Schools around Edinburgh

You have to open up the additional links to Education Authority Statistics and National Statistics and compare them.

So, for instance, 48% of pupils from Boroughmuir went on to Fulltime Higher Education, compared with 30% across Edinburgh, and 31% nationally.

your link of course your going to try locate to a good school if at a. not as if you'd chose a bad school, to locate to.that would be bizarre.

boroughmuir vg school
low absenteeism
high pass rate in s and h grade and at good grades
48% into higher ed eg uni from 5th yr

im not teacher, so hopefully someone knowledgeable tell you more i depth

It was one of the best decisions we made, tbh. Don't feel sad about it or regret it at all. The schools are good, the air is clean, the area is rich in culture and history, the people are lovely. All sorts of pluses.

We chose to leave the Edinburgh area in order for our kids to have the opportunity to go to a good school with a good secondary school.

we chose where to live to be near vg schools
as parents we are fortunate we can do it.it was a significant factor in choosing area to live in,and yes did factor in school strongly.discounted areas with not so good schools

but the OP has said she's not moving to within commuting distance of anywhere specificially and that the entire move is for the school.
IMO no individual school in isolation is good enough to direct a whole life like that.

Well if you're moving to commute to somewhere specific, like Edinburgh and your criteria is just - must be within a certain radius, why would you not look at where had a suitable school as well?

I can't say I'd move somewhere just for a school, but surely it'd be a factor? I'd definitely avoid places where I didn't like the schools

thats harsh. i live in area with vg schools that determined purchase of house
we knew moving here that schools were good and yes specifically moved here for that reason. tbh think you'll find plenty folk do so

we were fortunate in being able to chose an area to move to.a good school was important to us,and being able to make that choice of course we did

life pre-kids lived different part of city,v different accomodation. after kids changed area and made adjustments inc choosing a property with good adjacent schoosl

the OP isn't going to like this, but i'd say that moving to an area SPECIFICALLY for a school is very odd and shortsighted and not a way i would organise my life.

a child's future is so much more than the reputation of the school they attend, it's how they fit with that school, it's where you live in relation to the school and the implications for commuting and afterschool activities, it's the wider community, out of school activities and also parents' jobs and how much time they have at home vs. commuting etc.

the OP is fairly reasonable to be asking about schools but seems too fixated on just schools, rather than the wider picture.

yes,bathgate and armadale, are deprived

As mentioned, my foster son is at linlithgow, and I would have to say that while there are certainly a large number of middle class children there, there are also plenty from fairly deprived areas. The centre of Linlithgow itself is fairly pretty and there are a lot of professional people who have moved out of Edinburgh due to the good train link, however in my experience I would say that there are lots of large pockets of poverty across West Lothian as a whole.

gentrification does change areas and schools.yes
it elevates house prices and rental costs,and makes schools oversubscribed

The school does not come before the desirable area though.

It was not the good school in Linlithgow or North Berwick that attracted everyone to the towns.

Linlithgow and North Berwick were pretty places, the wealthier flocked to them, house prices went up to reflect and maintain exclusivity of the wealthy, the schools became "good". (Agree with your speech mark distinction, MIS.)

The wealthy nab all the pretty places.

yes.oversubscribed schools elevate house price/rental cost
its a straight select desired school and figure can you afford to rent or buy to guarantee catchment area

I think the question for the OP is whether their family income will allow them to buy/rent in places where the schools are generally rated as "good", given that those ones are largely determined by being in an expensive location.

Or whether she needs to be asking "Who is really happy with their catchment school which happens to cover an affordable area?"

Schools with a generally middle-class catchment are likely to have good league table results just because of their intake. They then tend to get "placing requests" from the kind of parents who want to send their child to a school which gets good results, which fills up any remaining places. (And I don't mean to sound unkind here, because it's exactly what I did)

So yes, schools which are perceived as "good" are likely to be oversubscribed.

There may still be loads of other schools which are good, add lots of value, and would give a child just as good exam results as the "high in the league table" schools, but which don't themselves end up at the top of the league table simply because of their intake being broader.

So good schools won't always be oversubscribed. But "good" schools tend to be...

yes.thats true.but generally "good" schools over subscribed

The thing is Scottishmummy what's a good school when SN are involved isn't the same thing at all.

Schools also do well because they've got a nice catchment area, which I'd suspect is the case in Linlithgow ( I don't know definitely as I have no experience with it) Linlithgow is always going to outperform schools in blackburn or Broxburn - but they're not neccessarily going to be doing a better job.

The primary school closest to me has the best reputation with parents, having had involvement with several parents of children with SN who attend there and attended IEP meetings - I wouldn't send a child there if you paid me, they are truely appalling, yet parents are delighted when their children get a place there

good schools are oversubscribed,and house price/rental in catchments are elevated.as a rule of thumb good schools are oversubscribed.stabvest high in tends not to be as subscribed as other better schools

You see, sm, I don't think it's a case of 'any good school will be oversubscribed'. Certainly not in Scotland.

There are very pretty towns and areas and all teh people with money want to live somehwere pretty. Very few of them will move to Cumbernauld or Tranent. So they live in pretty places and their children go to the local schools and that school is seen as a 'good school'.

Some of these schools actually become a bit complacent, the staff hang around longer because there are fewer discipline problems and often only on exam results can they be considered the 'best schools'.

I know a school that seems to struggle if you look at exam results alone but the staff and the work they do is very very good.

How to determine if you are 'ordinarily resident' in Scotland for university purposes (From SAAS). In summary, you must have been resident in the uk for 3 years or more and must be ordinarily living in Scotland on the relevant date (I.e. Not just have moved up to start your course):

To be eligible to apply for support you must meet our residence conditions as set out in The Students' Allowances (Scotland) Regulations 2007 (as amended) and be studying a course of higher education at HNC or equivalent level or above. To qualify for a student loan, you must meet the conditions set out in the Education (Scotland) Act 1980 and the Regulations thereunder. For more information on courses that we do and do not assist, please see our course eligibility section.

To meet the general residence conditions, you must have been ordinarily resident in the United Kingdom, the Channel Islands or the Isle of Man for the three years immediately before the first day of the first academic year of the course (the relevant date). For the majority of students who start their course in the autumn term, the relevant date is 1 August.

If you are not a UK or other EU national, you must also have ' settled status' in the UK (as set out in the Immigration Act 1971) on the relevant date. To find out about getting settled status, you can visit the Home Office website or phone their helpline on 0870 6067766. If you have not been living in the UK, you may still qualify depending on your circumstances.

You must also be ordinarily resident in Scotland on the relevant date, unless you are an English, Northern Irish or Welsh domiciled student taking a degree course in one of the Allied Health Professions. In this case, you must be ordinarily resident in your home country at the time you apply for your first years support.

The relevant date
The relevant date depends on when your course starts. The dates for session 2011-2012 are as follows.

1 August 2011 for courses that start between 1 August 2011 and 31 December 2011.
1 January 2012 for courses that start between 1 January 2012 and 31 March 2012.
1 April 2012 for courses that start between 1 April 2012 and 30 June 2012.

School starts next week! Many of the universities start back up the week after that. Accommodation can be difficult to source in the catchment of some of those schools listed as they are also in student-y areas.