As the Tiffin deadline looms, is there a girls SW London grammars / indies thread yet?

Well we received our SET email. I cant quite believe that it is next week.

I don't think there's any advantage to getting there early, tbh. There will be lots of waiting around for the kids anyway - it's just either going to be inside or outside! DD preferred being in the queue with me and able to chat than sitting in a hall in silence.

They did send very clear instructions - probably the best organised bit of the whole process!

You do have to queue up a lot. Best to walk down from the station if you can as there is no parking. They'll send you a letter about a week before with exactly what to bring - water, small snack, pen and pencil in plastic bag if I remember rightly.

Just be prepared to queue. You queue down the road, then snake through the car park. Be prepared to be ordered about "walk right around the cone" that sort of thing...
Then once inside the gate the kids go off and have to queue for longer in various playgrounds/zones. So weather dependent be ready to be outside for quite a while standing still.
Picking up is just as bad... I would have canned it if it had been cold and raining!

You get an instruction sheet telling you what to bring but yes a water bottle, snack and clear pencil case with not too much in iirc. They may even have had to just bring a pencil. I can't remember but the instructions were clear.

And yes - you get a morning or afternoon session, not all day.

Dd is at Tiffin & in her cohort about 30% ish got through to stage two. The cut off was about 76% iirc, and was given as a qualifying score not a percentage. Once through that the chances of getting a first round offer were I think around 1 in 3 again. A bit hazy on the detail as it was a while ago. We think it's a fab school and turned down good indie offers for it.

Thats great to hear Glaciferous! Hope she will have a great fun time in the new school.

Yes, I am near Kew too.

The journey has been fine. To be honest, it's less stressful for her than the journey to Tiffin or Waldegrave would have been as she goes on the tube so no worries about traffic and buses not arriving. I took her to school on the first day for her induction session and collected her, but she's done the journey alone with no problems at all since then. She likes to text me when she gets to the station and will give me a call to say she's arrived. I collect her from Kew at around 4.30ish when she gets off the tube, as she's tired by then and it just makes life easier. When she gets more used to the demands of the day, I'm hoping she will use her bike to get to and from the station. But this works OK for us now as I work from home so am able to collect her.

I think so as I dont live far from Kew @Glaciferous. How has your daughter journey to Hammersmith been?

You must be very near me, Greenleave. We are also about three miles away!

Ha! We are in designated area, didnt even know about this at all, just made a big assumption that we are only 3 miles away which means we are within catchment.

The admissions policy says up to 60 places are allocated to girls living in the inner area. Ranked by 1) looked after children 2) pupil premium 3) resident in inner area. Then they allocate the remaining places (incl any of the 60 not filled) to the designated area

Oh really? I had the impression there were a lot more last year. It's certainly not impossible, though. We are neither pupil premium nor in the inner area and DD got a place.

no way is it half the girls getting through to the second round of Tiffin!
Only 400 get through.

They also have an inner catchment and a pupil premium priority too, so if you are outside those you have to score incredibly highly.

Thanks Montenuit - we are in Molesey/ Thames Ditton.. not dead set on all girls so I'm going to look at KGS this month. Had forgotten about Radnor House and St Catherine's, will also look at WHS. our state option is Esher High which is pretty good too and still very much a possibility

I think roughly half the girls get through to round two, from what people were saying last time. No idea what that means on actual scores!

Is your state option good if you don't get Tiffin?

Depending where you live TheExtraGuineaPig I would add another. Tiffin is out of the way quite early so you can do 3 independents in Jan.
Assuming you want all girls, how about SWPS? Wimbledon High?

Theextraguineapig - going through the first round of tiffin in terms of nerves and the result will give you an idea. Visit somewhere like Radnor House/ st catherine's that you can have as a back up application if you need it in November. SHS changed their exam last year & made the maths more difficult. Dds tend to love the SHS open days, they sell the 6 super sports very well.

Hi everyone - finding this thread really helpful thank you! Dd is applying to Tiffin, LEH and SHS. She has a strong preference for LEH but it's the only one she's seen. Not sure if we should add another choice. She is doing very well at her primary so I hope she will be able to get into LEH but I'm not really sure of the expected standard.

It's not about the numbers of people applying. It's about the organisation of the process and how those people are treated as a consequence. Do you mean people should only be treated well if they're paying for the privilege?

While I keep saying Tiffin may have had less choice than independent schools in how to manage the process, there are still aspects of it that could have been managed far better, IMO. A queue of 2000 people in the rain for hours says very clearly 'we don't actually care about you, we'll be fine whatever'.