Pre-IB students

[HowardH]

I thought that this topic was supposed to focus on Pre-IB students!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Current Day pupils fees are c £13K for 11-13 year olds and £17K for 13-18.
Unlike your previous poster I do not believe that the Foundation should ever consider fee remission for day pupils.

Surely it is evolution that is needed not revolution.

I think a few folks need to look again at the school's mission statement.

[Antinous1]

I speak as someone who knows many local parents who would not send their child to a boarding school, (the idea of which is odd to the majority of people these days after all), but are very keen on CH as a day school.

That may well be true of local parents, but as the article here http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... cheme.html ,which is just one of several on the same subject that I've seen recently, shows there are clearly parents around the country unable to afford independent education who are interested in boarding for their children. I would guess from this that, although as you say elsewhere the 'market' for boarding places is smaller, there is still a demonstrable need for them.

CH is part of a very small provision in the Uk of decent boarding places for children who for whatever reason need that option but whose economic situation would normally preclude it. One of the very reasons that CH is able to appeal to these families is that when they come and look round the school they find it full of people from backgrounds like their own, and if you listen to conversations on the London train home after open days you will find that a major theme of them is that people thought the school would be posh and they and their children would feel out of place there, and they are relieved and encouraged to find that this is not so. Skew the current balance with an influx of day pupils from local prep schools and I can't help feeling that many parents from poorer backgrounds will end up feeling that CH is not for people like them. Lots of us are persuaded to apply to the school precisely because of the social, and for that matter ethnic mix, it represents, and I think that it would be a shame to see that go. The honest and unavoidable truth is that the more you fill the school with local kids from families who can afford the fees, and introduce lots of lovely parental visiting and participation from the parents of said children, then the more that you are creating 'poor cousins' out of those of us and our children who cannot, for reasons of finance and or distance, manage to join the party, and surely that is not what CH is meant to be about? Perhaps I am being unfairly pessimistic though and all those local day pupil parents who can actively involve themselves in the school on a daily basis will be busy fighting (as I would if I could) and fund-raising to protect the means-tested boarding places at the school, and not just pushing for more and more full-fee day places to become available!

No one seems to have answered the question about the IB students by the way.

Antinous

[ailurophile]

I can't help wondering whether Onewestguncopse might be a tad optimistic to believe that there's going to be a huge local demand for day places.

Howard H wrote:

Current Day pupils fees are c £13K for 11-13 year olds and £17K for 13-18.
Unlike your previous poster I do not believe that the Foundation should ever consider fee remission for day pupils.

These fees are fairly hefty, particularly for families with more than one child to consider, and even the affluent are likely to be looking for the best 'deal'. Many other independent schools attract parents by offering academic, musical and sporting scholarships - based on the pupils' performance and not means-tested - so it may be that CH will simply have to think about this in order to compete. In fact, haven't they already done this in the sixth form?

I guess only time will tell, but it will certainly be interesting to see how many day pupils are recruited over the next couple of years.

And meanwhile, nobody has answered my original question about Pre-IB students! Presumably the four German pupils are now in the school, does anyone with a child in the GE know how this is working?

[dinahcat]

There has been no official confirmation that the school will be offering IB to pupils unless I have missed it. Dr Wines is in charge of this course according to the listings in the school diary. I understand that he is supervising the German Pre IB students.That's all anyone knows.

[Mrs C.]

that there are 4 Germans on the GE is all I know I`m afraid

[Volupturaptor]

There has been no official confirmation that the school will be offering IB to pupils unless I have missed it. .

I have nothing in writing, but at the open day yesterday the headmaster did say it is on it's way...

[dinahcat]

I am supposing that if it affects us we will be told, which seems reasonable.

[Jane5]

My daughter is in GE and we were informed at her parents evening last yr that her yr is the 1st yr to be given the option of doing the IB. Therefore it will commence next Sep 2011

[J.R.]

that there are 4 Germans on the GE is all I know I`m afraid

"Don't mention the war. I did once, but I think I got away with it !!"

You can't beat a good line from 'Fawlty Towers' !

[onewestguncopse]

IB will arrive in 2011 barring some extraordinary turn of events. As with all new initiatives, it will take time to bed in and time for the pupil numbers to rise to their peak level. Personally, I think that the IB model is more attractive than the current AS/A2 model that is now fatally flawed as a result of grade inflation and dumbing down. Unless the Con/Lib change to A level is introduced (they plan to drop modules and possibly return to the old linear exam that most people did in the 1980s), the IB will slowly increase along with such alternatives as the Pre-U. Much depends on Michael Gove's plan.

Speaking as someone who knows the HE world well - the universities have given up on the A level as a bad exam. Hence the introduction of so many tests such as LNAT, BMAT, UKCAT, HAT .....

[onewestguncopse]

IB will arrive in 2011 barring some extraordinary turn of events. As with all new initiatives, it will take time to bed in and time for the pupil numbers to rise to their peak level. Personally, I think that the IB model is more attractive than the current AS/A2 model that is now fatally flawed as a result of grade inflation and dumbing down. Unless the Con/Lib change to A level is introduced (they plan to drop modules and possibly return to the old linear exam that most people did in the 1980s), the IB will slowly increase along with such alternatives as the Pre-U. Much depends on Michael Gove's plan.

Speaking as someone who knows the HE world well - the universities have given up on the A level as a bad exam. Hence the introduction of so many tests such as LNAT, BMAT, UKCAT, HAT .....

[dinahcat]

I wasn't aware that aware that Oxford and Cambridge had given up on A levels. I wish I had told my daughter before she set off for both this week only armed with four A grade AS levels .Oh dear.What will she do now that all is lost and no one thinks anything of her efforts to pass such weedy exams.Oh what a bad parent I am.I did not know that she should have gone to a school that did IB or Pre U. Woe is me.

[Mrs C.]

I wasn't aware that aware that Oxford and Cambridge had given up on A levels. I wish I had told my daughter before she set off for both this week only armed with four A grade AS levels .Oh dear.What will she do now that all is lost and no one thinks anything of her efforts to pass such weedy exams.Oh what a bad parent I am.I did not know that she should have gone to a school that did IB or Pre U. Woe is me.

dreadful parenting!!
(she`ll be fine!! As MAF and I told her last week!)

[dinahcat]

Thanks Mrs C. It really gets on my tonkers when students are undermined by constant references to whether this or that exam is easier or more difficult. The pupils can only do what they can with the exams they are given. The constant drivel about exams in the media is enough to send any pupil mad.If they do well then they are told the exams are too easy , if they do badly then they are lazy and the teachers are useless.
My daughter is off on the second lot of interviews and the support she has had from friends and staff has kept her going.She will cry and cry for a few days if she doesn't get an offer but that's understandable . She will pick herself up though and go on to the next thing and she has enjoyed herself and feels proud that she even got this far.She is holding her own( JR Pleeeease don't!) and that's all she can do.

[YadaYada]

I agree with all that you say about the exam system and really wish your daughter all the best. x