Emotional Retards

Discussion of the children's schools in the UK.
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bonsai
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Joined: Sun Feb 12, 2006 12:08 am
Location: London

Emotional Retards

Postby bonsai » Tue Nov 04, 2008 5:48 pm

http://women.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life ... 061464.ece

I found this in the times this weekend and thought it warranted posting here. It isn't without some reservation however, we are clearly not the only people who have had hard times recovering from so called prvileged educations. I am well aware that an oft touted defence of St James is that "this was what schools were like at the time". They point out that corporate punishment was not illegal. And my own father has often dismissed what has occurred by saying that it is no worse than what happened in lots of schools of the time or his time.

"IT DOESN'T MAKE IT OK OR RIGHT! AND I THOUGHT ST JAMES WAS TRYING TO DELIVER AN EDUCATION SYSTEM THAT PROVIDED A BETTER EDUCATION!"

The reason I do post it though is that many of the people who have posted about their experiences in St James and St Vedast express difficulties with emotions and having to bury how they feel and having to be careful about how and what they express.

Many of these failures are due to britishness or the english way and were common in schools and many of the independent and public schools that are often perceived to produce the best results. St James strives to be like these. It was always an ambition of St James to be a boarding school and ambition the senior boys achieved when they moved to Twickenham and aquired the Popes Villa property. St James is a single sex, english, prudish and conservative and independent school.

Add into this a strange philosophy, which the followers refer to as the Truth, and you have a pretty toxic mix. When people ask me how bad it is the only thing I can liken it too is and old fashioned strict catholic convent school. Ironically the likes of which that my attended and yet she managed to find the same sort of school for her kids just with a different belief system and core values.

I think the most important thing here is that any person can have a bad time at school and be stifled in all sorts of ways. The particular danger at St James is that the SES philosophy blinds them to the way that they are stifling and harming pupils.

Bonsai

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