A Daily Mail opinion piece argues that private schools foster entitlement and snobbery, while state education is presented as a more grounded alternative. The author, Sybilla Hart, writes that she is glad her children spent most of their schooling in the state system and recounts experiences that reinforce her view that the private-school world can be an anchor for snobbery and a lack of good manners. She cites bullying, social snubs at gatherings, and the pressure to keep up with peers financially as patterns she says are common in private-school circles.
Hart explains her family's schooling choices: their eldest child, Isaac, was privately schooled until age 16 because, at the time, they could not secure a state primary they were happy with in London. After moving to the north Essex countryside, they enrolled their second child, Beatrice, in a village primary while Isaac remained at a local private school with strong sports facilities. Isaac later joined the state school sixth form and she notes he has thrived there. The three daughters and youngest son have known only state schooling.
Hart recalls an instance at a party this summer when a boy who attends a private school asked her daughters whether they were "chavs," and notes that some peers in those circles still question whether a person’s school is private in front of others. Her daughters, she says, have learned to endure such remarks with a thick skin, while noting that boarding-school peers can be equally spoiled in other ways. The piece also describes a shopping trip with private-school friends in which items the girls wanted were snapped up for them without consideration, leaving Hart's child to carry their later purchases for them. She uses these anecdotes to illustrate a broader pattern she says favors status over courtesy.
She argues that time together is too short to police every disagreement in private-school settings, whereas private-school families may face a narrower window for discipline in the hands of busy, commute-heavy schedules. By contrast, Hart says, the children she has met in the state sector are generally more grounded, polite and respectful; they speak directly, look adults in the eye, and understand boundaries. She notes how her own refusal to host an impromptu sleepover was met with less drama from those friends than from private-school circles, and she points to episodes where some boarding-school children have been described as prone to behaving as if they are entitled to brands, lunches out, and other privileges.
The columnist suggests that the private-school system has, in her view, sacrificed ordinary manners for what she calls the "curriculum product," with extracurriculars such as fencing or lacrosse taking precedence over simple acts of courtesy. She reflects that if she had privately educated all five of her children, she would probably have seen them only on weekends or half-terms, returning with demands for new clothes or cosmetics, and negotiating how such purchases would be paid for. She concludes that the state sector offers less pressure to conform to private-school luxury while delivering a more grounded upbringing. "Give me a state school education over that any day," Hart writes, concluding that the state system, for all its challenges, has shaped her children to be more self-possessed and considerate.