A parent’s dilemma

In my study at home stands a small cork board with the names of eight target schools for my ten-year-old son. The state schools are on the left, the private schools on the right. The decision is due soon and I still have no idea what to do.

There aren’t many things that Britain genuinely does better than anyone else in the world, but secondary education is one of them. The discerning Russian plutocrat, who could buy anything anywhere, would have his son in England for his teenage years followed by an American Ivy League university. International league tables rank our private schools top of the world — their quality is world famous. But what’s less well-known is that exam results in the best state schools are now just as good. Which, given that they get by on less than a third of the money, is quite striking.

Over the past year, as a parent, I’ve been plunged into the great maze of English secondary education.