Writing in the early years of the rule of Augustus, Livy said that Rome had reached such a state of depravity that she could stand “neither the disease nor the cure”.

Education, or even independent education, may not have sunk to such levels as the sewers of Remus, but for some time now it has not been clear whether independent schools have been a disease or a cure for this country’s educational problems.

That uncertainty has been visible in recent days. When Oxford and Cambridge announce their continued intention to make themselves accessible to more disadvantaged pupils, some delight in the damage this will do to the independent sector while others, inside the sector, protest that many independent schools, with their deep commitment to bursary provision, are part of the solution to this issue.

And then there are those celebratory tales and pictures of bright pupils from inner-city schools winning free places at Eton. For some this is a giant leap for social mobility and a sign of fundamental changes in the independent sector. Others can see this as the independent sector creaming off the brightest and denuding “ordinary” schools of their role models. Quot homines, tot sententiae, as Juvenal used to quip in the Forum.

New rules of engagement

However, one thing that cannot be denied is that, in the 21st century, independent schools have been more engaged with the wider world and the wider world of education than since the end of the direct grant system in 1976.

That engagement has come in many shapes and sizes because independent schools come in many shapes and sizes and locations. The broadest form of that engagement is through partnership, ranging from small schools sharing their fields, facilities and staff for sport or music or art or drama, to the leviathans like Eton and Westminster and Highgate and Brighton, setting up free schools, Holyport, Harris Westminster, London Academy of Excellence and the London Academy of Excellence in Tottenham.

Already some of these schools, with very able, deeply ambitious pupils and high-quality teachers, are outperforming many an independent school. And in between there would not be an independent urban secondary school in the land which was not doing serious work with local schools and communities: to name but one school at random, King Edward’s, Birmingham, works with more than 200 local junior schools.

However, partnership also has a yoke fellow: the provision of means-tested bursaries. Once again, such a strategy is not open to all schools. A substantive bursary programme costs a lot of money and lots and lots of independent schools don’t have lots of money. Such a programme may also require substantial fundraising and large schools, with a large, loyal and grateful alumni body and/or wealthy parents, have a massive advantage in that regard. History can help a school, too: a large, ancient foundation certainly is no disadvantage and former direct grant schools often have loyal and grateful alumni/ae who got their education for free - all the way to the end of their degrees.

For the last year I have spent some of my retirement visiting a number of schools and organisations that are deeply committed to bursary provision, all the way from Bolton School which, according to its head, Philip Britton, is somewhere in a raincloud in the north, to Christ’s Hospital in sunny Sussex. None of these schools have stumbled on this strategy in recent times. It is a strategy not a tactic. This isn’t tokenism or virtue-signalling or gesture politics or backside-covering or knee-jerking.

Christ’s Hospital, founded along with 30 other schools by Edward VI, has been providing financial support for almost all of its pupils for 468 years and thereby has funded the education of 65,000 pupils. That’s a lot, even in four and a half centuries. Bolton School Boys’ and Girls’ Division, The Manchester Grammar School, King Edward’s School Birmingham, Latymer Upper, Reigate GS, Colfe’s and the schools of GDST were beneficiaries of the direct grant system and would have seen those years as the Golden Age of their school’s history. Much of what they do today is to restore that sense of openness and meritocracy. The Arnold Foundation at Rugby grew nearly 20 years ago out of the existing provision of means-tested day school places and Eton College invented junior scholarships for those who could not afford the fees nearly 50 years ago.

The sector’s trail-blazers

Of course, every school would want to do more - the Holy Grail of “needs blind” is out there somewhere in the future - but the scale of achievement and ambition needs to be told. Manchester Grammar School (MGS) and Bolton School were the trail-blazers among day schools. They saw most clearly the threats to their identity and purpose caused by the end of the government’s support of free places, so have been on the case for well over 20 years. In those years, two divisions of Bolton School have raised £17 million, largely from alumni, and in total spent £25 million on bursaries, so that today there are 342 bursary pupils across the two divisions. Some 140 of those 342 receive more than 90 per cent support. MGS can tell a similar, perhaps even greater, tale, raising £30 million from over 2,500 donors. At the moment a sixth of the pupils in the senior school are on bursaries at an average of 95 per cent remission. The next target is to raise £50 million - no small ambition.

Latymer Upper and Reigate GS perhaps didn’t need to be quite so prescient, so their campaigns started early in the 21st century. Latymer Upper set forth on its journey in 2004 and already has 110 pupils on free places. The aim is to be able to fund means-tested bursaries for up to a quarter of all students by 2024, the Foundation’s 400th birthday. That will require £40 million but they are well over half way there already and raised £5.3 million in the last year alone.

Reigate GS has raised £8 million in five years through its Changing Lives Campaign so that there are over 170 children receiving means-tested fee remission. The Arnold Foundation, set up in 2003 under Patrick Derham’s leadership, has not only provided substantial bursary provision at Rugby, but has produced something of perhaps even greater significance: the Royal Springboard Foundation. It started in 2013 and already it is working with 120 schools and 450 children. One of the schools with which Royal SpringBoard works is Eton, the biggest of beasts and the largest of targets. There, 90 boys currently receive a 100 per cent fee reduction and last year the school invested just under £7 million on this purpose. The ambitions are even bigger: with the creation of the Orwell Award whereby they aim to have 30 per cent or even 40 per cent of boys on means-tested awards.

That’s enough numbers for the moment. However, even for these strong, famous and historic schools, none of this comes easy, nor can it be done without some key elements. It needs to be true to the school’s history, identity and purpose: it has to be authentic. It also has to be central to the school’s future purpose and needs the total engagement of the head and the governors. So says Martin Boulton, high master of MGS: “Fundraising is one area where it has to be the head…and what better use can there be of a head’s time than to help boys from disadvantaged backgrounds to get a place at a school like MGS?’

It takes resources and time and patience. It takes real, long-term engagement with the community: “Schools like Reigate Grammar School exist within communities,” says Sean Davey, head of foundation there. “Everything we do is about the service and support we give to our community.”

And, whether you are an urban day school or a boarding school in Rugby or near Slough you have to work really hard to find the right children: “The most important thing of all has been and still is finding the right students,” according to Kerry Wilson, director of development at Rugby for 17 years.

Every head who is committed to this accessibility and this diversity believes not only that the students are being given a wonderful chance but also that the school itself is enriched and strengthened, made more human and humane by what they are doing. Philip Britton is clear about this. “Bolton School would be a completely different place without the bursary funds and the bursary student. They bring drive and enthusiasm and have an impact on the attitudes and values of everyone here.” David Goodhew, the head of Latymer Upper, agrees: “This is the kind of school our pupils want to go to. The parents want to send their children to a school that strives to be inclusive, grounded and in touch with the real world.”

Force for good?

Even with these stories of substantial success, there are questions to be asked and answered. Are good intentions actually doing good? Are the bursary students really prospering or do we live too much on glorious anecdotes of individual triumphs? Does this approach really weaken the state sector by taking the brightest at 11? Are sixth-form bursaries, as at Colfe’s and elsewhere, a better way forward? Can the substantial cost be justified, especially when partnership comes much cheaper? And, if the sector does believe that this is a way forward, is it doing enough to move the dial? After all, at the moment only 1 per cent of pupils in ISC schools are on free means-tested places.

A couple of weeks ago, Highgate School won the Tes Independent School of the Year Award and Highgate has been at the very forefront of work in partnerships and community engagement for the last decade. On that same night, Westminster School won the award for best Independent-State School Partnership for its work with Harris Westminster Academy. In 2019, the Tes Independent School of the Year was Bolton School. In 2018 it was Latymer Upper. I’d cautiously suggest that it is no coincidence that the schools that are achieving the highest recognition in the sector are those that are most deeply committed to an educational, social and moral purpose through partnership and bursarial provision.

A great deal is being done and there are reasons for hope of even bigger things. It is possible, if only possible, that the state might respond to the efforts of the independent schools and join in funding places, as it did of yore. There is even talk from some schools, Eton and MGS, of a vision of refounding their school, of creating an endowment to match the purposes of the original founders, who created some institutions of national significance and global recognition.

Even so, much more needs to be done by many more schools. The independent sector has the capacity and increasingly the will, to do more. I am tempted to ask, “If not now, when?”

John Claughton is former chief master of King Edward’s School in Birmingham and author of Transforming Young Lives - Fundraising for Bursaries