‘Why did Albert [not his real name] leave before sports day?’ As is increasingly the norm, I am driving my seven-year-old daughter home from school, and she has questions for me. As questions go, they are reasonable. ‘Albert left to go to a new school’ I say.
‘But he told me it was because of the bat’ comes the response from the back seat. We’ve been here before. The bat is not in fact a placental mammal but the VAT rise on school fees, in playgroundese. Bats and VAT rises are both alarming and linger in the dark of parents’ minds, so it makes sense. ‘Yes’ I reply, ‘you’re right; it’s because of the bat’.
In my own experience, children have left my daughter’s year group steadily since January
Figures due to be released by the Independent Schools Council (ISC) tomorrow reveal a drop in private school pupils of 13,000, the biggest fall in student numbers since the ISC began collecting data in 2012.
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