Higher education, in the social consciousness, is considered to determine the social and professional success of an individual. It is difficult to deny this. However, a vast amount of research highlights the fact that it is, in fact, the secondary education, and the secondary school in particular (apart from the family factor), that is decisive in shaping the individual’s cultural capital, and their social „potential”. In this respect, it is difficult to overrate the role of elite secondary schools, both in the historical and contemporary perspectives, whose graduates form intellectual elites of a given society. This article is a contribution to the contemporary debates on the role of education in sustaining social inequalities. It considers this issue on the example of social functions fulfilled by British elite secondary schools in the context of constructing graduate identities and the dynamics of relations between the phenomenon of cultural reproduction and social mobility.
