms of higher-education guidance and support and Mrs Ellis epitomised this in her total commitment and determination. The school recognises that the majority of its parents are ‘privileged choosers’ (Gewirtz et al, 1995). Having already engaged with the market at school level, they are familiar with the concept and implications of educational choice. This led Mrs Ellis to comment, The parents appreciate how vital it is to make the best possible choice that’s why they choose us. But crucially they are aware of university status and the like. So it’s up to us to do our utmost to deliver. Well I mean it’s life chances isn’t it’ In common with all the other girls in their year, both Joanna and Amy received a sixth-form induction that included a tour of the ‘university resource centre’. This is located next to the sixth-form library, which is well-stocked with up-to-date prospectuses and other independent university guides. A bank of networked computers is along one wall and these enable the girls to access university web sites, online prospectuses and career guidance materials. There are also wide selections of CDROMs on university options, all these resources can be borrowed from the school for use at home. Amy and Joanna began to receive higher education guidance as part of a weekly programme during the lower sixth (year 12). At Brangwyn Hall, one afternoon a week is dedicated to general studies, career guidance and higher education preparations. Initially, Mrs Ellis made sure that both the girls were provided with a period of one-toone tuition on the various computer-assisted guidance (CAG) packages and other career and higher-education resources. Before the end of their first term in the sixth form, each had several individual sessions with Mrs Ellis to discuss their higher-education and career options. Following on from these, both were required to produce a ‘plan of action’. This detailed the subjects they were studying, the opportunities these provided in relation to their preferred choices of

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degree subjects and universities and the potential future career pathways. As Mrs Ellis told me during our interview, Initially they are all required to sort out plans, with some help from me. That means they need to focus on the key issues, identify sources and resources; you know, really begin to get to grips with the whole process of applying to university. The implicit assumption among the staff, pupils and parents at Brangwyn Hall is one of a ‘natural’ progression in education, from compulsory schooling, to sixth form, to university. As Allatt (1996:173) notes, ‘an aspect of invisibility is entwined in the cultural strands of these families history, so the power of the discourse lies in the silence that surrounds it’. Both Amy and Joanna recognised and acknowledged that these assumptions had been made and Joanna told me, ‘It’s not like they [parents] pressure you, I mean they don’t say “oh you have to go”, but it’s the unsaid pressure, you just know it’s there.’ Both girls recognised that their families were looking to the school to support and reinforce their own aims and ambitions for the futures of their daughters. The reinforcement of the aims and ideals of these families was epitomised in the proactive approach that Mrs Ellis adopted toward an engagement with the choice process. The pupils felt that it was something of a catalyst for action, as Amy noted, Mrs Ellis gets you to do this action plan, you just book an appointment with her and then look at your different options. But then you can just keep going back as often as you want which is great. It’s important to have someone like Mrs Ellis. She is on your back, you know, really on at you to get moving, but in a good way. She makes you sit down and think things through. Also during the lower-sixth year, Joanna and Amy were able to take part in a careers guidance forum, this is provided annually by a member of the Independent Schools Career Office (ISCO). Mrs Ellis was insistent that each girl begin to formulate her ideas as to her choices at this early stage, rather than leaving things until Year 13, when the University Central Admissions Service (UCAS) imposes its deadlines (Oxbridge applications need to be submitted ahead of the general forms). During her time in post, Mrs Ellis has built up her own database of degree subjects, institutions, tutors and career opportunities. She has developed a number of contacts at several Oxbridge Colleges as well as at a number of other HEIs all of whom she invites to give talks at the school. She actively encourages all the pupils to research their choices and visit the universities they are considering. Each girl who attends

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open days, interviews, or simply visits institutions informally, is asked to record her overall impressions. These are then placed on file in the sixthform resource room, as an alternative point of reference. Mrs Ellis has also compiled an index system dating back more than ten years, detailing the university destinations, the courses studied and the career pathways of her former pupils. She maintains regular contact with them and uses them as a further resource to provide additional information about specific institutions. As she told me, ‘I have a really good network set up, they tell me all the gen. It’s marvellous.’ These former pupils are regularly invited back to give presentations at the annual Higher Education Conference, which the school organises in conjunction with the nearby Independent School for Boys. This provides the pupils with first-hand accounts of the university experience. Clearly Brangwyn Hall is very conscious of the significance of the market at the level of higher education, and, as Mrs Ellis noted, The parents appreciate how vital it is to make the best possible choices. That’s part of why they choose us. But they are really aware of university status and the like, well, I mean, its life chances isn’t it?’ The pupils too feel that this is a major factor driving much of their sixth form life at Brangwyn Hall, as Joanna told me, They [the school] are very keen on getting you to apply to the better universities. They do like you to go to the higher status places particularly at our school.’ It can be suggested that in part the school is conscious of its own market position. However, having spent time at Brangwyn Hall and talked to the staff and to pupils and their parents there is also a genuine desire to ensure that each girl achieves her potential. Staff actively encourage those pupils wanting to apply to Oxbridge and Joanna who hoped to read History at Oxford found herself in the ‘Oxbridge Club’ at the school. This ‘club’ is organised by Mrs Ellis and meets weekly in order to consider the various aspects of the Oxbridge admissions process. During the summer term of year 12 Joanna and the other members of the ‘club’ were taken, by the school, to open days at both Oxford and Cambridge colleges. Staying overnight at each, they had the opportunity to speak with college tutors and familiarise themselves with the settings. However, as Amy found, the focus at Brangwyn Hall is not solely on the highest-achieving pupils. The school is clearly committed to ensuring that it provides opportunities to maximise each individual pupil’s potential. In 1995 General National Vocational Qualifications (GNVQs) were introduced into the sixth form. Amy was among the first cohort of girls to take up these options and in addition to studying for an A-level in Religious Studies, she was also taking GNVQ Level 3 subjects. The school was active in promoting the GNVQ option both among parents and the local business community, seeing this as an opportunity to allow pupils to fulfil their potential. As Amy told me, ‘We

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have had so much help from the school in choosing universities and the right courses and that. I mean they have been brilliant in that respect and in supporting me doing GNVQs.’ In the summer term of year 12, the school arranges for all the pupils to be taken to a higher-education fair in Birmingham. This proactive approach by the school ensures that pupils focus on the various choice issues well before the applications deadline. At the start of the upper-sixth year, the school hosts a ‘Careers Forum’. Mrs Ellis invites groups of senior managers from a variety of industrial and commercial enterprises to give short presentations about career opportunities and participate in mock panel interviews. This allows the pupils to gain some experience of interview situations and also to receive formative feedback on their interview skills. Joanna found this aspect of the forum particularly helpful in preparation for her own interview. Amy enjoyed the opportunity to hear ‘what employers are looking for ‘in their graduate entrants. At Brangwyn Hall staff are committed to helping make sure that each pupil is ‘getting it right’. Amy and Joanna were rigorously shepherded through the whole process of choosing the most appropriate institutions and providing suitable application forms. The structures are firmly in place at this school to ensure that pupils are not only familiar with the entire application process including deadlines, but they are also informed as to the range of higher-education options available to them. Mrs Ellis ensures that the requisite forms are returned to the school for submission on time and that they are filled in correctly and legibly. This is vital, since statistics from UCAS (1996) indicated that in 1995 their office received some 20,000 forms that were either illegible or completed incorrectly. These all needed to be returned to their respective schools for correction which resulted in a delay in their processing. Mrs Ellis is determined that this will not happen at Brangwyn as she told me, Everyone gets copies of the UCAS form in the April of year 12. They have opportunities to practice filling these in and completed copies need to be approved by me, their subject teachers and their year tutors. This means that when they come back in September for Year 13, we expect them to be ready and able to complete the real thing. This insistence by Mrs Ellis that pupils provide a comprehensive UCAS form, required Joanna and Amy to focus their attention on the application process and to consider how best to present themselves. Amy told me,

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Mrs Ellis is fierce about the whole thing, she really bangs on about it. So you just have to start thinking about where you will apply, what you’ll put on the form, all of that stuff, because she will keep on at you until you do. However, at Brangwyn Hall the emphasis is not just on completing and submitting legible UCAS forms, Mrs Ellis is also keenly aware of the need for these forms to make interesting and informative reading. Each girl is individually ‘coached’ through the application process. She stresses to them that this is the only opportunity that most applicants have to promote themselves to the university of their choice. She ensures that the girls recognise the significance of an interesting well-rounded application. As she noted, I like to give them a little nudge now and again. It helps to keep reminding them, they need to do things, be involved, look and sound interesting. They need to be busy, get on and this is such an important time. So when they tell me they are thinking of doing a summer job in say Macdonald in Cardiff, I say ‘for heavens sake, why?’ Go to the Paris Macdonald and brush up your French. Spend the summer in their Moscow branch and improve your Russian. Do something different. It makes for a much better UCAS form and you have a good time. Amy and Joanna are bright, confident, pro-active young women, they attended a ‘posh’ high-status school and research data from the United Kingdom and Australia demonstrates the ways in which this type of education can give them ‘the edge’ (Connell et al, 1982; Delamont, 1990, 1996; Roker, 1993). The sixth-form support structures adopted at Brangwyn Hall endorse this, they ensure that each of the girls is well placed to make the best possible university choice. The school has a highly informed clientele who possess the necessary social and cultural capital to make informed choices (Bourdieu and Passeron, 1990). Brangwyn Hall offers more of the same. The structured and supportive framework provided an opportunity for Amy, Joanna and their peers to maximise their chances of success within this differentiated market. However, this level of preparation and planning was not so evident for others in the study as the following accounts indicate. MARIA AND MARK: DISCONNECTED PLAYERS At Llanover High School, there is a somewhat different approach to university guidance. In common with the majority of sixth-form pupils

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at this school, both Mark and Maria were from families in the lower socioeconomic groups, neither of which had any previous experience of postcompulsory education. On entering year 12, they found that the sixth-form common room and higher-education resource centres at this school are combined. The facilities are somewhat cramped, adapted from two classrooms, with a partitioned ‘quiet area’. This houses the somewhat limited higher-education and careers guidance resources; there are some prospectuses and a few UCAS handbooks. The school does not have a full-time member of staff dedicated to higher education and careers guidance. Mr Rears, deputy head at the school, is responsible for the UCAS process and liaises with the three local HEIs each of which has a Compact agreement with the school. Although Llanover School has computerised career guidance packages, as Mr Rears explained, ‘We can’t afford to provide it for free, so we charge the pupils £10 each if they want to use this system.’ In common with Brangwyn Hall, Llanover High offers pupils a range of GNVQ options in addition to A-levels. However, like their friends, neither Maria nor Mark considered these options because of the perceptions associated with these courses which permeated the school. It was evident talking to staff and other pupils, in both the A-level and the GNVQ streams that taking such options was perceived as a second-class route. The language of both staff and pupils was derogatory, Mr Rears commented that GNVQs are courses for ‘thickos’ while Mark told me, ‘I don’t have any friends in that group, I do know people doing them, but not my friends. We don’t see the point of them, they are rubbish courses for spanners (non-academic students).’ Unlike Brangwyn Hall, which presented a positive image of GNVQ courses as a means of developing and enhancing pupil potential, for Llanover High, providing pupils with this option had been a pragmatic marketing strategy as Mr Rears told me, ‘Offering GNVQs was great, they really bumped up our sixth form numbers. Two years ago we had 89 in year 13 and now we have 126.’ Both Maria and Mark found that during their year in the lower sixth staff made no formal mention of higher education and the feeling among the pupils was that this was an ‘easy year’. It was seen as an opportunity for them to have a break after their GCSEs, there was a sense that university was ‘still a long way off. The one exception was during a registration session when their class tutor told them about the open day at Cardiff University. As it was geographically their closest HEI, pupils were allowed time off school, if they wanted to attend. But as Maria noted, ‘We did it all off our own backs [attended the open day] didn’t we. A group of us, well we all just arranged to meet met up there.’ However this informal approach to attending an open day was seen by a number of the pupils as an opportunity to take a day off school, as

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another pupil told me, ‘Me and my friends, well we met up in town and just went the round the shops, it was a laugh.’ Brangwyn Hall, the more proactive and market-aware school, simply hires a coach and takes pupils to open days, while Llanover High relies on the pupils to take themselves. Pilcher et al. (1989) found similar disparities in their study of the Cardiff Roadshow. Llanover High does not have a history of Oxbridge applications and during my two years of fieldwork no links, either formal or informal, were made with the access liaison teams at these, or other institutions. Rather there was a sense of over-reliance on the local Compact schemes. Mr Rears saw little need to explore other avenues of choice with the pupils, his attitude rather suggesting that they would ‘slide into’ university. In year 13, Maria, Mark and their peers had four sessions on ‘applying to university’ given by their form tutors. However in the main the pupils felt that these did not really address their needs. As one pupil commented, ‘The whole thing is a waste of time really. They give you the form and then they just let you get on with it, they don’t advise you or anything.’ The UCAS forms were handed out in one of these sessions and the pupils were told the date they were to be returned to school. However, unlike Brangwyn Hall, where the personal statements were almost written for the girls, there was no such input at Llanover High. This despite the fact that the lingua franca of academia is highly specialised. When I spoke to her Maria told me, I’m so confused, I don’t know really what’s what. As far as applying to go [to university], well I mean I sort of know what I’m doing, but well…I don’t really understand the forms. They are really hard, you know, complicated like, what are you supposed to write in your personal statement? Mark too found that there was a lack of any structured guidance at the school and accessing information about particular courses was a real issue. Interested in studying automobile design he felt that the school could have been more supportive in helping him identify courses. He felt that there was no real opportunity for him to discuss his options with a member of staff. He recognised that his family felt totally out of their depth when trying to offer any practical advice and this added to the pressures he felt about making appropriate choices. As Mark told me, ‘My parents don’t know much about it [higher education]. But they are keen for me to go. I mean I’ll be the brains of our family, because no one else has been. But they don’t really know much about it, so it’s up to me.’ And Maria’s mother told me, ‘Well it’s no good her asking us,

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we’ll go along with whatever she wants. But it’s up to the school really, she needs to talk to them, they will have to sort it out.’ In her study of schools in the United States, Lightfoot (1983) noted that parents are often excluded from high school life because of their failure to understand bureaucratic procedures. Similarly in the United Kingdom, Jackson and Marsden (1962:153) found that by the sixth form ‘even the most ambitious [working-class] parents had in a sense been left behind’. Even when parents are allowed access to some detail and information about the daily life in schools, ‘there is disparity in the levels of information and awareness of different socio-economic groups’ (Sidgewick et al., 1994:469). Trying to decipher university prospectuses and accurately complete the application forms requires some level of competency which ‘presupposes possession of the correct code’ (Bourdieu and Passeron, 1990:51). These vignettes suggest that in the 1990s, the pattern of disconnection between working-class parents and educational systems is being replicated at Llanover High (Pugsley, 1998a). Recognising that their parents were unable to decode the application procedures and assist them with their choices, both Mark and Maria felt they had little option but to ‘bypass’ them. They hoped that in the absence of guidance from home, they could look to the school for help. Unfortunately, both felt that the school let them down, since at Llanover High, the focus of guidance is limited to a general account of the application process. They felt that the school did little to help them explore the range of options, neither Mark nor Maria were offered onetoone session with tutors. In consequence, Mark’s UCAS form remained in his school bag for a number of weeks before he eventually completed it. He was not really confident about choosing a course and by chance read of a university course that interested him in a special interest magazine and decided to apply for it, but he felt he was not assisted in this choice process at school. Maria also struggled with her form and her choices, she had considered applying to a local HEI, because it seemed the ‘most straightforward’ option, but ended up missing the UCAS deadlines. Despite gaining C and D grades in her examinations, Maria did not go on to university. DISCUSSION These vignettes allow the variety of support networks in these two schools to be made explicit. They highlight the ways in which one school in the private sector helps pupils make informed higher-education choices. At Brangwyn Hall, the pupils have Mrs Ellis. She is a highly skilled facilitator, well-practised in providing a solid structural

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framework for the choice process. It is largely as a result of her efforts that Amy, Joanna and the other girls at Brangwyn Hall make such successful transitions from school to university. Her attention to detail is, in some instances, what is different about the private sector and in many cases this is what parents are prepared to pay for. These families already possess the qualities of ‘privileged choosers’ (Gerwirtz et al, 1995) having opted for schooling in the private sector. They make use of their social networks in a variety of ways in order to inform their choices. This match of school and home-based support doubly advantages these pupils in their quest for entry to higher education. Bourdieu (1986) has described how families are reliant on a similarity of ‘taste’ between the school and the home as a means of aspiring towards the same goal. The combination of the cultural capital of the home and the added value of the school, ensure that the decisions which are made regarding higher education are ‘information rich’ thus maximising the pupils choices of university and degree course (Ball et al, 2000). The hidden curriculum presupposes that young people posses, via their family, the necessary competencies to adapt to and engage with the conventions of schooling (Young, 1971). But as has been demonstrated, in terms of choosing and applying to university, this is not necessarily the case. While many families in the state sector may be skilled choosers, for a variety of reasons, as these vignettes have illustrated, there is the potential for some to lack the competencies necessary to allow them to be rational, informed consumers. In such instances, the school plays a key role in facilitating access to higher education. At Llanover School, the focus for higher-education guidance is a mechanistic one, driven in the main by a lack of time and resources, rather than a lack of will. It could be suggested that, with a little additional support, Llanover High, in common with a number of other schools across the United Kingdom, could straightforwardly adopt many of the strategies of good practice which have been identified at Brangwyn Hall. Perhaps what is needed is input from someone like Mrs Ellis, if only on a part-time basis. Such support frameworks could well be informed by the successful ‘Advancement via Individual Determination’ (AVID) scheme. This is a school reform programme in San Diego, California (Mehan et al., 1999). It was set up in order to prepare students from non-traditional backgrounds (lower social class and ethnic minority groups) for college entry. Historically, educators in the United States adopted a structural response to ‘difference’ by separating ability groups and providing a differentiated curriculum. However, such ‘tracking’ systems, based on differential educational pathways and expectations, were highly criticised because of the limitations they placed on students’ abilities.

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The AVID initiative exposes pupils from all social and cultural backgrounds to the same rigorous academic curriculum, while varying the levels of institutional support that the schools provide for them. The programme is based on two interrelated concepts: the first is that in order to be successful in school pupils from less advantaged backgrounds need to master the hidden curriculum; the second, that the school should provide a structured system of institutional support to assist these pupils through the AVID programme. Mehan et al. (1999:85) suggest that ‘the most conspicuous and intriguing teacher led activity revolved around the complicated process of entering college’. To help prepare the students, in the juniors classes they are given handouts on choosing a college. These have checklists of information similar to those found in college prospectuses and timeframes identifying the need for particular actions at specific points on the timeline. They are also set research projects aimed at familiarising the AVID students with the college brochures in order to help them make the most appropriate college choices. Prior to making their applications, the senior students receive extra coaching on how to write their ‘statements of purpose’ (similar to the personal statements on the UCAS forms). Tutors help them to fill out applications forms, and ensure that they are reminded of the submission deadlines and the dates of entry exams. This whole socialisation regime has been designed in order to ensure that for these non-traditional entrants the college application process is demystified. It can be argued that this structured network of support and guidance which the AVID programme provides in the United States in many ways parallels that provided by Mrs Ellis’ at Brangwyn Hall in the United Kingdom. What then should be learned from both these programmes? ACCESSING HIGHER EDUCATION: POLICY IMPLICATIONS There is a clear paradox facing the second Blair government in terms of its policies towards expansion and funding in the higher education section. It is vocal in espousing a commitment to widening access to higher education and aims to have increased participation to 50 per cent of the population by 2010. If this target is to be met then clearly there is a need for changes to be made to the levels of support offered to potential undergraduates. We are already witnessing some policy shifts with the reinstatement of student grants in Scotland and Wales. However, in order to further widen access, it would be helpful if government were to implement a system of support networks at school level, on the lines of the AVID programme. These frameworks could help ensure that those pupils from non-traditional backgrounds who

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currently lack the necessary competencies to engage with the higher education system could experience and benefit from an extra level of support. However, herein lies the dilemma, how would government afford to fund such an initiative based on the successful, but clearly expensive, AVID model? However, given their expansionist agenda and their espoused commitment to widening access how could they not? The AVID scheme successfully provides a programme of cultural interruption for young people from minority backgrounds. The data discussed in this chapter are small scale, they provide cameos of the ways in which these schools facilitate choices. Nevertheless, they support the suggestion that some pupils from a nontraditional background who aim to enter higher education must look to the school to provide them with the necessary guidance and support. Unless they can be offered a lifeline in the form of a well-structured programme of highereducation guidance, they will continue to drown in the whirlpool of university choices. AVID has successfully demonstrated how a system of practical activities enables access policies to be truly inclusive across the spectrum of social class. While such an initiative may be neither economically feasible, nor necessary, across the whole post-16 sector in the UK it is suggested that policy could be introduced to ensure that all schools are proactive in assisting pupils to make informed choices about higher education. If such structures were to be available at national level in the United Kingdom, they it could be drawn upon locally in order to give lie to the suggestion that ‘privilege is still the passport to university’. REFERENCES Allatt, P. (1996). ‘Consuming Schools’, in S.Edgell, K.Hetherington and A.Warde (eds) Consumption Matters, Oxford: Blackwell. Ball, S.J., Maguire, M. and Macrae, S. (2000) Choice, Pathways and Transitions Post-16, London: Routledge. Bourdieu, P. (1986) Distinction, London: Routledge. Bourdieu, P. and Passeron, J-C. (1990) Reproduction in Education, Society and Culture (2nd edition), London: Sage. Connell, R.W., Ashenden, D.J., Kessler, S. and Dowsett, G.W. (1982) Making the Difference: Schools, Families and Social Divisions, London: George Allen and Unwin. David, M., West, A. and Ribbens, J. (1994), Mothers Intuition? Choosing Secondary Schools, London: Falmer. Delamont, S. (1989) Knowledgeable Women: Structuralism and the Reproduction of Elites, London: Routledge. Delamont, S. (1990) Sex Roles and the School (2nd edition), London: Routledge.

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Delamont, S. (1996) A Woman’s Place in Education, Aldershot: Avebury. Gewirtz, S., Ball, S.J. and Bowe, R. (1995) Markets, Choice and Equity in Education, Buckingham: Open University Press. Jackson, B. and Marsdon, D. (1962) Education and the Working Class, London: Routledge. Le Grand, J. and Bartlett, W. (eds) (1993) Quasi Markets and Social Policy, Basingstoke: Macmillan. Lightfoot, S.L. (1983) The Good High School: Portraits of Character and Culture, New York: Basic Books. Mehan, H., Villanueva, L. Hubbard, L. and Lintz, A. (1999) Constructing School Success, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Office of Her Majesty’s Chief Inspectors (1997) A Survey of Careers Education and Guidance in the Secondary Schools of Wales, Cardiff: Hackman. Pilcher, J., Delamont, S., Powell, G., Rees, T. and Read, M. (1989) ‘Evaluating a Women’s Careers Conventio: Methods, Results and Implications’, Research Papers in Education, 4, 1 pp.57–76. Pugsley, L.A. (1998a) ‘Class of ‘97: Higher Education Markets and Choice’, unpublished Ph.D. Thesis, Cardiff: University of Wales. Pugsley, L.A. (1998b) ‘Throwing Your Brains at it: Higher Education Markets and Choice’, International Studies in the Sociology of Education, 8, 1, pp.71–90. Robbins, Lord (1963) Higher Education: Report of the Committee. Cmnd.2154, London: HMSO. Roker, D. (1993) ‘Gaining the Edge: Girls at a Private School’, in I. Bates and G. Riseborough (eds) Youth and Inequality, Buckingham: Open University Press. Sidgewick, S., Mahoney, P. and Hextall, I. (1994) ‘A Gap in the Market? A Consideration in Market Relations in Teacher Education’, British Journal of Sociology of Education, 15, pp.467–79. Times Higher Educational Supplement (2000) ‘Privilege is Still the Passport to University’, Editorial 6 October. UCAS (1996) Statistical Survey 1996 Report: Qualified Applicants, Those Who Did Not Enter Higher Education (1995), Gloucestershire: UCAS. UCAS (2000) Statistical Survey 2000 Report. Applications and Acceptances by Educational Establishment UK (Home) Students, Gloucestershire: UCAS. Wagner, L. (1995) ‘A Thirty Year Perspective: From the Sixties to the Nineties’, in T. Schuller (ed.) The Changing University? Buckingham: Open University Press. Williams, G. (1997) ‘The Market Route to Mass Higher Education’, Higher Education Policy, 10, 3–4, pp.281–92. Yong, M.F.D. (ed.) (1971) Knowledge and Control, London: Collier-Macmillan.

Index

absence 105–26 Arnold, Thomas 33 assisted places scheme 12, 15–17, 23, 199 attitudes 192–200 Barber, Michael 15 Beale, Dorothea 66 Beer, Ian 23 Birmingham 161, 207 Blair, Tony 3, 22 boarding 1, 2, 129, 134 Bradford 164–70 Brighton College 146–1 Brougham, Henry 31 Bryant, Sophie 66 Buss, Francis Mary 66 Butler, R.A. 40, 45 Callaghan, James 13, 20 charities 5, 10–11, 34, 140–56 Charterhouse school 37 choice of school 6, 171–200 choice of university 6, 201–22 City Technology College 14 Clarendon Commission 31, 34, 148 co-education 1, 123–42, 159 Conservative Party 11, 36, 51 Crosland, Anthony 42 curative planning 112 Davies, Emily 66 direct grant schools 39, 48 disconnected 209–19 Donnison Committee 46–48

elections 9, 19, 22 Eton College 1, 31, 37, 49, 51 examinations 74–97, 190, 196, 198 fascism 61, 62 feminism 53–69 Flemming Committee 37, 39, 40, 44 Franks Commission 43–7 Freudianism 55–56 girls 4, 5, 53–69, 123–42, 204–12 Governing Bodies Association xi grammar schools 82–7 grant maintained schools 14 Haddow Committee 20 happiness 175–3, 180, 183, 191 Harrow School 1, 33, 37 Headmasters (and Headmistresses) Conference xi, 1, 2, 20, 38 homework 181–9 homosexuality 167 immigration 153–9 Independent Association of Preparatory Schools xi Independent Schools Council xi, 1, 2 inhibitory policies 112, 113–20 Islam xi, 155–8 Islamia School 163–9 Kinnock, Neil 16 Labour Party 9–26, 29, 36, 45, 47, 49– 4 217

218 BRITISH PRIVATE SCHOOLS

Lampl, Peter 19 Lancing College 130, 136, 137 lesbianism 66, 68 Manchester Grammar School 47 Morris, Estelle 20 Muslim schools 2, 5, 153–73 National Child Development Study 4, 74–97 National Union of Teachers 28, 29 Newsom Committee 44–9 Oxbridge 20, 22, 43, 49, 74, 195, 206, 210 Oxford Mobility Study 75 parents 171–200 parent/teacher association 86, 92 planning 184–195 preventative policies 112–17, 118 prospectuses 124–40 Public Schools Commission 9, 10 risk 177–5 Rugby School 32, 131, 134 Russell group 190 San Diago 213 school histories 53–69 sex education 158, 162 Short, Edward 4 sickness 5, 105–26 Simon, Brian 36 Summerhill School 2 Sutton Trust 19 Taunton Commission 34 Teacher Training Agency 21 Thatcher, Margaret 24 Trades Union Congress 3, 28–52 tutors 182, 184 universities 201–22 voluntary schools 155–73 vouchers 17, 18

Westminster School 37, 148 Wilkinson, Ellen 41 Winchester College 32, 37, 51, 147 Woodard, Nathaniel 32