To send child to a secondary one hour away?

[hibbledibble]

I'm thinking hard about secondary options currently. One option is about an hour away, and an amazing school. It would however involved a train ride and then a bus.

Other options are a bus ride away, and also good, but don't have the same amazing facilities or stellar results.

I'm torn regarding which school to pick as first choice.

Is an hour too much to travel?

My son goes to a school that is 60-90 mins journey away. It is an outstanding school. He is very happy, has many friends (that he stays in touch with on line during evenings and weekends) and is getting an exceptionally good education. He doesn't mind taking the 6.50am bus as he loves the school. I would recommend that you go for the outstanding school.

@tickledtiger

I didn’t ever resent my parents for sending me to the school I had to do a long commute to, they honestly thought it was my best shot at success and I did ok there.

I must say though, I didn’t do any extra curricular activities at all and I very rarely met up with any school friends outside of school. All due to the distance.

I wouldn’t send my own child to a school 1+ hour away unless there was something very wrong with the local option.

I've put down all 6 choices for secondary for DS3. Some of those are a 2 hour commute, because there are only 3 near us. If he gets offered one of the further ones, he'll have to go there.

I went to both boarding school with a just-fall-out-of-bed commute and a day school with an hour's commute by car/bus/tube then school bus. I also had after school music and sports activities every day so got home at 6pm 4 nights a week, 9.30pm on Fridays, with Saturday junior music college, 1-2 hours homework plus music practice every day. I honestly don't think I ever felt tired or stressed or like I was missing out on socialising when I was commuting, it was no harder than boarding with everything in one place.

But, all my classmates had a similar commute/schedule, the school bus was fun, we all lived all over the place so meeting up was left to weekends. Plus it was the eighties with only 4 channels on TV, no X-boxes or Internet so there wasn't much to do in the evenings My DC's schools were similar with kids coming from far and wide.

Like PP's have said, it depends on whether a long commute is the norm or whether you DC will be the only one who can't meet up after school on a whim and be left out socially. It also depends on the commute, whether there will be other kids to travel with, whether there will be long waits for buses in the rain etc. I don't think a 1 hour commute itself is an issue.

I wouldn’t my brother did this and moved my niece after 2 terms as it was too much for her

Before I became a boarder, my parents thought it was a great idea for me to be a day girl.
My journey was a little over an hour each way each day.

By the Christmas term everyone had figured out that I was the girl who could never meet on the weekends, go out after school, be in any of the afterschool clubs, go to peoples birthday parties etc... because I had that stupid journey home.

By Easter even the polite children who invite everyone had stopped sending invites they knew I couldn't accept.

It REALLY isolated me from all the girls in my year & even when I became a boarder because I was shy that never really changed because they'd got used to me never being able to go anywhere.
Leaving me out had become a habit that never really changed.

The reason my parents finally decided boarding was better than being a day girl was because I was stalked at the train station I had to wait at for my train by the way.
I didn't notice myself & I was a quiet sensible sort of girl.
It was only when someone else who was at the station (complete stranger who happened to do the same regular journey) became concerned & reported it to the school that anyone found out.
If they hadn't done so, I might never have got to finish secondary school.
You might think 11 is 'all grown up'.
It's not that grown up at all.

@hettol

But I got public transport by myself. Surprised at those saying they were tired. I had so much energy as a teenager.

Same

@hettol, as you are choosing to be a bit disingenuous about your energy comment, above is the full quote I was referring to when I asked whether your “energy levels” would really have extended to any journey on public transport. You agreed with someone who said they had so much energy as a teenager, they were fine with getting public transport by themselves without finding it tiring. So, no, I do not think I was “confused” to ask you whether your “energy levels” really would have extended to any type of journey on public transport. You were giving the distinct impression of attempting to be dismissive of other viewpoints, not to say that if the OP is a Londoner, it’s not an unusual journey.

Ps if you want to know just how irregular some bus services can be, the village I grew up in had a bus service once a week.

I'm not being disingenuous at all, I agreed with someone that said But I got public transport by myself. Surprised at those saying they were tired. I had so much energy as a teenager. which you yourself just quoted.

You then replied to my point agreeing with the above to ask me would you have had the “energy” as a teenager (or 11 year old) to appreciate commuting past lots of good schools to go to a school miles from your local community when the bus and train services you relied on arrived, at best, once an hour, so that your journey home was a minimum of 2 hours if you missed a connection? Or are you limiting your comments on energy to Londoners?

I'm not sure why me agreeing with that poster warranted the above response? It wasn't relevant to what I said.

I went to a secondary school which was 45 minutes away on the bus. It didn't bother me on a day to day basis, but made it more difficult to meet up with friends. Some lived on the way to school, but a couple lived past the school. We used to hand around in town past the school, so I would spend 1.5 hours travelling each way.

The key is to choose the school your child will be happiest at.

Ps if you want to know just how irregular some bus services can be, the village I grew up in had a bus service once a week.

P.S the countries that my immigrant parents grew up in had no bus services & my dad walked miles to school from the age of 6.

P.P.S not sure why you think that I'm not aware that there are some public transport black holes in the UK

P.P.P.S none of this is relevant to the OPs post as her dc won't be walking miles to school or only getting a bus that comes once a week.

🙄

I agree that some people are missing the point that there is a huge difference between a long journey to school when it is the norm in your area and it's essentially unavoidable, to being the only one, making a journey alone.
Where I live, every child knows that they are going to be going a significant distance to secondary. We do have choices, but they are all similar distances away and I'd say that about 90% of the kids in ours and the neighbouring village go to the same school. Yes, they cope fine. Yes, going on the bus part of their social life and is something of a rite of passage that the new year 7s actually look forwards to each year. Parents co-operate and we make things work. It's "fine".
But if we got up on Monday morning and a secondary school had magically appeared in our village, would we move our children? Too right we would! Well unless it was truly terrible anyway.
You can make these things work if you have to. Children are adaptable. But if I didn't have to, I would take some convincing that a long journey was in my child's best interests.

I was not in London but in a small town. I was the one who said I was surprised at people saying they got tired as a teenager I had so much energy. I couldn't do what I could do then.
I didn't live miles away from the school, but the bus went everywhere so it took it a while. If I missed the bus I walked. It took about the same length of time.

Maybe this depends on what kind of child you have? I always wanted to be busy and had zero issue with being focused on doing homework.

Obviously it depends on the child, on the location, on the reliability of public transport, on the norm for the area, on what you are trying to avoid by travelling so far and on what is so amazing about your destination.

Ps if there is no bus service to an area, the service is not irregular, it is non-existent @hettol. You were the one who seemed to think a 90 minute gap between bus services was an extreme. It really isn’t. You are not in a public transport black hole if there is a 90 minute gap between buses. Walking six miles to school a day because there is no bus at all is irrelevant. Pointing out that you do not appear to understand what an extreme is is not irrelevant.

You were the one who seemed to think a 90 minute gap between bus services was an extreme. It really isn’t.

Where did I say it was extreme?

Do you think it's likely the OPs dc is looking at a train service that is once every 90 mins?

or buses?

@hettol - I have worked in a school where some children had very long journeys on unreliable public transport and whose parents would phone to complain if the school, eg, gave them an after school detention, because it would mean they might miss the last connection home, etc, etc, so I can easily believe they could be contemplating it, because parents do. I do not live in a public transport black hole at all. I live in a large town. Do you really think the OP would be asking if it were an incredibly easy journey?

The OP's post says One option is about an hour away, and an amazing school. It would however involved a train ride and then a bus. Is an hour too much to travel?

I think she is concerned about the 1 hour travel time.
I don't think the bus journey involves a bus that runs every 90 mins as that would definitely be something to consider imo. You can disagree of course.

No. It's a massive faff. What about when they have homework and coursework due? But they've got an extra 2 hours a day of travel taking time. Yes and the social stuff - can't meet with friends down the shops etc cause it's another 2 hour return trip. Will you ferry them about in the car?? Not worth it

I do not disagree at all it would be something to consider, hence pointing out it would be something she ought to consider . Clearly she is worried about it being a more complicated journey, as she specifically notes the other schools are just a bus ride away, not a train and bus and she does not comment on the length of the other journeys, so I would say the added risks of two types of transport are also a focus of her concern. You can of course disagree.

@Walkaround I don't understand what you are misunderstanding about my posts as you keep ignoring my actual questions but replying to me with different points 😆

If you can't answer them just stop @ing me please

@hettol - you are clearly not understanding my posts. I am answering your posts perfectly satisfactorily.

What about their social opportunities, they are unlikely to form strong friendship groups with such a distance. That's just as important as academics in my opinion. I think its a terrible and rather selfish idea. Your child can still do well and accomplush their goals in another school, you openly say is just as good

Or, in conclusion, neither of us interprets what the other one says in the way the other one anticipated.

And after 2 hours of commuting each day they are unlikely to want nor tlfit in time for studies. The more I think about it the more ridiculous its sounds