Day 318 - A Privileged Life

Sunday February 28th

We drove up to East Horsley for lunch with my brother. We regaled him with stories of life in a comprehensive school. He positively blanched. I guess when you have been to private boarding school, Oxford University and sent your kids to private school, the very thought of a comprehensive school is a bit alien. The kids enjoyed it!

I went to private boarding school and it feels a bit alien to me as well. Of course it feels alien. Without it sounding like a social experiment, that's what makes it so interesting, to see what a school is like with the full spectrum of society trying to function together with varying levels of motivation.

Would I have found it difficult in a comprehensive school as a child? If I had moved to one from private school, maybe, but if I had started in primary like everyone else, it would have made no difference. Would I have come out a different person? Undoubtedly, as the experience would have been very different.

I wonder whether I would have done as well academically? I think I would as the results I got were all self-motivated. However, the values I have today were as much moulded at school as they were by my parents, so who knows if I would have had that self-motivation and independence of thought in the public sector?