An intelligent mix of culture, style, travel, food and property, as well as where to go and what to see.
Oxford and Cambridge have released figures showing how many offers they gave to pupils from various schools last year. We have combined the figures in this table below. It shows how well state grammars and sixth-form colleges now compete with Britain’s finest independent schools. Over the years, both universities have roughly doubled the proportion of
I’m teaching a boy named Drayton. He’s from a typical Coventry family. I should know. I went to school in ‘Cov’. It seems like only the day before yesterday I was hopping the fence with Drayton’s older brother to go to KFC. But that was ten years ago. These days, Drayton orders an Uber Eats
Rod Liddle If you leave a Bunsen burner on for about ten minutes, then quickly put the rubber pipe over a water tap and turn it on full, you get a small explosion and a scalding stream of water to be directed at a boy called Harris. Similarly, if you attach crocodile clips to Harris’s
You might have seen ‘Asian dad’ memes on the internet, poking fun at the famously high expectations of fathers from my part of the world. ‘You Asian, not B-sian,’ he says in one version. Or: ‘After homework, you can play… the piano.’ My personal favourite is a picture of a crying Chinese girl saying: ‘I
One of the great advantages private schools offer is an ability to change with the times. While some hold on to traditional notions, many are adapting nimbly to the new woke world — expunging their problematic historical figures and educating pupils in the new equivalent of U and Non-U. But how do parents ensure their
If you were starting with a blank screen to design an education system today, it seems unlikely that you would think of creating single-sex schools, any more than you would single-sex professions or single-sex restaurants. Education for life is something we do together, like working or eating. Their existence is explained by the fact that
Thinking about taking up a musical instrument, but unsure where to start? Whether you have amazing musical abilities or not one iota, try our handy quiz to find out what’s right for you, from tissue paper and comb to saxophone.
What I remember in most vivid detail about my school trips are the coach journeys. This may be testimony to the fact that the schools I went to never took me anywhere glamorous, not because they didn’t have the money (our parents were paying enough) but because it wasn’t really thought decent or necessary to
I had a Post-it note beside my laptop during the online lessons I taught during lockdown. It simply said ‘shut up’. I have spent 20 years teaching maths in urban comprehensives, reflecting and refining my methods and trying to train others. I thought I was doing a pretty decent job, but the pandemic and the
St Edward’s School, Oxford St Edward’s School has featured in these pages before, because of its North Wall performing arts centre which attracts (in ‘normal’ times) more than 20,000 public visitors a year to its exhibitions and performances. St Edward’s sets great store by being part of Oxford as a whole. ‘Beyond Teddies’ is the
Whilst not exactly (to paraphrase Richard Burton as Marc Anthony in Cleopatra) the ‘biggest thing to hit Rome since Romulus & Remus’, Oprah Winfrey’s recent interview with the Duke and Duchess of Sussex was certainly A Big Deal. With over 17 million viewers watching in the States and 11.3m here, the renegade former royals cannot
When Kazuo Ishiguro first appeared on the literary scene in the 1980s, his work was often described using terms such as ‘exquisite’, ‘refined’ and ‘understated’. The supposedly Japanese sensibility of this Surrey-raised writer was on full display in his fine second novel An Artist of the Floating World (1986), narrated by a retired artist called
As if the Labour party didn’t have enough to worry about with its withering opinion poll ratings, yesterday’s Times reveals that party officials are warning MPs of another potential danger: malicious TikTok parodies. The paper reports that Sir Keir himself is one of several Labour MPs whose names have been used by hard-left TikTok pranksters
What better way to get shoppers back into London’s West End than by, er, building a large hill in the middle of it? That’s the latest plan from Westminster City Council, who hope that the Marble Arch Hill will lure people back to the area with the promise of stunning views around the city from
If you’re sick to death of Deliveroo, it’s time to take a look at the meat box. Forget vegan meats and plant-based pretenders. It’s dark and wet and we’re all stuck indoors — there’s no point making ourselves any more miserable. Steakhouses and brasseries have been moving their menus online and into cardboard boxes, with
The sacking of Gina Carano is still creating waves in Hollywood. The martial artist turned movie actress was dropped from the Star Wars spin-off, The Mandalorian, after blocking BLM supporters on Twitter and stating that being a Republican in Hollywood was like being a Jew during the Holocaust. She compounded her sins by suggesting that
On April 23, 1946, Enrico Piaggio filed a patent with the Ministry of Industry and Commerce for ‘a motorcycle of a rational complexity of organs and elements combined with a frame with mudguards and a casing covering the whole mechanical part’. In less formal terms, the machine in question was called a Vespa – and
Every weekend Spectator Life brings you doses of topical trivia – facts, figures and anecdotes inspired by the current week’s dates in history … 6 March In 1957 Ghana achieved independence from Britain. The country’s subsequent heroes have included Ferdie Ato Adoboe, who holds the world record for the fastest time to run 100 metres backwards
Netflix gets a lot of stick for being woke these days – and not just from this parish. And when you look at the network’s recent signings, it’s not hard to see why. From hiring Michelle Obama to present kids’ shows to splashing out on the Sussexes, Netflix executives don’t exactly hide their worldview. But for
The campervan is the ideal vehicle for a British spring (at present there is no foreign spring available). There are two extremes to consider. There is the original VW which looks like a fairy princess with big dewy headlamps for eyes. I was driven to Glastonbury in the old VW by a woman who looked like
As the nation waits with bated breath for Sunday’s broadcast of Oprah Winfrey’s already notorious interview with the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, here’s a smorgasbord of royalty in the movies, both real and fictional. With the success of Netflix’s, The Crown at the Golden Globes (granted a semi-seal of approval from Prince Harry) and the
As the Covid vaccination continues to roll out across the country with impressive speed and daily numbers of cases continue to steadily fall, the allure of the gradual release of lockdown restrictions into the sunlit uplands of something resembling a more normal existence grows stronger by the day. Unfortunately for many people – latest estimates
I am an unapologetic pudding pusher. Now, by pudding, I don’t simply mean that more people should eat dessert – although I do think we might feel a little more sweetly-disposed towards others if that were the case – but the peculiarly British tradition of steamed sponge puddings. Once terribly popular, now they are criminally
Every year, at the same time, they come – great flocks of them. Squawking, squabbling, screeching. Never mind the first cuckoo call or the sighting of the earliest swallow, there is no more reliable metric in modern Britain for the arrival of spring than parents moaning about their children having to dress up for World
What is Carrie Symonds’s status? She seems to have a lot of influence but its extent is undefined. People find the lack of clarity unsettling. Nic Conner of the Bow Group observed in the Times that unlike ministers or civil servants she ‘cannot be sacked’ — a questionable point given Boris Johnson’s alleged amatory record. It
Buy when there is gunfire on the streets, goes the old adage. But could this be a case of the right time to buy being when there is, well, hardly anything happening on the streets? Few investments have been as hard hit by Covid-19 as commercial property in central London. As shops and restaurants have
It is the third day of Women’s History Month, and instead of talking about a range of female accomplishments and achievements; everyone is instead, once again, talking about Taylor Swift. Swift tweeted yesterday, criticising the Netflix series Ginny and Georgia for its ‘lazy, deeply sexist joke’ which apparently is ‘degrading hard working women.’ The joke
Venison’s attributes are remarkable. It is the probably the most sustainable meat you can eat, given the unquestionable need to manage the country’s deer population to stop these elegant but pesky creatures from damaging woodland and wildlife habitats. And what of its health credentials? The deer’s free-foraging, cross-country roaming lifestyle makes it incredibly lean: higher
After famously criticising Rishi Sunak for his ‘£180 Bluetooth coffee mug’ back in July last year, Labour’s Angela Rayner seems to have started something of a gadget war. On Monday she came under fire for claiming a pair of Apple AirPods on parliamentary expenses. It was then swiftly pointed out that Peter Bone has also splashed out on some tax-payer
