I READ with interest the letter from Gavin Bell (September 19) responding to Kevin McKenna’s article about private schools (“Advantages enjoyed by private schools simply cannot be justified”, The Herald, September 16).

What caught my interest was Mr Bell’s comment to the effect that “Private schools have teachers teaching the exact same curriculum, towards the same exams, the only difference being that they are better at it”.

I would be interested to know on what evidence he bases such a sweeping statement.

I taught for 37 years in the state sector in a wide variety of state schools ranging from the east end of Greenock to the south side of Glasgow.

I ended my teaching career as a headteacher in South Ayrshire.

Teachers in those schools had a dedication to the pupils they were educating, a strong work ethic and a desire to ensure that the children whom they taught would achieve to the best of their ability. That work ethic existed in all of the schools in which I taught.

Within the state sector itself, the barriers to success in delivering the curriculum were different from one school to another, usually depending on the socio-economic groups from which the pupils were drawn.

Life was very different for teachers in leafy Eastwood – where families are largely, although not totally, drawn from upwardly mobile parents – to the experience of teachers in parts of, for instance, Greenock where the barriers to learning, not in all cases of course, were much much more significant.

In all of these schools I found delightful children from lovely families.

However, in schools in more socially deprived areas the complexity of life for children and families experiencing deprivation impacted greatly on the learning and teaching experience of children and teachers alike.

I am pretty sure that most children entering private education do so having met certain conditions and these are usually based on academic ability as well as, with few exceptions, the ability to pay.

There will be a limited number of pupils in such schools experiencing the barriers to learning and teaching which many pupils experience in the state sector.

Indeed, as a head, I knew of several teachers who moved to the private sector as they found the state sector too challenging.

I also accepted pupils into my school who had fallen foul of the rules and regulations in their private school.

They had been ejected and it was left to the nearest state school to provide appropriate education for that child. The state school has no choice.

In no school, private or state, is life easy, no matter what some people like to think.

All teachers, even the few teachers in my experience who are not particularly well suited to the job, try their hardest for their pupils. What annoys me is when ill-informed people who choose privilege for their children (that is their right, of course) pretend that it is because teachers in private schools are, in some way, superior to those who teach in the state sector.

Why make this a competition?

When I taught in Eastwood my academic classes did achieve more highly than those in poorer areas.

However, when socio-economic conditions were taken into account for my pupils in more deprived areas, my results were at least as good.

I wasn’t a better teacher in a better area; I was just doing a job that I loved.

That is what all teachers do. The job is hard enough without silly comments being made by people who should know better.

Moira Gray,

1 Rock Drive,

Kilbarchan,

Renfrewshire.