Public school (United Kingdom)#Early and mid 20th century

There is no single or absolute definition of public school, and the use of the term has varied over time and according to context. The starting point was the contrast between a public school and private teaching (eg., provided by a hired tutor).{{cite web |title=The term 'Public School' Appendix A of Fleming Report (1944) |url=https://www.education-uk.org/documents/fleming/fleming.html#11 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240322054705/https://www.education-uk.org/documents/fleming/fleming.html#11 |archive-date=22 March 2024 |website=education-uk.org |publisher=Gillard D (2018) Education in the UK: a history |access-date=22 March 2024 }}

In England and Wales schools that are called public schools are not funded from public taxation, generally called "state schools".{{cite web |title=The British Education System |url=https://www.hmc.org.uk/about-hmc/projects/the-british-education-system/ |website=www.hmc.org.uk |publisher=Headmasters' and Headmistresses' Conference}}

Sydney Smith in an 1810 article published in The Edinburgh Review suggested the following:

{{blockquote|"By a public school, we mean an endowed place of education of old standing, to which the sons of gentlemen resort in considerable numbers, and where they continue to reside, from eight or nine, to eighteen years of age. We do not give this as a definition which would have satisfied Porphyry or Duns-Scotus, but as one sufficiently accurate for our purpose. The characteristic features of these schools are, their antiquity, the numbers, and the ages of the young people who are educated at them ...".{{cite journal |last1=Smith |first1=Sydney |title=Remarks on the System of Education in Public Schools |journal=The Edinburgh Review |date=Aug 1810 |issue=via Google Books |pages=327 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Iko7AQAAMAAJ&pg=PA327}}}}

Arthur Leach, in his History of Winchester College (1899), stated: "The only working definition of a Public School...is that it is an aristocratic or plutocratic school which is wholly or almost wholly a Boarding School, is under some form of more or less public control, and is ... non-local".{{cite book |last=Leach |first=Arthur |title=A History of Winchester College |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=eU44AAAAMAAJ&q=plutocratic |year=1899 |location=London |publisher=Duckworth |page=7}} Edward C. Mack in 1938 proposed the simple definition of "a non-local endowed boarding school for the upper classes".{{cite book |last1=Mack |first1=Edward C. |title=Public Schools and British Opinion, 1780 to 1860 |date=1938 |publisher=Methuen |location=London |page=viii}}

Vivian Ogilvie in The English Public School (1957) suggests five "characteristics commonly associated with a public school" (while allowing that these are not absolute or definitive):

{{blockquote|"it is a class school, catering for a well-to-do clientèle; it is expensive; it is non-local; it is a predominantly boarding school; it is independent of the State and of local government, yet it is not privately owned or run for profit."{{cite book |last1=Ogilvie |first1=Vivian |title=The English Public School |date=1957 |publisher=B. T. Batsford Ltd |location=London |page=7}}}}

Oxford Dictionary of English:

{{blockquote|'In England, originally, a grammar-school founded or endowed for use or benefit of the public, either generally, or of a particular locality, and carried on under some kind of public management or control; often contrasted with a "private school" carried on at the risk and for the profit of its master or proprietors.'{{cite book |title=Oxford Dictionary of English |date=19 August 2010 |publisher=OUP Oxford |isbn=978-0199571123}}}}

In November 1965, the UK Cabinet considered the definition of a public school for the purpose of the Public Schools Commission set up that year. Its starting point was the 1944 Fleming Committee definition of Public Schools, which used schools that were members of the then Headmasters' Conference, the Governing Bodies Association or the Girls' Schools Association.{{cite web |last1=Crosland |first1=Anthony |title=House of Commons 22nd December 1965 |url=https://hansard.parliament.uk/Commons/1965-12-22/debates/c096cb1f-d00b-47e9-bc5c-7d2d8d30e5d6/PublicSchools(Commission) |publisher=Hansard}} At that time, there were 276 such independent schools (134 boys and 142 girls), which the 1965 Public Schools Commission took in scope of its work alongside 22 maintained and 152 direct grant grammar schools.

In 2023, using the 1965 Public Schools Commission definition or the 1944 Fleming Committee definition,{{cite web |last1=Fleming |first1=David |title=The Public Schools and the General Education System |url=https://www.education-uk.org/documents/fleming/fleming.html#00a |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230804195219/https://education-uk.org/documents/fleming/fleming.html#00a |archive-date=4 August 2023 |access-date=1 January 2023 |website=www.education-uk.org |publisher=Gillard D (2018) Education in the UK: a history }} there are 302 independent secondary schools belonging to the Headmasters' and Headmistresses' Conference (78% of HMC schools are co-educational, 9% are boys only and 13% are girls only),{{cite web |last1=HMC |first1=Leading Independent Schools |title=About Us |url=

https://www.hmc.org.uk/about-hmc/|publisher=The Heads' Conference |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230308091917/https://www.hmc.org.uk/about-hmc/ |access-date=31 March 2023|archive-date=8 March 2023 }}{{cite web |title='Fact 5' from HMC 'Facts and Figures' |url=

https://www.hmc.org.uk/facts-figures/top-10-facts/|publisher=The Heads' Conference |archive-url=

https://web.archive.org/web/20230308091947/https://www.hmc.org.uk/facts-figures/top-10-facts/|access-date=31 March 2023|archive-date=

8 March 2023}} and 152 independent girls' secondary schools belonging to the Girls' Schools Association.{{cite web |title=gsa - Girls' School Association |url=https://www.independentschoolsyearbook.co.uk/content/2564/gsa |website=www.independentschoolsyearbook.co.uk |access-date=1 January 2023}}

The majority of public schools are affiliated with, or were established by, a Christian denomination, principally the Church of England,{{cite web |last1=Landow |first1=George |title=A Critical View of British Public Schools |url=https://victorianweb.org/history/education/eh4.html |website=victorianweb.org |publisher=The Victorian Web}} but in some cases the Roman Catholic and Methodist churches.{{cite news |last1=Heaven |first1=Will |title=Have posh Catholics had their day? |url=http://www.catholicherald.co.uk/issues/july-3rd-2015/have-posh-catholics-had-their-day/ |work=The Catholic Herald |publisher=via Internet Archive Wayback Machine |date=3 Jul 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160124153952/http://www.catholicherald.co.uk/issues/july-3rd-2015/have-posh-catholics-had-their-day/ |archive-date=24 January 2016 }} A small number are non-denominational or inherently secular, including Oswestry School,{{cite book |last1=Miner |first1=John N. |title=Grammar Schools of Medieval England:A.F. Leach in Historiographical Perspective|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=WlMBBAAAQBAJ&q=oswestry+school+secular&pg=PA24 |date=January 1990 |publisher=McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP |isbn=9780773561526 }} Sevenoaks School, Bedales{{cite web |title=Bedales Jaw |url=https://www.bedales.org.uk/about-us/history/bedales-jaw#:~:text=John%20Badley%20described%20Bedales%20as,would%20be%20in%20other%20schools. |website=www.bedales.org.uk |publisher=Bedales School}} and University College School.{{cite book |last1=Gathorne-Hardy |first1=Jonathan |title=The Public School Phenomenon |date=1977 |publisher=Hodder and Stroughton |isbn=978-0340223734 |page=100}}

A minor public school is defined in Brewer's Dictionary of Modern Phrase and Fable{{cite book |last1=Ayto |first1=John |last2=Crofton |first2=Ian |title=Brewer's Dictionary of Modern Phrase and Fable |date=2006 |publisher=Weidenfeld & Nicolson |isbn=9780304368099 |page=497 |edition=2nd}} as "a somewhat demeaning term dating from the 1930s for an English public school that is not one of the ancient foundations, such as Eton, Harrow, Rugby or Winchester". Public school rivalry{{cite journal |last1=Mount |first1=Harry |title=A guide to public school rivalries |journal=The Spectator |date=12 April 2019 |url=https://www.europebreakingnews.net/2019/04/a-guide-to-public-school-rivalries/amp/}} is a factor in the perception of a "great" (or "major") versus "minor" distinction.{{cite journal |last1=Delingpole |first1=James |title=Thank God I don't have that ghastly sense of entitlement that Eton instils |journal=The Spectator |date=17 December 2011 |url=https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/thank-god-i-don-t-have-that-ghastly-sense-of-entitlement-that-eton-instils}}

The perception of a top tier of public schools is long standing but with some debate on membership.

Howard Staunton's book of 1865 entitled The Great Schools of England considered the nine Clarendon schools plus Cheltenham College, Christ's Hospital, and Dulwich College.{{cite book |last1=Staunton |first1=Howard |title=The Great Schools of England |date=1865 |publisher=Sampson Low, Son, and Marston |location=Milton House, Ludgate Hill |isbn=978-1345096538}}

In 1881 C.Kegan Paul & Co published Our Public Schools with chapters on seven schools: Eton, Harrow, Winchester, Rugby, Westminster, Marlborough, and Charterhouse.{{cite book |title=Our Public Schools |date=1881 |publisher=C.Kegan Paul & Co |location=London |edition=via Google Books |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=wJcWAAAAIAAJ&pg=PP9}}

In 1893 Edward Arnold published a book entitled Great Public Schools with a chapter on each of Eton, Harrow, Charterhouse, Cheltenham, Rugby, Clifton, Westminster, Marlborough, Haileybury, and Winchester.{{cite book |last1=Various Authors |title=Great Public Schools |date=1893 |publisher=Edward Arnold |location=London |isbn=978-0530527772}} The Bryce Report of 1895 (Report of the Royal Commission on Secondary Education) described the schools reformed by the Public Schools Act 1868 as the "seven 'great endowed schools'".{{cite web |title=Page 44 Bryce Report 1895 |url=http://www.educationengland.org.uk/documents/bryce1895/bryce1895.html |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180605151514/http://www.educationengland.org.uk/documents/bryce1895/bryce1895.html |url-status=dead |archive-date=5 June 2018 |website=educationengland.org.uk/history |publisher=Gillard D. (2018) Education in England: a history}}

{{see also|History of education in England}}

File:W. Harvey, King's School Canterbury. Wellcome M0015720.jpg, lithograph by William Harvey, 1851 ]]

Public schools emerged from grammar schools{{cite web |last1=David Fleming |title=The Fleming Report 1944, p.6 (para.22) |url=http://www.educationengland.org.uk/documents/fleming/fleming.html |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150419070633/http://educationengland.org.uk/documents/fleming/fleming.html |url-status=dead |archive-date=19 April 2015 |website=educationengland.org.uk|publisher=Derek Gillard}} established to educate pupils, usually destined for clerical orders, in Latin grammar. Thus, concerned with educating boys. The term "public" came into use because over time access to such schools was not restricted on the basis of home location, paternal occupation or status, and that they were subject to an element of public management or control,{{OED|public school, n. and adj.}} in contrast to private schools which were run for the personal profit of the owner(s).{{OED|private school, n.}} The origins of schools in England were primarily religious, although in 1640 the House of Commons invited the reformer and promoter of universal education Comenius to England to establish and participate in an agency for the promotion of learning. It was intended that by-products of this would be the publication of "universal" books and the setting up of schools for boys and girls.{{cite web|url=https://education-uk.org/history/chapter01.html|title=Education in England – Chapter 1|website=educationengland.org.uk|publisher=Gillard D (2018) Education in England: a history}} The English Civil War prevented any such reform.{{Cite NIE |wstitle=Comenius, Johann Amos |pages=198–200||volume=V|short=1}}{{cite EB1911|wstitle=Comenius, Johann Amos |volume=06 |page=759 |short=1}}

File:Eton College by Loggan 1690 - R - slpl ste02048 merge.jpeg, founded 1440, by David Loggan, published in his Cantabrigia Illustrata of 1690]]

Some schools are particularly old, such as The King's School, Canterbury {{Circa|597}}, The King's School, Rochester {{Circa|604}}, St Peter's School, York {{Circa|627}}, Sherborne School {{Circa|710}}, (refounded 1550 by Edward VI), Warwick School {{Circa|914}}, King's Ely {{Circa|970}} (once the Ely Cathedral Grammar School, then the King's School Ely when refounded in 1541 by Henry VIII, subsequently adopting the current name in 2012) and St Albans School {{Circa|948}}. Until the Late Middle Ages most schools were controlled by the Church; and had specific entrance criteria; others were restricted to the sons of members of guilds, trades, or livery companies.{{cite news |last1=Cross |first1=Richard |title=When education meant Bible study |url=https://www.churchtimes.co.uk/articles/2006/15-december/books-arts/book-reviews/when-education-meant-bible-study |work=The Church Times |date=14 Dec 2006}}{{cite web |title=Livery Companies and Education |url=https://world-traders.org/livery-companies-and-education/#:~:text=Many%20of%20these%20still%20flourish,and%20Londonderry%20College%2C%20Northern%20Ireland. |website=world-traders.org |publisher=The Worshipful Company of World Traders}}

In 1382 William of Wykeham, Bishop of Winchester and Chancellor of England, founded Winchester College. In 1440 Henry VI founded Eton College. These schools had significantly larger foundations than the existing local grammar schools, had high level political patronage, and also accepted "non-local" pupils. This was "the start of a new kind of school".{{cite book |last1=Ogilvie |first1=Vivian |title=The English Public School |date=1957 |publisher=Batsford |page=34}} Elizabeth I refounded Westminster School in 1560,{{cite book |last1=Turner |first1=David |title=The Old Boys The Decline and Rise of the Public School |date=2015 |publisher=Yale University Press |location=New Haven and London |isbn=9780300219388 |page=21}}{{Cite web |url=http://www.luminarium.org/encyclopedia/westminsterschool.htm |title=Elizabeth I has been credited with founding the Westminster School in 1560 |publisher=Luminarium.org |access-date=30 August 2011}} with new statutes, to select forty Queen's Scholars.{{cite book |last1=Thornbury |first1=Walter |title=Old and New London Volume 3 |date=1878 |publisher=Cassell, Petter & Galpin |location=London |pages=462–483 |edition=via British History Online |url=https://www.british-history.ac.uk/old-new-london/vol3/pp462-483}} This created a "triad" of privileged schools—Winchester, Eton and Westminster.{{cite book |last1=Ogilvie |first1=Vivian |title=The English Public School |date=1957 |publisher=Batsford |page=57}} From the 16th century onward, boys' boarding schools continued to be founded or endowed for public use.

Daniel Defoe in The Compleat English Gentleman of 1728,{{cite book |last1=Defoe |first1=Daniel |title=The Compleat English Gentleman |date=1728 |publisher=BiblioBazaar |isbn=978-1113145932 |edition=2009 reprint}} writes of "the great schools of Eton, Winchester, Westminster, Felsted, Bishop Stortford (sic),{{efn|Defoe is referring to the long defunct Bishop's Stortford Grammar School,{{cite web |title=The Old Grammar School |url=https://www.stortfordhistory.co.uk/guide3/grammar-school/ |website=www.stortfordhistory.co.uk}} not Bishop's Stortford College which was established in 1868.}} Canterbury and others, where the children—nay, the eldest sons—of some of the best families in England have been educated."{{cite web |last1=Defoe |first1=Daniel|date=1728|title=The Compleat English Gentleman |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=VRRAAAAAYAAJ&q=nay%2C+the+eldest+sons+-+of+some+of+the+best+families+in+England&pg=PA8 |website= via Google Books |edition=1890 reprint|access-date=13 August 2021}}

By the end of the 17th century, the London day schools St Paul's and Merchant Taylors', together with the charitable foundations of Christ's Hospital and Charterhouse, had developed an elevated "standing in popular regard".{{cite web |last1=David Fleming |title=The Fleming Report 1944, p.9 (para.30) |url=http://www.educationengland.org.uk/documents/fleming/fleming.html |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150419070633/http://educationengland.org.uk/documents/fleming/fleming.html |url-status=dead |archive-date=19 April 2015 |website=educationengland.org.uk|publisher=Gillard D (2018) Education in England: a history}} By the end of the 18th century, two local grammar schools, Harrow and Rugby, had achieved national fame.{{cite web |last1=David Fleming |title=The Fleming Report 1944, p.17 (para.40) |url=http://www.educationengland.org.uk/documents/fleming/fleming.html |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150419070633/http://educationengland.org.uk/documents/fleming/fleming.html |url-status=dead |archive-date=19 April 2015 |website=educationengland.org.uk|publisher=Gillard D (2018) Education in England: a history}} In the case of Harrow, political sponsorship by aristocratic Whig politician James Brydges (later Duke of Chandos) played a significant role,{{cite web |last1=David Fleming |title=The Fleming Report 1944, p.13 (para.35) |url=http://www.educationengland.org.uk/documents/fleming/fleming.html |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150419070633/http://educationengland.org.uk/documents/fleming/fleming.html |url-status=dead |archive-date=19 April 2015 |website=educationengland.org.uk|publisher=Gillard D (2018) Education in England: a history}} but also, as was the case too with Rugby, an exemplary headmaster was a key factor in raising the status of the school.{{cite web |last1=David Fleming| title=The Fleming Report 1944, p.13 (para.36) |url=http://www.educationengland.org.uk/documents/fleming/fleming.html |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150419070633/http://educationengland.org.uk/documents/fleming/fleming.html |url-status=dead |archive-date=19 April 2015 |website=educationengland.org.uk|publisher= Gillard D (2018) Education in England: a history}} This phenomenon was also seen at Shrewsbury, where Samuel Butler was headmaster between 1798 and 1836.{{cite web |last1=David Fleming| title=The Fleming Report 1944, p.17 (para.41) |url=http://www.educationengland.org.uk/documents/fleming/fleming.html |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150419070633/http://educationengland.org.uk/documents/fleming/fleming.html |url-status=dead |archive-date=19 April 2015 |website=educationengland.org.uk|publisher=Gillard D (2018) Education in England: a history}}

{{Quote box|align=right|quote=

"Would you your son should be a sot or dunce,

Lascivious, headstrong, or all these at once;

That in good time the stripling's finish'd taste

For loose expense and fashionable waste

Should prove your ruin, and his own at last;

Train him in public with a mob of boys,

Childish in mischief only and in noise,

Else of a mannish growth, and five in ten

In infidelity and lewdness men. ..."

|source=—Extract from William Cowper's 1784
Tirocinium or A Review of Schools}}

In 1801 William Vincent, headmaster of Westminster published A Defence of Public Education.{{cite web |last1=Vincent |first1=William |title=A Defence of Public Education |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=I6QAAAAAYAAJ&q=Google+books+WIlliam+Vincent+A+Defence+of+Public+Education&pg=PA149 |website=via Google Books|year=1817 }} It contains the text "...comprize under the expression of Public Schools? Are we to understand only Winchester, Eton and Westminster? or are we to extend our notion, as we ought to do, to the other three great schools in the Metropolis;{{efn|St Paul's, Merchant Taylors', Charterhouse}} to Harrow, Rugby, Manchester, Wakefield and many more of equal magnitude in the North?"

In 1816 Rudolph Ackermann published a book which used the term "History of the Public Schools" of what he described as the "principal schools of England",{{cite web |title=The History of the Colleges of Winchester, Eton, and Westminster: With the Charter-House, the Schools of St. Paul's, Merchant Taylors, Harrow, and Rugby, and the Free-school of Christ's Hospital |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Qa_hwAEACAAJ |website=via Google Books|last1=Ackermann|first1=Rudolph|last2=Combe|first2=William |year=1816|publisher=R.Ackermann 101, Strand, London}} entitled The History of the Colleges of Winchester, Eton, and Westminster; with the Charter-House, the Schools of St. Paul's, Merchant Taylors, Harrow, and Rugby, and the Free-School of Christ's Hospital.

In 1818 Nicholas Carlisle published a two-volume survey entitled A Concise Description of the Endowed Grammar Schools in England and Wales.[https://books.google.com/books?id=rY-8ceSYvWoC A Concise Description of the Endowed Grammar Schools in England and Wales] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221230143035/https://books.google.com/books?id=rY-8ceSYvWoC |date=30 December 2022 }}, 2 vols. (1818) The survey was conducted by means of a questionnaire sent to the schools. The description of 475 schools{{cite book |last1=Carlisle |first1=Nicholas |title=A Concise Description of the Endowed Grammar Schools in England and Wales |date=1818 |publisher=Forgotten Books |location=London |isbn=978-0265990551 |page=xliv |edition=2019 reprint}} range from one or two paragraphs to many pages of detail. Included in the survey are the renowned nine schools which forty three years later became the subject of the 1861 Clarendon Commission.

Thomas Arnold became headmaster of Rugby School in 1828, and the reforming actions he took during his fourteen years of tenure established a new model for the nineteenth and early twentieth century public school.{{cite book |last1=Ogilvie |first1=Vivian |title=The English Public School |date=1957 |publisher=Batsford |location=London |page=138}} Arnold developed the praepostor (or prefect) system, in which a group of senior boys were given disciplinary powers of other pupils.{{cite book |last1=Ogilvie |first1=Vivian |title=The English Public School |date=1957 |publisher=Batsford |location=London |page=141}} This became a standard method to establish good order in the public schools, which had developed a reputation for rowdiness and on occasion, serious disorder. King's College School was founded in 1829 and University College School in 1830.

Separate preparatory schools (or "prep schools") for younger boys developed from the 1830s, with entry to the senior schools becoming limited to boys of at least 12 or 13 years old. The first of these was Windlesham House School, established with support from Thomas Arnold, the headmaster of Rugby School between 1828 and 1841.{{cite web|url=http://www.windlesham.com/download/The_History_of_WHS.pdf|title=The History of Windlesham House School|publisher=Windlesham House School|access-date=21 April 2013|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131102184642/http://www.windlesham.com/download/The_History_of_WHS.pdf|archive-date=2 November 2013|url-status=dead}}{{cite web|url=http://histclo.com/app/history.html|title=History of British Preparatory School}}

{{anchor|Clarendon schools}}

File:Cheltenham College Chapel and library.jpg, 1841 ]]

A royal commission, the Clarendon Commission (1861–1864), investigated nine of the more established schools, including seven boarding schools (Charterhouse, Eton, Harrow, Rugby, Shrewsbury, Westminster and Winchester) and two day schools (St Paul's and Merchant Taylors').{{sfnp|Shrosbree|1988|p=12}}

The Public Schools Act 1868 subsequently regulated and reformed the seven boarding schools investigated by Clarendon, and in summary established and granted autonomy to new governing bodies for the seven schools and as part of that, released them from previous obligations under their founding charters to educate "boys on the Foundation" ie scholarship boys who paid nominal or no fees.{{cite web |title=Text of Public Schools Act 1868 |url=http://www.educationengland.org.uk/documents/acts/1868-public-schools-act.html |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131114013537/http://www.educationengland.org.uk/documents/acts/1868-public-schools-act.html |url-status=dead |archive-date=14 November 2013 |publisher=Gillard D (2018) Education in England: a history}} The act gave the seven schools independence from direct jurisdiction or responsibility of the Crown, the established church, or the government. Henceforth each of these schools was to be managed by a board of governors. St Paul's School and the Merchant Taylors' School claimed successfully that their constitutions made them "private" schools, and were excluded from the requirements of this legislation.{{sfnp|Shrosbree|1988|p=118}}

The Taunton Commission was appointed in 1864 to examine the remaining 782 endowed grammar schools, and in 1868 produced recommendations to restructure their endowments; these recommendations were included, in modified form, in the Endowed Schools Act 1869. In that year Edward Thring, headmaster of Uppingham School, wrote to 37 of his fellow headmasters of what he considered the leading boys' schools, not covered by the Public Schools Act 1868, inviting them to meet annually{{cite web |title=The Public and Preparatory Schools Handbook 1968 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=tdrqjA5j7tYC&q=%22School+Society+and+Annual+Conference%22 |website=Google Books|year = 1968}} to address the threat posed by the Endowed Schools Act 1869. In the first year 12 headmasters attended; the following year 34 attended, including heads from the Clarendon schools. The Headmasters' Conference (HMC), now the Headmasters' and Headmistresses' Conference, has grown steadily and by 2021 had 298 British and Irish schools as members.{{cite web |title=Member schools in British Isles |url=https://www.hmc.org.uk/about-hmc/ |website=About Us – HMC}}

Many new schools were established in the mid-part of the nineteenth century including the day schools City of London School (1837) and Liverpool College (1840). New boarding schools included Cheltenham (1841), Marlborough (1843), Rossall (1844), Radley (1847), Taunton (1847), Lancing (1848), Hurstpierpoint (1849), Bradfield (1850), Wellington (1852), Epsom (1855), Ardingly (1858), Clifton (1862), Malvern (1862), Haileybury (1862), Framlingham (1864) and Cranleigh (1865).{{cite web |last1=David Fleming |title=The Fleming Report 1944, p.19 (para.46) |url=http://www.educationengland.org.uk/documents/fleming/fleming.html |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150419070633/http://educationengland.org.uk/documents/fleming/fleming.html |url-status=dead |archive-date=19 April 2015 |website=educationengland.org.uk|publisher=Gillard D (2018) Education in England: a history}} In 1887 the Divisional Court and the Court of Appeal determined that the City of London School was a public school.Blake v The Mayor and Citizens of the City of London [1887] L.R. 19 Q.B.D. 79.

The Public Schools Yearbook{{efn|Published annually as The Public Schools Yearbook from 1889 to 1934; as The Public and Preparatory Schools Yearbook from 1935 to 1985; as ''The Independent Schools Yearbook from 1986 to date.{{cite web |title=Independent Schools Yearbook |url=https://www.independentschoolsyearbook.co.uk/ |website=www.independentschoolsyearbook.co.uk |publisher=Bloomsbury}}}} was published for the first time in 1889, listing 30 schools,{{cite journal |title=The Public Schools Yearbook |journal=Public Schools Year Book and Preparatory Schools Year Book1908, 1909 |date=1889 |publisher=Swan Sonnenschein & Co |location=London |page=29 |edition=via HathiTrust Digital Library |url=https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=mdp.39015062795003&view=1up&seq=29&skin=2021}} mostly boarding schools. The day school exceptions were St Paul's School and Merchant Taylors' School. By 1895 there were entries for 64 schools.{{cite journal |title=The Public Schools Yearbook |journal=Public Schools Year Book and Preparatory Schools Year Book1908, 1909 |date=1895 |publisher=Swan Sonnenschein & Co |location=London |page=35 |edition=via HathiTrust Digital Library |url=https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=hvd.hn77a4&view=1up&seq=37&skin=2021}}

File:Stowe School in Stowe Park - geograph.org.uk - 3991335.jpg, 1923, in Stowe House, completed 1779]]

[[File:Arms Of The Public Schools Of England.png|thumb|The arms of 24 public schools on a 1911 postcard. From top to bottom (left to right):

{{hlist

|1. Tonbridge

|Charterhouse

|Winchester

|Bedford

}}

{{hlist

|2. Haileybury

|Uppingham

|St Paul's

|Manchester Grammar

}}

{{hlist

|3. Merchant Taylors'

|Eton

|Malvern

|King Edward VI

}}

{{hlist

|4. Repton

|Clifton

|Harrow

|St Edwards

}}

{{hlist

|5. Shrewsbury

|Radley

|Cheltenham

|Marlborough

}}

{{hlist

|6. Dulwich

|Wellington

|Rossall

|Rugby

}} ]]

Frederick William Sanderson, Headmaster of Oundle School, initiated educational reforms at the turn of the century. Oundle became the first school to create an engineering curriculum as well as teaching biochemistry and agriculture.{{sfn|Tyson|1996|p=484}}

There was a further expansion in public school education in the interwar years. New schools such as Rendcomb (1920), Stowe (1923), Canford (1923), Bryanston (1928) and Millfield (1935) were established.{{cite web |last1=David Fleming |title=The Fleming Report 1944, p.30 |url=http://www.educationengland.org.uk/documents/fleming/fleming.html |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150419070633/http://educationengland.org.uk/documents/fleming/fleming.html |url-status=dead |archive-date=19 April 2015 |website=educationengland.org.uk|publisher=Derek Gillard}}

In 1942 the then President of the Board of Education Rab Butler appointed a Committee on Public Schools under the leadership of David Fleming. The committee was tasked to "consider means whereby the association between the Public Schools and the general educational system of the country could be developed and extended".{{cite web |last1=Fleming |first1=David |title=The Fleming Report (1944) The Public Schools and the General Educational System |url=http://www.educationengland.org.uk/documents/fleming/fleming.html#00 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150419070633/http://educationengland.org.uk/documents/fleming/fleming.html#00 |url-status=dead |archive-date=19 April 2015 |website=www.educationengland.org.uk |publisher=Gillard D (2018) Education in England: a history |access-date=5 January 2023}} The Fleming Report (1944) entitled The Public Schools and the General Education System defined a public school as a member of the Governing Bodies Association or the Headmasters' Conference. The Fleming Committee recommended that one-quarter of the places at the public schools should be assigned to a national bursary scheme for children who would benefit from boarding. A key advocate was the post-war Minister of Education Ellen Wilkinson, but the proposed national bursary scheme never got into legislation in that post-war age of severe budget constraints. The Conservative government elected in 1951 did not adopt the proposal. It failed because it was not a high priority for either party, money was tight, there was wavering support from both public schools and local education authorities, and no consensus was reached on how to select the pupils to participate.{{cite journal |last1=Hillman |first1=Nicholas |title=Public schools and the Fleming report of 1944: shunting the first-class carriage on to an immense siding? |journal=History of Education |date=March 2012 |volume=41 |issue=2 |pages=235–255 |doi=10.1080/0046760X.2011.598468 |s2cid=144081906 }}

Based on the recommendations of the Fleming Report, the Education Act 1944, also known as "the Butler Act", did, however, establish an enhanced status for endowed grammar schools receiving a grant from central government. The direct grant grammar schools would henceforth receive partial state funding (a "direct grant") in return for taking between 25 and 50 percent of its pupils from state primary schools.{{sfnp|Donnison|1970|p=49}} Other grammar schools were funded by local education authorities.

The Labour government in 1965 made major changes to the organisation of state maintained schools issuing Circular 10/65 which directed local authorities to phase out selection at eleven years of age. It also fulfilled its pledge to examine the role of public schools, setting up a royal commission "to advise on the best way of integrating the public schools with the State system". The commission used a wider definition than that of the Fleming Committee.{{citation |date=19 November 1965 |url=http://filestore.nationalarchives.gov.uk/pdfs/small/cab-129-123-c-155.pdf |title=Public Schools: Memorandum by the Secretary of State for Education and Science |page=1 |access-date=21 May 2019 |archive-date=12 December 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191212023437/http://filestore.nationalarchives.gov.uk/pdfs/small/cab-129-123-c-155.pdf |url-status=dead }} The Public Schools Commission produced two reports: the Newsom Report of 1968 entitled The Public Schools Commission: First Report{{cite web |title=Newsom Report 1968 |url=http://www.educationengland.org.uk/documents/psc1/newsom1968-1.html |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150419074317/http://educationengland.org.uk/documents/psc1/newsom1968-1.html |url-status=dead |archive-date=19 April 2015 |website=educationengland.org.uk/ |publisher=Gillard D (2018) Education in England: a history}} covering boarding schools and the Donnison Report of 1970 entitled The Public Schools Commission: Second Report{{cite web |title=Donnison Report 1970 |url=http://www.educationengland.org.uk/documents/psc2/donnison1970-1.html |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150419024338/http://educationengland.org.uk/documents/psc2/donnison1970-1.html |url-status=dead |archive-date=19 April 2015 |website=educationengland.org.uk |publisher=Gillard D (2018) Education in England: a history}} covering day schools, including also direct grant and maintained grammar schools. The report presented by John Newsom in 1968 was supportive of boarding school education and made 52 recommendations, including state funding of up to 45,000 places.{{cite web |title=Summary of Newsom report|url=http://www.educationengland.org.uk/documents/psc1/index.html#:~:text=The%20Commission%20decided%20to%20produce,grant%20and%20maintained%20grammar%20schools.&text=The%20main%20objection%20to%20private%20schools%20is%20that%20they%20are%20socially%20divisive. |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120505090328/http://educationengland.org.uk/documents/psc1/index.html#:~:text=The%20Commission%20decided%20to%20produce,grant%20and%20maintained%20grammar%20schools.&text=The%20main%20objection%20to%20private%20schools%20is%20that%20they%20are%20socially%20divisive. |url-status=dead |archive-date=5 May 2012 |website=www.educationengland.org.uk |publisher=Gillard D (2018) Education in England: a history}} No action was taken by the then Labour government (or successive administrations). The report presented by David Donnison in 1970 made 25 recommendations for England and Wales and 22 for Scotland.{{cite web |title=Summary of Donnison report |url=http://www.educationengland.org.uk/documents/psc2/index.html#:~:text=It%20was%20announced%20by%20education%20secretary%20Anthony%20Crosland%20in%20December%201965.&text=This%20Second%20Report%20considered%20the,the%20middle%20of%20comprehensive%20reorganisation. |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120505085044/http://educationengland.org.uk/documents/psc2/index.html#:~:text=It%20was%20announced%20by%20education%20secretary%20Anthony%20Crosland%20in%20December%201965.&text=This%20Second%20Report%20considered%20the,the%20middle%20of%20comprehensive%20reorganisation. |url-status=dead |archive-date=5 May 2012 |website=www.educationengland.org.uk |publisher=GillardD (2018) Education in England: a history}} The commission was divided on many issues so several of the recommendations were not made with full consensus. No action was taken by the incoming (1970) Conservative government but five years later the direct grant scheme was terminated by Labour.{{cite news |last1=Andalo |first1=Debbie |title=No support for direct grant schools, union warns |url=https://www.theguardian.com/education/2006/oct/19/schools.uk1 |work=The Guardian |date=19 Oct 2006}}

The social changes of the 1960s were felt in the public schools; the new headmaster at Oundle School noted that "student protests and intellectual ferment were challenging the status quo".{{cite web|url=http://www.oundleschool.org.uk/news/newsItem.php?id=982|title=Headmaster Dr Barry Trapnell CBE (1924–2012)|publisher=Oundle School|access-date=27 April 2013|archive-url=https://archive.today/20130505152624/http://www.oundleschool.org.uk/news/newsItem.php?id=982|archive-date=5 May 2013|url-status=dead}} These challenges later coincided with the mid-1970s recession and moves by the Labour government to separate the independent and state sectors.{{sfnp|Walford|1986b|p=149}}

The direct grant scheme was abolished in 1975 and the HMC schools within the scheme became fully independent.{{sfnp|Walford|1986b|p=149}} Local authorities were ordered to cease funding places at independent schools. This accounted for over a quarter of places at 56 schools, and over half the places at 22 schools.{{sfnp|Donnison|1970|pp=81, 91}} Between 1975 and 1983 funding was also withdrawn from 11 voluntary-aided grammar schools, which became independent schools and full members of the HMC.{{cite hansard |url=https://api.parliament.uk/historic-hansard/written-answers/1980/nov/05/schools-status |house=House of Commons |title=Schools (Status) |date=5 November 1980 |column=579W |speaker=Rhodes Boyson |position=Under-Secretary of State for Education }} State funding was however revived between 1981 and 1997 with the introduction of the Assisted Places Scheme, which provided support for 80,000 pupils attending schools not part of the state maintained sector.{{cite web |url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/special/politics97/issues/education.shtml |title=The main elements of the Queen's Speech on May 14, 1997 upon the two Education Bills |publisher=BBC Politics 1997 |access-date=19 June 2011 |archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20110618155343/http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/special/politics97/issues/education.shtml |archive-date=18 June 2011 |url-status=live}} Many boarding schools started to admit day pupils for the first time, and others abolished boarding completely.{{sfnp|Sampson|1971|p=132}}{{sfnp|Walford|1986b|p=244}} Some started accepting girls in the sixth form, while others became fully co-educational.{{sfnp|Walford|1986b|pp=141–144}}

Corporal punishment, was abolished in state schools in 1986, and had been abandoned in most public schools by the time it was formally banned in independent schools in 1999 in England and Wales,{{cite web|url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/politics/69478.stm|title=Corporal punishment banned for all|publisher=BBC News}} (2000 in Scotland and 2003 in Northern Ireland).{{cite web|url=http://www.corpun.com/counuks.htm|title=Corporal punishment in schools – United Kingdom|author=C.Farrell}} The system of fagging, whereby younger pupils in some schools were required to act to some extent as personal servants to the most senior boys, was phased out during the 1970s and 1980s.{{sfnp|Walford|1989|pp=82–83}}

In September 2005 the UK Office of Fair Trading (OFT) found that 50 prominent public schools were in breach of the Competition Act 1998 through their exchange of details of planned fee increases over three academic years 2001–02, 2002–03 and 2003–04.{{cite news |last1=Clare |first1=John |title=50 public schools fined for fixing their fees |url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1511429/50-public-schools-fined-for-fixing-their-fees.html |work=The Telegraph |date=25 Feb 2006}} The Independent Schools Council claimed that the investigation had been "a scandalous waste of public money".{{cite news |url= http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/education/4420822.stm |title= Private schools fee-fixing ruling |publisher =BBC News |date =9 November 2005}}

Three-quarters of HMC schools are now either partially or fully co-educational.{{cite web |title='Top 10 Facts' |url=https://www.hmc.org.uk/facts-figures/top-10-facts/ |website=www.hmc.org.uk |publisher=HMC (Headmasters' & Headmistresses' Conference)}} Of the Clarendon nine, three are fully co-educational (Rugby, Charterhouse and Shrewsbury), while two have begun to admit girls on a limited basis with plans to move to full co-education (Westminster and Winchester). Four remain as boys-only schools, two day schools (St Paul's{{efn|St Paul's admits a small number of boarders.{{cite journal |title=Schools St Pauls School |journal=The Tatler |date=20 Nov 2022 |url=https://www.tatler.com/article/st-pauls-tatler-school-guide}}}} and Merchant Taylors') and two retaining the full-boarding, boys-only model (Eton and Harrow).

File:Fettes College Edinburgh.jpg, Edinburgh, 1870 ]]

By the end of the 19th century the "public school movement",{{cite book |last1=Fort |first1=Rodney |title=International Sports Economics Comparisons (Studies in Sports Economics) |date=30 Mar 2004 |publisher=Praeger Publishers Inc |location=Westport |isbn=978-0275980320 |page=21 |edition=via Google Books |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=6mQHaZaDTzAC&dq=english+public+school+movement&pg=PA21 |access-date=1 January 2023}} had extended to all parts of the (then) United Kingdom.{{cite book |last1=Turner |first1=David |title=The Old Boys The Decline and Rise of the Public School |date=2015|location=New Haven and London |publisher=Yale University Press |isbn=978-0300189926 |page=116}} The 1895 Public School Yearbook included Loretto School (1827), Glenalmond College (1847) and Fettes College (1870).

In Ireland, of the Royal Schools, The Royal School, Armagh 1608 was described as offering an excellent public school education and being the equal of any school in the British Isles.{{cite web |title=Tudor & Stuart Educational Policy |url=https://www.ancestryireland.com/history-of-the-irish-parliament/background-to-the-statutes/education/tudor-and-stuart-educational-policy/ |website=www.ancestryireland.com |publisher=Ulster Historical Foundation}}{{cite news |last1=Smyth |first1=Lisa |title=Royal schools' history brought to book |url=https://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/education/royal-schools-history-brought-to-book-28067363.html |access-date=15 January 2023 |work=Belfast Telegraph |date=4 Jul 2008}}{{cite web |title=The Royal Schools of Ulster |url=https://www.historyireland.com/the-royal-schools-of-ulster/ |website=www.historyireland.com |date=13 March 2013 |publisher=History Ireland |access-date=15 January 2023}} Cork Grammar School 1881 was established for 'the purpose of supplying a great want in Cork—namely, a good public school, and with the object of inducing persons who had been sending their children to England, to educate them at home'.{{cite journal |last1=d’Alton |first1=Ian |title=Educating for Ireland? The Urban Protestant Elite and the Early Years of Cork Grammar School, 1880–1914 |journal=Éire-Ireland |date=2011 |volume=46 |issue=3 |pages=201–226 |id={{Project MUSE|458543}} |doi=10.1353/eir.2011.0024 |s2cid=162889380 }} In 2020 6.7% of the school population in the Republic of Ireland attended 'elite' fee charging schools.{{cite book |doi=10.1007/978-3-030-45175-2_13 |chapter=How Can We Identify Elite Schools (Where They do Not Exist)? The Case of Ireland |title=Researching Elites and Power |date=2020 |last1=Courtois |first1=Aline |pages=169–178 |isbn=978-3-030-45174-5 |s2cid=202325499 }}

File:Wellington College International Shanghai.jpg

In 1892 Haileybury alumnus Charles Rendall, founded Haileybury "altera terra" in Melbourne, Australia.{{cite book |title=Australian Dictionary of Biography |chapter=Rendall, Charles Henry (1856–1925) |chapter-url=https://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/rendall-charles-henry-8180 |publisher=National Centre of Biography, Australian National University }} In the 20th and 21st centuries, several public schools opened affiliates in other countries, especially the Middle and Far East.{{cite news |last1=London |first1=Lela |title=Famous British public schools with branches abroad |url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/expat/life/famous-british-public-schools-branches-abroad/?WT.mc_id=tmgoff_psc_ppc_dsa_life&gclid=CjwKCAiAqaWdBhAvEiwAGAQltj9963tg2yPKoK7GqrpUsUV3wPvG6qFvobRBDX3zAJ1cuMpW7Ecu1BoCli4QAvD_BwE |work=The Telegraph |date=11 Oct 2019}}{{cite news |title=How posh British schools are branching out in Asia |work=BBC News |date=12 April 2022 |url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-60597999 }}{{cite news |last1=Chhapia |first1=Hemali |title=Global schools queue up to start their India chapters |url=https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/global-schools-queue-up-to-start-their-india-chapters/articleshow/90754967.cms |work=The Times of India |date=10 Apr 2022}} The schools are typically founded in partnership with a local business person or organisation with the "home" school maintaining control of curriculum and staffing.{{cite news |last1=Spear's |title=The rise of branded schools |url=https://spearswms.com/branded-schools/ |work=Spear's |publisher=Progressive Media International |date=3 Oct 2022}}{{cite news |last1=Adams |first1=Richard |title=UK private schools rush to expand overseas as profits soar |url=https://www.theguardian.com/education/2023/mar/12/uk-private-schools-rush-to-expand-overseas-as-profits-soar |access-date=14 March 2023 |work=The Guardian |date=12 Mar 2023}}

File:Harrow cricket team of 1869 for the match against Eton.jpg Cricket XI of 1869]]

The almost exclusive teaching of grammar (Latin and to a lesser extent ancient Greek) prevailed until well into the 19th century.{{cite journal |last1=Turk |first1=Thomas N. |title=Learning Latin and Greek in the Uk |journal=The Classical Outlook |date=2015 |volume=90 |issue=3 |pages=91–95 |jstor=43940258 }} Most schools were legally obliged to do so by the terms of their original endowment.{{cite web |title=Grammar Schools Act 1840 - An Act for improving the Condition and extending the Benefits of Grammar Schools. |url=https://vlex.co.uk/vid/grammar-schools-act-1840-808410157 |website=vlex.co.uk |publisher=vLexJustis}} As a response to the perceived need to modernise such a curriculum in line with commercial needs, the Grammar School Act 1840 was passed.{{cite web |title=Grammar Schools Act 1840 |url=http://www.educationengland.org.uk/documents/acts/1840-grammar-schools-act.html |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131114013526/http://www.educationengland.org.uk/documents/acts/1840-grammar-schools-act.html |url-status=dead |archive-date=14 November 2013 |website=www.educationengland.org.uk |publisher=Gillard D (2018) Education in England: a history}} This allowed schools to make an application to a court of law (rather than Parliament) to deviate from the wishes of the original founder and teach "other branches of literature and science".{{cite web |title=Grammar Schools Act 1840 - An Act for improving the Condition and extending the Benefits of Grammar Schools. |url=https://vlex.co.uk/vid/grammar-schools-act-1840-808410157 |website=vlex.co.uk |publisher=vLexJustis}} The new public schools established in the early and mid-19th century were not constrained by early endowments and therefore were able from foundation to offer a wider range of taught subjects.

From the 1850s organised games became prominent in the curriculum,{{cite web |title=Nineteenth-century public schools and their impact on the development of physical activities and young people |url=https://www.pearsonschoolsandfecolleges.co.uk/asset-library/imported-assets/take-a-peek/OCR-A2PE-SB-CH03.pdf.pdf |website=www.pearsonschoolsandfecolleges.co.uk |publisher=Pearson}} based on the precedent set at Rugby by Thomas Arnold, forming a keystone of character development through teamwork, sportsmanship and self-sacrifice.{{cite book |last1=Heffer |first1=Simon |title=High Minds: The Victorians and the Birth of Modern Britain |date=3 Oct 2013 |publisher=Random House Books |isbn=978-1847946775 |pages=1–30}}{{cite journal |last1=Neddam |first1=Fabrice |title=Constructing masculinities under Thomas Arnold of Rugby (1828–1842): gender, educational policy and school life in an early-Victorian public school |journal=Gender and Education |date=September 2004 |volume=16 |issue=3 |pages=303–326 |doi=10.1080/09540250042000251461|s2cid=144365477}} Hely Almond headmaster at Loretto 1862–1903, in stating 'Games in which success depends on the united efforts of many, and which also foster courage and endurance are the very lifeblood of the public school system',{{cite book |last1=Mangan |first1=J. A. |title=Athleticism in the Victorian and Edwardian Public School: The Emergence and Consolidation of an Educational Ideology. |date=2009 |publisher=Cambridge University Press|page=55 |isbn=978-0521090391}} encapsulated the thinking of the era. The prominence of team sports prevails to the current day and is a feature by which public schools still distinguish themselves from state maintained schools.{{cite web |title='Fact 10' from HMC 'Facts and Figures' |url=

https://www.hmc.org.uk/facts-figures/top-10-facts/|publisher=The Heads' Conference |archive-url=

https://web.archive.org/web/20230308091947/https://www.hmc.org.uk/facts-figures/top-10-facts/|access-date=31 March 2023|archive-date=

8 March 2023}} By the latter part of the 19th century 'modern' subjects such as mathematics and science featured in many schools listings in The Public Schools Yearbook.

Within English law a charity is defined as an institution established for a charitable purpose and providing a public benefit.{{cite web |title=Charitable status and independent schools|publisher=House of Commons Library |url=https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/sn05222/ |website=commonslibrary.parliament.uk|date=17 October 2019 |last1=Fairbairn |first1=Catherine }} The "advancement of education" is a long-standing charitable purpose. The UK's oldest charity is the King's School Canterbury.{{cite web |title=The UK's 10 oldest charitie |url=https://www.theguardian.com/society/voluntary/page/0,7896,615176,00.html |website=www.theguardian.com}} Charitable status for schools outside of the state maintained sector confers various tax benefits. This means schools are not liable for corporation tax or capital gains tax and receive an 80% reduction in business rates (a local property tax).{{cite web |title=Business rates relief |url=https://www.gov.uk/apply-for-business-rate-relief/charitable-rate-relief |website=www.gov.uk}} Donations by individuals to such schools are considered "tax free".{{cite web |title=Tax relief when you donate to a charity |url=https://www.gov.uk/donating-to-charity |website=www.gov.uk}} Fee-charging schools having the status of charities are not totally tax exempt as they pay some business rates, VAT on procured goods and services and staff pay income tax on earnings.{{cite web |title=The charitable status of independent schools |url=https://www.hmc.org.uk/hmc-blog/the-charitable-status-of-independent-schools/ |website=www.hmc.org.uk}} The public benefit that a charity is obliged to provide is not defined in law. Typically schools provide this public benefit by offering bursaries to pupils of families with limited financial means and supporting local state maintained school(s) and institutions, including allowing public access to school facilities.{{cite web |title=Top 10 Facts About HMC |url=https://www.hmc.org.uk/facts-figures/top-10-facts/ |website=www.hmc.org.uk}}

As of 2020 the nine Clarendon schools had a combined asset value of almost £2bn.{{cite news |last1=Lavin |first1=Sascha |title=Elite Private Schools Increase Assets by More than Half a Billion Pounds in Six Years |url=https://bylinetimes.com/2021/11/25/elite-private-schools-increase-assets-by-more-than-half-a-billion-pounds-in-six-years/ |work=Byline Times |date=25 Nov 2021}} Eton College is the school with the largest endowment of over £500m.{{cite news |last1=Watts |first1=Robert |title=The British public schools sitting on piles of cash |url=https://www.thetimes.com/business-money/article/the-british-public-schools-sitting-on-piles-of-cash-cb8fv7nkq |work=The Sunday Times |date=3 July 2022}} Charitable status is politically controversial. The UK Labour Party leader Keir Starmer in 2021 pledged to remove charitable status for fee-charging schools,{{cite news |last1=Cowburn |first1=Ashley |title=Labour conference: Keir Starmer plans to remove charitable status of private schools to raise £1.7bn |url=https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/keir-starmer-labour-private-schools-b1927130.html |work=The Independent |date=26 September 2021}} a policy also of Harold Wilson, stated in the 1974 Labour election manifesto.{{cite web |title=February 1974 Labour Party Manifesto |url=http://www.labour-party.org.uk/manifestos/1974/feb/1974-feb-labour-manifesto.shtml |website=www.labour-party.org.uk |access-date=13 January 2023}} Removal of charitable status would enable the UK government to levy VAT on school fees, a commitment (re)made in the 1983 Labour Party election manifesto under Neil Kinnock's leadership,{{cite web |title=The Labout Party:1983 |url=http://www.politicsresources.net/area/uk/man/lab83.htm |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150924123945/http://www.politicsresources.net/area/uk/man/lab83.htm |access-date=13 January 2023|archive-date=24 September 2015 }} and revived in 2017 by Jeremy Corbyn.{{cite news |last1=Woolcock |first1=Nicola |title=Labour vows to charge VAT on school fees|url=https://www.thetimes.com/uk/education/article/labour-vows-to-charge-vat-on-school-fees-v98l98g2h |work=The Times |date=4 April 2017}} In support of the case for maintaining the status quo, the Independent Schools Council published in 2022 a report which stated that the independent education sector contributed in 2021 £16.5 billion to the UK economy and generated £5.1 billion of tax revenue.{{cite web |title=The Impact of Independent Schools on the UK Economy|publisher=Independent Schools Council |url=https://www.isc.co.uk/research/independent-schools-economic-impact-report-2018/ |website=www.isc.co.uk}}{{cite news |last1=Clarence-Smith |first1=Louisa |title=Private schools warn bursaries under threat from Labour's tax plan |url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2022/11/29/private-schools-warn-bursaries-threat-labours-tax-plan/ |work=The Telegraph |date=29 Nov 2022}} The 2019 UK Conservative Party election manifesto made no mention of education outside of the state maintained sector.{{cite web |title=Our Plan: Conservative Manifesto 2019 |url=https://www.conservatives.com/our-plan/schools |website=www.conservatives.com |publisher=Conservative Party, 4 Matthew Parker Street, London, SW1H 9HQ. |access-date=13 January 2023}} In September 2023 the UK Labour party announced that, if elected, it planned to allow public schools to retain their charitable status (and some associated tax benefits) but did plan to charge VAT on fees and remove concessions on business rates paid to local authorities.{{cite news |last1=Adams |first1=Richard |title=Loose language leaves Labour accused of flip-flop on private schools |url=https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2023/sep/28/loose-language-leaves-labour-accused-of-flip-flop-on-private-schools |access-date=29 September 2023 |work=The Guardian |date=28 September 2023}}

The 19th-century public school ethos promoted ideas of service to Crown and Empire,{{cite magazine |last1=Scutts |first1=Joanna |title=Britain's Boarding School Problem - how the country's elite institutions have shaped colonialism, Brexit, and today's global super-rich |url=https://newrepublic.com/article/151232/britains-boarding-school-problem |magazine=The New Republic |date=14 Sep 2018}} exemplified in tropes such as "Play up! Play up! And play the game!" from Henry Newbolt's 1892 poem Vitaï Lampada and "the Battle of Waterloo was won on the playing fields of Eton", the latter popularly attributed to the Duke of Wellington.{{cite web |title=Eton, the first Duke of Wellington and the Battle of Waterloo |url=https://collections.etoncollege.com/past-exhibition/eton-the-first-duke-of-wellington-and-the-battle-of-waterloo/ |website=collections.etoncollege.com |publisher=Eton College}} Many ex-pupils, like those from other schools, had, and still have, a nostalgic affection for their old schools (George Orwell remembered being "interested and happy" at Eton,Buddicom, Jacintha. Eric and Us. Finlay Publisher. 2006: p. 58) and a public school tie and an "old boy network" of former pupils were useful in advancing a career.{{cite web |title=Old-boy network definition |url=https://www.collinsdictionary.com/dictionary/english/old-boy-network#:~:text=When%20people%20talk%20about%20the,influence%20to%20help%20each%20other.&text=The%20majority%20obtained%20their%20positions%20through%20the%20old%20boy%20network.&text=hoard%20or%20horde%3F |website=/www.collinsdictionary.com/dictionary/english}} The English public school model influenced the 19th-century development of Scottish elite schools, but a tradition of the gentry sharing their primary education with their tenants kept Scotland more egalitarian.{{cite book|author1=P.J. Cain|author2=A. G. Hopkins|title=British Imperialism: 1688–2015|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=4VipCwAAQBAJ&pg=PA724|year=2016|publisher=Routledge|page=724|isbn=9781317389255}}{{cite journal |last1=Cookson |first1=Peter W. |last2=Persell |first2=Caroline H. |title=English and American Residential Secondary Schools: A Comparative Study of the Reproduction of Social Elites |journal=Comparative Education Review |date=1985 |volume=29 |issue=3 |pages=283–298 |doi=10.1086/446523 |jstor=1188490 |s2cid=143570673 }}

Former Harrow pupil Stanley Baldwin wrote that when he first became Prime Minister in 1923, he wanted to have six Harrovians in his government. "To make a cabinet is like making a jig-saw puzzle fit, and I managed to make my six fit by keeping the post of Chancellor of the Exchequer for myself".{{cite book | url=https://archive.org/stream/in.ernet.dli.2015.149663/2015.149663.Inside-Europe#page/n307/mode/2up | title=Inside Europe | publisher=Harper & Brothers | author=Gunther, John | author-link=John Gunther | location=New York | year=1940 | page=286}} Until the First World War, the role of public schools in preparing pupils for the gentlemanly elite meant that such education, particularly in its classical focus and social mannerisms, became a mark of the ruling class.{{cite book |last1=Gathorne-Hardy |first1=Jonathan |title=The Public School Phenomenon |date=1977 |publisher=Hodder and Stroughton |isbn=978-0340223734 |page=343}}{{cite news |last1=Dawson |first1=Tim |title=In defence of Public schools |url=https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/in-defence-of-public-schools/ |work=The Spectator |date=21 August 2018}} Acceptance of social elitism was reduced by the two world wars,{{cite book |last1=Marwick |first1=A |title=Britain and the Netherlands |publisher=Springer|doi=10.1007/978-94-015-7518-8_10 }} but despite portrayals of the products of public schools as "silly asses" and "toffs", the old system continued well into the 1960s.{{cite journal |last1=Adonis |first1=Andrew |title=Boris Johnson: The Prime Etonian |journal=Prospect |date=9 July 2021 |issue=August/September 2021 |url=https://www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/magazine/boris-johnson-profile-eton-prime-minister}}

File:Clegg Victory for the Gurkhas.jpg (left), Lib Dem spokesman and future Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change Chris Huhne (centre left) and Lib Dem leader and future Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg (centre right), all of whom had attended English public schools.]]

Postwar social change has, however, gradually been reflected across Britain's educational system, while at the same time fears of problems with state education have pushed some parents, who can afford the fees or whose pupils qualify for bursaries or scholarships, towards public schools and other schools in the independent sector.{{cite news |last1=Murray |first1=Janet |title=Why I sent my child to a private school |url=https://www.theguardian.com/education/2012/jul/23/why-send-child-to-private-school |work=The Guardian |date=23 Jul 2012}} By 2009 typical fees were up to £30,000 per annum for boarders.{{cite web |title=ISC Annual Census 2009 |publisher=Independent Schools Council |date=29 April 2009 |url=http://www.isc.co.uk/publication_8_0_0_11_561.htm |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20091206203001/http://www.isc.co.uk/publication_8_0_0_11_561.htm |archive-date=6 December 2009 }} As of 2019, 20 Prime Ministers attended Eton,{{Cite magazine |last=Glancy |first=Josh |date=2020-01-11 |title=British Elites Know Who Isn't Quite Their Type |url=https://getpocket.com/explore/item/british-elites-know-who-isn-t-quite-their-type |magazine=Foreign Policy |access-date=2020-06-23}} seven Harrow, and six Westminster. From 2019 to 2022, two Prime Ministers Boris Johnson (Eton) and Rishi Sunak (Winchester) were educated at Clarendon public schools.

Conservative former cabinet minister Iain Macleod wrote in 1964 in "The Tory Leadership" that a conspiracy by an Etonian "magic circle" had made Alec Douglas-Home prime minister. The assertion was so powerful that until Cameron, being an Etonian was a disadvantage to becoming a party leader, as Douglas Hurd learned in the 1990 Conservative Party leadership election.{{cite news|url=https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/the-spectator-book-review-that-brought-down-macmillan-s-government |title=The Spectator book review that brought down Macmillan's government|author=Vernon Bogdanor|work=The Spectator|date=18 January 2014|access-date=30 June 2014}} While Home had been educated at Eton and the incoming Labour Prime Minister in 1997 (Tony Blair) at Fettes College, all six British Prime Ministers in office between 1964 and 1997 and from 2007 to 2010 were educated at state schools (Harold Wilson, Edward Heath, Margaret Thatcher, and John Major at grammar schools, and James Callaghan and Gordon Brown at other state secondary schools).{{cite news |last1=Mount |first1=Harry |title=How politics got 'posh' again |url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/8277371/How-politics-got-posh-again.html |work=The Telegraph |date=23 Jan 2011}}{{cite news |last1=Grice |first1=Andrew |title=Resignations fuel fears of posh-boy politics |url=https://www.nzherald.co.nz/world/resignations-fuel-fears-of-posh-boy-politics/CGCNXDBWT557QAAEUFKHMPUGMI/?c_id=2&objectid=10701954 |work=The New Zealand Herald |date=25 Jan 2011}} Theresa May's secondary school education also was primarily in the state sector.{{cite web |title=The Rt Hon Theresa May MP |url=https://www.gov.uk/government/history/past-prime-ministers/theresa-may |website=www.gov.uk}} Liz Truss was educated at a state comprehensive school.{{cite news |last1=Finan |first1=Victoria |title=Leeds educated Liz Truss comes under fire again for criticising her time at Roundhay School |url=https://www.yorkshirepost.co.uk/news/politics/leeds-educated-liz-truss-comes-under-fire-again-for-criticising-her-time-at-roundhay-school-3869685 |work=The Yorkshire Post |date=6 Oct 2022}}

While members of the aristocracy and landed gentry no longer dominate independent schools, studies have shown that such schools still retain a degree of influence over the country's professional and social elite despite educating less than 10% of the population. A 2012 study published by the Sutton Trust noted that 44% of the 7,637 individuals examined whose names appeared in the birthday lists of The Times, The Sunday Times, The Independent or The Independent on Sunday during 2011 – across all sectors, including politics, business, the arts and the armed forces – were educated at private schools.{{cite web |title=The Educational Background of the Nation's Leading People |url=https://www.suttontrust.com/our-research/the-educational-backgrounds-of-the-nations-leading-people/ |website=www.suttontrust.com |publisher=The Sutton Trust; 20 Nov 2012}} It also found that 10 elite fee-charging schools (specifically Eton, Winchester, Charterhouse, Rugby, Westminster, Marlborough, Dulwich, Harrow, St Paul's, and Wellington) produced 12% of the leading high-flyers examined in the study.{{cite news |last1=Telegraph Reporters |title=Public schools retain grip on Britain's elite |url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/educationnews/9689795/Public-schools-retain-grip-on-Britains-elite.html |work=The Telegraph |date=20 Nov 2012}} The Social Mobility and Child Poverty Commission came to a similar conclusion in a 2014 study of the professions: 71% of senior judges, 62% of senior armed forces officers, 55% of Whitehall permanent secretaries and 50% of members of the House of Lords had been educated at fee-charging schools.{{cite news|title=Elitism in Britain – breakdown by profession|url=https://www.theguardian.com/news/datablog/2014/aug/28/elitism-in-britain-breakdown-by-profession|work=The Guardian|date=28 August 2014|first=George|last=Arnett}}

Public schools have long provided content for artistic and factual media productions:{{cite news |last1=Christiansen |first1=Rupert |title=What explains the peculiar British obsession with public schools? |url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/theatre/what-to-see/explains-peculiar-british-obsession-public-schools/ |work=The Telegraph |date=27 Jun 2021}}

File:Tom Brown 6th ed-p276.png (6th edition of 1911)]]

Rugby School inspired a whole new genre of literature, i.e. the school story. Thomas Hughes's Tom Brown's School Days, published in 1857 was set there.{{cite news |last1=Hughes |first1=Kathryn |title=Back to school |url=https://www.theguardian.com/books/2008/sep/20/booksforchildrenandteenagers |work=The Guardian |date=20 Sep 2008}} There were however as many as 90 earlier novels set in British boarding schools, taking as an example just girls' school stories,{{cite book|last=Gosling|first=Juliet|title=Virtual Worlds of Girls|chapter-url=http://www.ju90.co.uk/indexsho.htm|year=1998|publisher=University of Kent at Canterbury|chapter=5}} published between Sarah Fielding's 1749 The Governess, or The Little Female Academy and the seminal 1857 Tom Brown's School Days. Such stories were set in a variety of institutions including private boarding and prep schools as well as public schools. Tom Brown's School Days{{'}} influence on the genre of British school novels includes the fictional boarding schools of Talbot Baines Reed's St Dominic's, Rudyard Kipling's Stalky & Co. at "the College",{{efn|reputed to be the United Services College{{Cite web |url=http://www.kiplingsociety.co.uk/rg_stalky_background.htm |title="Stalky & Co.: The general background", Roger Lancelyn Green |access-date=28 December 2022 |archive-date=15 May 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190515032353/http://www.kiplingsociety.co.uk/rg_stalky_background.htm |url-status=live }}{{cite web |title=Westward Ho! |url=https://www.bidefordarchive.org.uk/featured-articles?id=1971 |website=www.bidefordarchive.org.uk |publisher=Bideford & District Community Archive}}}} Frank Richards' Billy Bunter at Greyfriars School, James Hilton's Mr Chips at Brookfield,{{efn|reputed to be The Leys School{{cite news |last1=Carroll |first1=Timothy |title=Who was the real Mr Chips |url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/tvandradio/3586865/Who-was-the-real-Mr-Chips.html |publisher=The Telegraph |date=9 December 2002}}}} Anthony Buckeridge's Jennings at Linbury Court,{{efn|reputed to be based on the author's experience at Seaford College{{cite news |last1=Mount |first1=Harry |title=Jennings shone a light on the (junior) human condition |url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/personal-view/3607868/Jennings-shone-a-light-on-the-junior-human-condition.html |work=The Telegraph |date=30 June 2004}}}} P. G. Wodehouse's St. Austin's and girls' schools Malory Towers and St. Trinian's. It also influenced J. K. Rowling's Harry Potter series, set at the fictional boarding school Hogwarts. The series' first novel Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone has many direct parallels in structure and theme to Tom Brown's School Days.{{cite journal|last=Steege|first=David K.|title=Harry Potter, Tom Brown, and the British School Story|journal=The Ivory Tower and Harry Potter: Perspectives on a Literary Phenomenon|pages=141–156}} Len Deighton said of his 1962 novel, The IPCRESS File, that it is "about spies on the surface, but it's also really about a grammar school boy among public school boys and the difficulties he faces."{{cite news |last1=Kerridge |first1=Jake |title=From Ian Fleming to Ann Cleeves: Desert Island Discs' best crime writer castaways |url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/radio/what-to-listen-to/crime-writers-desert-island-discs-best-interviews/ |work=The Telegraph |date=18 February 2019}}

In his 1968 play Forty Years On, Alan Bennett used the metaphor of an end-of-term revue at a minor public school to contrast the events of the twentieth century with the routines of public school life. The title alludes to the Harrow school song, "Forty Years On".{{cite news |last1=Spencer |first1=Charles |title=School's back with Bennett at his best |url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/theatre/drama/3617268/Schools-back-with-Bennett-at-his-best.html |work=The Telegraph |date=19 May 2004}} The 1968 film if...., which satirised the worst elements of English public school life, culminating in scenes of armed insurrection, won the Palme d'Or at the 1969 Cannes Film Festival.{{cite web |url=http://www.festival-cannes.com/en/archives/ficheFilm/id/2527/year/1969.html |title=Festival de Cannes: If.... |access-date=6 April 2009|publisher=festival-cannes.com}}{{cite web|url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/films/2002/02/26/if_1968_review.shtml|title=If... (1968) film review|quote=if... "taps into the revolutionary spirit of the late 60s. Each frame burns with an anger that can only be satisfied by imagining the apocalyptic overthrow of everything that middle class Britain holds dear|publisher=BBC|date=26 February 2002}}{{cite news |last1=Canby |first1=Vincent |title=Screen: 'If . . .' Begins Run:Tale of School Revolt Opens at the Plaza |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1969/03/10/archives/screen-if-begins-runtale-of-school-revolt-opens-at-the-plaza.html |work=The New York Times |date=10 March 1969}}

Tom Brown's School Days has been the subject of five cinematic and television productions. Goodbye Mr. Chips has been the subject of three cinematic productions. Ronald Searle's girls' school St Trinian's has featured in seven cinematic productions. The 1942 film A Yank at Eton is a comedy-drama where the protagonist eventually overcomes outdated manners and attitudes. The 1947 stage play and 1950 comedy film The Happiest Days of Your Life, based at fictional minor public school Nutbourne College, were commercial and critical successes.{{cite web|url=http://www.screenonline.org.uk/media/mfb/1007216/index.html|title=Monthly Film Bulletin review|website=screenonline.org.uk}} The Guinea Pig, a 1946 stage play and 1948 film, dealt with the experiences of a boy from a modest background being sent to public school. The Browning Version was a 1948 stage play, 1951 film, 1994 film and subject to several television and radio adaptations. A BBC TV series Billy Bunter of Greyfriars School ran from 1952 to 1961. Another Country was a 1981 stage play and 1984 film loosely interpreting the schooldays of Eton-educated spy Guy Burgess.

'Fly on the wall' television documentaries about schools is an established genre;{{cite news |last1=Gilbert |first1=Gerard |title=TV documentaries filmed in classrooms are now a genre in their own right |url=https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/tv/features/tv-documentaries-filmed-in-classrooms-are-now-a-genre-in-their-own-right-9761096.html |access-date=4 January 2023 |work=The Independent |date=22 Sep 2014}} the following documentaries broadcast in the UK allowed a mass audience to view daily life in public schools:

• 1967: Eton, a documentary produced by Anthony de Lotbiniere, narrated by René Cutforth, broadcast on BBC TV.{{cite web |title=Eton |url=https://www2.bfi.org.uk/films-tv-people/4ce2b6c85b490 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210808152509/https://www2.bfi.org.uk/films-tv-people/4ce2b6c85b490 |url-status=dead |archive-date=8 August 2021 |website=BFI}}
• 1979: Edward Mirzoeff produced the BBC documentary entitled Public School about Westminster School, including footage of John Rae.{{cite web |last1=BFI |title=Public School |url=https://www2.bfi.org.uk/films-tv-people/4ce2b75d47f02 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221208084113/https://www2.bfi.org.uk/films-tv-people/4ce2b75d47f02 |url-status=dead |archive-date=8 December 2022 |website=www2.bfi.org.uk}}
• 1980: Richard Denton produced a ten part documentary about Radley College also entitled Public School, which ran on BBC2, including footage of Dennis Silk.{{cite web |title=100 Radley Objects |url=https://100radleyobjects.blog/no-4-film-reel-1979/ |website=100radleyobjects.blog |date=9 March 2012 |publisher=Radley College Archives}}
• 1981: The Gentleman Factory about Eton College, directed by Simon Dewhurst was shown on BBC1.{{cite web |last1=BFI |title=The Gentlemen Factory |url=https://www2.bfi.org.uk/films-tv-people/4ce2b71dcf07b |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200508115541/https://www.bfi.org.uk/films-tv-people/4ce2b71dcf07b |url-status=dead |archive-date=8 May 2020 |website=www2.bfi.org.uk}}
• 1991: Eton – Class of '91, a Channel 4 documentary about Eton College directed by Simon Shore.{{cite web |title=Eton – Class of 91 |url=https://www2.bfi.org.uk/films-tv-people/4ce2b7b17cf36 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210808153925/https://www2.bfi.org.uk/films-tv-people/4ce2b7b17cf36 |url-status=dead |archive-date=8 August 2021 |website=BFI}}
• 1995: Inside Eton by Howard Guard, narrated by Charles Dance.{{cite web |title=Inside Eton |url=https://sesc.hist.cam.ac.uk/school-cinema/1990s/ |website=sesc.hist.cam.ac.uk |publisher=Cambridge University}}
• 1996: True Stories: Gordonstoun directed by Penny Woolcock.{{cite news |last1=Sutcliffe |first1=Thomas |title=review |url=https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/review-5608751.html |work=The Independent |date=10 July 1996}}
• 2001: Harrow:The School on the Hill, featuring Barnaby Lenon, narrated by Aden Gillett, broadcast by ITV (Carlton).{{cite web |title=Harrow School Archive |url=https://www.londonsscreenarchives.org.uk/browse/collections/collection/48 |website=www.londonsscreenarchives.org.uk/browse/collections/collection/48 |publisher=London's Screen Archives}}{{cite news |last1=Vickers |first1=Amy |title=Harrow public school profiled in TV documentary |url=https://www.theguardian.com/media/2001/mar/28/education.schools |work=The Guardian |date=28 Mar 2001}}
• 2003: Ampleforth: My Teacher's a Monk, broadcast on ITV1, narrated by Alex Jennings,{{cite news |last1=Crossley |first1=Neil |title=Pick of the Day |url=https://www.theguardian.com/media/2003/apr/29/tvandradio.television1 |work=The Guardian |date=29 Apr 2003}}
• 2008: Pride and Privilege: A Year in the Life of Glenalmond College, a three part series broadcast on BBC2 Scotland produced and directed by Stephen Bennett.{{cite web |title=Pride and Privilege: A Year in the Life of Glenalmond College |url=http://bufvc.ac.uk/dvdfind/index.php/title/av73194 |website=bufvc.ac.uk |publisher=BBC2 Scotland}}{{cite news |title=The best days of their lives? |url=https://www.heraldscotland.com/default_content/12371672.best-days-lives/ |work=The Herald |date=19 Nov 2008}}
• 2008: My New Best Friend about Cheltenham Ladies College, directed by Jo Abel and broadcast on BBC4.{{cite web |title=My New Best Friend |url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00bfm0m |publisher=BBC}}{{cite web |last1=Abel |first1=Jo |title=On location: My New Best Friend |url=https://www.broadcastnow.co.uk/on-location-my-new-best-friend/1330454.article |website=www.broadcastnow.co.uk |publisher=Media Business Insight Limited |access-date=3 January 2023}}
• 2011: Posh and Posher: Why Public School Boys Run Britain, produced by Matthew Laza and presented by Andrew Neil, broadcast on BBC2.{{cite web |title=Posh and Posher: Why Public School Boys Run Britain |url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00y37gk |publisher=BBC}}{{cite news |last1=Crace |first1=John |title=TV review: Posh and Posher: Why Public School Boys Rule Britain and Great White Silence |url=https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2011/jan/27/andrew-neil-posh-and-posher |work=The Guardian |date=27 Jan 2011}}
• 2013: Hannah Berryman's BBC documentary with alternative titles of A Very English Education and Boarding School: Boys to Men, a follow-up on the pupils who featured in the 1980 documentary about Radley College.{{cite web |title=A Very English Education |url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b03fvqqf |publisher=BBC}}{{cite web |title=Boarding School: Boys to Men |url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/n3cszjvy |publisher=BBC}}{{cite news |last1=Billen |first1=Andrew |title=TV review: A Very English Education |url=https://www.thetimes.com/culture/tv-radio/article/tv-review-a-very-english-education-bk7j79thhrj |access-date=4 January 2023 |work=The Times |date=28 Oct 2013}}{{cite news |last1=Wollaston |first1=Sam |title=A Very English Education - TV Review |url=https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2013/oct/28/very-english-education-tv-review|access-date=4 January 2023|work=The Guardian |date=28 Oct 2013}}
• 2013: Harrow: A Very British School, broadcast on Sky1.{{cite news |last1=Crace |first1=John |title=Whitechapel; Harrow: A Very British School – TV review |url=https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2013/sep/04/whitechapel-harrow-very-british-school-tv-review|access-date=4 January 2023 |work=The Guardian |date=4 Sep 2013}}
• 2014: The Most Famous School in the World, a BBC documentary about Eton College, produced by Maggie Liang and Sarah Murch as part of the My Life series for children.{{cite web |title=My Life |url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/cbbc/shows/my-life |publisher=BBC}}{{cite news |last1=Jones |first1=Ellen |title=My Life: the Most Famous School, CBBC - TV review |url=https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/tv/reviews/my-life-the-most-famous-school-cbbc-tv-review-9200469.html |access-date=3 January 2023 |work=The Independent |date=19 Mar 2014}}
• 2015: Gordonstoun: A Different Class, a six episode series broadcast on Sky1.{{cite news |last1=Welsh |first1=Susan |title=Meeting the stars of new TV series all about Gordonstoun |url=https://www.pressandjournal.co.uk/fp/lifestyle/737213/there-is-more-in-you/ |access-date=4 January 2023 |work=The Press and Journal}}{{cite news |title=Tonight's TV highlight: Inside Gordonstoun with the poshest of the posh |url=https://www.heraldscotland.com/life_style/arts_ents/13951040.tonights-tv-highlight-inside-gordonstoun-poshest-posh/ |access-date=4 January 2023 |work=The Herald |date=6 Nov 2015}}

• Armorial of UK schools
• Combined Cadet Force
• Direct grant grammar school
• Eton Group, a group of twelve schools within the HMC
• Fagging
• List of SR V "Schools" class locomotives (named principally after public schools)
• List of the oldest schools in the United Kingdom (a number of which are public schools)
• List of English and Welsh endowed schools (19th century) (a number of which are public schools)
• List of direct grant grammar schools (list of schools that were part of the scheme, between 1945 and 1976)
• List of private schools in the United Kingdom
• Private school
• Public Schools Battalions
• Public Schools Club
• Rugby Group, a group of eighteen schools within the HMC
• Toffs and Toughs photograph

{{reflist}}

{{notelist}}

{{refbegin|30em}}

• {{cite book |last1=Airy |first1=Reginald |title=Westminster |date=1900 |publisher=George Bell and Sons |location=London |isbn=978-1356990061 |edition=reprint 2016}}
• {{cite book |last=Bamford |first=T. W. |year=1967 |title=Rise of the Public Schools: a study of boys' public boarding schools in England and Wales from 1837 to the present day |location=London |publisher=Nelson }}
• {{cite book |last1=Beard |first1=Richard |author-link=Richard Beard (author)|title=Sad Little Men: Private Schools and the Ruin of England |date=2021 |publisher=Harvill Secker |isbn=978-1787302938}}
• {{cite book |last=Benson |first=A. C. |author-link=A. C. Benson |date=1902 |title=The Schoolmaster: A Commentary Upon the Aims and Methods of an Assistant-master in a Public School|edition=reprint 2011|publisher=Peridot Press |isbn=978-1-908095-30-5}}
• {{cite book |last1=Benson |first1=E.F. |author-link=E. F. Benson |title=David Blaize |date=1916 |publisher=Hodder & Stoughton |location=London |isbn=978-1636373478 |edition=reprint 2020}}
• {{cite book |last1=Bradby |first1=H.C. |title=Rugby |date=1900 |publisher=George Bell and Sons |location=London |isbn=9781444608816 |edition=reprint 2009}}
• {{cite book |last1=Bishop |first1=T. J. H. |last2=Wilkinson |first2=Rupert |year=1967 |title=Winchester and the Public School Élite: A Statistical Analysis |location=London |publisher=Faber }}
• {{cite book |first=Asa |last=Briggs |author-link=Asa Briggs |year=1955|chapter=Thomas Hughes and the Public Schools |title=Victorian People: a reassessment of persons and themes, 1851–67 |location=Chicago |publisher=University of Chicago Press |pages=[https://archive.org/details/victorianpeoplea000327mbp/page/n159/mode/2up 140–167] |url=https://archive.org/details/victorianpeoplea000327mbp/page/n9/mode/2up }}
• {{cite book |last1=Brooke-Smith |first1=James |title=Gilded Youth: Privilege, Rebellion and the British Public School |date=2019 |publisher=Reaktion Books |isbn=978-1789140668}}
• {{cite book |last1=Campbell |first1=Michael |title=Lord Dismiss Us |date=1967 |publisher=William Heinneman |location=London |isbn=978-0552080422}}
• {{cite book |last=Carman|first=Dominic |author-link=Dominic Carman |title=Heads Up: the challenges facing England's leading head teachers|publisher=Thistle Publishing|location=London, UK|date=2013 |isbn=978-1909869301 }}
• {{cite book |last1=Chandos |first1=John |title=Boys Together |date=1984 |publisher=Yale University Press |isbn=978-0300032154}}
• {{cite book |last1=Clutton-Brock |first1=Arthur |title=Eton |date=1900 |publisher=George Bell and Sons |location=London |isbn=9781340998721 |edition=reprint 2015}}
• {{cite book |last1=Connolly |first1=Cyril|author-link=Cyril Connolly|title=Enemies of Promise |date=1938 |publisher=Andre Deutsch |isbn=978-0233989778}}
• {{cite book |last1=Cotton Minchin |first1=James |title=Our Public Schools: Their Influence on English History: Charterhouse, Eton, Harrow, Merchant Taylors', Rugby, St. Paul's, Westminster, Winchester |date=1901 |publisher=Swan Sonnenschein |location=London |isbn=978-0341825142 |edition=Internet Archive / 2018 reprint |url=https://archive.org/details/ourpublicschools00minciala/page/n7/mode/2up}}
• {{cite book |last1=Dancy |first1=John |title=The Public Schools and the Future |date=1963 |publisher=Faber and Faber |location=London}}
• Dishon, Gideon. (2017) [https://www.researchgate.net/publication/312573081_Games_of_character_team_sports_games_and_character_development_in_Victorian_public_schools_1850-1900 Games of character: team sports, games, and character development in Victorian public schools, 1850–1900]. Paedagogica Historica: 1–17.
• {{cite book |last1=Duffell |first1=Nick |title=The Making of Them: The British Attitude to Children and the Boarding School |date=2000 |publisher=Lone Arrow Press |isbn=978-0953790401}}
• {{cite book |last1=Farrar |first1=Frederic |author-link=Frederic Farrar|title=Eric, or, Little by Little |date=1858 |publisher=Adam and Charles Black}}
• {{cite book |last1=Fischer Williams |first1=John |title=Harrow |date=1901 |publisher=George Bell and Sons |location=London |isbn=9781355761839 |edition=reprint 2016}}
• {{citation |title=Report on the Public Schools and the General Educational System |editor-first=David |editor-last=Fleming |editor-link=David Fleming, Lord Fleming |publisher=Her Majesty's Stationery Office |location=London |year=1944 |url=https://www.education-uk.org/documents/fleming/index.html|edition=education-uk Gillard, D (2018) }}
• {{cite book |last1=Fletcher |first1=Frank |title=After Many Days : A Schoolmaster's Memories |date=1937 |publisher=Robert Hale and Co.}}
• {{citation |title=The World of the Public School|editor-last1=Fraser|editor-first1=George MacDonald|editor-link=George MacDonald Fraser|date=1977 |publisher=Weidenfeld & Nicolson|location=London |isbn=978-0297772286}}
• {{cite book |last1=Fraser |first1=Nick |title=The Importance of Being Eton |date=2008 |publisher=Short Books |isbn=978-1906021276}}
• Gardner, Brian.(1973) The Public Schools: An Historical Survey Hamish Hamilton, London {{ISBN|978-0241023372}}
• {{cite book |last1=Gathorne-Hardy |first1=Jonathan|author-link=Jonathan Gathorne-Hardy|title=The Public School Phenomenon |date=1977 |publisher=Hodder & Stoughton Ltd |isbn=978-0340223734}}
• {{cite book |last1=Graham |first1=Ysenda Maxtone |title=Terms & Conditions: Life in Girls' Boarding Schools, 1939-1979 |date=2017 |publisher=Abacus |isbn=978-0349143064}}
• Green, Francis and Kynaston, David (2019) Engines of Privilege: Britain's Private School Problem, Bloomsbury Publishing, {{ISBN|978-1526601261}}
• {{citation |title=The Old School: Essays by Divers Hands|editor-last1=Greene|editor-first1=Graham|editor-link=Graham Greene|date=1934 |publisher=Cape |location=London |isbn=978-0192814845}}
• {{cite book |last1=Hardy |first1=H.H. |title=Rugby (Public School Life) |date=1911 |publisher=Sir Isaac Pitman & Sons |location=London |isbn=9780267961252 |edition=reprint 2019}}
• {{cite book |last1=Hickson |first1=Alisdare |title=The Poisoned Bowl: Sex and the Public School |date=1996 |publisher=Duckworth |isbn=978-0715627099}}
• {{citation |title=Tom Brown's universe: the development of the Victorian public school |first=John Raymond de Symons |last=Honey |publisher=Quadrangle/New York Times Book Co. |year=1977 |isbn=978-0-8129-0689-9 }}
• Hope-Simpson, J. B. (1967) Rugby since Arnold: A History of Rugby School from 1842 (1967)
• {{cite book |last1=Hurst |first1=Steve |title=The Public Schools Battalion in the Great War |date=2007 |publisher=Pen & Sword Books Ltd |isbn=978-1844155101}}
• {{citation |title=John Bull's Schooldays|editor-last1=Inglis|editor-first1=Brian|editor-link=Brian Inglis|date=1961 |publisher=Hutchinson |location=London}}
• {{cite book |last1=Jones |first1=Henry Paul Mainwaring |title=War Letters of a Public-School Boy |date=1918|url=https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/29333 |publisher=Project Gutenberg}}
• {{cite book |last1=Lamb |first1=G.F. |title=The Happiest Days |date=1959 |publisher=Michael Joseph |location=London}}
• {{cite book |last1=Lambert |first1=Royston |last2=Millham |first2=Spencer |title=The Hothouse Society: An Exploration of Boarding-school Life Through the Boys' and Girls' Own Writings |date=1974 |publisher=Penguin |isbn=978-0140216752}}
• Laughton, M., Paech-Ujejski, A., Patterson, A., eds. (2021) Men's Accounts of Boarding School: Sent Away {{ISBN|978-0367546823}}
• {{cite book |last1=Lunn |first1=Arnold |author-link=Arnold Lunn|title=The Harrovians A Tale of Public School Life |date=1913 |publisher=CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform |isbn=978-1453809488}}
• {{cite book |last1=Kalton |first1=Graham |title=The Public Schools: A Factual Survey |date=1966 |publisher=Longmans |location=London |isbn=978-0582324060}}
• {{citation |title=History of Secondary Education: a study in the development of liberal education |first=Isaac Leon |last=Kandel |publisher=Houghton Mifflin |year=1930 |isbn=9780598831125 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=HhVDPP5-1yUC&q=%22Public+Schools+Yearbook%22 }}
• {{citation |title=Public Schools and British Opinion, 1780 to 1860: the relationship between contemporary ideas and the evolution of an English institution |first=Edward Clarence |last=Mack |publisher=Columbia University Press |location=New York |year=1938 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=q_ENAAAAQAAJ&q=%22non-local+endowed+boarding+schools+for+the+upper+classes%22&pg=PR11 }} [Covers history and reputation of Eton, Harrow, Rugby, Shrewsbury, Westminster, Winchester, and Charterhouse.]
• {{cite book |first=Edward Clarence |last=Mack |title=Public Schools and British Opinion since 1860: the relationship between contemporary ideas and the evolution of an English institution |location=New York |publisher=Columbia University Press |year=1941 |url=https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=uc1.$b16637;view=1up;seq=9 }}
• {{cite book |last1=Mangan |first1=J.A. |title=Athleticism in the Victorian and Edwardian Public School: The Emergence and Consolidation of an Educational Ideology |date=2009 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=978-0521090391}}
• {{cite book |last1=May |first1=Trevor |title=The Victorian Public School |date=2009 |publisher=Shire Library |isbn=978-0747807223}}
• {{cite book |last1=Melly |first1=George |title=School Experiences of a Fag at a Private and Public School |date=1854|publisher=Smith, Elder, and Company |location=London |isbn=978-0559976308 |edition=reprint 2009 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=i-P0texbUTIC&dq=School+Experience+of+a+Fag+at+a+Private+and+Public+School&pg=PP8}}
• {{cite book |last1=di Monaco |first1=Mario |title=Cradles of Success; Britain's Premier Public Schools |date=2012 |publisher=The University of Buckingham Press |isbn=978-1908684066}}
• {{cite book |last1=Monro |first1=Edward |title=Basil the Schoolboy |date=1854 |publisher=Joseph Masters |location=London |isbn=978-0526697793 |edition=reprint 2019}}
• {{citation |title=Good Behaviour – being a study of certain types of civility |first=Harold |last=Nicolson|author-link=Harold Nicolson|publisher=Doubleday |location=Garden City, NY |year=1956 |url=https://archive.org/details/goodbehaviourbei011828mbp }}
• {{citation |title=The English Public School |first=Vivian|last=Ogilvie |publisher=Batsford |location=London |year=1957 |isbn=978-0598782021|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=qfYkAAAAMAAJ&q=%22a+public+school+is%22 }}
• {{cite book |last1=Okwonga |first1=Musa|author-link=Musa Okwonga|title=One of Them: An Eton College Memoir |date=2021 |publisher=Unbound |isbn=978-1783529674}}
• {{cite book |last1=Onyeama |first1=Dillibe |title=Nigger at Eton |date=1972 |publisher=Delta of Nigeria |isbn=978-9782335920}}
• {{cite book |last1=Parker |first1=Peter|author-link=Peter Parker (author)|title=The Old Lie: The Great War and the Public-School Ethos |date=2007 |publisher=Continuum |isbn=978-1847250445}}
• {{cite book |last1=Pascoe |first1=Charles |title=Everyday Life in Our Public Schools |date=1889 |publisher=Griffith & Farran |location=London |isbn=978-1376883589 |edition=2018 reprint}}
• {{cite book |last1=Peel |first1=Mark |title=The New Meritocracy: A History of UK Independent Schools 1979–2014 |date=2015 |publisher=Elliott & Thompson Limited |isbn=978-1783961757}}
• {{cite book |last1=Rae |first1=Daphne |title=A World Apart |date=1983 |publisher=Lutterworth Press |isbn=978-0718825584}}
• {{cite book |last1=Rae |first1=John|author-link=John Rae (educator)|title=The Old Boys Network: A headmaster's diaries 1972–1986 |date=2011 |publisher=Short Books Ltd |isbn=978-1906021931}}
• {{cite book |last1=Raven |first1=Simon |author-link=Simon Raven|title=The Old School – A Study in the Oddities of the English Public School System |date=1986 |publisher=Hamish Hamilton |isbn=978-0241119297}}
• {{cite book |last=Reed |first=John R. |year=1964 |title=Old School Ties: the public schools in British literature |location=Syracuse, NY |publisher=Syracuse University Press |url=https://archive.org/details/oldschooltiespub00reed }}
• {{cite book |last1=Renton |first1=Alex |title=Stiff Upper Lip: Secrets, Crimes and the Schooling of a Ruling Class |date=2017|publisher=W&N |isbn=978-1474601016}}
• {{cite book |last1=Richards |first1=Jeffrey |title=Happiest Days: Public Schools in English Fiction |date=1988 |publisher=Manchester University Press |isbn=978-0719027758}}
• {{citation |title=Secondary Education in England 1870–1902: Public Activity and Private Enterprise |first=John |last=Roach |publisher=Routledge |year=2012 |isbn=978-1-134-96008-8 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=8UFWkE8d8qYC&pg=PT114 }}
• {{cite book |last1=Rodgers |first1=John |title=The Old Public Schools of England |date=1938 |publisher=B. T. Batsford Limited}}
• {{citation |title=The New Anatomy of Britain |first=Anthony |last=Sampson |author-link=Anthony Sampson |publisher=Hodder & Stoughton |location=London |year=1971 |isbn=978-0-340-14751-1 }}
• {{cite book |last1=Schaverien |first1=Joy |title=Boarding School Syndrome |date=2015 |publisher=Routledge |isbn=978-0415690034}}
• {{cite book |last1=Seldon Anthony|author-link=Anthony Seldon|first1=Walsh David|title=Public Schools and the Great War: The Generation Lost |date=2013 |publisher=Pen & Sword Military |isbn=978-1781593080}}
• {{cite book |last1=Seldon Anthony|author-link=Anthony Seldon |first1=Walsh David |title=Public Schools and the Second World War |date=2020 |publisher=Pen and Sword Military |isbn=978-1526750396}}
• {{citation |title=Public Schools and Private Education: The Clarendon Commission, 1861–64, and the Public Schools Acts |first=Colin |last=Shrosbree |publisher=Manchester University Press |year=1988 |isbn=978-0-7190-2580-8 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=1RcNAQAAIAAJ&pg=PA118 }}
• Simon, B. and Bradley, I., eds. (1975) The Victorian Public School: Studies in the Development of an Educational Institution {{ISBN|978-0717107407}}
• {{cite book |last1=Stephen |first1=Martin |title=The English Public School – A Personal and Irreverent History |date=2018 |publisher=Metro Publishing |isbn=978-1786068774|author1-link=Martin Stephen }}
• {{cite book |last1=Stibbe |first1=Mark |title=Home at Last: Freedom from Boarding School Pain |date=2021 |publisher=Malcolm Down Publishing Limited |isbn=978-1910786413}}
• {{cite book |last1=Tapper |first1=Ted |title=Fee-paying Schools and Educational Change in Britain: Between the State and the Marketplace |date=1997 |publisher=Routledge |isbn=978-0713040302}}
• {{citation |chapter=Bullying in public schools: myth and reality |pages=81–88 |first=Geoffrey |last=Walford |author-mask=2 |title=Bullying in Schools |editor1-first=Delwyin P. |editor1-last=Tattum |editor2-first=David A. |editor2-last=Lane |location=Stoke-on-Trent |publisher=Trentham Books |year=1989 |isbn=978-0948080227}}
• {{cite book |last1=Tod |first1=A.H. |title=Charterhouse |date=1900 |publisher=George Bell and Sons |location=London}}
• {{cite book |last1=Townsend Warner |first1=Robert |title=Winchester |date=1900 |publisher=George Bell and Sons |location=London |isbn=9781371142766 |edition=Reprint 2016}}
• {{cite book |last1=Trelawney-Ross |first1=Alexander |title=Their Prime of Life: A Public School Study |date=1956 |publisher=Warren}}
• {{cite book |last1=Turner |first1=David |title=The Old Boys: The Decline and Rise of the Public School |date=2015 |publisher=Yale University Press |isbn=978-0300189926}}
• {{cite book |last1=Tyerman |first1=Christopher |title=A History of Harrow School 1324-1991 |date=26 Oct 2000 |publisher=OUP |location=Oxford |isbn=978-0198227960}}
• {{cite book |last1=Vachell |first1=Horace Annesley |author-link=Horace Annesley Vachell|title=The Hill: A Romance of Friendship |date=1905 |publisher=John Murray |location=London |url=https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/author/3495|via=Project Gutenberg}}
• {{cite book |last1=Verkaik |first1=Robert |title=Posh Boys: How The English Public Schools Ruin Britain |date=2018 |publisher=Oneworld Publications |isbn=978-1786073839}}
• {{cite book |last1=Vincent |first1=William |author-link=William Vincent (priest)|title=A Defence of Public Education |date=1801 |publisher=Forgotten Books |isbn=978-1332996537 |edition=2016 reprint}}
• {{cite book |last1=Wakeford |first1=John |title=The Cloistered Elite:A Sociological Analysis of the English Public Boarding School |date=1969 |publisher=Macmillan |isbn=978-0333026502}}
• {{citation |title=Life in Public Schools |first=Geoffrey |last=Walford |publisher=Methuen |location=London |year=1986b |isbn=978-0-416-37180-2 }}
• {{citation |chapter=Chapter XV. English and Scottish Education. Universities and Public Schools to the Time of Colet |first=T. A. |last=Walker |series=The Cambridge History of English and American Literature |title=Volume II: English. The End of the Middle Ages | editor1-first=A. W. |editor1-last=Ward | editor2-first=A. R. |editor2-last=Waller |year=1907–21 |chapter-url=http://www.bartleby.com/212/ }}
• {{cite book |last1=Warner |first1=Rex |title=English Public Schools |date=1945 |publisher=William Collins |location=London}}
• {{cite book |last1=Waugh |first1=Alec |author-link=Alec Waugh |title=Public School Life: Boys, Parents, Masters |date=1922 |publisher=Collins |isbn=978-0331035803 |edition=2018 reprint}}
• {{cite book |last1=Waugh |first1=Alec |author-link=Alec Waugh |title=The Loom of Youth |date=1917 |publisher=Bloomsbury USA |isbn=978-1448200528}}
• {{cite book |last1=Webster |first1=F.A.M. |title=Our Great Public Schools |date=1937 |publisher=Ward, Lock & Co., Ltd |location=London}}
• {{cite book |last1=Weinberg |first1=Ian |title=The English Public Schools: The Sociology of Elite Education |date=1967 |publisher=Atherton Press}}
• {{cite book |last1=Wilkins |first1=Harold T. |title=Great English Schools |date=1925 |publisher=Noel Douglas |location=London}}
• {{cite book |last=Wilkinson |first=Rupert |year=1964 |title=The Prefects: British Leadership and the Public School Tradition: A Comparative Study in the Making of Rulers |location=London |publisher=Oxford University Press }}
• {{cite book |last1=Wober |first1=Mallory |title=English Girls' Boarding Schools |date=1971 |publisher=Allen Lane |isbn=978-0713902396}}

{{refend}}

• {{citation

| title = Report of Her Majesty's Commissioners appointed to inquire into the Revenues and Management of Certain Colleges and Schools, and the Studies Pursued and Instruction Given Therein ('Clarendon')

| editor-first = George | editor-last = Villiers | editor-link = George Villiers, 4th Earl of Clarendon

| publisher = HM Stationery Office

| location = London | year = 1864

| url = https://www.education-uk.org/documents/clarendon1864/index.html

| website=education-uk.org

| postscript = .

}}

• {{citation

| title = Report of the Schools Inquiry Commission ('Taunton')

| editor-first = Henry | editor-last = Labouchere | editor-link = Henry Labouchere, 1st Baron Taunton

| publisher = HM Stationery Office

| location = London | year = 1868

| url = https://www.education-uk.org/documents/taunton1868/index.html

| website=education-uk.org

| postscript = .

}}

• {{citation

| title = Secondary Education with Special Reference to Grammar schools and Technical High Schools

| editor-first = Will | editor-last = Spens | editor-link = Will Spens

| publisher = HM Stationery Office

| location = London | year = 1938

| url = https://www.education-uk.org/documents/spens/

| website=education-uk.org

| postscript = .

}}

• {{citation

| title = The Public Schools and the General Educational System

| editor-first = David| editor-last = Fleming | editor-link = David Fleming, Lord Fleming

| publisher = HM Stationery Office

| location = London | year = 1944

| url = https://www.education-uk.org/documents/fleming/fleming.html

| website=education-uk.org

| postscript = .

}}

• {{citation

| title = The Public Schools Commission: First Report

| editor-first = John | editor-last = Newsom

| publisher = HM Stationery Office

| location = London | year = 1968

| url = https://www.education-uk.org/documents/psc1/newsom1968-1.html

| website=education-uk.org

| postscript = .

}}

• {{citation

| title = The Public Schools Commission: Second Report

| editor-first = David | editor-last = Donnison | editor-link = David Donnison

| publisher = HM Stationery Office

| location = London | year = 1970

| url = https://www.education-uk.org/documents/psc2/index.html

| website=education-uk.org

| postscript = .

}}

{{Schools}}

{{Public schools in England}}

{{Public schools (United Kingdom)}}

{{authority control}}

Category:Private schools in the United Kingdom