Established nearly 150 years ago in 1873, Gabbitas, originally called Gabbitas and Thring, began life as a pioneering agency recruiting teachers for top schools both here in the UK and overseas. A few years later they added tutors to their range of activities. Amongst the more illustrious tutor alumni there are several well known authors and composers including Evelyn Waugh, HG Wells, CS Lewis and Edward Elgar plus many other outstanding figures from the arts and sciences. Over the years, Gabbitas has worked with crowned heads of Europe, celebrities from stage and screen together with families from all walks of life looking to find the best education solutions for their children, using the independent sector.

Today whilst no longer recruiting teachers, Gabbitas provides a full range of education services from nursery to higher education covering every stage of a child’s educational journey. With offices in the Middle East, China and a Russian language desk in our London office Gabbitas is uniquely positioned to help families in the UK and overseas find the right school for their children.

From finding the right school to preparing for it through tuition, assessment, the application process and pastoral care using our dedicated guardianship services. Help is available too for students applying to University, from selecting the right courses to completing the application process so that they can make the best choices to meet their potential.

School search services

Our school search services can best be broken down into three categories. There are clients for whom we provide a long-term plan to take their children through the whole journey, advising at every stage from pre-prep through to senior school and very often beyond to higher education choices. Our more tactical service helps families deal with the choices around specific stages in the journey such as prep, 11+, 13+, sixth form and HE choices. And, for those who need immediate help due to a change in family circumstances or a move, there is expert advice on hand from our very experienced consultants to fulfil that requirement.

The internationally recognised assessment product, Ukiset, delivered by Gabbitas, identifies not only a student’s potential but helps ensure that the choice of schools matches their abilities. The Ukiset test is used around the world helping to simplify the schools admissions process for overseas students. Our expert team of professional tutors can help students to reach the standards required if there are gaps that are identified following assessment.

The Gabbitas tutors also provide invaluable subject tuition for students and has provided tutoring to everyone from the young actors in the Harry Potter films to members of the Royal Family. We only work with tutors who have a passion for education and a strong academic background, often already qualified teachers or Oxbridge graduates.

In addition to our work with families Gabbitas also helps organisations deliver the best in education worldwide. We have consulted on projects in the UK and overseas to help investors, education companies, schools and senior management teams achieve success in establishing and improving schools. We have consulted on projects in the UAE, UK and further afield. We also work with a team of highly skilled and experienced school development and improvement advisers to enhance and improve educational provision in schools on a worldwide basis.

The importance of the British Independent Education

We are very aware of the importance of British Independent Education not only for the pupils it serves but also for the important part they play in the economy of this country. International students in our schools contribute £1.8 billion to GDP and support not only half a billion in tax revenues, their fees also support free bursaries for children across Britain. We work with families all over the world seeking British education for their children in our schools and Universities. For those who chose to keep their children closer to home there is a burgeoning growth of new international schools that primarily follow the British education template. Over 60% of international schools around the world are British curriculum or British backed and the British education system is revered around the world and for very good reason – it is considered as one of the best systems of education in the world and is the benchmark for measuring the standard of education practices.

A British Education is seen as a passport for life, our independent schools are some of the academically highest achieving schools in the world and their successful franchises overseas are reaching a new generation and providing revenue to support educating more children in their UK campuses.

Our British Independent sector remains the envy of the world. Gabbitas unsurprisingly is a strong supporter of the many merits that UK independent schools offer parents with students of wide-ranging interests and abilities. Great education is never achieved by sinking towards the lowest common denominator and we are confident as trusted education consultants that the British independent schools we work closely with will continue to not only survive but thrive, given the appetite that has never been stronger for our younger generations.

The Chairman of the Independent Schools Council in the UK, Barnaby Lenon, had this to say in a recent Times newspaper interview: “Independent schools provide excellence, capacity and innovation. They support science and arts subjects, which are vital to productivity; foreign languages as we enter a post-Brexit world; qualifications such as the International Baccalaureate, which provide a rounded curriculum; and through their focus on sport, 43 per cent of our new cricketing world champions.”

 

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This article from Vanessa Miner, Managing Director of London-based education consultant, Gabbitas, first appeared in the January 2020 edition of Conference & Common Room

Some the challenges that are facing Independent Schools currently revolve around the on-going political debates being discussed as possible future Government policy. Will a Labour Government close all private schools or will they impose punitive taxes that will price these schools out of the reach of middle class families looking for the best education for their children?

With no conclusions at hand it is hard to determine the future but it is probably safe to say that the reality will not be a bad as the diatribe and there is a long way to go before such dramatic actions are likely to be taken, if at all! The Independent sector, as far as we can see, remains resilient to such challenges and is aware of the very positive benefits it brings to the economy and to the communities in which the schools operate.

The other potential challenge is of course Brexit and although this has had an impact on many businesses it has not had a dramatic effect on our Independent schools who continue to attract students from overseas – both from within the EU and much further afield. The falling pound has made studying in the UK an even more attractive proposition with some overseas families even offering to pay 5 years’ fees up front!

Our British Independent sector remains the envy of the world. It is still the blueprint for schools setting up overseas.

Gabbitas has been placing children in this sector for close to 150 years and unsurprisingly is a strong supporter of the many merits that UK independent schools offer parents with students of wide-ranging interests and abilities. Great education is never achieved by sinking towards the lowest common denominator and we are confident as trusted education consultants that the British independent schools we work closely with will continue to not only survive but thrive, given the appetite that has never been stronger for our younger generations to enjoy the very best opportunities.

 

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This article from Vanessa Miner at London-based education consultant, Gabbitas, first appeared in the December 2019 edition of Independent Education Today

There has been a major but also considered reaction to the Labour Party’s declaration at its recent conference that it would seek to integrate Britain’s private schools into the state sector if it acceded to government.

Barnaby Lenon, Chairman of the Independent Schools Council in the UK had this to say in a recent Times newspaper interview:

 Independent schools provide excellence, capacity and innovation. They support science and arts subjects, which are vital to productivity; foreign languages as we enter a post-Brexit world; qualifications such as the International Baccalaureate, which provide a rounded curriculum; and through their focus on sport, 43 per cent of our new cricketing world champions.

Supporting this view Fiona Boulton, Chair of the influential Headmasters and Headmistresses Conference had this to say at HMC’s recent annual conference:

UK independent schools are academically the highest achieving schools in Britain. We have been producing some of the most able students at our universities, and have recently educated a third our doctors. We have taught an even higher proportion of the best students of modern languages and classics, helping those subjects survive and supplying many teachers for the state sector.

Our schools continue to emphasise the importance of extra-curricular life.  That is why such a high proportion of the current English cricket team and our rugby teams out in Japan come from our schools and why so many medallists at the Rio Olympics were formed in our schools. This is something to be proud of.

Far from wanting our schools taken over, voters want the government to help more children to get access to them. There is strong support for our idea of the government helping to pay for children from low-income backgrounds to attend independent schools with nearly 50% actively in favour and just 27% against. Interestingly, there is little difference in views between those who vote for different parties. This idea needs open, sensible debate.

Voters are resoundingly in favour of parents having the right to choose how their child is educated. Over two-thirds agree that parents should be able to pay for their children’s education if they can afford to. Only 18% disagree.

This tells us that the policy of destroying great independent schools is a vote loser. The political activists who want to tax good schools to death, without a notion of how to nurture achievement elsewhere, do not understand the common sense of the British people.

Our British Independent sector remains the envy of the world. Gabbitas has been placing children in this sector for close to 150 years and unsurprisingly is a strong supporter of the many merits that UK independent schools offer parents with students of wide-ranging interests and abilities. Great education is never achieved by sinking towards the lowest common denominator and we are confident as trusted education consultants that the British independent schools we work closely with will continue to not only survive but thrive, given the appetite that has never been stronger for our younger generations to enjoy the very best opportunities.