Boarding Schools revisited

Stuck in boarding school hell right now. I can't decide what to do with my son. If we stay here, it will have to be boarding school so I am now researching boarding schools - everywhere. France? The UK? Switzerland? Amsterdam? Australia? Thailand?

What I don't know about boarding schools frankly isn't worth knowing.

And then today I meet someone who does one of those know-it-all things.

"Yes, well actually, the school that you have thought about is such an inferior school! One should really look elsewhere is one cares about one's son."

Really? It has a 98% admittance to first preference university places? And acres of grounds, fabulous facilities, lovely nice well spoken boys.

"Yes, but seeing as it isn't a guaranteed 100% university entrance, it really is rather shabby."

Give me a break. Where do these people get off. My old school had about a 20% university entrance and that was a private school - a fee paying selective school.

Does my head in.

The thing is though that I don't really want my son to be hobnobbing with fabulously rich people. I don't want him hanging out with insanely competitive children. I don't want him to feel inadequate or lack confidence. I want him to go somewhere that he will be happy. Somewhere that he will grow and mature in and that is accessible to us so we can see as much of him as possible.

A 100% toffy nosed, dysfunctional, academic, rich, nerd is not my idea of future happiness for him.

But what do I know? I'm Australian!