St Paul's School, London in the context of "Preparatory school (UK)"

A public school in England and Wales is a type of fee-charging private school originally for older boys. The schools are "public" from a historical schooling context in the sense of being open to pupils irrespective of locality, denomination or paternal trade or profession or family affiliation with governing or military service, and also not being run for the profit of a private owner.

Although the term "public school" has been in use since at least the 12th century, its usage was formalised by the Public Schools Act 1868 (31 & 32 Vict. c. 118), which put into law most recommendations of the 1864 Clarendon Report. Nine prestigious schools were investigated by Clarendon (including two day schools, Merchant Taylors' and St Paul's) and seven subsequently reformed by the Act: Eton, Shrewsbury, Harrow, Winchester, Rugby, Westminster, and Charterhouse. Team and competitive sports became an important part of the curriculum, which contributed to establishing the rules and propagating the growth of many different sports.

Sir Isaiah Berlin OM CBE FBA (6 June 1909 – 5 November 1997) was a Russian-British social and political theorist, philosopher, and historian of ideas. Although he became increasingly averse to writing for publication, his improvised lectures and talks were sometimes recorded and transcribed, and many of his spoken words were converted into published essays and books, both by himself and by others, especially by his principal editor from 1974, Henry Hardy.

Born in Riga (now the capital of Latvia, then a part of the Russian Empire), he moved to Petrograd, Russia, at the age of 6, where he witnessed the Russian Revolution. In 1921 his family moved to England, and he was educated at St Paul's School, London, and Corpus Christi College, Oxford. In 1932, at the age of 23, Berlin was elected to a prize fellowship at All Souls College, Oxford. In addition to his own output, he translated works by Ivan Turgenev from Russian into English. During the Second World War he worked for the British Diplomatic Service.

George Gideon Oliver Osborne CH (born 23 May 1971) is a British retired politician and newspaper editor who served as Chancellor of the Exchequer from 2010 to 2016 and as First Secretary of State from 2015 to 2016 in the Cameron government. A member of the Conservative Party, he was Member of Parliament (MP) for Tatton from 2001 to 2017.

The son of the Osborne & Little co-founder and baronet Sir Peter Osborne, Osborne was born in Paddington and educated at Norland Place School, Colet Court and St Paul's School, London before studying at the University of Oxford as an undergraduate student of Magdalen College, Oxford. After working briefly as a freelancer for The Daily Telegraph, he joined the Conservative Research Department in 1994 and became head of its political section. He went on to be a special adviser to Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food Douglas Hogg and work for John Major at 10 Downing Street, including on Major's unsuccessful 1997 general election campaign. In Opposition, he worked as a speechwriter and political secretary to Major's successor as party leader, William Hague. Osborne was elected as MP for Tatton in 2001, becoming the youngest Conservative member of the House of Commons. He was appointed Shadow Chief Secretary to the Treasury by Conservative leader Michael Howard in 2004. The following year Howard appointed him Shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer, a position Osborne kept after running David Cameron's successful party leadership campaign.

Merchant Taylors' School is an 11–18 boys' public day school, founded in 1561 in London. The school has occupied various campuses. Since 1933 it has been at Sandy Lodge, a 285 acres (115 ha) site close to Northwood in the Three Rivers district of Hertfordshire. The school has 1100 students between the ages of 11 and 18. The school is an all-through school from age 3 to 18 after merger with Northwood Prep School in 2015.

Founded in 1561 by Sir Thomas White, Sir Richard Hilles, Emanuel Lucar and Stephen Hales, it was one of the nine English public schools investigated by the Clarendon Commission set up in 1861, and successfully argued that it should be omitted from the Public Schools Act 1868, as did St Paul's School, London, the other day school investigated by the Clarendon Commission.

Philip Russell Hardie, FBA (born 13 July 1952) is a specialist in Latin literature at the University of Cambridge. He has written especially on Virgil, Ovid, and Lucretius, and on the influence of these writers on the literature, art, and ideology of later centuries.

Philip Hardie was educated at St Paul's School, London and Corpus Christi College, Oxford. He was Corpus Christi Professor of the Latin Language and Literature at the University of Oxford (2002–6), and since 2006 he has been Senior Research Fellow and Honorary Professor of Latin at Trinity College, Cambridge. In 2000 he was elected a fellow of the British Academy. In 2014 he was elected as an honorary fellow of the Australian Academy of the Humanities, and in spring 2016 was the 102nd Sather lecturer at the University of California, Berkeley. He is also a member of the Academia Europaea.