Charity Work
The Dragon School in Oxford is trying to protect its tax breaks by teaching seven-year-olds the wonders of sanctimony. As an independent school which charges more than twenty thousand pounds a year to keep its pupils out of their parents' way during term time, the Dragon is naturally anxious about its "charitable" status, which is at risk from the Charity Commission's new standards requiring schools to offer their services to those who can't afford to pay for them. The Dragon has responded with "a number of bursaries", which will give the more privileged pupils a useful supply of financial inferiors on whom to practise their newly-inculcated philanthropic impulses; and has appointed a Blairily-titled "director of social impact" to ensure that none of its charges miss their place in the ongoing motorway pile-up that is New Labour's social policy.
To its credit, the school has recognised that, while in a healthy society privilege and responsibility imply one another, the present situation in our Mother of Democracies is a bit more liberalised. The Dragon is not paid twenty thousand a year to turn out a lot of plumbers, teachers, home helps for the elderly and other social dross; the loving parents who put up the fees have a right to expect a captain of industry, a celebrity or, at the very least, a tennis player for their trouble. The director of social impact wants the pupils "to understand that by any stretch of the imagination they are privileged", but does not imagine for one second that the pupils' privileged status means they will automatically be of some use: "We hope a lot of them will be successful in the future and in a position to give".
Accordingly, a seed must be planted at the age of seven in the fragile hope of its blossoming into a charitable impulse in twenty years or so; by which time, if present trends continue, the health and education of those who cannot afford to gamble on private schemes will be entirely the responsibility of charitable organisations, or of nobody at all. Classes include "giving children a pound, asking them to 'grow it' and then encouraging them to discuss which charity to donate to"; meanwhile, there are consultancies for older individuals, offering three whole weeks a year in which to learn that "philanthropy is not just about money; it is about time".
To its credit, the school has recognised that, while in a healthy society privilege and responsibility imply one another, the present situation in our Mother of Democracies is a bit more liberalised. The Dragon is not paid twenty thousand a year to turn out a lot of plumbers, teachers, home helps for the elderly and other social dross; the loving parents who put up the fees have a right to expect a captain of industry, a celebrity or, at the very least, a tennis player for their trouble. The director of social impact wants the pupils "to understand that by any stretch of the imagination they are privileged", but does not imagine for one second that the pupils' privileged status means they will automatically be of some use: "We hope a lot of them will be successful in the future and in a position to give".
Accordingly, a seed must be planted at the age of seven in the fragile hope of its blossoming into a charitable impulse in twenty years or so; by which time, if present trends continue, the health and education of those who cannot afford to gamble on private schemes will be entirely the responsibility of charitable organisations, or of nobody at all. Classes include "giving children a pound, asking them to 'grow it' and then encouraging them to discuss which charity to donate to"; meanwhile, there are consultancies for older individuals, offering three whole weeks a year in which to learn that "philanthropy is not just about money; it is about time".
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