HELP! Moving to Warrington

[Emilybell87]

Hi I’m new to mumsnet and need some advice. Me and my partner Live in Kent (hubby is from Scunthorpe) and we have just sold our house and are going to rent in Warrington.

We have 3 kids all primary age and our eldest daughter is non verbal autistic so needs a special soon. We have a few areas we like the sound of but not entirely sure

Woolston
Lymm
Westbrook
Butts green
Great sankey
Ideally we want to rent for a year to find our feet and get the kids into school and then buy but we don’t want to move the kids school twice.

Anyone shed any light on them and how they rate in area please?

Thanks

Welcome, I live near by but not close enough to give any really info. My sister who I would describe as very fussy actually likes living near Westbrook.

Hope someone else comes along to help and advice.

What is your budget? I live in Lymm and love it. It is quite expensive though, and I think it will be quite a lot more than the other places you mention. It is a lovely place to live, with a great village centre. Do you both drive? Lymm doesn’t have the best public transport links, but great road links. I don’t know enough about the other places to comment.

I would definitely recommend Woolston. I used to live there and now live just on the outskirts. Woolston have 2 special needs schools, the children with disabilities team is on one of the school sites. Additionally, there are a number of good primary schools and a fantastic high school (Kings Leadership) I know people currently looking to move to Woolston so they are in the catchment for the high school. If I could afford to I would personally move back myself! I would also look at Paddington which is next to Woolston. HTH x

With an autistic child I'd consider Woolston too. It has a fantastic sensory centre run by a really lovely team also its own library, doctors, swimming pool and community hub.

As your DC grow up of the areas you mention Woolston is very well located for getting into town. They do grow up fast and as a mum of three myself (mine are older 8, 13, 15) being convenient for town for my NT children to access themselves without me having to organise and drag along my eldest gives them more opportunities and relieves a tiny bit of pressure on me.

The sensory centre is a specialist adult accessible playbarn (saves your back going in with them) with special sensory equipment. There's a quiet sensory room with warm water bed for movement, handing led light curtains to play with, ball pool with white balls and led lights under controlled by child hitting hands on the wall, light screen that's great fun but I've never quite worked out. They hold all sorts of inclusive clubs and run activities. Can also be rented in it's entirety for parties at a very reasonable rate (siblings are welcome to join in most activities so it's family friendly)

Warrington has a lovely NAS support group too worth checking out. Lots of inclusive holiday activites. Warrington Wolves (the rugby team), run lots of inclusive clubs and holiday stuff too.

Woolston would be my recommendation as well, however I know that the special school (they are both joint on the same campus, but cater for different levels of special needs) are really stretched and I know of several children waiting for places in different years.

Defintiely Woolston.

Thank you so much for all the info. We really like the look of lymm but am a little
Concerned now as I’m the only driver at the moment and my husband will be commuting. I’m not sure how it will
Work with Woolsten SEN school place either. Would hate to move and then my DD have to go ages away to a different school. Do you know of any other SEN schools close to/writhing woolston that aren’t over subscribed?

Thanks

Within woolston I mean

I know a couple of children who get a bus to delamere special school in Urmston, not sure where the other closest schools are. It might be worth ringing the local authority education department and ask about the likelihood of a space. I presume you have an EHCP for your daughter which will transfer over, so the LA need to find a suitable place, but just might be a wait/ negotiation about transport to a school further away.

I think there is one in st Helen's too, which isn't that far

Thank you. Yes we have an EHCP In place for her so will need transferring over, it can be such a pickle juggling mainstream and SEN. At the moment my daughter gets government transport minibus so i can drop the mainstream kids and not worry. Hopefully I’ll be able to do the same when we move.

If you contact Warrington parent partnership and communicate with Iain Macdonald, he's a bit of a local superstar when it comes to all things special education needs. Really down to earth and honest in his help.

School transport forms and criteria are online. Funding is tight but with other primary age DC to get to school you should meet the local criteria.

link to the SEND page with his contact details

Thank you very much. Is parent partnership a Facebook thing?

Where will your husband be commuting to? My husband doesn’t drive, but works from home so the lack of public transport isn’t such an issue for him. There are buses from Lymm to Altrincham/ Warrington, they just aren’t very regular and can be a bit of a walk to the bus stop depending on where in Lymm you live.

My friend’s child goes to a lovely special school called Pictor, in Timperley. That is in Trafford though, so I’m not sure how that would work with funding.

Parent Partnership isn't facebook related. I think its broadly local council but I've never really thought about it. I stumbled across them when moving and they were brilliant. Sent me out all sorts in the post to help me get established much faster when I moved.

That’s good to know about more networking bits are in place for when we move. The more support the better

Hi, I just wanted to say I am available for Maths tutoring, currently in year 12 finished all GCSE’s so can tutor up to that level. I live in the Appleton area but can also do online if that’s easier. Please get in contact if you’re interested