The Old Boys Network

120 years of biographical data in Who’s Who, researchers from the London School of Economics calculated that the so-called Clarendon schools, which include Eton, Harrow, Rugby and Westminster, continue to produce nearly 10% of entrants. This is despite those schools having traditionally educated fewer than one in 500 (0.15%) of pupils aged between 13 and 18.  They still hold “extraordinary power”, according to the study.

The elite schools, which also include Charterhouse, Merchant Taylors’, Shrewsbury, St Paul’s and Winchester College, continue to exert a “profound influence”. The researchers also observed that the decline in the Clarendon schools’ powers stalled completely over the past 16 years.

“Although the Clarendon schools have not always been the best performing schools in the country, they have consistently remained the most successful in propelling their alumni into elite positions. Clearly their power lies beyond simple academic excellence and is likely rooted in an extensive extracurricular education that endows old boys with a particular way of being in the world that signals elite male status to others.” The joint lead authors, Aaron Reeves of the International Inequalities Institute at LSE and Sam Friedman of its department of sociology, said.  “While the democratisation of education clearly dented the influence of these elite schools, their power remains a testament to how far adrift Britain lies from true equality of opportunity,” they observed.