School of Hard Knocks

We are skint.

Long, long ago when we had savings and pensions, holidays and cleaners, we were in the privileged position, not so much to pay for our children to attend a newly founded independent primary school in the next town, as to pay for them not to attend our allocated state version in the next road.

This decision has been reinforced many times over by their passion for school, an evolving hunger and enjoyment at learning new topics and developing existing strengths, their strong confidence in their current abilities and an enthusiasm to attempt many subjects, sports or artistic efforts, regardless of their abilities.

As with many sole traders, other people’s recessionary measures have undermined my husband’s attempts to keep a strong credit balance in our bank accounts.  The cost of barely living rising quickly, our decision to educate our children privately has been much derided by our accountant and any of the lending institutions with whom we have attempted to build a pecuniary relationship.  All recoil from our attempts to ameliorate the situation once they are in possession of our school bills outgoings against our actual incomings.

With two children in consecutive years, there is no respite from the merciless burden of the school fees invoice, and we have been slowly reducing extra-ordinary expenses in order to meet the final demands.

As well as a million other mothers in the UK (I know this figure to be exact, as I have been told by several large employers ...  “Dear Mrs. Lane, Thank you for your application for shite-y job.  We were overwhelmed by the response from a million applicants and sadly we have been unable to look properly at your application at this time as we are now seeking a suitable employee to reply to the million applications.”), I am desperate to find the perfect job.  This, of course, used to be megabucks-earning Head of Something at Dynamo International, but my lack of extended family to support my primary employment as mother of two young children means my expectations are diminished and I must find something more parochial, school hours, term time only, in order that I can accommodate my family responsibilities.  My current salary expectations go hand-in-hand with the demands of my children, i.e. I will work for almost any ridiculously low salary if I can find something that fits in with the school timetable and the excruciatingly long and frequent holidays and thereby save outlaying extortionate childcare fees.

Constant on our minds is the capital we have in our London home.  It sometimes seems ridiculous to have so much equity in a house, which will only realize any of its potential if we up sticks and move hundreds of miles away from it.  Do we really have to move just to afford a better education for our children?

For my own part, instead of downsizing my house, aside from my small efforts to earn money, I have attempted to maintain what little we have by incrementally downgrading my lifestyle.  Gone are the Lady That Lunches restaurant bookings, the fortnightly pedicures, rich and luxurious unguents to smother my ageing skin.  Oh, Pampered Princess, wherefore art thou?  I have recently bought my body lotion from Sainsbury’s instead of Harvey Nichols, so it cannot be said that I am not doing my bit.

Our only beacon of hope is the recently opened West London Free School – it’s not until you pay school fees that you realize quite how much you would save if you didn’t pay them.

A river of promise flooded this part of West London and maybe some parts of North, South and East London too, when Toby Young and his fellow steering committee members announced they had signed their Funding Agreement to set up a free school in the area.  Early days yet, but glimpses of pupils in King Street and Ravenscourt Park, send shivers of anticipation and excitement at the opportunity for my children to wear the WLFS’s smart uniform and the opportunity for me to wear my own uniform of choice made entirely out of pieces-not-necessarily-found-in-every-High-Street-in-the-UK.

Could this be the answer to all our problems?  All of our problems?  Because, let’s face it, what could not be resolved by the restoration of our family’s middle-to-low income as opposed to just bus fare for Carey Street?  Do not all parents with children at great state schools live blissfully in love with their spouses, never arguing about whether the incredulously high heating bill in the winter will negate the warmth of a sunny holiday in the summer?  What couldn’t be achieved by expensive weekends in Mr &  Mrs Smith boutique hotels with bills being settled from full bank accounts? And which relationship not rejuvenated by the wife wearing expensive moisturizer again?

Don’t get me wrong.  It is NOT ALL ABOUT MONEY.  The primary reason we were reluctant to accept readily the local authority’s designated offering was driven by its new Head who reassured me that whilst the school had failed to reach a reasonable level in their recent OFSTED report for Literacy and Numeracy, I should satisfy myself that my 4-yr old Number One Son, who counted to 100 and could read basic words like cat, mat, hat, would surely be awarded a place on the school’s Gifted programme.  I am ashamed to admit this but when I heard “gifted”, I also heard “special” in the same breath, but not with the same warmth with which I greet Special Offer.  As much as I think my children are the most intelligent, confident, amusing, interesting children I could ever wish to spend my time with, gifted seems rather farfetched and I was adamant that my child would not be dozen-ed out merely on the basis that he was one of 12 children out of 60 in Reception Year who benefited from two English as a first-language parents, and thus the mere fact that he spoke fluent English was enough to make him conspicuous.

Unfortunately, our naivety at not attending services regularly over the previous four years also annihilated any chance of his attendance at a church school and so we were left with a school which had been our reluctant third choice or to look elsewhere.

The decision to go privately did not come lightly.  We had two children and only one proper income. My husband had attended several state schools across the world when his father was in the RAF and had managed a First in Chemistry before beginning a PhD at Oxford.  We flattered ourselves that we were bright, educated parents, who would easily support our children at a state school and we had looked forward to being part of the local school community.  But this was at the outstanding state school a few hundred yards from our home, or even perhaps at the other good state school less than a mile away.  All this was attenuated when reality came to visit and our son was not placed at either of our first choice schools.

In Kew, there are two schools opposite each other – one, Queen’s, a state funded church school and the other, Kew College, an independent.  Recently driving through at pick up time, a number of 4x4 and sports cars were parking in the street between the two schools.  What was interesting was that the parents, on alighting, turned towards the state school and not the independent.  Possibly, by not paying school fees, these families had income enough for high-end vehicles.

Of course, I am not so ignorant that I believe this to be the case for the majority of parents.  Just as not all fee-paying schools are populated with children whose parents are on the breadline paying the fees.  But why can’t all hard-working parents have our cake and eat some of it too?  Although there are many thousands of families who would not even consider a private education for their children as it is so far from their means, it does seem like a sacrifice for so many of us, that merely by living 100 yards too far from a good school, we should then have to consider spending thirty percent of our income on our children’s education.

Yes, children from independent schools get more attention from smaller class sizes, but they also have longer school holidays, which in turn means providing more childcare, whether by one of the parents or by paying someone else to look after their children whilst they are at work paying for the school fees.  Anecdotal evidence suggests that more women are working part-time just to countermand the holiday and afterschool childcare costs of sending their children to state school.  Can you imagine how much that increases when you are paying fees and childcare?

Statistically, fee-paying pupils come from comfortable homes with all mod cons and Ocado delivery shopping.  But not all of these children are from middle-class Stepford families.  There are divorces and deaths and siblings with disabilities across a wide spectrum of middle England – state schools do not get exclusivity when it comes to broken homes or living with terminal handicaps.  But most fee-paying parents provide good school and home support for the children and, naturally, this is reflected in their children’s education.  If you are paying for something you tend to support it wholeheartedly.  Not to say that state school parents are not one hundred percent behind their children, but our parents are in front of their children hammering at the door asking whether they are getting their money’s worth and kicking down the door if we feel we are not.  That is the benefit we buy from a private school and, at this level, when it is just a case of your child settling into their legal obligation to be educated, THAT IS IT.

There are no longer tax allowances for parents of independently schooled children or any financial incentives, but the very nature of some parents not sending their children to state schools means they are saving the country millions of pounds every year by the government not having to provide education, buildings and general care for them.  What would happen if the majority of independent schools closed and the local authorities had to accommodate over half a million extra pupils?

Why are there so many detractors from the new West London Free School or any similarly set up institution?  Why would anyone not want a really good school to open up which had places from families from any income bracket and offered a similar academic adhesion to that of private schools together with a real crack at social mobility for many families?  AND WAS FREE???  We must all try and live within the limits of our actual situation, but the opportunities arising from an aspirational education means that every now and then we are encouraged to tip toe out of those parameters and have the confidence to push those boundaries back a bit.

Don’t get me wrong, if I win the National Lottery or I somehow find out that despite both my parents being dead for many years now, that I have inherited more than strong calves and a strong stomach for cava, I will be applying at every independent secondary school across London and the South East of England.  The truth is that we need the Free School but even at its best, at this stage in its evolution, it cannot compete with some of the more established fee-paying schools available and, if I was to find myself rolling in money, I would take advantage of them.  But, the chances of us having more money than our house is worth are slim.  So I cross my fingers that we will make the WLFS allocation, and there is a chance that not only will our children receive a first class education, but perhaps by no longer paying out one-third of our net household income each year on school fees, we can begin to start saving for our future too.

Pericles said “what you leave behind is not what is engraved in stone monuments, but what is woven into the lives of others”.  I hope our children remember this when they look back at their heady childhood days and then look gratefully forward to subsidizing their aged parents who despairingly spent all of their pensions on their children’s education.

Port Plum Cream

Really quick, cheap, pudding for cheering yourself up on a ranting day.  Quantities depend on how miserable you are or if you decide to share with others - the pudding and the rant.  Increase as necessary.

4 plums – de-stoned and quartered

Good splash of port, say, 100mls

1 Cinnamon stick or teaspoon of powdered cinnamon

5 Cardamom pods

2 tablespoons of any kind of light brown sugar

300 mls Double Cream

150 mls Greek or Greek-style yoghurt

Put the plums, splash of port, sugar and cinnamon and cardamom into a pan and heat gently with a lid on until bubbling.  Leave to simmer until plums are soft through with a knife.  Leave to cool.  Remove the cinnamon stick if used and cardamom pods.

Whip double cream until consistency of Mr Whippy machine ice-cream.  Fold in the yoghurt and then fold in the fruit.

Chill until needed or if you are sharing, decant into pretty serving bowls first then chill.