NLCS vs Tiffin Girls

[lefol]

I agree with DAO and Amber and the sentiments raised by Finchley mum. Some of the boys at my ds indie have a false sense of superiority based on wealth and what I will call arrogance and not confidence . They acquire this unattractive characteristic from their parents and sometimes peers and you can see it when they become rude or talk about others including teachers in derogatory terms . I have always cautioned my ds and will continue to do so to make sure he does not become a spoilt brat. Comments such as lower end of social hierarchy is where the kids gets this type of behaviour from!

[eal238]

To be honest, in my experience its normally parents and pupils from the lower end of the social hierarchy who tend to be the most badly behaved at my son's football matches.

[Proud_Dad]

To be honest, in my experience its normally parents and pupils from the lower end of the social hierarchy who tend to be the most badly behaved at my son's football matches.

not sure what this has to do with NLCS? At any rate, whether NLCS, Habs or others, sometimes middle class parents can be (perhaps inadvertently) very offensive and generalise a bit more than is sensible. Your comment falls in this category.

I was just curious about the type of bad behaviour that Daogroupie said that he/she had observed from NLCS pupils and parents.

There are different types of bad behaviour.

When I think of the worst bad behaviour at children's sporting events which I've experienced I think of things like constant swearing and bad language, verbal abuse and initimidation of the referee and linesman, and an overtly aggressive attitude which can sometimes even verge on physical violence. All totally unacceptable behaviour, particularly in front of 10 year old children, but unfortunately from time to time it does occur.

And almost without exception this extreme bad behaviour tends to come from parents and pupils who would probably be described as lower working class. That isn't me being snobbish or generalising, its just a brutally honest observation, and I don't see any point in pretending otherwise, or trying to maintain that a "social hierarchy" doesn't exist in this country because it clearly does whether we like it or not. (Of course it goes without saying that not ALL working class people behave like that. Most are very pleasant and civilized, but the small minority who are badly behaved in that particular way do all tend to be from that social group in my experience)

So I was a bit surprised that Daogroupie seemed to be saying that the very worst behaved parents and pupils that they had come across at their childs sporting events came from one of the top independent girls schools becasue it didn't fit with my own experiences.

But perhaps Daogroupie was talking about a different "type" of bad behaviour and I just wondered what it involved. That's all.

[lefol]

I used to be quite naive and thought private schools are full of kids who do not swear or discuss girlfriends at age 11 , open doors for parents and behave prim and proper , but I quickly realised in my ds school , his friends school and others locally that when you check their BBM status, Facebook , overhear conversations , what's app etc, the language used is equivalent if not worst to those used across all schools and the behaviour is equally the same and the only difference is they can put on posh voices when appropriate ! Paying fees does not give you the kind of child we all aspire our kids to be. It has to start from the home and be reinforced in the home .

[shootmenow]

You'll find arrogant people in whatever school you choose. You meet a fair few who believe that they are morally superior for sending their DCs to the local comp 'so they'll learn to get along with everyone' and then regale you with their skiing trip to Gstaad. Or the ones who worked out the catchments for the partially selectives pre-conception and paid through the nose for their house- it only takes a few glasses of wine at a party to hear how much over the odds they paid. Or the ones who tutored their child to the point of exhaustion for super selectives and keep tutoring once they're in but pretend they've never heard of a Bond book. There are less than delightful DCs and parents in every school. My DCs and I just avoid the handful we've come across.

[Finchley mum]

Proud dad - I can see you are prefacing everything you say with "in my experience" which is good and of course your experiences are important and relevant to how you see the world. We are all the same that way. My experience would be the reverse of yours (ie constantly seeing privilege trying to maintain privilege and being absolutely ruthless in doing so - not so much in school setting but more in the business world) so for that reason, I would care less for poor language on the football pitch than those who through language and conduct try and maintain a (false) sense of superiority. So I agree with one of the previous posts here that there are many types of poor behaviour and we all have our personal experiences to determine which behaviours we believe are worse than others.

But to go back to the OP, you are very lucky to have a DD that give you this amazing choice and frankly, I don't think you can go wrong.

[London-Dad]

I would go NLCS...

It's academic results are fantastic...literally top or near-top on any measure you want + loads of great drama / music / sport etc
...and I don't recognise the behaviour described earlier in thread.

My daughter's school sends plenty to NLCS...and they are bright, pleasant hard-working girls.
Any group of teenage girls or boys can get a bit boisterous when they let their hair down...but I would say there is a calmer air of confidence (rather than arrogance) about NLCS pupils.

Some of the parents will be affluent North London residents...+ a few with more international background (European or US expats)....+ plenty of normal everyday parents...just wanting a great education for their DDs.

To nitpick... you might say that the school is slightly over-concerned about its image / brand etc.
It doesn't surprise me that they are pulling out of North London Consortium for exams.
This desire to manage the image of the school sometimes spreads to the parents...who can be very keen to talk up the school...but I honestly feel that it stems from genuine pride in the school rather than any attempt to mislead anyone...
As I have said many times in many threads....their academic results are fantastic... and I can appreciate that there is sometimes frustration that this is not more widely recognised outside North London (and sometimes even within North London)

[highwater]

Hmm. Some will say confident, some would say arrogant. We have a wide range of schools come and play our teams and some of the girls make a lot of loud derogatory comments which I know my dds would not dream of making in public Some of the parents also behave in a quite extraordinary manner. After 3.5 years of being forced to listen to this NLCS remain quite unrivalled champions. So if this is what being taught to be confident means give me HBS girls any day of the week. DG

I don't really understand this need to make sweeping derogatory generalisations about other schools in some kind of misguided attempt to promote the virtues of the school or sector you have chosen for your own children. Does it always have to degenerate into a some kind of battle between parents who are smug at having played the state-sector system in order to swerve paying fees for a high-quality education, against parents who are smug because they have chosen to pay fees in order to swerve the state sector?

NLCS and Tiffin are both excellent schools but I'm sure there are some less than perfect kids at both of them, as there are at all schools (except DAO it appears). Hopefully the OPs daughter won't be affected by them, or indeed be one of them.

[Amber]

Despite what some would have us believe, neither intelligence nor manners are income-related.

[future]

Despite what some would have us believe, neither intelligence nor manners are income-related.

The best and most sensible quote on this thread