Posted by Owen Roberts on November 03, 2013 at 07:29:54 user OwenRoberts.
In Reply to: Re: Amazon school- was: Lakeland Cam posted by Peter Ceresole on November 03, 2013 at 00:22:20:
I was fortunate enough to go to the same school, in South London, as P G Wodehouse. I also started as a day boy and became a boarder when my parents moved beyond the radius of reasonable daily travel.
Many other boarders were there because parents were abroad or in remoter parts of the country. There were also a percentage of foreign students, mainly from Thailand, India and Argentina.
London schools, who took boarders, were perhaps untypical in as much as they had a high percentage of day boys (or girls). This was because many pupils could easily travel to school with good transport links. Not sure that in London there were many families who used to send their children to board at the same school generation after generation.
One wonders many parents can now afford to send their children to board especially in London. I have just checked at my old school, it now costs GBP 50,646 per annum for tuition and boarding plus the inevitable extras. You have to have a high gross income to afford the fees for one child let alone a family of 4 such as the Swallows – although the armed forces always used to help with boarding fees for their officers.