Roedean is now known as ‘Beijing High’. Cheltenham Ladies’ College is ‘Hong Kong College’. In the country’s most elite boarding schools, pupils say that they are one of just a handful of English children. Others note that Chinese has become the dominant language in hallways and dormitories.

Many English parents can no longer afford a boarding school education for their children. And the pressure of recently introduced VAT on fees, as well as above-inflation rises year on year, means the number able to cough up will dwindle further. By contrast, China and Hong Kong’s growing economy and cultural obsession with education provides a surfeit of parents with the cash needed to secure the educational prospects of their children.

More than 30 independent schools and their brands have been snapped up by Beijing investors

There are 11,000 Chinese pupils at British independent schools. At Harrow, 28 per cent arrive from overseas, climbing to 40 per cent at Roedean. The parenting forum Mums-net is awash with complaints that the ‘inter-national’ make-up of English public schools has ‘diluted’ the cultural value of the education one might expect at these institutions.

None of this is a coincidence. Admissions teams have made every effort to attract eastern money. Harrow, among others, has appointed designated agents through ‘Academic Asia’ and the ‘UK Boarding Schools Admissions Service’ to simplify overseas applications and recruit from Hong Kong and China. Chinese applicants to Shrewsbury School, named independent school of the year in 2020, can contact an official representative on WeChat – a Chinese–only instant messaging, social media and payment app that operates under ChineseCommunist party oversight.

The classroom demographic isn’t the only thing changing at these schools. Over the past decade, more than 30 independent schools and their brands have been purchased by Chinese investors. KSI Education, a company which invests in British private schools and is bankrolled by China First Capital, has already bought Kingsley School in Devon, Heathfield Knoll in Worcestershire and Greene’s College in Oxford. It is bargain-hunting: snapping up smaller boarding........

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