THE EDUCATION DILEMMA – PUBLIC OR PRIVATE

“… private education is a gamble which may, in the end, prove to be
counterproductive to a child’s development…”

Many parents are currently debating the virtues of the public verses private
education systems as the start of the 2020 school year nears. Some public
schools are battling to grow and maintain their enrolments as competition
between the two spheres heats up with the private sector now days attracting
greater numbers of enrolments due to savvy marketing campaigns and
greater financial resources.

However, many parents don’t have the choice with a private education costing
up to $200,000 per child from K-12 for school fees alone making it prohibitive.

I am an ex-public schoolteacher of eighteen years and founder of Master
Coaching, a national after-school tuition service, and I believe the system,
whether it be public or private, has little to do with a child’s level of
achievement. Of paramount importance is attitude and environment – not
only within the school grounds but perhaps more importantly within the home.

Children will do well in either system if the family supports the child through
the education process. If a child believes, because he has been told by an
authority figure, that he or she is getting a second grade education in a public
institution or under a certain teacher, then the child’s education will likely
suffer as a result.

Parents weighing up the public/private debate often ask me which school they
ought to send their kids to. My response is that a system that fosters self
belief, where encouragement replaces criticism and where students are taught to expect excellence in all their pursuits, regardless of whether it is
public or privately based, is where their child will receive a superior education.

It’s a matter of using these criteria and investigating each school on its merits
he added.

Some of the nation’s greatest teachers can be found in the State system and
a private education is a gamble that may prove to be counterproductive to a
child’s development.

The public verses private debate is multi-faceted. It’s very difficult to compare
the two systems objectively because for every example that you find in favour
of one system there will be a counter example. I can tell you that a child’s
academic performance is the consequence of expectation. Students at
expensive private schools are encouraged to expect great results. Some
students in comprehensive high schools, often in poorer socio-economic areas,
expect to perform poorly and subsequently, teachers teach to this expectation.

I have personally coached many students from both public and private
schools, and their potential for greatness doesn’t correlate to the school
system from which they come. Wealth is not a reliable indicator of a child’s
future prospects for success. Many years of teaching has shown me that a
child’s level of achievement is closely linked to its own subconscious
evaluation of itself. Raise a child’s level of expectation and their performance
level will improve dramatically in every direction, every time.

I once coached a family of three sons, the eldest two gained entry into a
selective school while the youngest didn’t. In both the School Certificate and
Higher School Certificate, the youngest of the three far out-performed his two
elder brothers. I have witnessed similar stories where parents have sent their
elder children to expensive private schools and sent their younger children to
the local state school. In many cases the children at the state school have
out-performed the children at the private school

I taught with the Department of Education for 18 years, eight of them as Head
Teacher in the Mathematics faculty. Since establishing Master Coaching
some thirty-five years ago I have personally ‘coached’ more than 3000
students to excel in Mathematics.

Private school students are undoubtedly provided with a better learning
environment – that is – better facilities, smaller classes, motivation to achieve.
These things should lead to better HSC results.

Nevertheless, I believe there are teachers in public comprehensive schools
that are better in their profession than many of their private colleagues, and so
you have situations where children in public comprehensive schools perform
better than they would have done if they had attended an expensive private or
selective high school.

And in fairness to the public system, parents should be aware that private
schools advertise and promote themselves via their strong HSC results, and
so offer scholarships to talented children to artificially inflate the school’s
performance. Many private schools insist their students show evidence of
after school coaching with private agencies in their weaker subjects to ensure
the school’s academic record is held in high regard.

After school tuition or ‘coaching’ as we call it, is chosen by many parents as a
viable solution to improve a student’s overall academic performance and
personal development, ensuring their children achieve to their true potential.
A ‘maths coach’ or a ‘reading coach’ is not unlike a soccer, football, tennis or
netball coach. Coaching is about teaching the child rather than the subject.