In that case, the differences between the average Canadian state school and the private school are petty. Private schools, unless they offer a specific program or style of teaching, or religious doctrine, aren't really worth the extra cost. This is of course my local experience in Vancouver. In Vancouver the private school system is definitely the old money network, so it holds prestige for families who care about affluent social status, etc. Private schools can also hand-select the brightest, most gifted children and can deny others, so on paper private schools around here will always look like they offer better education. However, the reality is that you can send your child to the local state schools and, while there are exceptions, the general rule of thumb is that they'll get a good education and will continue on to university after they graduate. And from my observations, the majority of families send their children to public schools.

I have my child in public school. There would have to be a really compelling reason, like the ones you've described, for us to move her to the private system. The friend I have who is doing private is doing it mainly for religious reasons. Almost everyone I know has their child in state school.

If it makes you feel any better, this year our school has a waitlist and 11 of the children on it have chosen our public school over the local private one. The private school's headmistress even called our school to find out why she's losing students.

I've never heard of kids from the state system being behind in pre-med or engineering and I'd really like to see the research to back that up.

OK, I'm being careful with my wording and being deliberatly vague because I'm not exactly anonymous here.

I work In a private school. Aside from the smaller class sizes, I don't see any massive increase in the standards of teaching/eduction here ( certainly not enough to jusity the fees in my mind) but the students do have access to a wide range of opportunities ( especially international ones) that perhaps wouldn't happen in the state sector for all kinds of budget/funding issues.

If anyone asks me to give specific examples I can't because it would ID my workplace far too easily

This might give students the edge in the university application process. That and the factt hat we have admin staff dedicated to walking them through the process

Sorry, dont have any stats, just direct experience based on the kids of two friends who went to UofT (dentistry) and waterloo (chem eng) both of whom reported that their straight A valedictorian kids were finding it really hard, to the point one dropped out and one just squeaked past 1st year exams.

These arent partying kids either, so its not a sudden lot of distraction that was making it hard for them compared to the prep school prepared kids, the university expected them to have already covered some of the calculus and physics and chemistry, but despite graduating high school with high GPAs, they had not covered those topics.

Come to think of it the only other kid I know who was in that situation took 7 years to get his waterloo degree, and he was another straight A kid at high school. He liked to party thought

I think when a child as certain special needs private schools offer an advantage over state schools.

For example I am dyslexic and spent my first 2 years of schooling in a state school with 35 other kids in my class, by 6 I could barely read and my teachers didn't have the time to spend helping me. I went from there to a school with 10 kids in my class and every day we each had individual reading time with the teacher. Having the extra time and smaller class size help me personally and I actually went back to a state school to do a-levels as they have better facilities and more course options.

I don't think my parents have ever regretted the extra money they spent on my education.

OK, I understand now.

I only know one set of parents who send their children to private school. As you say, they work their butts off to afford the fees and IMHO it is a complete waste of money. I don't see any difference in their kids to the kids that go to the local state schools.

That said, I live in quite an affluent area and the local schools reflect this. If I lived in a poorer neighborhood the difference may be more pronounced.

here in Vancouver:

the francophone state schools here in BC don't offer the IB curriculum at the elementary school level, whereas some of the English-language ones do.

I wonder how kids from other provinces stack up. Interesting. I wonder if there's been any studies into this.

I didn`t think Canada had a class system Surely the parents of such children cannot all be British

Yeah, it would be interesting to know. Allthough those three are all from around my general area of Ontario, they all went through different school boards...both catholic and public.

Private schools don't necessarily provide better support for special needs. If they are cherry picking students many of the teachers will simply not have had the exposure to special needs students and therefore lack the experience. I seem to have more knowledge than some of our SEN equivalent team here

agreed, just because a teacher is at a private school doesn't mean they have experience or training at dealing with special needs but at elementary age I think even 30 mins a day of one on one reading time with a teacher is a bonus

Isnt that what parents are for

I suppose if a parent is prepared to stump up $15k a year for school then they are perhaps also more likely to stump up 15 minutes a day to read with their kids too. (assuming they are not working 16 hr days to pay for it)

Parental involvment is what makes kids do well at school when all is said and done. Thats party why kids in "good school areas" do well in the UK...parents took the trouble to move and enroll there and are also more likely to be fully engaged parent... it becomes a self fullfilling prophecy to some extent. Perhaps the same is true of private schools too...

It may be a factor but that's way too strong. A stupid or antisocial child cannot be propelled through A levels no matter how keen the parent.

Fair enough, but when looking at the overall picture, I cant help think that having a school that attracts interactive, involved and engaged parents who are prepared to do what they have to to help their kids succeed is not going to do that schools chances of success any harm. In the same way having deep pockets to call on come fundraising time probably is no bad thing either.