St Marylebone vs Stokey vs Clapton Girls

Ah funnily enough my DS is Y8 at Stokey! I agree with all the above. The disruption particularly bothers DS but he is broadly very happy there. I also think disruption calms down a lot from Y9. They did ask parents at the recent Y8 forum to email the teachers if we feel our child isn't being challenged enough so might be worth getting in touch. On streaming, I've been reliably informed that being in a mixed ability group for maths is actually better for both the most academically able (explaining formulas to peers reinforces their knowledge) and the more academically challenged ( hearing explanations from peers lands better than from teachers). However I do wish they'd set for English!

Hi @purpleturtle1 I'm in Stokey and going through the exact same decision process for my DD! I was wondering if you'd made any decisions yet?

Thank you MumsRule, yes that does make sense. Thanks for unpacking my fuzzy thinking. I’d love to know what other church leaders actually did. I wonder if there will be more appeals for school places?

I think the necessity of online church attendance for 20-21 lockdown periods would have been down to each individual church / Family Minister relaying to the parents on the registers for Young Church / Sunday school etc. how attendance would monitored and considered towards admissions for the CofE schools with which children would generally be applying to. I know ours made parents aware via church newsletter and correspondence that if they were not doing the virtual online church google classroom hand in or activities which and ‘attending’ as they would usually have done in person, then this could affect their attendance record for school admissions.

For those churches who did not do this - maybe it would have impacted what the ministers could declare on the clergy form used for admission purposes and thus impacted attendance required for a higher criteria church place. Hope that makes sense...would need more posters to clarify what their respective churches relayed to them or not and if a conversation was had with their ministers pre-application.

Thanks Banana.

Would that explain the smaller banding then? I can’t see any amendments to the school admissions code to do with Covid-19. Would children who were relying on the 2020/21 year to make up the 5 years miss out on church attendance criteria if they couldn’t actually attend church? Or am I confusing things?

I think most schools allowed for some variance from the normal minimum attendance if the child could not attend their place of worship during lockdown periods and online attendance was not provided by their church. But there should be some kind of statement in the admissions policy about this.

Does anyone know how church attendance was counted during all the lockdowns? Did church schools just right off a year, or did they expect and accept an online attendance?

I’m not being serious. Well not entirely.

I’m interested in knowing why the change in banding distance between This year and last and between CSG and St M. Was it last year that was the anomaly?

I'm really not sure you can read too much into the data being this different for one year. I'm not sure what effect Covid could have had, since band A is so much shorter. I think it may be just a single anomaly, next year will tell. But I do think there could be some relation to the exact opposite happening at CSG, where the band A offers are much further than previous years. The numbers aren't that big in each band so small differences can matter. I note also that in the open places for StM, band A is further than usual (from memory) and further than bands B, C and D. So maybe this year a few more of the band A girls who live close to the school are church attenders (compared to other years) applying under that category rather than open?
It would have also been interesting to see the Greycoats church distances, but they only ever publish their open distances. Could be there is some relationship between their distances and StM as well, as quite a few girls apply for church places at both schools.

@BananaDaiquiri thanks for this. That is odd - likely effects of Covid? Be useful to hear others thoughts around the comparison of the two years.

@Camdenish Haha, I like this way of thinking and might be worthwhile considering @purpleturtle1 :) steer away from a likely Band A performance on the test.

So long as you fulfil the next highest CofE church criteria with attendance for the minimum required or more as per their admissions over the preceding 3 years prior to application, then you may be fine and if it is your preferred school then definitely put it first choice as if you don’t get it, you will then get Stokey which is obvs closest to you and if you have that down as second on the LA admissions form and you can accept it on offer day. Nothing lost and if your clergy form substantiates as above, likely you will be quite high up on the waitlist for a chance of a place St Marylebone at first or second rounds.

@MumsRule20 @purpleturtle1
I got it from Rbkc who publish their own admissions allocation alongside Westminster.
www.rbkc.gov.uk/children-and-education/schools/join-school/admissions/primary-secondary-school-transfer-2021

Don't know what's going with band A compared to previous years. Oddly, at CSG band A went out the furthest, and much further than previous years. Perhaps the two are related as there may be some overlap in applicants. May just be a one off strange year. I know of someone 2.6 miles away, in band A church who didn't get in this year.

@purpleturtle1

This link shows the 2020 allocations from the Westminster Council Secondary brochure:

www.westminster.gov.uk/media/document/secondary-school-admission-brochure-2021

Interesting to compare this with
excerpt for 2021 allocations which @BananaDaiquiri posted above - and would also be interested to know where they were published?

You mention your DD would very likely be Band A / is this because she is very bright and high achieving and therefore would have scored highly on her Banding test? I don’t think being Band A and falling under the church criteria gives more advantage - as competitions is high across the board and expect for a school such as St Marylebone there is a large number girls applying who are bright and fall within the higher Band and are coming from private primaries not just state.

If you really want DD to go on a church place wouldn't it be better if she wasn't a Band A student? Do band D students tend to get in from further afield generally? How about DD writes her name on the banding paper and nothing else?

@ClaireSage @sausagedogststandupandtakeover "catchment" for this years allocation was:

There were 7 EHCP and 16 performing arts places and then the cut off distances for each band under church and open places was as follows:

Church of England Places (under criterion 2.1.2)
Band A up to 1.824 miles
Band B up to 3.018 miles
Band C up to 4.208 miles
Band D "All offered" (so assume they then started to offer places to the next criterion down)

Open Places (distance)
Band A 0.998 miles
Band B 0.641 miles
Band C 0.564 miles
Band D 0.614 miles

To further reiterate above - the banding tests for the state schools I mentioned in my last messages incl. St Marylebone are to ensure they have a mixed ability intake and only used for admission purposes not for setting or streaming.

They are not academically selective. Their admissions is based purely on each school specific order of criteria.

Also to avoid confusion - where I mentioned the other schools above St Marylebone / Grey Coat Hospital / St Augustines all share the same banding test results so you only need to sit once if applying to each of those and these are all C of E schools. It is about half hour long and for this year’s intake was just Verbal Reasoning.

But Camden Girl’s School is a separate and comprehensive and long banding test around 2.5hrs, specific to their school.

Oops forgot the link click here for St Marylebone Admissions Policy

@ClaireSage

This might help you understand:

“Banding tests are used by some state schools to ensure they’re admitting pupils with a wide range of academic abilities.
Under the ‘fair banding’ system, all pupils who’d like a place at a specific school take the same test.
Their results are used to put them into an ability band, for example:
Band A (highest marks): 25% of children Band B: 25% of children
Band C: 25% of children
Band D (lowest marks): 25% of children
The school will then offer places to equal numbers of children within each band to ensure they’re admitting an even spread of academic abilities.”

This is used for admission purposes only and by other schools such as Camden School for Girls / Grey Coat Hospital / St Augustine’s...

You may want to read more about admissions here.

Will your daughter be trying for Sept 22? Church place or performing arts and music?

Either way, all applicants need to sit the banding test if you apply for the school.

@MarvelAnn

What are the 4 bands? Are they certain levels of testing?

And thank you for the PM! So appreciate it. I will answer tomorrow since I’m about to pass out.

It depends on what band your daughter tests into (there are 4 bands), and whether you have a church reference or not (and how strong your reference is, if you have one).