Secondary Considerations

[Cerise]

Glowing reports for J at parents evening. He’s a good boy.

[Edith Bacon]

Lovely J.

[Cerise]

Also, online parent consultations are the way forward!

[smalex]

Ah, well done J!

Do you think? Ours was terrible, the quality was so pixilated, it ended up so stilted because it was impossible to see who was meant to be talking or not.

[Edith Bacon]

Neither of our schools has offered any kind of parent meeting. They’ve just gone into Y10 and Y9 though so they might not be priority years.

[Flora Poste]

Also, online parent consultations are the way forward!

Totally agree.

[Cerise]

Ah, well done J!

Do you think? Ours was terrible, the quality was so pixilated, it ended up so stilted because it was impossible to see who was meant to be talking or not.

Yes! Ours went very smoothly and there’s no room to overrun because it just cuts you off!

[smalex]

I felt like it was just a bit short, I think. kids don't go to school for nearly 6 months, w gets stuck in a new class etc etc and we get less time than we normally get to discuss any of it. I mean, we got the basics but between that and how much the feed broke up, there wasn't room for much else.

[Cerise]

I felt like it was just a bit short, I think. kids don't go to school for nearly 6 months, w gets stuck in a new class etc etc and we get less time than we normally get to discuss any of it. I mean, we got the basics but between that and how much the feed broke up, there wasn't room for much else.

That does sound annoying. How long was your appointment? D’s school did 10 minutes but I ended up having my appointment face to face because I did supply a couple of days that week. J’s appointments were only five minutes which, for most subjects, was plenty. We actually ended up seeing more teachers than we would have bothered with had we had to go to the school. It was nice to get a bigger overview of him and how he’s quiet in some lessons and has a lot to say in others!

[smalex]

Yeah 10 minutes. With the aggressive countdown for the last two minutes I didn't really feel like I could ask anything further so it was all a bit awkward

[Flora Poste]

Oh FFS! Without going all TLDR, one of our closest outstanding secondaries (Alma Mater of Naomi Campbell, no less) has changed it's admissions criteria this year because of covid as they aren't holding the usual banding test. The new arrangements mean that they're doing random allocation within a specified distance as the crow flies from the school - which as far as Mr P and I can work out, runs through our back garden.

I'd argue the toss with them whether that counts or not, but we didn't put it high enough on our list of schools because in normal years, we'd be extremely unlikely to get in on distance, so it's all a moot point really

[Loralei]

Have they changed the criteria since the submission date? That doesn't seem fair.

[emma_p]

Yes, that doesn’t seem fair! They’re already applying blindly, not knowing the results of some of the tests they would have usually known about before the application closing date!

[Flora Poste]

Yes - I've just checked my emails and both the announcement about the banding and the one about the change in criteria were well after the submission date. It doesn't change our preferences that much (we'd still have put it third after two other schools), but if we don't get those, I might think about an appeal if it looks like we would have been in the smaller distance. It really is a matter of metres - I can't be 100% sure as I was just measuring on google maps and I cant tell exactly where they measure the entrance of the school from (or whether it's our front door, or our property which is the other end).

[Little My]

It's good you're keeping on top of things!

[Cerise]

How did the hatchlings get on with their Secondary placements?

[Kleio]

Betty got her first choice so she’ll be at the same one as Cube.

[Loralei]

Same here. Phew! I don't know what I was thinking with our 2nd and 3rd choices as, although they'd have been fine for J, Berty would never have coped with the travel!

[Texaco Shirley]

A got into L’s school, we didn’t put any other choices. I think it is a low birth number year though as I haven’t heard of anyone not getting in even those quite a long way down the selection criteria.

Now it’s the joys of dealing with school transport.

[emma_p]

G was offered a place at his second choice. I know he (and especially S ) is a bit disappointed. His score was emailed this afternoon and he wasn't that far off getting a place. He's automatically on the waitlist and they'll let us know where he is on the list after Easter. S has been googling and some years people with his score have been offered a place by September but who knows, there may be a huge bunch of kids all around the same mark.

I'm definitely playing it cool about the waitlist and will focus on the positives of the school that did offer him a place. And it does have a lot going for it, great results, around the corner from our house (5 mins walk!) and I already know that 4 other kids in his year were offered places there so there will be familiar faces. It has a reputation for being very strict and lot of homework which I think is why people seem down on it compared to other local schools. G said last night that he heard someone got a detention for not having their top button down up in summer. It will be a big jump for him as he currently has no uniform .