EXCLUSIVE: “Independent Schools have become their own worst enemies”, says former Eton Master.

“For many years, independent schools have been their own worst enemies,” declares John Claughton, former Master at Eton College from 1984 to 2011 and Chief Master of King Edward’s School, Birmingham from 2006 to 2016. 

“The great boarding schools, and many of the most successful independent day schools, have, over recent decades turned themselves into   six-star luxury liners with fifty metre swimming pools and golf courses and debating halls, competing for a global market.”

Claughton, who won the Times Educational Supplement Independent School Lifetime Achievement award  in 2016, says that Labour’s plans to swifty end the tax exemptions enjoyed by the independent sector, without stripping them of their charitable status, “will not stop me from voting them in the general election”. Simply put, the independent sector has “engaged in a space race with each other, with bigger and better facilities, all while increasing the fees that parents have to pay: It isn’t easy to justify charitable status for schools that are charging £50,000 a year and providing education for a global, financial elite. Of course, Eton and Harrow are not ‘ordinary’ or ‘normal’ independent schools, but these ‘Great Schools’ have a massive impact on the world’s perception of independent education”

“Perhaps I shouldn’t say this”, Claughton adds wryly. But, ultimately, as Alan Bennett famously said, “independent education is unfair. I used to say so at Open Mornings at King Edward’s. It does give certain children from certain backgrounds an unfair advantage”. Cameron’s return to office, which has made the Cabinet more dominated by private school alumni, has been criticised by Kwasi Kwarteng, for embodying the “politics of yesterday” earlier this month.

Several months ago, Claughton had written a letter to The Times which drew attention to the risk that comes with an education at a school like Eton.   Reflecting on the debate that unfolded, he tells Per Capita that “some of the boys I taught at Eton remain my friends and are wonderful human beings. Eton did not make Kwasi Kwarteng or Boris Johnson, but it fed into the flaws of their characters and self-perceptions. There is a danger that winning a scholarship to Eton, as Johnson and Kwarteng did, brings with it a sense of superiority which you never lose.”

“I did teach Kwarsi, but I told him what I thought of him  […] Get an Eton Scholarship, you think you know more than your teachers”. “The privilege, entitlement and omniscience of a select group of Etonians have been born out […] Being an Etonian matters so much to Etonians”, he adds.

“In 1972, doctors could send their children to Eton … this isn’t possible anymore”, Claughton reflects. “I am a guilty party, too, because I spent my career in this world, but all I could do as Chief Master at King Edward’s was make it as fair as I could by raising funds for means-tested places and engaging in a massive partnership programme with local schools.”

Whilst the Chief Master at King Edward’s John Claughton abolished A levels in the school and introduced the International Baccalaureate Diploma. So, he is not short of an opinion on Sunak’s invention of the British Baccalaureate.

“If the British Baccalaureate is a flagship education policy, it will sink […] like an ancient mariner in a ghost ship”. The British Education system beyond the age of sixteen has been deeply damaged for 70 years.’  

He is critical of “narrowing down so precipitously early, as I did myself  […] The decision about post-16 education should not be made by universities alone. And yet, why were A Levels invented? For the selection of candidates by universities and, of course, what universities wanted in their candidates was narrow expertise in specialist subjects”. 

But, “Rishi’s five subject British Baccalaureate has not got a cat in hell’s chance”, he says– in a sentiment shared by several other educators. ‘Even if he were to be Prime Minister in a year’s time, the British Baccalaureate would require more funding for the increased amount of teaching at a time when the funding of education is going nowhere. It would also require more teachers in subjects like Maths and languages where there is already a massive shortage. It is not going to happen.”

“Indeed, the number of schools offering the International Baccalaureate in the state and the independent sector has declined substantially in the last decade precisely because of these cost pressures. And that when the vast majority of teachers who have taught the IB Diploma are strong advocates of this broader education. And a broader education might mean that more politicians had a better mathematical and scientific understanding – and that could help in future pandemics.”