What do you think?
Rate this book
Posh Boys: How English Public Schools Ruin Britain
Imagine a world where leaders are able to pass power directly to their children. These children are plucked from their nurseries and sent to beautiful compounds far away from all the other children. They are provided with all the teachers they need, the best facilities, doctors and food. Every day they are told this is because they are the brightest and most important children in the world.
Years later they are presented with the best jobs, the grandest houses and most of the money. Through their networks of friends and family they control the government, the courts, the army, the police and the country's finances. They claim everyone is equal, that each person has a chance to become a leader. But this isn't true. If such a world existed today wouldn't we say it was unfair, even corrupt?
With Posh Boys Robert Verkaik issues a searing indictment of the public school system and outlines how, through meaningful reform, we can finally make society fairer for all.
Years later they are presented with the best jobs, the grandest houses and most of the money. Through their networks of friends and family they control the government, the courts, the army, the police and the country's finances. They claim everyone is equal, that each person has a chance to become a leader. But this isn't true. If such a world existed today wouldn't we say it was unfair, even corrupt?
With Posh Boys Robert Verkaik issues a searing indictment of the public school system and outlines how, through meaningful reform, we can finally make society fairer for all.
400 pages, Paperback
Published August 13, 2019
147 people are currently reading
1240 people want to read
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 30 of 88 reviews
September 1, 2018
Posh Boys is a very brave effort to flag up the threat to British democracy through our perpetuation of the independent school system. Verkaik has researched his subject very well and has come up with a number of convincing arguments that make any reader squirm when realisation dawns of the insidious influence of the public school mafia is on British society.
Much of the material confirms suspicions that something unsavoury must be afoot to allow someone like that vile self-seeking buffoon Boris Johnson hold high office into UK. Our watered-down education system which sees 7% of the population receive a privileged education yet hoover up a majority of the most influential positions in the land is clearly at fault and leaves most folk out in the cold.
Posh Boys is an interesting book snd makes many points well but it's repetitive at times and occasionally strays off the point. Worth reading though.
David Lowther. Author of The Blue Pencil, Liberating Belsen, Two Families at War and The Summer of '39, all published by Sacristy Press.
Much of the material confirms suspicions that something unsavoury must be afoot to allow someone like that vile self-seeking buffoon Boris Johnson hold high office into UK. Our watered-down education system which sees 7% of the population receive a privileged education yet hoover up a majority of the most influential positions in the land is clearly at fault and leaves most folk out in the cold.
Posh Boys is an interesting book snd makes many points well but it's repetitive at times and occasionally strays off the point. Worth reading though.
David Lowther. Author of The Blue Pencil, Liberating Belsen, Two Families at War and The Summer of '39, all published by Sacristy Press.
March 24, 2021
To my friends’ boyfriends seeing this I say: sorry mate, nothing personal
January 5, 2020
This is a well researched and well written book which I picked up and decided to read after, let's face it a few years of Britain very obviously being messed up by ex-public school boys. As a liberal and largely an economic liberal in theory I should not have a problem with people being able to buy education; but that flies in the face of my egalitarian view that we should all have the equal start in life (and equal access to good health). Private schools the British disease, prolonging a class based system. For me it's not really ideology, the sum of our educational system would be better if these parents did not remove themselves from it. The other problem with the system is that it pushes less bright and less dynamic people higher up the management leadership chain. I much prefer to have someone on my team who has forged their own path through comp and university, maybe working to pay their way; than the spoon fed exec who just feels entitled to be there. Anyway, at the very least surely it is time to end the tax breaks, and charitable status.
September 18, 2018
This is a wonderfully provocative read. However once you sport one or two inaccuracies, you start to wonder what you can and cannot believe. I'm sorry Mr Verkaik's obsession with successful people who all went to public schools ended up making me believe the reverse of what he was trying to argue: I believe public schools educate to a high level of excellence that those who benefit deserve their success in life. I found it fascinating that that Verkaik could describe how everyone - on the left as much as on the right - wants the best for their own children ie a private education, despite charges of hypocrisy. This book made me feel that instead of public schools being the evil in our society, really we need to focus on how to improve state schools, so they can offer a similarly broad range of opportunities, excellent teaching and an absence of disruptive pupils. I think Mr Verkaik gets it wrong in suggesting 'only the rich' can buy a snobby education which gives them social connections that will benefit them for the rest of their lives. No, 'only the really talented and smart and hard working', no matter what school they went to, can get the professional qualifications that will benefit them for the rest of their lives. I don't believe an arbitrary notion of social justice, helping the very poorest, is valid grounds for doing away with schools that do a good job of educating those who are smart and ambitious.
January 7, 2024
First half was 4 stars, second half closer to 2. A really interesting book that made me think hard about the topic, but got a bit loose and scatty towards the end without a convincing conclusion.
The first half, particularly its recounting of the entire history of public schools, was fascinating. To see how the original purpose of public schools to help the poor in communities had been subverted by the rich, and how those rich groups worked so hard to preserve their interest in these sources of privilege over the subsequent centuries, did make me sad and exposed the unfairness of the current system from a few angles.
But unfortunately there was no convincing alternative for British education compared to the current state of play. Solutions seemed to focus far more on bringing the stick to private schools without bringing the carrot to the state system. I would have appreciated further research of state systems that have worked well in eg Finland, Sweden, Germany and for that to underpin solutions.
A very interesting read nonetheless - would recommend the first half strongly.
The first half, particularly its recounting of the entire history of public schools, was fascinating. To see how the original purpose of public schools to help the poor in communities had been subverted by the rich, and how those rich groups worked so hard to preserve their interest in these sources of privilege over the subsequent centuries, did make me sad and exposed the unfairness of the current system from a few angles.
But unfortunately there was no convincing alternative for British education compared to the current state of play. Solutions seemed to focus far more on bringing the stick to private schools without bringing the carrot to the state system. I would have appreciated further research of state systems that have worked well in eg Finland, Sweden, Germany and for that to underpin solutions.
A very interesting read nonetheless - would recommend the first half strongly.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
May 28, 2023
“Public schools breed networks, not communities.”
Verkaik explores the origins of the English public schools, he shows that it was actually the Romans who had introduced the idea of private education, but it was the founding of Eton in 1440, by Henry VI, its original intentions were worlds away from what it is today. It was set-up to educate the poor and give an opportunity to learn and thrive and progress beyond their background, but that soon changed when the land owning aristocracy forced changes to allow the rich to infiltrate and soon dominate and effectively steal yet another thing from the poor.
“Until 1870 cavalry and infantry officers secured rank in the British Army under the purchase system, for which no formal military education was required.” This led to the military becoming the plaything of the aristocracy, with Lord Cardigan, who led the disastrous Charge of the Light Brigade in the Crimean War paid the equivalent of £2 million in today’s money to purchase his commission.
“Official military discrimination against the recruitment of non-public school boys meant that in the first year of the war the British army was without the services of thousands of soldiers who later proved themselves to be excellent officers…the grammar school soldiers had a much better understanding of the men they led into battle.”
“Churchill and his generals made many tactical errors and only started winning after the Americans joined the war.”
He makes a great point in illustrating many of the military disasters, including the biggest capitulation in British military history at Singapore in 1942, which saw the surrender of 140’000 Allied personnel to less than 30’000 Japanese soldiers. Or the disaster that was Dunkirk, which left behind 68’000 troops and only managed to rescue 224’000 others due to a tactical blunder by Hitler. Both these and many others were thanks to the incompetence of the military men from the private schools of England, which led one former Wellington master to say, “If public schools are national assets because of their leadership and training qualities, what are we to think of those qualities when we survey the mess into which their leadership has brought us?”
What we see time and time again is simply the breath taking greed, arrogance and entitlement of the public school system, which is manifested time and time again in society at the expense of the majority. Just look at the culture of the Conservative government and those within in to get a clear idea of the vile specimens that have crawled out of these fetid, elitist swamps to leech even more from the tax payer to steal and hide away in their already bloated, private wealth funds.
The rich soon insisted around 1818 that it was about time the most elite schools on earth should be legible for charitable status and (presumably with a straight, possibly inbred face), they insisted that, “It was only their parents who were rich.” So public schools started off about helping the poor and needy but now exist to serve the interests of the rich. Sound familiar?...
“Almost all the notable engineers and inventors who made Britain’s industrial revolution did so outside the public school system.”
The English public school system was inextricably linked with empire and relentless in its promotion and enforcement of colonialism, which promoted the values embodied by so called, “muscular Christianity” (which may or may not be a gay porn sub-category?) and had little interest in ever questioning or challenging these accepted values as they were so drunk on their own self-delusion and self-importance forcing these beliefs onto millions of others throughout the world, through lies, torture, slavery and killing.
One tiny but telling example is with the case of one Major Edmund Musgrave Battelot, who along with James Sligo Jameson were bored and stranded somewhere in the African jungle, so
“Curious about the practice of cannibalism, they paid six silk handkerchiefs to purchase a young slave so they could witness the act first hand. The 10 year old girl they bought was tied to a tree, stabbed twice in the abdomen and bled to death. The cannibals then sliced meat from her. Jameson captured the ordeal in water colours which he exhibited among the column.”
Perhaps this is what the elite meant when they talked about bringing civilization to the natives throughout the colonies?...
Reflecting on some interesting facts Atlee’s 45 government who gave us the NHS and where only 25% of the cabinet were privately educated, compare that to Thatcher’s 79 cabinet, where 92% were privately educated and we know where that ended up. Elsewhere I was pretty shocked and disappointed to learn that so called left wing, anti-establishment figure Paul Weller, author of “Eton Rifles”, and former member of the Red Wedge movement sent all five of his kids to public school. Wow. That’s what you call a sell-out, or buying in?...
In 2001 the private schools got caught running a price-fixing cartel, when two students hacked into Winchester’s system and a total of fifty schools (also charities) had to pay fines totalling £3.5 million, although in reality each school only paid 10 grand and an ex gratia payment of £60,000 into an education to compensate the 40,000 pupils who’d attended during the time they found out about. The governors at Winchester later contacted the police to charge the two hackers who exposed their criminality and sacked two chaplains who took confessions without telling the school about them. Now imagine working class people committing the exact same crime?...How different do we think the outcome would have been?...
“Scotland provides us with a counter-example to England-a place with few public schools and much greater commitment to a national education system. The high level of literacy is Scotland by the end of the eighteenth century could only be matched in Switzerland and New England…Scottish universities committed substantial resources to bursaries and scholarships so that they could offer free places to impoverished students who showed talent or aptitude for learning.”
“Overall the annual tax saving for the public school charitable sector is well on the way to £2.5 billion, enough to build 100 state secondary schools.”
Verkaik explores the origins of the English public schools, he shows that it was actually the Romans who had introduced the idea of private education, but it was the founding of Eton in 1440, by Henry VI, its original intentions were worlds away from what it is today. It was set-up to educate the poor and give an opportunity to learn and thrive and progress beyond their background, but that soon changed when the land owning aristocracy forced changes to allow the rich to infiltrate and soon dominate and effectively steal yet another thing from the poor.
“Until 1870 cavalry and infantry officers secured rank in the British Army under the purchase system, for which no formal military education was required.” This led to the military becoming the plaything of the aristocracy, with Lord Cardigan, who led the disastrous Charge of the Light Brigade in the Crimean War paid the equivalent of £2 million in today’s money to purchase his commission.
“Official military discrimination against the recruitment of non-public school boys meant that in the first year of the war the British army was without the services of thousands of soldiers who later proved themselves to be excellent officers…the grammar school soldiers had a much better understanding of the men they led into battle.”
“Churchill and his generals made many tactical errors and only started winning after the Americans joined the war.”
He makes a great point in illustrating many of the military disasters, including the biggest capitulation in British military history at Singapore in 1942, which saw the surrender of 140’000 Allied personnel to less than 30’000 Japanese soldiers. Or the disaster that was Dunkirk, which left behind 68’000 troops and only managed to rescue 224’000 others due to a tactical blunder by Hitler. Both these and many others were thanks to the incompetence of the military men from the private schools of England, which led one former Wellington master to say, “If public schools are national assets because of their leadership and training qualities, what are we to think of those qualities when we survey the mess into which their leadership has brought us?”
What we see time and time again is simply the breath taking greed, arrogance and entitlement of the public school system, which is manifested time and time again in society at the expense of the majority. Just look at the culture of the Conservative government and those within in to get a clear idea of the vile specimens that have crawled out of these fetid, elitist swamps to leech even more from the tax payer to steal and hide away in their already bloated, private wealth funds.
The rich soon insisted around 1818 that it was about time the most elite schools on earth should be legible for charitable status and (presumably with a straight, possibly inbred face), they insisted that, “It was only their parents who were rich.” So public schools started off about helping the poor and needy but now exist to serve the interests of the rich. Sound familiar?...
“Almost all the notable engineers and inventors who made Britain’s industrial revolution did so outside the public school system.”
The English public school system was inextricably linked with empire and relentless in its promotion and enforcement of colonialism, which promoted the values embodied by so called, “muscular Christianity” (which may or may not be a gay porn sub-category?) and had little interest in ever questioning or challenging these accepted values as they were so drunk on their own self-delusion and self-importance forcing these beliefs onto millions of others throughout the world, through lies, torture, slavery and killing.
One tiny but telling example is with the case of one Major Edmund Musgrave Battelot, who along with James Sligo Jameson were bored and stranded somewhere in the African jungle, so
“Curious about the practice of cannibalism, they paid six silk handkerchiefs to purchase a young slave so they could witness the act first hand. The 10 year old girl they bought was tied to a tree, stabbed twice in the abdomen and bled to death. The cannibals then sliced meat from her. Jameson captured the ordeal in water colours which he exhibited among the column.”
Perhaps this is what the elite meant when they talked about bringing civilization to the natives throughout the colonies?...
Reflecting on some interesting facts Atlee’s 45 government who gave us the NHS and where only 25% of the cabinet were privately educated, compare that to Thatcher’s 79 cabinet, where 92% were privately educated and we know where that ended up. Elsewhere I was pretty shocked and disappointed to learn that so called left wing, anti-establishment figure Paul Weller, author of “Eton Rifles”, and former member of the Red Wedge movement sent all five of his kids to public school. Wow. That’s what you call a sell-out, or buying in?...
In 2001 the private schools got caught running a price-fixing cartel, when two students hacked into Winchester’s system and a total of fifty schools (also charities) had to pay fines totalling £3.5 million, although in reality each school only paid 10 grand and an ex gratia payment of £60,000 into an education to compensate the 40,000 pupils who’d attended during the time they found out about. The governors at Winchester later contacted the police to charge the two hackers who exposed their criminality and sacked two chaplains who took confessions without telling the school about them. Now imagine working class people committing the exact same crime?...How different do we think the outcome would have been?...
“Scotland provides us with a counter-example to England-a place with few public schools and much greater commitment to a national education system. The high level of literacy is Scotland by the end of the eighteenth century could only be matched in Switzerland and New England…Scottish universities committed substantial resources to bursaries and scholarships so that they could offer free places to impoverished students who showed talent or aptitude for learning.”
“Overall the annual tax saving for the public school charitable sector is well on the way to £2.5 billion, enough to build 100 state secondary schools.”
July 20, 2019
Though it is about 100 pages too long and repetitive in places, Verkaik’s main argument about public (elite private) British schools is not inaccurate: well insulated systems of power that are formed from a young age breed corruption.
Read
December 26, 2018This book is fascinating, but not without its flaws.
On the one hand, it made me aware of the roots of the UK's huge class division (which I was aware of but didn't know that much about) and the role education plays in it. It also made me think of the influence private schools have in my own country and propelled me to learn more about it.
On the other, the prose lacks dynamicity and the tone of the book shifts around too much. The subject Verkaik has chosen is complex and controversial and the ground he attempts to cover is enormous, which results in a messy structure and confusing timeline.
Also, reading some reviews, it seems there might be some factual inaccuracies, which worries me and I cannot really attest to. As someone who is not from the UK nor the EU, I understand I might not be the target demographic, but still it felt like too much information and name dropping in too narrow a space. Additionally, I had to google the differences between public/private/independent schools in the UK, which are kind of used interchangeably (or at least it seemed so to me) in the book and doesn't clarify the confusion of using public for private until too late in the book.
That said, this was thought-provoking and I liked that Verkaik dared to offer suggestions for change instead of just complaining. I don't know I fully agree with all his conclusions, but I still enjoyed having read this and I would revisit it in the future.
On the one hand, it made me aware of the roots of the UK's huge class division (which I was aware of but didn't know that much about) and the role education plays in it. It also made me think of the influence private schools have in my own country and propelled me to learn more about it.
On the other, the prose lacks dynamicity and the tone of the book shifts around too much. The subject Verkaik has chosen is complex and controversial and the ground he attempts to cover is enormous, which results in a messy structure and confusing timeline.
Also, reading some reviews, it seems there might be some factual inaccuracies, which worries me and I cannot really attest to. As someone who is not from the UK nor the EU, I understand I might not be the target demographic, but still it felt like too much information and name dropping in too narrow a space. Additionally, I had to google the differences between public/private/independent schools in the UK, which are kind of used interchangeably (or at least it seemed so to me) in the book and doesn't clarify the confusion of using public for private until too late in the book.
That said, this was thought-provoking and I liked that Verkaik dared to offer suggestions for change instead of just complaining. I don't know I fully agree with all his conclusions, but I still enjoyed having read this and I would revisit it in the future.
May 21, 2021
As expected, this book made me feel angry.
The stranglehold that the public school system has on western society ensures that power lies with the rich rather than the truly able.
The stranglehold that the public school system has on western society ensures that power lies with the rich rather than the truly able.
July 4, 2022
Full disclosure: I work at a Japanese elementary school with selective admission, though without annual fees.
I cannot truly say that I enjoyed Robert Verkiak's Posh Boys because much of it made me want to bash my Kindle against a wall. However, it is an important book dealing with the insidious issue of Britain's (and particularly England's) two tier education system. In fact, it might be more accurate to call it a three tier system. At the top, there are the toffs and the ultra-wealthy, who can expect all the help imaginable to get their children into the UK's top schools, usually through donations, contacts, or family connections to the school, regardless of the particular child's academic performance. Then there are the places available for the "best and brightest" of the rest. Those kids will have to perform at the absolute top level throughout their educational lives in order to simply sail in the wake of the titular posh boys. They will also have to learn to code switch away from the accents and mannerisms of their backgrounds, or face school life as an outsider, never really benefitting from the educational opportunity for which they have worked so hard. All the better to make sure that they are fully converted into the public school tent and compliant in the ongoing class war from on high. Then, there is literally everyone else, left to attend schools which are, for the most part, underfunded, understaffed, and overstretched. That the independent school system then sucks up so much in the way of government funding and gives so little back, despite the schools' charitable status, is an even bigger scandal.
Verkiak finishes his book by offering clear steps to remedy the situation and I concur with all of them. Where I disagree is in his optimism that there is political will on either side of Westminster to do anything at all about it. Yes, the likes of David Cameron, Theresa May, Michael Gove, and others have all made the right noises concerning reform but, ultimately, these are all people who have benefitted (and continue to benefit) from the system as it is, so the chances of action on any front seem very, very slim. The same exact logic applies to the Labour Party's overwhelmingly public school educated top brass. Sadly, this is not really an issue that English voters care about at the polls so it is not an issue that elected officials care about either.
I cannot truly say that I enjoyed Robert Verkiak's Posh Boys because much of it made me want to bash my Kindle against a wall. However, it is an important book dealing with the insidious issue of Britain's (and particularly England's) two tier education system. In fact, it might be more accurate to call it a three tier system. At the top, there are the toffs and the ultra-wealthy, who can expect all the help imaginable to get their children into the UK's top schools, usually through donations, contacts, or family connections to the school, regardless of the particular child's academic performance. Then there are the places available for the "best and brightest" of the rest. Those kids will have to perform at the absolute top level throughout their educational lives in order to simply sail in the wake of the titular posh boys. They will also have to learn to code switch away from the accents and mannerisms of their backgrounds, or face school life as an outsider, never really benefitting from the educational opportunity for which they have worked so hard. All the better to make sure that they are fully converted into the public school tent and compliant in the ongoing class war from on high. Then, there is literally everyone else, left to attend schools which are, for the most part, underfunded, understaffed, and overstretched. That the independent school system then sucks up so much in the way of government funding and gives so little back, despite the schools' charitable status, is an even bigger scandal.
Verkiak finishes his book by offering clear steps to remedy the situation and I concur with all of them. Where I disagree is in his optimism that there is political will on either side of Westminster to do anything at all about it. Yes, the likes of David Cameron, Theresa May, Michael Gove, and others have all made the right noises concerning reform but, ultimately, these are all people who have benefitted (and continue to benefit) from the system as it is, so the chances of action on any front seem very, very slim. The same exact logic applies to the Labour Party's overwhelmingly public school educated top brass. Sadly, this is not really an issue that English voters care about at the polls so it is not an issue that elected officials care about either.
August 17, 2020
Fascinating read, well researched and factual. Really demonstrated how much of a two tiered education system the UK has and the privilege children can carry through their lives from such a young age.
Systemic class apartheid is the emerging theme and an education system that is in need of reform. Education is not a ‘traded commodity’ and we should all be vested in change.
The charitable status of public schools should surely be of the utmost concern, not a dirty secret topic hidden away.
My head is spinning a little having been confronted with so many interesting and undeniable facts, so have no way near managed to highlight all the points. It was particularly pertinent to me as a privately educated student, the undeniable leg up independent schools can have versus state schools and therefore shattering the illusion of true meritocracy.
Systemic class apartheid is the emerging theme and an education system that is in need of reform. Education is not a ‘traded commodity’ and we should all be vested in change.
The charitable status of public schools should surely be of the utmost concern, not a dirty secret topic hidden away.
My head is spinning a little having been confronted with so many interesting and undeniable facts, so have no way near managed to highlight all the points. It was particularly pertinent to me as a privately educated student, the undeniable leg up independent schools can have versus state schools and therefore shattering the illusion of true meritocracy.
April 17, 2022
this was an immensely well-researched and well-crafted book addressing the fundamental question of how societies should educate their children. my biggest takeaway from this is that education is a social issue - and cannot be viewed in isolation from other entrenched interests, seen through the explanation of how british public schools result in the creation of tiered societies in the uk. definitely will come back to this book
September 11, 2022
I really enjoyed this book as it opened my eyes to a lot of the issues with public schools which manage to stay hidden from the general state-educated public. Slightly wordy at times but overall really informative.
April 22, 2025
I wish I had never read this
wish-list
June 17, 2019Published in paperback this July, #PoshBoys @robertverkaik1 is a searing indictment of public schools, the system originally intended to educate the most underprivileged Britons, and outlines how, through meaningful reform, we can finally make society fairer for all.
April 10, 2020
This book is quite an eye opener, even to a public school educated boy like me. It put a great deal of undesirable flesh on the bones of a system I thought I knew reasonably well.
The book is all about the way public schools dominate our modern English world. Truth of the matter is it isn't even the whole system it is just the elite schools within the public schools. Schools like mine, Malvern, were built to provide cannon fodder and administrators for the lower and middle ranks of the Raj in nineteenth century India or some other colony.
The author begins his thesis with a sixteenth century debate over the merits of educating poor children. For a while the side in favour came out on top, which led to the creation of a number of schools for poor children, now known as the public schools.
The rest of the book is the sad story about how that laudable plan to provide charitable schools which educated poor but able children for free, turned into an exclusive club for the rich and powerful.
Take Eton for example. It was not long before there were two classes of children at the school, the rich and the poor. The poor boys became the fags of the rich boys, being forced to perform all manner of menial tasks for them. This even extended to life after being at school.
By the time I went to school almost every child was fee paying. You began as a fag and stopped when you were older. When you became a prefect you had fags of your own. Sex was seldom demanded, but all kinds of menial chores like boot cleaning were. It was like an officer having a batman in the army.
Curiously, my step son became a scholar, free student Gordonstoun, Prince Charles, the prince of Wales school. My older daughter had an assisted (state supported) place at The Perse in Cambridge, a top private day school for girls. Their status was not abused by richer boys and girls as far as I can tell.
The book is worth reading as a history of how charitable schools for poor children turned into quite the opposite and how every attempt over centuries to reverse the process has been blocked by the powerful people who run the country.
Even Jeremy Corbyn comes from this rank in society. My friend Mr Benn is one of the few powerful people who sent his children to comprehensives.
The book claims to show how the schools have ruined the country. It picks up on a thesis that the brutality of the system ends up with men who are outwardly tough and confident, but inwardly stuck in childish narcissism. Johnson and Churchill are given as examples.
I am not sure the book succeeds in its claims. It works better as history.
It could have worked harder at establishing the point that if you only draw your leaders from a tiny elite of plutocrats down the generations you are bound to miss an abundance of talent which is bound to be discoverable among those not in the elite.
Do I owe my success in life to being a public school boy? I can never know. I have never used the old boy network. I did not even do that well in exams. But would I have done worse under less important teachers, one of whom was a friend of CS Lewis and Tolkein, another won Mastermind.
There was physical and sexual abuse in the system which has been all too big a part of the religious systems of this country, to which many of the schools are linked.
The book does not really decide whether the church screwed the schools or the schools fed into the abuse of the church. It seems to have worked both ways.
What is utterly clear is that the system id profoundly corrupt and in need of fundamental reform.
Maybe Covid 19 is the stimulus we need to begin to change this corruption at the heart of Government and education.
The book is all about the way public schools dominate our modern English world. Truth of the matter is it isn't even the whole system it is just the elite schools within the public schools. Schools like mine, Malvern, were built to provide cannon fodder and administrators for the lower and middle ranks of the Raj in nineteenth century India or some other colony.
The author begins his thesis with a sixteenth century debate over the merits of educating poor children. For a while the side in favour came out on top, which led to the creation of a number of schools for poor children, now known as the public schools.
The rest of the book is the sad story about how that laudable plan to provide charitable schools which educated poor but able children for free, turned into an exclusive club for the rich and powerful.
Take Eton for example. It was not long before there were two classes of children at the school, the rich and the poor. The poor boys became the fags of the rich boys, being forced to perform all manner of menial tasks for them. This even extended to life after being at school.
By the time I went to school almost every child was fee paying. You began as a fag and stopped when you were older. When you became a prefect you had fags of your own. Sex was seldom demanded, but all kinds of menial chores like boot cleaning were. It was like an officer having a batman in the army.
Curiously, my step son became a scholar, free student Gordonstoun, Prince Charles, the prince of Wales school. My older daughter had an assisted (state supported) place at The Perse in Cambridge, a top private day school for girls. Their status was not abused by richer boys and girls as far as I can tell.
The book is worth reading as a history of how charitable schools for poor children turned into quite the opposite and how every attempt over centuries to reverse the process has been blocked by the powerful people who run the country.
Even Jeremy Corbyn comes from this rank in society. My friend Mr Benn is one of the few powerful people who sent his children to comprehensives.
The book claims to show how the schools have ruined the country. It picks up on a thesis that the brutality of the system ends up with men who are outwardly tough and confident, but inwardly stuck in childish narcissism. Johnson and Churchill are given as examples.
I am not sure the book succeeds in its claims. It works better as history.
It could have worked harder at establishing the point that if you only draw your leaders from a tiny elite of plutocrats down the generations you are bound to miss an abundance of talent which is bound to be discoverable among those not in the elite.
Do I owe my success in life to being a public school boy? I can never know. I have never used the old boy network. I did not even do that well in exams. But would I have done worse under less important teachers, one of whom was a friend of CS Lewis and Tolkein, another won Mastermind.
There was physical and sexual abuse in the system which has been all too big a part of the religious systems of this country, to which many of the schools are linked.
The book does not really decide whether the church screwed the schools or the schools fed into the abuse of the church. It seems to have worked both ways.
What is utterly clear is that the system id profoundly corrupt and in need of fundamental reform.
Maybe Covid 19 is the stimulus we need to begin to change this corruption at the heart of Government and education.
November 4, 2019
I am one of a great many people in this country of mine who went to a state school. We were always, of course, aware of private schools. living where I do it is only a stone's throw to any of these places. The occasional game of rugby or football would bring them circling into our orbit. But with all this said I can't say I ever game it much thought to what they were experiencing alongside my own academic life. So at first glance, this book was always going to be an eye-opening experience for me. As is stated in the book for most people living outside of England the thought of us having a caste system. But that would be a huge mistake on any one's part. This is a book about how the other half lives. A side I would never have given much thought to when I was at school.
It would be all to easy to think that growing up rich will give you everything you ever wanted and live would be a dream. But as Verkaik show, being shipped off, often hundreds of miles from your family to go to school can do something altogether not pleasant to the way you think. And I would point out that I'm not saying everyone's experience of private school twisted them into little monsters. But the impression I got from this book is that a good many have. It seems to breed a certain way of looking not only at the world but of people who have never been part of there own. I suppose all you have to do is look at the state of British politics to realize this. All of our leaders went to private schools. It seems to me that it only allows them to think in the same way, even if they all claim different political allegiances. This is becoming ever more highlighted by our now general election. where their words may change, but the game they are running is so close it is hard to tell the differences.
For me, the author has set out a well throughout the book. He has tried his best to give an unbiased opinion as to how we came to be in the current situation we find our selves in. As is pointed out for reasons that stretch back a very, very long way the British people seem to have a blind spot when it comes to the rich elite. We seem to give them a pass time after time as they rip our country apart. I find it funny that people like Boris Johnson and Nigel Farage both claim to be for the poor and working classes yet have never lived a day on minimum wage or below the poverty line. How is it time and again we are fooled by these people? In part, the author manages to answer some of my questions and does a great job to cover a great deal of ground. I fear it is a subject that you could write so many books and articles about. But for his part, he has done a great job of getting across the message I think he set out to do. It is hard to see you are trapped in a closed system with not much hope of change from the inside. Just look at the London riots of two thousand and eleven does anyone really remember them now sidelined by our politicians with distractions and magic tricks.
There is a lot in this book that should seem obvious but until it's pointed out kind of exists in your side view. That little blind spot we all seem to have. It is also a book that is likely to make you a wee bit on the angry side. How we are on a daily basis pushed and pulled in the direction they want and one we think is of our own choosing. It's like those reality t.v scare programs when all is reviled you can't help but feel a wee bit stupid for not having seen it.
It would be all to easy to think that growing up rich will give you everything you ever wanted and live would be a dream. But as Verkaik show, being shipped off, often hundreds of miles from your family to go to school can do something altogether not pleasant to the way you think. And I would point out that I'm not saying everyone's experience of private school twisted them into little monsters. But the impression I got from this book is that a good many have. It seems to breed a certain way of looking not only at the world but of people who have never been part of there own. I suppose all you have to do is look at the state of British politics to realize this. All of our leaders went to private schools. It seems to me that it only allows them to think in the same way, even if they all claim different political allegiances. This is becoming ever more highlighted by our now general election. where their words may change, but the game they are running is so close it is hard to tell the differences.
For me, the author has set out a well throughout the book. He has tried his best to give an unbiased opinion as to how we came to be in the current situation we find our selves in. As is pointed out for reasons that stretch back a very, very long way the British people seem to have a blind spot when it comes to the rich elite. We seem to give them a pass time after time as they rip our country apart. I find it funny that people like Boris Johnson and Nigel Farage both claim to be for the poor and working classes yet have never lived a day on minimum wage or below the poverty line. How is it time and again we are fooled by these people? In part, the author manages to answer some of my questions and does a great job to cover a great deal of ground. I fear it is a subject that you could write so many books and articles about. But for his part, he has done a great job of getting across the message I think he set out to do. It is hard to see you are trapped in a closed system with not much hope of change from the inside. Just look at the London riots of two thousand and eleven does anyone really remember them now sidelined by our politicians with distractions and magic tricks.
There is a lot in this book that should seem obvious but until it's pointed out kind of exists in your side view. That little blind spot we all seem to have. It is also a book that is likely to make you a wee bit on the angry side. How we are on a daily basis pushed and pulled in the direction they want and one we think is of our own choosing. It's like those reality t.v scare programs when all is reviled you can't help but feel a wee bit stupid for not having seen it.
August 21, 2018
Illuminating.
April 5, 2019
Eton mess: are public schools a jolly anachronism or fundamentally evil, as Robert Verkaik argues (spoiler alert!)? My father (J. Clarke ii, Bedford 1942-7) appeared to learn little more than a love for cricket, a few scurrilous songs and a fondness for incredibly stodgy food at his. Of course he got to Cambridge later so all was not lost, but based on this familial experience - and To Serve Them All My Days/Best Days Of Your Life on telly, and the Jennings stories which Dad got me reading - I could never quite see them as anything other than comically outmoded and fit for the scrap heap.
However, nothing’s funny in the era of Brexit - even satire seems to have been euthanised - and this is a pretty powerful plea for a mercy killing. If the author sometimes comes on as a finger-pointing Trot heckling one in the Arndale Centre (jacket with elbow patches, insanitary beard, a flume of spittle), his anger may be justified. After a brief equinox in the 60s and 70s, social mobility has gone into reverse in the last 30 years, and it is his view that the tax avoiding, social responsibility dodging, charitable bastions of education for the scions of the ultra-rich and privileged are to blame.
If their job is to incubate generations of leaders suited to the task in politics, business, the military and the professions, then they have failed us down the years. From wartime:
“Few historians believe that the Nazis or Japanese would have been defeated if the Americans had left Britain to fight on alone with its depleted resources marshalled by an out-of-touch officer class.”
to modern times:
“...one of [George] Osborne’s favourite responses to political trouble was ‘oh look, it’s all a game.’ For those who have been educated at Eton or St Paul’s, that rings true. The trouble is the stakes are so much higher when you are playing with people’s jobs and families.”
and on to the devisive political stew of our own day. A blistering indictment of how Nigel Farage’s nasty schoolboy antics show he has scarcely grown up, from a contemporary at Dulwich - and his old school won’t have him back. Indeed in summing up the current shitshow:
“The whole story of Brexit can be told without reference to anyone educated in the state sector, from the eurosceptics building their movement to the prime minister who promised a referendum to stave off rebels in his own party, to both the remain and two leave campaigns. Even the phrase ‘take back control’ was formulated by a canny privately educated strategist. It begs the question: who was wresting control, and from whom?”
If it’s their job to educate our masters then they’ve not done it very well, have they?
However, nothing’s funny in the era of Brexit - even satire seems to have been euthanised - and this is a pretty powerful plea for a mercy killing. If the author sometimes comes on as a finger-pointing Trot heckling one in the Arndale Centre (jacket with elbow patches, insanitary beard, a flume of spittle), his anger may be justified. After a brief equinox in the 60s and 70s, social mobility has gone into reverse in the last 30 years, and it is his view that the tax avoiding, social responsibility dodging, charitable bastions of education for the scions of the ultra-rich and privileged are to blame.
If their job is to incubate generations of leaders suited to the task in politics, business, the military and the professions, then they have failed us down the years. From wartime:
“Few historians believe that the Nazis or Japanese would have been defeated if the Americans had left Britain to fight on alone with its depleted resources marshalled by an out-of-touch officer class.”
to modern times:
“...one of [George] Osborne’s favourite responses to political trouble was ‘oh look, it’s all a game.’ For those who have been educated at Eton or St Paul’s, that rings true. The trouble is the stakes are so much higher when you are playing with people’s jobs and families.”
and on to the devisive political stew of our own day. A blistering indictment of how Nigel Farage’s nasty schoolboy antics show he has scarcely grown up, from a contemporary at Dulwich - and his old school won’t have him back. Indeed in summing up the current shitshow:
“The whole story of Brexit can be told without reference to anyone educated in the state sector, from the eurosceptics building their movement to the prime minister who promised a referendum to stave off rebels in his own party, to both the remain and two leave campaigns. Even the phrase ‘take back control’ was formulated by a canny privately educated strategist. It begs the question: who was wresting control, and from whom?”
If it’s their job to educate our masters then they’ve not done it very well, have they?
January 30, 2022
Interesting and deeply researched, but the writing isn't good and the author sometimes forgets what his purpose is: is it telling a factually accurate history of public (private) schools, making an objective policy recommendation, or going on an ideological tirade? He likes to indulge in speculative character assassination of people who happened to have gone to public schools; for example, he makes the entirely unfounded allegation that General Gordon was a paedophile, which has no relevance to his argument, and later makes the bizarre, pseudo-Freudian claim that many public schoolboys are misogynists because they subconsciously blame their mothers for sending them to boarding school.
The most interesting takeaway was just how dominant ex-public schoolboys are in British public life, which the author highlights by telling the history of recent events (Brexit, the rise and fall of Corbyn, etc) using only the names of ex-public schoolboys and the schools they went to. Incredibly, the reader hardly notices the absence of state-educated figures since so few were involved. To his credit, he doesn't spare either Left or Right and points out the hypocrisy of politicians who publicly condemned private schools while sending their own children to them.
One area that I found missing was discussion of grammar schools and the role their abolition played in strengthening private education over the past few decades. It is a point often missed in public debate that state-educated grammar school pupils used to dominate Oxbridge admissions, before the abolition of academic selection in the state sector knocked down this ladder for social advancement and left only the paltry stock of private school scholarships and bursaries to fulfill the same role. This to me seems a tremendous own-goal. Sadly, re-establishing grammar schools and competiting with the private schools directly doesn't seem to be on the political agenda. In the meantime, I suspect that public schools and their modern counterpart, private tutoring (which is also hardly mentioned), will play an ever larger role in British education.
The most interesting takeaway was just how dominant ex-public schoolboys are in British public life, which the author highlights by telling the history of recent events (Brexit, the rise and fall of Corbyn, etc) using only the names of ex-public schoolboys and the schools they went to. Incredibly, the reader hardly notices the absence of state-educated figures since so few were involved. To his credit, he doesn't spare either Left or Right and points out the hypocrisy of politicians who publicly condemned private schools while sending their own children to them.
One area that I found missing was discussion of grammar schools and the role their abolition played in strengthening private education over the past few decades. It is a point often missed in public debate that state-educated grammar school pupils used to dominate Oxbridge admissions, before the abolition of academic selection in the state sector knocked down this ladder for social advancement and left only the paltry stock of private school scholarships and bursaries to fulfill the same role. This to me seems a tremendous own-goal. Sadly, re-establishing grammar schools and competiting with the private schools directly doesn't seem to be on the political agenda. In the meantime, I suspect that public schools and their modern counterpart, private tutoring (which is also hardly mentioned), will play an ever larger role in British education.
December 22, 2019
It's a sprawling, messy book that is too unaware of its own omissions - discussions of gender, boarding/ separation from home, private tutoring and psychological impact fall almost entirely by the wayside, unless it's within the context of sexual abuse (and it's hard to see what point was being made by that chapter, or where sympathies really lay). At times it reads like one of the more genealogical sections of the Old Testament - the writer makes a point to indicate how many high ranking people in politics and the law went to certain schools, but they could have equally pointed out the universities that they'd attended, or that they were almost all men. One of the larger omissions comes with the discussion of the Oxford PPE and the various politicians and journalists who have taken that course - the argument doesn't pause to consider that maybe it's the plucking of people from such a small pool that's the problem. Oxford and Cambridge, as is so often the case in these types of discussions, remain beyond reproach - the only problem in the writer's eyes is that parents can pay to increase their children's chances of admission. That's a problem, of course, but the problems go much wider, and it's disappointing that this book, for all its breadth of research, doesn't go into questions of causality and culture, such as why people keep voting for people like Boris Johnson. The book too often falls back onto glib references to contemporary characters that are already outdated at the time of reading. I happen to agree, mostly, with the book's conclusion, but it's hard to see how the conclusion follows from much of what was written before.
November 20, 2019
Robert Verkaik has a huge bone to pick with the public school system.
He starts with the origin story of public schools to show how corrupted the purpose of public schools has been (and why it’s gone on to confuse everyone else around the world why Public schools in Britain refer to the most exclusive schools).
Unfortunately, the people whose bones he pick will be unfamiliar if the reader does not closely follow British politics and understand how British government works.
At the same time, this understanding is not necessary as Verkaik will go on to expand how British public schools have expanded into global franchises, and how other countries have sought to mimic the public school system and the reader will inevitably be able to draw parallels with schools they have heard of; people they know who benefit from the old-chum network, perhaps not as much as the David Camerons and Boris Johnsons but enough.
Verkaik also touches briefly on how private education segregated a community, aggravates the class gap, disenfranchises the majority working class that ends up voting demagogues to power because they have been left out of the loop. It’s not a line I have read drawn before despite the many op-eds about authoritarianism and strongmen ever since Brexit, Trump, Xi Jin Ping’s promotion to leader for life, etc. etc.
Verkaik makes very good points. Yet, if he had made his points more succinctly, or with more wit, and with less tonal shifts, this might have been a better book. A definite recommended read if you would like to understand better the class war in GB.
He starts with the origin story of public schools to show how corrupted the purpose of public schools has been (and why it’s gone on to confuse everyone else around the world why Public schools in Britain refer to the most exclusive schools).
Unfortunately, the people whose bones he pick will be unfamiliar if the reader does not closely follow British politics and understand how British government works.
At the same time, this understanding is not necessary as Verkaik will go on to expand how British public schools have expanded into global franchises, and how other countries have sought to mimic the public school system and the reader will inevitably be able to draw parallels with schools they have heard of; people they know who benefit from the old-chum network, perhaps not as much as the David Camerons and Boris Johnsons but enough.
Verkaik also touches briefly on how private education segregated a community, aggravates the class gap, disenfranchises the majority working class that ends up voting demagogues to power because they have been left out of the loop. It’s not a line I have read drawn before despite the many op-eds about authoritarianism and strongmen ever since Brexit, Trump, Xi Jin Ping’s promotion to leader for life, etc. etc.
Verkaik makes very good points. Yet, if he had made his points more succinctly, or with more wit, and with less tonal shifts, this might have been a better book. A definite recommended read if you would like to understand better the class war in GB.
April 5, 2020
Public schools: “Anachronistic institutions of inequality which no longer serve the nation’s best interests.”
“Education is the passport to the future,” with some of us having more powerful passports than others and granted more travelling rights than the majority of those with whom we share a society. Robert Verkaik exposes the injustice of the existence of public schools and their role in perpetuating inequality and what this means for the fabric of our society.
Verkaik begins the biography of the public school with its genesis: public schools were originally founded to educate the poorest and most disadvantaged in society, hence the name “public”, as there was no financial barrier to entry. The name has now become a misnomer and whilst public (i.e. private) schools were intended to be philanthropic institutions, they became hijacked by the elite and their initial raison d'être was perverted. They are now instruments of social apartheid, gaining their denizens the best outcomes in life, the best jobs, the highest salaries and the highest positions in power, which they then pass onto their children, ad nauseaum.
Before Britain became a global superpower, leaders and politicians were already being plucked from a handful of elite schools. The conditions of public schools were bad, with pupils outnumbering teachers at ratios that meant that students had far more control than their teachers and rebelled regularly and sometimes violently. Verkaik posits that the British empire was constructed and maintained by public school boys who waged war, wrought havoc and subdued those who wished to defy them, much as their teachers had done to them during their public school days. One master of Eton wrote that the First World War “could be seen as public schoolboys’ war, fought to preserve an imperial system which had been good for public schools but not for the working classes.” It is worrying that the Nazis looked across the Channel admiringly at Britain’s public schools, intending to send their children there once the war had been won. Winston Churchill noted bitterly the inequalities perpetuated by private education and wanted to widen attendance of public schools to be filled by “bursary boys” (i.e. those who were bright but could not afford the fees) and Verkaik states “what is sometimes framed today as a Trotskyite plot by a lunatic fringe of the Labour Party was once considered Conservative common sense.”
Some advocates of private education argue that fee-paying parents are saving the state money by having their children privately educated - at their own expense, but this view was shot down by the Newson Commission:
“We are not impressed by the argument sometimes heard that parents paying school fees are paying twice for their children’s education- once through fees and again through rates and taxes for the maintained schools which they are not using. Every taxpayer and ratepayer contributes towards public services, whether he or she uses them or not. Fee-paying parents are, in this respect, in no different situation from single people or married couples without children.”
Public schools benefit from state subsidies and teachers who have been educated at the expense of the state through university tuition fees and those who have trained at state schools but been poached to work for private schools. Public schools cost the state far more than they save them and stripping schools of their charitable status would provide £2.5 billion, enough for 100 new state schools, claims Verkaik. VAT exemption on school fees allow parents to secure the best future for their children at a 20% discount, money that could help narrow the gap in attainment between state schooled and privately schooled students. Private schools should be stripped of their charitable status, as it means that they pay less tax as a result, “yet state schools, which are not charities, and do not receive fee incomes, [end up paying] the full rate.” If private schools were made to pay business rates, then this would mean more money for the treasury that could be made available for state schools. Donations to charity schools also benefit from gift aid savings, meaning that contributions can be boosted by 20%.
The very bastions of power are populated by public schoolboys and Verkaik names entire cabinets and governments that are majority public-schooled, despite the fact that only 7% of students attend public school. And yet, the majority of politicians in power, editors of prestigious newspapers, prominent journalists, top judges and lawyers derive from this 7%. This bodes badly for our society when the laws are designed by a privileged elite, when current affairs are written about and reported by the elite and other people in positions of power are elected by the elite and work for the elite.
Verkaik criticises Corbyn and Labour for having so many privately educated MPs and then uses the example of the Scottish Labour Party leadership elections in 2017 in which there was only a choice of two privately educated candidates. An odd example considering that he had spent pages noting that entire Conservative cabinets were almost entirely private schooled. He makes the point that it is unfair to blame privately educated adults for their parents’ choices (agreed) and says that rather parents should be held accountable for sending their children to private schools. In an interesting twist, he then blames Corbyn and McDonnel for their private education and neglects to mention Corbyn’s stance against selective education, being so opposed to it, that he separated from his wife over sending his son to a grammar school.
Private schools are vulnerable to money laundering and criminals have used their illegal wealth to pay private school tuition fees. Insufficient checks on the source of parents’ wealth means that public schools are a black hole in the anti-money laundering system and escape the scrutiny which businesses are subjected to. This loophole needs to close.
Girls’ private schools have a harder time raising funds from alumnae and Barnaby Lenon attributes this to “women not having the glittering careers as the men have had,” espousing an opinion that seems to have originated at the same time as the foundation of public schools in the medieval period; he and the author neglect to mention the effect of the gender pay gap, discrimination against women, bias in the workplace and the glass ceiling that women slam against to reach top positions. Incidentally, Barnaby Lenon is the former headmaster of one of Britain’s most notorious charities: Harrow and taught for a number of years at another notorious charity, Eton. In completely unrelated facts, he attended a private school and subsequently attended both Oxford and Cambridge University and was awarded a CBE for his services to education, as he is currently the chairman of the Independent Schools Council, i.e. an institution designed to further the interests of private schools in Britain. I can just see him brushing the “glittering” shards of glass off his shoulders, whilst blaming the struggling status of Britain’s private girls schools on the alumni themselves and not the glass ceiling that he is responsible for reinforcing and making bulletproof. Note that all private schools, regardless of the gender of their alumnae and their generosity, are struggling to raise donations.
Verkaik argues that “from a free market perspective, it makes little sense for public schools to invest resources into making competitor state schools better so that the parents will no longer need to educate their children privately.” So rather than expecting public schools to help state schools (or threaten them with losing their charitable statuses) Verkaik ultimately argues for abolition of state schools. Amanda Spielman, the chief inspector of schools for Ofsted, unashamedly sends her own children to private school, with Verkaik noting that “if there’s a job in the public sector where a commitment to state education is a prerequisite, surely it is the one where you go around the country telling state school heads how to run their schools.” How little faith she clearly places in the state school system and how little she must be vested in the improvement of state schools, if her own children don’t attend them. The same could be said of our politicians and others in power; if they remove their children from the fray and educate them independently of the state, then they will have no motivation to improve conditions for everyone else.
Notable quotes:
Nick Clegg, private schools produce a “two-tier education system [and] a two-tier society [...] a plutocracy, in which a tiny minority is able to entrench its power and privilege.”
“Radical reform would mean curtailing the right of a parent to pay for their child’s education. But what about the rights of the overwhelming majority of children who can’t afford to attend public schools?”
“As a society, do we prioritise the right for individuals to educate their child as they wish (a phantom right for most people, given that fees are not an option), or the right of every child, including the poorest, to an even start? It is not the child’s money that is spent on fees; no child has earned the right to a better education, just as no child has failed to earn that right.”
“If you are born poor in Britain, the chances are that you will die poor. Millions of people will go to their graves, never knowing that there are charities called Eton, Harrow and Charterhouse whose sole purpose is to improve the lives of [...] children.”
“Education is the passport to the future,” with some of us having more powerful passports than others and granted more travelling rights than the majority of those with whom we share a society. Robert Verkaik exposes the injustice of the existence of public schools and their role in perpetuating inequality and what this means for the fabric of our society.
Verkaik begins the biography of the public school with its genesis: public schools were originally founded to educate the poorest and most disadvantaged in society, hence the name “public”, as there was no financial barrier to entry. The name has now become a misnomer and whilst public (i.e. private) schools were intended to be philanthropic institutions, they became hijacked by the elite and their initial raison d'être was perverted. They are now instruments of social apartheid, gaining their denizens the best outcomes in life, the best jobs, the highest salaries and the highest positions in power, which they then pass onto their children, ad nauseaum.
Before Britain became a global superpower, leaders and politicians were already being plucked from a handful of elite schools. The conditions of public schools were bad, with pupils outnumbering teachers at ratios that meant that students had far more control than their teachers and rebelled regularly and sometimes violently. Verkaik posits that the British empire was constructed and maintained by public school boys who waged war, wrought havoc and subdued those who wished to defy them, much as their teachers had done to them during their public school days. One master of Eton wrote that the First World War “could be seen as public schoolboys’ war, fought to preserve an imperial system which had been good for public schools but not for the working classes.” It is worrying that the Nazis looked across the Channel admiringly at Britain’s public schools, intending to send their children there once the war had been won. Winston Churchill noted bitterly the inequalities perpetuated by private education and wanted to widen attendance of public schools to be filled by “bursary boys” (i.e. those who were bright but could not afford the fees) and Verkaik states “what is sometimes framed today as a Trotskyite plot by a lunatic fringe of the Labour Party was once considered Conservative common sense.”
Some advocates of private education argue that fee-paying parents are saving the state money by having their children privately educated - at their own expense, but this view was shot down by the Newson Commission:
“We are not impressed by the argument sometimes heard that parents paying school fees are paying twice for their children’s education- once through fees and again through rates and taxes for the maintained schools which they are not using. Every taxpayer and ratepayer contributes towards public services, whether he or she uses them or not. Fee-paying parents are, in this respect, in no different situation from single people or married couples without children.”
Public schools benefit from state subsidies and teachers who have been educated at the expense of the state through university tuition fees and those who have trained at state schools but been poached to work for private schools. Public schools cost the state far more than they save them and stripping schools of their charitable status would provide £2.5 billion, enough for 100 new state schools, claims Verkaik. VAT exemption on school fees allow parents to secure the best future for their children at a 20% discount, money that could help narrow the gap in attainment between state schooled and privately schooled students. Private schools should be stripped of their charitable status, as it means that they pay less tax as a result, “yet state schools, which are not charities, and do not receive fee incomes, [end up paying] the full rate.” If private schools were made to pay business rates, then this would mean more money for the treasury that could be made available for state schools. Donations to charity schools also benefit from gift aid savings, meaning that contributions can be boosted by 20%.
The very bastions of power are populated by public schoolboys and Verkaik names entire cabinets and governments that are majority public-schooled, despite the fact that only 7% of students attend public school. And yet, the majority of politicians in power, editors of prestigious newspapers, prominent journalists, top judges and lawyers derive from this 7%. This bodes badly for our society when the laws are designed by a privileged elite, when current affairs are written about and reported by the elite and other people in positions of power are elected by the elite and work for the elite.
Verkaik criticises Corbyn and Labour for having so many privately educated MPs and then uses the example of the Scottish Labour Party leadership elections in 2017 in which there was only a choice of two privately educated candidates. An odd example considering that he had spent pages noting that entire Conservative cabinets were almost entirely private schooled. He makes the point that it is unfair to blame privately educated adults for their parents’ choices (agreed) and says that rather parents should be held accountable for sending their children to private schools. In an interesting twist, he then blames Corbyn and McDonnel for their private education and neglects to mention Corbyn’s stance against selective education, being so opposed to it, that he separated from his wife over sending his son to a grammar school.
Private schools are vulnerable to money laundering and criminals have used their illegal wealth to pay private school tuition fees. Insufficient checks on the source of parents’ wealth means that public schools are a black hole in the anti-money laundering system and escape the scrutiny which businesses are subjected to. This loophole needs to close.
Girls’ private schools have a harder time raising funds from alumnae and Barnaby Lenon attributes this to “women not having the glittering careers as the men have had,” espousing an opinion that seems to have originated at the same time as the foundation of public schools in the medieval period; he and the author neglect to mention the effect of the gender pay gap, discrimination against women, bias in the workplace and the glass ceiling that women slam against to reach top positions. Incidentally, Barnaby Lenon is the former headmaster of one of Britain’s most notorious charities: Harrow and taught for a number of years at another notorious charity, Eton. In completely unrelated facts, he attended a private school and subsequently attended both Oxford and Cambridge University and was awarded a CBE for his services to education, as he is currently the chairman of the Independent Schools Council, i.e. an institution designed to further the interests of private schools in Britain. I can just see him brushing the “glittering” shards of glass off his shoulders, whilst blaming the struggling status of Britain’s private girls schools on the alumni themselves and not the glass ceiling that he is responsible for reinforcing and making bulletproof. Note that all private schools, regardless of the gender of their alumnae and their generosity, are struggling to raise donations.
Verkaik argues that “from a free market perspective, it makes little sense for public schools to invest resources into making competitor state schools better so that the parents will no longer need to educate their children privately.” So rather than expecting public schools to help state schools (or threaten them with losing their charitable statuses) Verkaik ultimately argues for abolition of state schools. Amanda Spielman, the chief inspector of schools for Ofsted, unashamedly sends her own children to private school, with Verkaik noting that “if there’s a job in the public sector where a commitment to state education is a prerequisite, surely it is the one where you go around the country telling state school heads how to run their schools.” How little faith she clearly places in the state school system and how little she must be vested in the improvement of state schools, if her own children don’t attend them. The same could be said of our politicians and others in power; if they remove their children from the fray and educate them independently of the state, then they will have no motivation to improve conditions for everyone else.
Notable quotes:
Nick Clegg, private schools produce a “two-tier education system [and] a two-tier society [...] a plutocracy, in which a tiny minority is able to entrench its power and privilege.”
“Radical reform would mean curtailing the right of a parent to pay for their child’s education. But what about the rights of the overwhelming majority of children who can’t afford to attend public schools?”
“As a society, do we prioritise the right for individuals to educate their child as they wish (a phantom right for most people, given that fees are not an option), or the right of every child, including the poorest, to an even start? It is not the child’s money that is spent on fees; no child has earned the right to a better education, just as no child has failed to earn that right.”
“If you are born poor in Britain, the chances are that you will die poor. Millions of people will go to their graves, never knowing that there are charities called Eton, Harrow and Charterhouse whose sole purpose is to improve the lives of [...] children.”
June 8, 2022
A missed opportunity. I found the initial chapters of the book full of new (to me) and relevant information, in this case tracing the history of private education in the UK. After that I found the book directionless and clichéd, adding little for anyone with a basic familiarity with the issue and mostly just regurgitating familiar arguments. While the book doesn't claim to cover Britain's whole education system rather just private schooling, I would nevertheless have appreciated more in-depth comparison between the private system and other schooling streams in the UK as well as the UK's international peers. Everyone who's heard of British private schools knows their students get most of the best jobs, etc., but how different is their underlying academic performance and why? The book also fails to address the issue of these schools' (often ludicrous) costs beyond the fact that these high costs exist. What do they spend all that money on and how does it differ from spending in state schools? The author tells us there's money involved but fails to do the basic thing and follow it. All in all, feels very much like a book on the outside looking in that doesn't add much new information or perspective for anyone not completely ignorant of the topic.
December 1, 2020
Could be condensed and presented a bit better but did contain some thought provoking points.
July 24, 2021
Poorly researched.
Started with the conclusion & tried hopelessly to justify. Poorly written.
Started with the conclusion & tried hopelessly to justify. Poorly written.
June 16, 2021
As a product and then an employee of private education, I found this interesting in that it confirmed my misgivings about the system. Robert Verkaik certainly addresses some characteristics often associated with public schools - the arrogance, the presumptuousness, the sense of entitlement, of being above the law, for example. I never liked or admired these qualities, still don’t, hope I grown out of them, and hope I actively challenged them – alas, usually too indignantly to obviate the activation of the standard defence of inattentiveness. Nevertheless, I have to acknowledge that simply by teaching in the system I was in effect supporting the continuation of such undesirable characteristics.
My inclinations were (and are) for the arts and the gentler side of life, and, in this respect, during my career I came across many good, and often very tender souls who were not, and have not, I think ruined Britain. Nevertheless, there is small doubt that their attending a private school, with its appropriate and well-funded arts facilities, gave them easy access to drama, music, dance, film, creative writing and fine art. There was no reason they should not have done well in arts professions thereafter, and indeed many have. There is thus a chasm between the opportunities available in the arts between privately and state educated children, and, using statistics, Verkaik points this out, together with the relative ease with which the establishment’s institutions are evidentially open to educationally advantaged children.
The power that private schools have acquired is such that successive governments, even when strongly minded to deal with them, have never managed to bowl them out. They may take on a few more poor pupils here and a few there, but basically they remain bastions of financial privilege and are, in this regard, deeply inegalitarian. Even, one suspects, were a government to legislate against many private schools’ founders’ charitable intentions and withdraw their charitable status, the schools would respond merely by turning themselves into fortresses for plutocrats.
But even supposing private schools were required and actually managed to arrange their finances to operate more charitably and equably than they do, I think it reasonable to say that the chances are their underprivileged pupils would become part of the system that admires or at least allows privilege and elitism, and some of them would acquire the ethos and attitudes that Verkaik identifies as currently ruining Britain. Verkaik’s own proposals about how to deal with such schools were, I felt, the least successful part of his book. I don’t think he is to be accused of failing to satisfy any expectation he may have built up during his detailed, evidenced-based and extremely well referenced argument – it’s just that the problem the schools pose to many a social conscience is a genuinely hard one to solve.
I also felt Verkaik was careful to give the supporters of the schools – often their headteachers or former headteachers – an opportunity to put their point of view, and his arguments did not casually dismiss such voices, but considered what they had to say. When he opposed their line of argument, he did so thoughtfully and with evidence.
An interesting companion read to this is Musa Okwonga’s ‘One of Them’, an account of an immigrant boy’s time at Eton. I’ve reviewed it elsewhere.
My inclinations were (and are) for the arts and the gentler side of life, and, in this respect, during my career I came across many good, and often very tender souls who were not, and have not, I think ruined Britain. Nevertheless, there is small doubt that their attending a private school, with its appropriate and well-funded arts facilities, gave them easy access to drama, music, dance, film, creative writing and fine art. There was no reason they should not have done well in arts professions thereafter, and indeed many have. There is thus a chasm between the opportunities available in the arts between privately and state educated children, and, using statistics, Verkaik points this out, together with the relative ease with which the establishment’s institutions are evidentially open to educationally advantaged children.
The power that private schools have acquired is such that successive governments, even when strongly minded to deal with them, have never managed to bowl them out. They may take on a few more poor pupils here and a few there, but basically they remain bastions of financial privilege and are, in this regard, deeply inegalitarian. Even, one suspects, were a government to legislate against many private schools’ founders’ charitable intentions and withdraw their charitable status, the schools would respond merely by turning themselves into fortresses for plutocrats.
But even supposing private schools were required and actually managed to arrange their finances to operate more charitably and equably than they do, I think it reasonable to say that the chances are their underprivileged pupils would become part of the system that admires or at least allows privilege and elitism, and some of them would acquire the ethos and attitudes that Verkaik identifies as currently ruining Britain. Verkaik’s own proposals about how to deal with such schools were, I felt, the least successful part of his book. I don’t think he is to be accused of failing to satisfy any expectation he may have built up during his detailed, evidenced-based and extremely well referenced argument – it’s just that the problem the schools pose to many a social conscience is a genuinely hard one to solve.
I also felt Verkaik was careful to give the supporters of the schools – often their headteachers or former headteachers – an opportunity to put their point of view, and his arguments did not casually dismiss such voices, but considered what they had to say. When he opposed their line of argument, he did so thoughtfully and with evidence.
An interesting companion read to this is Musa Okwonga’s ‘One of Them’, an account of an immigrant boy’s time at Eton. I’ve reviewed it elsewhere.
May 31, 2022
Fantastic book recommended to me by a friend (who himself went to public school). It made me angry and put into eloquent arguments some of the thoughts and frustrations I’ve had over the years about education and social inequality. Very interesting too how it highlights it as an issue on the left and right of politics.
I think it’s essential reading for all - especially those who are defensive of the UK public school system. It does leave many unanswered questions and there are some points that aren’t touched on or expanded on enough. For example, I was expecting at least a chapter or a wider analysis on gender inequality and it’s links with public schools, since the book does mention many of the traditionally all-boys schools, links with all-male private members clubs, unhealthy cultures in these settings and difficulties for girls’ schools raising funds. The book also briefly mentions the different education systems in France, Germany and some of the Scandì countries; however, I think a deeper international analysis would have strengthened the latter part of the book (looking at solutions) by giving examples of places to follow - albeit perhaps this was avoided due to the unique British system and the difficulty applying other models.
I don’t believe any shortcomings of the arguments in the book warrant anybody to still remain wholly defensive of the system. I imagine that still many people will be; as the idea of public schooling is so entrenched and as Verkaik highlights, people often see it as an attack on their ideals and those of their family’s. It’s similar to when anybody’s privilege is highlighted, it prompts them to become defensive whether that’s along gender, race, wealth etc. I think the book does strike a conciliatory tone here though and if you do find yourself being on the defensive, take a minute to ask yourself why? The book highlights so clearly how the schools have deviated from their original ethos, the absolute hypocrisy of their charity status, the clear unfair advantage they have over state schools (which disproves the classic argument of simple meritocracy) and the terrible impact this and so much more is having on our society that nobody can honestly defend the current system on any moral or intellectual grounds.
As politicians on all pales of the political spectrum have highlighted, the writing is on the wall; when change will come is difficult though given the influence of public schools and their alumni to continue avoiding reform.
Overall, a fantastic book that I just wanted to talk about to everybody I met.
I think it’s essential reading for all - especially those who are defensive of the UK public school system. It does leave many unanswered questions and there are some points that aren’t touched on or expanded on enough. For example, I was expecting at least a chapter or a wider analysis on gender inequality and it’s links with public schools, since the book does mention many of the traditionally all-boys schools, links with all-male private members clubs, unhealthy cultures in these settings and difficulties for girls’ schools raising funds. The book also briefly mentions the different education systems in France, Germany and some of the Scandì countries; however, I think a deeper international analysis would have strengthened the latter part of the book (looking at solutions) by giving examples of places to follow - albeit perhaps this was avoided due to the unique British system and the difficulty applying other models.
I don’t believe any shortcomings of the arguments in the book warrant anybody to still remain wholly defensive of the system. I imagine that still many people will be; as the idea of public schooling is so entrenched and as Verkaik highlights, people often see it as an attack on their ideals and those of their family’s. It’s similar to when anybody’s privilege is highlighted, it prompts them to become defensive whether that’s along gender, race, wealth etc. I think the book does strike a conciliatory tone here though and if you do find yourself being on the defensive, take a minute to ask yourself why? The book highlights so clearly how the schools have deviated from their original ethos, the absolute hypocrisy of their charity status, the clear unfair advantage they have over state schools (which disproves the classic argument of simple meritocracy) and the terrible impact this and so much more is having on our society that nobody can honestly defend the current system on any moral or intellectual grounds.
As politicians on all pales of the political spectrum have highlighted, the writing is on the wall; when change will come is difficult though given the influence of public schools and their alumni to continue avoiding reform.
Overall, a fantastic book that I just wanted to talk about to everybody I met.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
May 21, 2021
Full disclosure: I went to a private school, so I fully understand how much of an advantage it is. I've come to realise however that it's a system that is inherently unfair.
“Only 7 per cent of the population attend a private school. Yet private school pupils represent 74 per cent of senior judges, 71 percent of high-ranking officers in the armed forces, 67 per cent of Oscar winners, 55 per cent of permanent secretaries in Whitehall, 50 per cent of Cabinet ministers and members of the House of Lords, and a third of Russel Group university vice-chancellors.”
This book is required reading for anyone who, like me, is dismayed by the rising inequality in Britain today. I’m not suggesting of course that the public school system is completely to blame. But this book demonstrates that it does plays a persistent, insidious role in keeping a despicable class system in place, and in keeping power and wealth concentrated in the hands of a very privileged few.
What is so shameful about the public schools is that they were established with a charitable motive – to improve access to education for the poorest in society i.e. they were for the ‘public’. Since then however, these institutions have been co-opted (read: misappropriated, seized, stolen) by the wealthy for the betterment of their own children, at the expense of others.
Verkaik makes a compelling case for why capitalism has no place in our education system. He suggests that private schools, which have always benefitted from generous tax breaks at the expense of the taxpayer, be stripped of these privileges. He observes that when parents with money and resources send their children to private school, they no longer scrutinise the local school or hold it to account; rich, pushy parents might improve the standard of education for all children. He argues for the opening up of industries like banking and the media, which are currently only really accessible to those with a private school network and enough private wealth to take on unpaid internships.
Verkaik also questions whether we really want the leading minds in politics, the justice system, the media, the military and so many other areas to grow up in cloistered environments that bear such little resemblance to modern British society (I won’t even go into the long history of child abuse and bullying). Children at private schools are told that they are the cream of society, that they are special. There is a fierce competition to succeed, to go down in the history books at any cost. It explains why so many of our politicians are privately educated – and why so many of them find it easy to put personal ambition before the national interest (Boris Johnson during the Brexit referendum, Dodgy Dave etc etc). These people don’t want to help the community, or even be part of it; they think they’re above it. The same rules just don’t apply.
“Only 7 per cent of the population attend a private school. Yet private school pupils represent 74 per cent of senior judges, 71 percent of high-ranking officers in the armed forces, 67 per cent of Oscar winners, 55 per cent of permanent secretaries in Whitehall, 50 per cent of Cabinet ministers and members of the House of Lords, and a third of Russel Group university vice-chancellors.”
This book is required reading for anyone who, like me, is dismayed by the rising inequality in Britain today. I’m not suggesting of course that the public school system is completely to blame. But this book demonstrates that it does plays a persistent, insidious role in keeping a despicable class system in place, and in keeping power and wealth concentrated in the hands of a very privileged few.
What is so shameful about the public schools is that they were established with a charitable motive – to improve access to education for the poorest in society i.e. they were for the ‘public’. Since then however, these institutions have been co-opted (read: misappropriated, seized, stolen) by the wealthy for the betterment of their own children, at the expense of others.
Verkaik makes a compelling case for why capitalism has no place in our education system. He suggests that private schools, which have always benefitted from generous tax breaks at the expense of the taxpayer, be stripped of these privileges. He observes that when parents with money and resources send their children to private school, they no longer scrutinise the local school or hold it to account; rich, pushy parents might improve the standard of education for all children. He argues for the opening up of industries like banking and the media, which are currently only really accessible to those with a private school network and enough private wealth to take on unpaid internships.
Verkaik also questions whether we really want the leading minds in politics, the justice system, the media, the military and so many other areas to grow up in cloistered environments that bear such little resemblance to modern British society (I won’t even go into the long history of child abuse and bullying). Children at private schools are told that they are the cream of society, that they are special. There is a fierce competition to succeed, to go down in the history books at any cost. It explains why so many of our politicians are privately educated – and why so many of them find it easy to put personal ambition before the national interest (Boris Johnson during the Brexit referendum, Dodgy Dave etc etc). These people don’t want to help the community, or even be part of it; they think they’re above it. The same rules just don’t apply.
August 31, 2022
The subtitle of Robert Verkaik's Posh Boys is How English Public Schools Ruin Britain. And that pretty much sums it up.
The book is a very thoroughly researched and extremely well thought out argument against our current educational apartheid. Some of the facts and statistics quoted are staggering:
"there are charities called Eton, Harrow and Charterhouse whose sole purpose is to improve the lives of rich and privileged children"
"When the governors of Winchester were directly challenged in 1818 about the overwhelming number of rich pupils at a school established for the benefit of the poor they claimed that all their pupils were very poor – ‘it was only their parents who were rich"
"Today, of course, the word ‘poor’ is very much a qualified term among public schools, with some offering financial assistance to families whose combined income is as high as £140,000 per year"
"In 1995, Eton College was awarded a £4.6 million grant from the National Lottery for a state-of-the-art sports complex and athletics stadium to add to its two swimming pools and fifty-odd football, rugby and cricket pitches"
"The company of business-rate specialists which conducted the research concluded: ‘It cannot be right that state schools pay normal business rates but 56 per cent of private schools, using charitable status, receive 80 per cent discount. As the overall tax burden continues to rise, businesses – particularly small and medium-sized enterprises – must have the confidence that fairness is at the heart of the tax system"
"So overall the annual tax saving for the public school charitable sector is well on the way to £2.5 billion, enough to build 100 state secondary schools"
"Each year more than £200 million of taxpayers’ money is spent on independent school places, making our private schools the most subsidised schools in the Western world"
Its utterly rage-inducing, and even more so once you realise that nothing is ever going to change. The system is so rigged and the people making the decisions almost all benefitted from it and therefore will never reform it. If your blood pressure can cope, it's well worth a read, but be warned - ultimately it's pretty depressing stuff. I'll finish with a final quote:
"Thus the inconvenient truth is this: if we genuinely want to create a level playing field for our children, and ensure equality of opportunity and social justice, there can be no place for private schools. It is time to abolish our educational caste system"
The book is a very thoroughly researched and extremely well thought out argument against our current educational apartheid. Some of the facts and statistics quoted are staggering:
"there are charities called Eton, Harrow and Charterhouse whose sole purpose is to improve the lives of rich and privileged children"
"When the governors of Winchester were directly challenged in 1818 about the overwhelming number of rich pupils at a school established for the benefit of the poor they claimed that all their pupils were very poor – ‘it was only their parents who were rich"
"Today, of course, the word ‘poor’ is very much a qualified term among public schools, with some offering financial assistance to families whose combined income is as high as £140,000 per year"
"In 1995, Eton College was awarded a £4.6 million grant from the National Lottery for a state-of-the-art sports complex and athletics stadium to add to its two swimming pools and fifty-odd football, rugby and cricket pitches"
"The company of business-rate specialists which conducted the research concluded: ‘It cannot be right that state schools pay normal business rates but 56 per cent of private schools, using charitable status, receive 80 per cent discount. As the overall tax burden continues to rise, businesses – particularly small and medium-sized enterprises – must have the confidence that fairness is at the heart of the tax system"
"So overall the annual tax saving for the public school charitable sector is well on the way to £2.5 billion, enough to build 100 state secondary schools"
"Each year more than £200 million of taxpayers’ money is spent on independent school places, making our private schools the most subsidised schools in the Western world"
Its utterly rage-inducing, and even more so once you realise that nothing is ever going to change. The system is so rigged and the people making the decisions almost all benefitted from it and therefore will never reform it. If your blood pressure can cope, it's well worth a read, but be warned - ultimately it's pretty depressing stuff. I'll finish with a final quote:
"Thus the inconvenient truth is this: if we genuinely want to create a level playing field for our children, and ensure equality of opportunity and social justice, there can be no place for private schools. It is time to abolish our educational caste system"
Displaying 1 - 30 of 88 reviews