To ask which school you'd choose?

[LittlePetitePsychopath]

We're at an impasse, and I need to get the application in!

School 1 -
Very close to our house, probably a 5 minute walk.
Well-regarded locally.
Spacious and in good condition
Lots of additional features... it's own swimming pool, forest school, they have specialist teachers for IT, Spanish, art etc, even from reception.
They swim and do forest school once a week in every year.
Lots of decent afterschool clubs, although we wouldn't really need any.
A religious school, and about 60% of the school that attends are religious.

We do not massively follow the religion, but are very likely to get in anyway. One of us is concerned that the religious element might interfere with our son's love of science and logic, and affect his critical thinking skills. They also think the teacher seemed quite stern during a taster session.

School 2 -
About 25 minutes walk from our home.
Also very well-regarded locally; and the school I wanted to go to as a kid!
Great community links with the theatres, emergency services, etc
Lots less space - it's an old building in the centre of town - and less facilities as they get less funding. There's a smaller playground, especially for KS2. They do have access to a big paddock in good weather.
Not religious, and do lots of interesting trips and challenging the children. The yr6s gave us a great tour and then talked us through tracing back soldiers from WW2 who went to their school...
Each reception child has a yr6 buddy, which seems like a nice scheme. Our tourguides were super excited to introduce us to theirs.
The school prides itself on all staff knowing all children by name, which is nice.

He has four close friends... two are going to school 1, 1 is going to school 2, 1 is going to a private school.

Where would you choose?

If they were equidistance, school 2.
But the distance is really important. So school 1.

Thanks all!

Ironically I felt school 1 was the best initially, and DS loves it and won't be swayed on saying he's going there, but DH was less sure due to the religious aspect.

Now I'm feeling more uncertain 😂 But it sounds like logistics should swing it, and school 1 is a great school, so I've got nothing to complain about really. There's far worse situations to be in!

I'd choose school 2. We vetoed all faith schools when looking for our kids - made it easier when moving house tbh as there were villages we were able to dismiss because the local school was CofE.

I'm assuming you're looking at primary schools, if so it's also worth taking into consideration which secondaries they feed into, and whether that sways you more in one direction or another.

School 1, but consider high school. If the local RC is hugely oversubscribed will your dc need to be baptised and make FHC etc to get in? If you're not prepared to that would they be seperated from all their friends at 11?

What are your options for secondary locally and would a catholic feeder give you any advantage? I say this only because I’m finding that a lot of children seem to find Catholicism around year 4 locally to us to try and get into the outstanding catholic secondary school. We will go private (hopefully) but it is something we’d have had to consider ourselves if we hadn’t been in a position to do so as the catholic school is head and shoulders above our catchment secondary.

My children have been at a cofe primary school that is more religious than I’d have liked. I don’t particularly like some of the Old Testament things that have been taught and I’ve had to do a bit of reinforcing at home that the world wasn’t made in 7 days. They are taught properly in science but I think some of the religious content is not as scrutinised as it should be.

School 1 obviously. The Catholic religion doesn't deny the presence of space or science.....

School one, without a doubt. Logistics trumps most other things tbh. You have to think about the fact you've got to do this school run for 7 years in rain, wind, cold etc. A 25 minute walk there and back twice a day plus all the waiting around in between really does add up. If you go to the local school, they'll be able to walk home no problem in years 5 and 6 then you'll have no school run to do at all. I'm currently doing a 4 mile drive to primary as we moved house and didn't want to unsettle the kids who were happy where they were, trust me, it's a bind. Plus it sounds like the swimming pool alone will save you hundreds in no swimming lessons etc

If your child isn't doing first communion/doesn't attend a Catholic church he won't be doing confessions. They will just mean that the catholic children can do their first holy communion preparation through school.

We had a similar choice to make, although the Catholic school wasn't as good as what you describe! But it had more options for music, science etc, smaller classes and better academic results.
The state school has the forest club and more space.

Ultimately we based it on the social aspect for us and the kids. Although the Catholic school is a bit closer and more convenient to us, all the neighbourhood kids will be going to the state school. We are not religious (although I was raised Catholic and went to Catholic school), so thought we would struggle a bit more to integrate to the school life.

The other point for us was the state school is oversubscribed, and the Catholic schools are unsubscribed. So if for whatever reason we don't like the school, we can always change our mind and transfer to the Catholic one in later years. We can't transfer the other way around.

My children are at something that sounds very like your school 1. We love the school and are a very scientific household.

My husband has similar misgivings initially but the religion part is much more low key than I think it sounds (yes they say a thank you prayer for how lucky they are and a please look after everyone every morning/afternoon - but it’s sweet rather than super Catholic).

They are good a dealing with poor behaviour and are very hot on values which align with ours - kindness, looking after others, charity, trust etc and therefore there is much less bullying. They are quite strict generally and on uniform compared with others but I think that is what leads to such outstandIng ratings and a very happy school.

Hi OP,

Are they both state schools? Do they have similar year 6 outcomes?

If yes to both these questions, I'd choose school 1.

Main reason is that school 2 will also have Religious Education as part of their curriculum. School 2 you said also has less funding, less facilities and less outside space. And I think you said in one of your posts that if you picked school 2, your DH wouldn't be able to work full time? A parent not being able to work full time, if they usually would, in order to do the school run when there's a closer and arguably much better school would be massive.

What is your gut telling you?