Schools dilemma - Stanley Park or Barrow Hedges

[RobinsonOnTheA232]

Happy New Year!

We are moving to Carshalton in the next couple of weeks and have accepted a place at Stanley Park Infants School for dd (year 2). We have been to visit, filled out all the forms etc and were all sorted to start on 8th January

However, we received a letter from Sutton Council a few days ago offering us a place at Barrow Hedges, which was our first choice. Unfortunately we have not yet visited Barrow Hedges (we didn't think there was any chance of getting a place as we had been told that the waiting list was quite long), and will not now have the opportunity to do so before we have to make the decision, so it is very hard to know what to do.

It would certainly be easier for us to stick with Stanley Park at this point, but Barrow Hedges has such a good reputation, especially for music, that we feel we need to consider taking up the place there instead of Stanley Park.

I would be hugely grateful if anyone has any experience or knowledge of either school that they would be prepared to share. We have to decide by 7th Jan, and then arrange uniform, childcare etc all on the same day...

Many thanks in advance

[RobinsonOnTheA232]

bumping

[Abcfacepaints]

Barrow hedges most definately

[goguca]

Hi Robinson

What did you decide? We will soon have a similar dialemma plus St Marys RC

It will help a lot to hear your views

[RobinsonOnTheA232]

Hi,

We stuck with Stanley Park in the end. To be honest I'm still a bit lost with it all, and find it hard to know whether it was the right decision. Stanley Park seems OK, dd seems fairly happy and they've got some nice extra-curricular stuff going on. I have to admit I do feel slightly underwhelmed with the school but can't quite put my finger on what it is. It may just be that it is very different from her previous school which was very much more diverse and perhaps a bit more keyed into the individual children's needs. I've never actually visited Barrow Hedges or St Mary's inside so can't really compare. Sorry - not very helpful I know.

I'm keen to visit BH soon, as we will need to apply for ds next year and want to explore all the options before we commit him to Stanley Park (although I am not sure we would really want to move dd again, or be able to negotiate the logistics of two different schools...) so will post again if anything new to report.

Are you moving to the area or are you already here with a dc coming up for Reception? Do PM me if you want to meet up and talk it over.

[goguca]

Hi Robinson,
What a similar story we got, we left Barrow Hedges as our second option, we got our first choice but recently heard not very good things about the first choice and great things about BH. We put down our names in the waiting list for BH and we got a call yesterday saying that we got a place. Need to decide by Monday. Tried to PM you to hear your views but it comes with an error.
Did you finally visit BH?
G

[debrabrown2007]

@RobinsonOnTheA232 @goguca What schools did you end up using ? Need to apply for reception for LO, can't decide on Barrow Hedges & Stanley Park as first choice! Thanks to any Mums to let me know their opinion on either. x

[goguca]

@debrabrown2007 We took the offer from BH and our daughter has been very happy. The first word to describe the school is "community". Not many are farer than 1000 mts from the School. SP is also a great school and it seems to have very good academic results. Based on what other parents choose, it seems that if you are close enough to BH, the preference is to go for that one as first choice.