During my short stint as an IT trainer, I had the honour of teaching in a few primary schools.
It was thus so that I had a first hand experience of the difference between the attitudes and behavior of those from neighbourhood school, and those from so-named prestigious schools.
My opinion is that kids from the former are more down to earth and therefore more pleasant to have as students.
On the other spectrum, the one class I had from the prestigious school had so much lesser… innocence.
I can’t begin to state how much this judgement suffers from various survey biases, but the truth for me is - those students worried me.
Let me elaborate.
There was one kid whose teammates were away for the session and so were told by her form teacher to join this other group.
The reaction of the team leader was, in American slang’ed English, “Oh my god, are you serious?” in stereotypical Gossip Girls style, with a hand gesture to boot.
Halfway into the lesson, about half of them whipped out their iPhone 4s (not even a 3GS there) and fiddled around with them.
Another time, I’ve heard from a fellow trainer that the kids asked her about her Gucci and CK and stuff.
This class was a mix of primary 3s and 4s - 9 and 10 year olds.
Is this how the rich and elite treat their children? Exposing them to the material life at so young an age and thus destroying most of their sense of innocence and any opportunity to instill the correct values?
If this is what “prestigious” entails, then I would very much stick with “neighbourhood” to avoid the taint, thank you.
