South Hampstead High School Application Form

[11plusisafulltimejob]

Dear M-Netters.

Am filling out the SHHS application form and there is a section which asks you to list the other schools you are applying to. Without wanting on the one extreme to be overly paranoid nor on the other entirely naïve, how should one navigate this? I assume that if one were to list a clutch of competitor schools, that would be frowned upon? Clearly it would make sense to list other schools in the consortium, but otherwise, what business is it of theirs? I would rather they don't make a snap-judgement or use game theory as to whom they should make offer to based on this info.

Your thoughts / feedback would be most welcome!

[whenwillsummerend]

I went for honesty with all our forms (SW London) and DD was asked about other schools in some interviews so worth being honest I think. They all know that lots of people apply to loads of schools. Round our parts many, many girls will have applied to Putney High, Wimbledon High, LEH, Godolphin etc. It must be similar in N London.
I may be wrong but I think part of the point of the question is to assist the registrars with offer ratios etc?

[Farewelltoarms]

It didn't occur to us to do anything but tell the truth. They'd think you were a bit odd if you didn't apply to other schools. We also listed the state ones. They do realise that everyone's on the same carousel of schools.

They look at it when trying to decide how many offers to make. For example, if a child has three older siblings all at another school that's next door to their house, they'll assume that that's the one they'll likely opt for if offered a place.

I think they might slightly judge if there's a bonkers amount of schools listed (this is conjecture on my part though). We've always kept to a strict three-school rule which is more fewer than most but I think they'd wonder why someone had applied to, say, 8 schools.

[Farewelltoarms]

Oh and I was told they'll still offer to the child with the three siblings - it won't stop them offering but they'll mark them down as an unlikely acceptance.

[11plusisafulltimejob]

Many thanks all for your pertinent and rapid feedback. I agree of course about honesty and figured they'd question her in interview, however we are attempting a lot of state schools but absolutely none are looking likely as we are either not CofE, or not in the catchment and therefore must rely on scholarships or highly selective testing so the chances are slim. It therefore looks like a massive list, when in reality it is 3 private and 4 state (some of which share a banding test). I assume that will look like we are lunatics

[whenwillsummerend]

I probably wouldn't bother listing all the states- maybe just the selective ones? We had 5 on our CAF form but I certainly didn't put them all down as 3 were just to fill the space on the form in case circumstances changed massively before September.

[WhyOhWine]

in your case i would list the private schools and also say that you will be submitting a CAF form forstate schools. If applying to a grammar like Henrietta Barnett, I might state that specifically

[Farewelltoarms]

We just put the three state schools they might have heard of rather than the full six we listed on the CAF. I was quite keen that they know we were trying state as well, I don't know why really, but we weren't private or bust.

[BruceFoxton]

It won’t affect offers but it helps the school gauge whether someone is likely to accept as if they’ve got a competitive school close to where they live there’s A likelihood that they’ll go for that and therefore the offering school can make a few more offers. Trust me they have got thousands of forms to process and won’t be making value judgement about people. It’s all about trying to make the right number of offers.

[horsemadmom]

They just want to know if you will have a clash of dates for the exam. Nothing more sinister.