Mendip Living Dec 2021 - Jan 2022

THE POWER of BURSARIES
Levelling up – the transformative power of bursaries and how we might level up rather
than dumb down...
If a random sample of British
adults were to play a game of
word association when the chosen
words were ‘prep’, ‘independent’ or
‘private school’, the results would
be predictable. ‘Posh’, ‘exclusive’
and ‘expensive’ might make an
appearance, although so might
‘excellence’, ‘results’ and ‘success’.
Placed against these pre-conceptions
of independent education, it is easy to
see why some politicians feel the days
of independent schools’ charitable
status to be numbered.
Even as a Headmaster of an
independent prep school, I sometimes
struggle, morally, to reconcile the
opportunities that we can create with
the reality for many children across
the country, despite the best efforts
of so many fellow professionals in
maintained schools. Having started my
career in the state sector, I only made
the switch because I felt I would have
the freedom to design an education
that worked in the fullest sense and
the ability to create something unique
and bespoke for every child is a
joy. The moral tension comes from
considering why this is only available
for those who can afford it, although
surely it can never be right to knock
excellence and reduce everything to
the lowest common denominator in
the quest for equality.
The charitable status of most
independent schools hides, from
some, our need to balance the books.
This is particularly challenging in
prep schools where the fees are
lower and the margins tighter: the
preconceptions of wealth held by
many are simply incorrect in most
cases. Competition between prep
schools can be fierce and the need
to demonstrate relative strength and
quality over rival schools is essential.
This need creates a tension between
the school as a business and the
school as a charity, and it would
be easy for Heads and Bursars to
prioritise the former at the expense
of the latter. Not only would this be
morally wrong, it is also a short-term
and blinkered course of action and
schools, even small prep schools,
need to factor creating inclusivity into
their business plans so that they are a
charity in action as well as in name.
I can’t describe the satisfaction to be
gained from watching a child benefit
from support from the school as a
charity. It feels right, is transformative
for those involved, and justifies the
charitable status of the school. All
involved benefit. Given appropriate
levels of financial and strategic
planning, it is possible, even for small
independent schools, to provide
their brand of education to a wider
cross-section of society and this
broadening of access to the best of
British education is something to be
celebrated. In senior schools, the level
of bursary support is greater again,
with many schools actively seeking to
broaden access with bursaries of up to
100% of the fees and some even work
with prep schools to create a pathway
from prep school entry through to the
end of their secondary education.
The provision of bursaries
demonstratively levels up society in
some small way but the scale of what
is possible is, of course, not enough.
There is no philosophical barrier to
opening our doors to the whole of
society. I know of no Head of an
independent school who would not
leap at the chance to open their doors
and provide an education for free, and
any blockage to this is caused by pure
economics.
What is the answer? Well, we can look
to the rest of the world for examples
of how state and private education
co-exist far more equitably than
they do in the UK. In this country, all
taxpayers fund state education but
only some are using it, the others
choosing to pay extra for their children
to be educated privately. In other
countries, the money follows the child
and parents may choose to top this
sum up to have their child attend an
independent school. This broadens
access, meaning that there is no need
for charitable status tax perks and the
gap between private and state is much
narrower.
I can’t think of an argument against
making this a reality, other than it may
be politically inconvenient to do so.
We need to find ways of providing
the best possible education to all
children in the UK and, whilst there
is a moral imperative on schools to
offer bursaries and broaden access,
there must surely also be a duty for
government to be more creative and
forward thinking in finding ways to
level up without dumbing down.
Charlie Minogue, Headmaster,
Moor Park, Ludlow, Shropshire
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