Is it morally acceptable to send your child to a private school?

Apologies if this question has been done before, I suspect however that most such threads regard the educational system as a whole.

Here is an initial argument in opposition of the question:

We presumably agree with the notion of equal opportunities for everyone. In particular, we expect children to be given equal opportunities regardless of their financial background since as children they can not influence this via merit / effort.

Now schooling is a very important factor for university and job opportunities. Further, education can be thought of as an positional good in that how 'useful' it is depends on how much you have relative to others. As a result, since private schooling (on average) provides better schooling in exchange for money, we can think of private schools as converting money into greater opportunities. Now since opportunities are limited, then accounting for the positional nature of education means that by sending your child to a private school you are actively harming someone else's child. Essentially the argument is that this is not fair to those children whose parents could not afford to send their child to a private school and that you are unfairly advantaged.

Since the action you are committing is unfairly causing harm to others, it is morally unacceptable to send your child to a private school.

So how would you respond to such an argument, and what do you guys think?

To argue the fact it is morally acceptable I would state that the fact is state schools do not have the provision to provide all children with an equal opportunity. While I am not disagreeing with your post their are children who state school can not cater for. I was lucky my parents could afford a private school and this is the only reason I recieved the education I am entitled to a a basic human right. My friends in states schools were often refused the right to attend schools trips and take full part in school life because of our disabilities. The law stated for each school trip at least two members of staff had to have specialist training equal to the training recieved by my parents on how to manage my disability. Most state schools could not afford this and no I am no disabled as to be granted specialist school provision. Also I regularly missed school for hospital appointments or illness. One I missed a whole year- but my school being a private school had the financial resources to successfully reintergrate me with out harming my academic potential.

Now whilst like for like this supports your argument short term.it counters the argument long term as my disability (despite the better opportunities afford by private schooling) will still limit my opportunities. Just the private schooling will go some way to closing the gap.

Your starting position of "everyone should be equal" is wrong. Being equal doesn't mean dragging everyone down to the lowest common denominator. The position should be that everyone should at least get a certain level - so in our society this is free schooling to everyone to the age of 16 with certain standards to be met by all schools.

Now this refers to an interesting case where the only state schools around are deemed inadequate. There is hence the argument that parents are justified in securing an 'adequate' education for their children even if it means they have to send their child to a private school. I think it is reasonable to think that if there are these adequate state schools then you should send your child to them. If however the other choices are inadequate, it's much less clear.

My personal view is that parents have a moral obligation to do something to fix the moral injustice of private schools. This might mean they have to send their child to an inadequate school, or it can simply mean continuing to send their child to a private school but perhaps lobbying to remove them or donating money to help less educated children or what not.

I'm not going to argue that it's always wrong to send your child to a private school if the state schools are inadequate. However I do think it is wrong to do so if the state schools are adequate, as you are unfairly breaching other people's rights to equal opportunities. Note when I refer to adequacy, this would include cases where a school does not address the needs of a child with a disability.

Now this refers to an interesting case where the only state schools around are deemed inadequate. There is hence the argument that parents are justified in securing an 'adequate' education for their children even if it means they have to send their child to a private school. I think it is reasonable to think that if there are these adequate state schools then you should send your child to them. If however the other choices are inadequate, it's much less clear.

My personal view is that parents have a moral obligation to do something to fix the moral injustice of private schools. This might mean they have to send their child to an inadequate school, or it can simply mean continuing to send their child to a private school but perhaps lobbying to remove them or donating money to help less educated children or what not.

I'm not going to argue that it's always wrong to send your child to a private school if the state schools are inadequate. However I do think it is wrong to do so if the state schools are adequate, as you are unfairly breaching other people's rights to equal opportunities. Note when I refer to adequacy, this would include cases where a school does not address the needs of a child with a disability.

What if I were to tell you there is no moral injustice of private schools?

/thread

But talking of moral obligation many private school do take their morale obligation to address educational disadvantage seriously. Both private school I attended and the one brother attended make a commitment 30% of each year 7 intake will be assisted/ subsidised places. This may not seem a lot but considering that a private school takes no government funds where these students would otherwise be funded by the treasury it actually has a knock on effect. And no prizes for guessing who is making up the shortfall- the parents who can afford to pay.

Second to this the private schools me and my brother were at insisted at some point that current pupils do something towards addressing educational disadvantage that had arisen from socio economic position. Personally I went weekly to a local state school in a really deprived area and did one to one reading sessions for a couple of hours a week. Some of my friends (we were A2 maths students) were sent to a local state secondary to assist with GCSE Maths lessons almost like TA's.

To really address the question you asked you would have to look at the financial impact of educating the additional 7-10 % who are at private school in state school. Basic logic states that move them and you get more children to the same budget. The budget will not increase as the parents of children at private schools pay for places at state schools through tax and private school in a addition. Hence because we pay towards cost of state schools we increase the availible funds per person as we paying for a place we are not using. Now yes this situation arises form the imperfection in our system but it is a substantial consideration.

Sorry- I am really being devils advocate here. I am just trying to suggest things.

It's people's choice at the end of the day. I was privately educated from kindergarten until secondary school, and I am grateful for that. It is not morally unacceptable to send a child to a private school.

Honestly think this is a rather rude and useless reponse that adds nothing. Sure its one way to argue, but I would heavily disagree with your claim for starters, and you haven't given any sort of reason why.

Well I wasn't particularly fond of the idea of giving a well thought out response, considering you don't seem like the type of person who is going to change their view so easily.

But anyway, your argument is flawed. You're going off the pretence that the existence of private schools means that it is 'unfair' for other children who are not given an equal opportunity. (Define 'equal opportunity', because free education up to the age of 16 seems pretty equal to me). Dictating that it is immoral for a parent not to be able to spend money on their child in ways which they please is immoral in itself. If my parents buy me an iPhone, for example, is that immoral because there are a finite number of iPhones in the world, and me having an iPhone means someone else can't have it? Going off this argument of finite resources and whatnot, everything will end up being 'immoral'. Is it 'immoral' that I got into Oxford, because there are only a certain number of places available, and me getting in means someone else didn't.

The quality of state schools has nothing to do with the existence of private schools. Is it immoral that there is such a disparity in the quality of state schools? Some state schools produce excellent results (better than private schools) and some state schools rank extremely poorly. Is it moral that despite the fact they're both free, children at a high-achieving state school in London are going to get a better a better education than a child at an underachieving comprehensive in Wales? Similarly, the fact that a school is private does not guarantee any superior education. Some private schools produce poor results. Is that immoral when compared to the high-achieving private schools?

In a society based on capitalism, there are finite resources. People compete to get these resources. This is always going to be the case. You can argue that this is immoral, but then socialism can be argued to be immoral too. Private/state schools are just the tip of the iceberg.

Calm the arrogance, how can you be sure I am unwilling to change my perspective? At the same, when you assert things there's no need with this attitude that other people are flawed or simply wrong when you can simply present a polite argument to attempt to convince others.

Regardless, since you have at least tried this time I will respond fairly as I would with everyone else.

In terms of equal opportunity for children I refer to the idea that the opportunities given to children should be based upon their own ability or effort as opposed to the financial background of their parents.

My argument has been so far that there is a limit to how parents can bias towards their children, and private schools are not within this limit. I imagine you don't think for example that parents are free to do anything for their child's best interest. For example murdering another child or paying for someone to do so to give your child a better chance is clearly wrong. On the other hand, certain advantages such as reading to your child seem quite acceptable.

In terms of constructing these boundaries of legitimate partiality, I can offer you two types of reasons although to go into detail would take too long. The first would be be that under a veil of ignorance where we had to decide social principles without knowing our personal position, we would likely ban private schools altogether. The second reason would be that things like reading to your child is valuable on the basis of emotional connection as opposed to the actual act of giving advantage. We think children have a right to such a emotional connection and are willing to allow a degree of such advantage. The same does not hold for private schools.

I think it's ultimately naive to think that there is no relation between private and state schools. Whilst I actually do think there is an argument that private schools on some level 'raise' everyone up, I think this is outweighed by their negative impact on state school students. The existence of private schools mean we are taking the 'wealthy' students who are likely well socialised, already advantaged via parents away from their peers. Further these wealthy parents with comparatively higher political clout will also stop caring about state schools. Imagine if we had a society where even the rich parents were sending their children to state schools, and think about how much more uproar there would be if the state schools were inadequate.

In terms of your competing for resources, I would agree with you. However, I think in terms of competition, it should be genuinely fair such that people can compete to the best of their ability. To me, a system of private schools undermines this.

With regards to what you said in bold, I went to a private school where just over 50% if students are on some form of scholarship or bursary (one of the highest in the country, if it means anything). Is this not an example of opportunity being given to children based on merit and achievement? Yes, a lot of people pay for their children's education, but what about the children who are given opportunities because of individual success?

And what is your opinion on universities? Fees are £9000 per year, so not everyone can afford to go university. Does that make universities immoral because they aren't free?

Overall I think it's a sloppy argument to say private schools make state schools worse. All it is is using private schools as a scapegoat for the wider issue. It's a bit like when grammar schools were still around but deemed 'unfair' as they created class bias and made state schools worse. Since their closure, I haven't seen any improvement in the quality of state schools though. Hypothetical arguments with no real backing are just that. Hypothetical. You can say private schools are 'hypothetically immoral', but unless you come up with actual facts and evidence that they make state schools worse, it's a weak argument.

University fees are not a similar barrier at all because of the availability of very cheap fee loans to 100% of UK & EU students which cover the full charge for tuition and maintenance loans for UK students to cover the expenses of living away from home. The loans have been brought in at the same time as the fees exactly because governments decided it would be immoral to charge people uni fees on a private school basis (cash) - there is no evidence that anyone can't afford to go to university because they can't afford to pay the fees.

We presumably agree with the notion of equal opportunities for everyone.

The ideal of it, yes.

As a result, since private schooling (on average) provides better schooling in exchange for money, we can think of private schools as converting money into greater opportunities.

Since the action you are committing is unfairly causing harm to others, it is morally unacceptable to send your child to a private school.

So how would you respond to such an argument, and what do you guys think?

I like your argument but I think there are a couple of flaws.



The ideal of it, yes.



This is the problem - see end.



I'm not sure this is empirically true, but I could grant it for the sake of argument.



But you could make the same argument about other factors too - having books in the house; having two parents to raise children, maybe where one doesn't have to work; having enough food regularly; having musical instruments around etc. etc. Taking your argument to its logical conclusion, we should all have to live in one-working-parent households with no books and poor food so we don't disadvantage the poorest in society.

So we should not spite the practical in pursuit of the ideal. If you don't like the idea of private schools, a better idea is to force parents to pay into the state school system via taxes (but get nothing out)...which they already do.

I have responded to this objection a number of times. Essentially the argument is that such activities may provide unfair disadvantage, but they are acceptable because they lie within the boundary of legitimate partiality (this means the extent to which parents can bias towards their children). I've expanded on this in other posts but I haven't edited the original one because I wanted to ensure it was short.

I'm personally unconvinced that the overall effect of private schools has been positive, in the sense that they do not take resources but continue to provide to the government. This could be tested to some extent empirically (monetarily speaking) but a lot of the impact is the simply the positive influence gained from having 'weathy' students, along with the impact of well-off parents who care and are able to significantly influence their child's education.

Apologies if this question has been done before, I suspect however that most such threads regard the educational system as a whole.

Here is an initial argument in opposition of the question:

We presumably agree with the notion of equal opportunities for everyone. In particular, we expect children to be given equal opportunities regardless of their financial background since as children they can not influence this via merit / effort.

Now schooling is a very important factor for university and job opportunities. Further, education can be thought of as an positional good in that how 'useful' it is depends on how much you have relative to others. As a result, since private schooling (on average) provides better schooling in exchange for money, we can think of private schools as converting money into greater opportunities. Now since opportunities are limited, then accounting for the positional nature of education means that by sending your child to a private school you are actively harming someone else's child. Essentially the argument is that this is not fair to those children whose parents could not afford to send their child to a private school and that you are unfairly advantaged.

Since the action you are committing is unfairly causing harm to others, it is morally unacceptable to send your child to a private school.

So how would you respond to such an argument, and what do you guys think?