Private schools urge bursary bids

Leading independent schools in London are taking out advertisements in national newspapers to urge more applications for their bursary schemes.

The schools say they want to encourage bright pupils from less affluent homes to apply for fee-assisted places.

Eighteen schools, including Dulwich College and St Paul's, have pooled resources for the £65,000 publicity.

The adverts appear in the capital's Evening Standard and in national papers which have a London edition.

The schools offer to help parents "with the sums" if their child can pass their entrance exams.

"A place at a decent independent school is viable if a child is bright"
Schools spokesman

A spokesman for the group orf schools said the idea of subsidised places had "vanished from the radar of a lot of families" since the scrapping of the assisted places scheme in 1997.

"We want to spread the word that these things are here and put the concept of bursaries on people's radars," he said.

"A place at a decent independent school is viable if a child is bright and can pass an entrance exam.

"With the lapse of the assisted places scheme, large sectors of society wrote off the chance of their children ever going to independent school.

"This is an attempt to claw back some of that awareness."

Under changes to the rules associated with charitable status, independent schools are going to have to show they are offering a public benefit.

Offering bursaries to children from homes where school fees would be unaffordable might be one way of helping to satisfy that requirement.

Charitable status is estimated to save £100m in tax breaks for the independent school sector.