<p>Private school graduates hold an inordinate number of top jobs in the UK.</p>
<p>Is that true in the US as well?</p>
<p>*In the UK…The research, published by the Sutton Trust education charity, shows that of the leading 100 media opinion-formers, 54 per cent came from private schools, compared with 49 per cent 20 years ago. Thirty-three per cent of the remainder came from selective grammar schools and only 14 per cent were from comprehensive schools, which cater for 90 per cent of all pupils.</p>
<p>The report on the legal profession shows that almost 70 per cent of barristers from leading chambers were educated at private schools. And in the House of Commons, 42 per cent of those holding government office or shadowing ministers are former pupils of private schools. Just 7 per cent of all pupils are educated in the private sector.*</p>
<p>In the US, there are 2,027 public institutions and 1,875 private, nonprofit institutions. (There are another 2400 or so private, for-profit schools). </p>
<p>The trend for CEOs to be from private colleges has been reversing itself over the last 20 years. In 1980, 54% of the Fortune 100 CEOs came from private schools and 32% from publics. In 2001, that number had shifted. 48% came from private schools; 48% from publics.</p>
<p>Digmedia mentioned CEOs, in which there is a pretty even balance, however if you look into politics, investment banking, private equity, management consulting, and hedge funds there seems to be a huge amount of private school (especially elite/prestigious school) graduates as compared with public schools.</p>
<p>I did an informal look at Senators and Members of Congress. I did not look at every one, but all (100%) of the ones I randomly picked were graduates of their state universities. I only looked at about 15 random people, but somehow I think that would show a trend.</p>
<p>I wouldn’t call hudge fund managers and ibankers “opinion-formers,” so I don’t accept the premise yet.</p>
<p>I did some further checking and found for your state, PA, 11 of the 18 Representatives went to private schools - a few to Penn, most most to smaller colleges (I was guessing on which were private; for example, Shippensburg is private??).</p>
<p>digmedia, I don’t think that trend holds true in the Senate. I will list just a few senators who attended private schools: Ted Kennedy (Harvard), John Kerry (Yale), Diane Feinstein (Stanford), Arlen Specter (UPenn), Bill Frist (Princeton), Lincoln Chafee (Brown), Joseph Lieberman (Yale), Dick Durbin (Georgetown), Ron Wyden (Stanford), etc.</p>
<p>“School” in the UK means education for under 16s, or 18 and under if they take A-levels (at least 1/3 leave as soon as they are able to at age 16. In many places schools finish at 16 and students who want to do A-levels attend a separate school called 6th form college. Others attend vocational schools at this age). UK universities are state owned and therefore all effectively like US state schools, including Oxford and Cambridge. This article refers to the attendance of a fee paying school for pupils aged under 18. It does not refer to higher education (this is any education after age 18) in any way.</p>
<p>A private school is a school where parents have to pay to send their kids.students aged 18 or under.</p>
<p>A public school is a TYPE of private school (the most expensive type) where anyone can go, as long as they pay (no entrance test). students aged 18 or under. This costs at least £20,000 per year and I have only met 2 or 3 people in my entire life who attended such a school.</p>
<p>A state or state maintained school is for under 18s and is paid for by the government (free to parents). A grammar school is one of these where there is selective entry through a test (called 11-plus). These schools are dying out. A comprehensive school is a free state school with no entry test. As the article says, more than 90% of UK students attend a state comprehensive. Most Americans seem to believe that UK students attend Hogwarts-like boarding schools. This couldn’t be further from the truth. As the article says, only 7% of pupils attend any sort of private school and probably 1% or less will be at a boarding school and most of those it is because their parents are in the Navy or some other kind of military job in which case their children’s school fess are paid for them. </p>
<p>Essentially all this article shows is that pupils from private schools are more likely to get into good universites, and hence more likely to get the best jobs. Not rocket science.</p>
<p>If you tell someone from the UK that you are “still in school” but you are over 18, they will assume you are in remedial classes! (or perhaps an institute for young offenders - prisoners aged under 21)</p>
<p>I think you’ll find in most of congress, the northeast will have a lot from private schools, the south, west, and midwest will not. The reasons are simple. The northeast has the private schools to a greater degree, and for the generation that is in congress (50 and up largely), that was the path into politics in that region. In Texas for instance, UT is the path into politics. You have to forgive the aggie governor, he didn’t know:)</p>