Grammar vs independent

[ssj123]

We are navigating the 11plus journey with our daughter. We have offers from Wimbledon High, Putney High (w scholarship), Surbiton High (w scholarship), LEH (w scholarship) and Guildford High (w scholarship) and we are awaiting results from St Paul's Girls tomorrow. We have already turned down her Kingston Grammar 10plus spot. We are waiting for Tiffin Girls outcome in March but we will have only half a day once we know about Tiffins to decide on other options so we are trying to rule out choices as we go - we are not keen on SPGS, Putney High and LEH seem less appealing now than when we started, Surbiton High was a backup, Guildford High seems best at the moment. But also, we need to have a firm view on the tough choice of independent vs. Grammar. Can someone who had similar options on independent front but went grammar please walk me through their rationale and whether they were happy with the choice in the end? Are we being unreasonable considering grammar in the face of all these options? Thanks!

Thanks for sharing, yes with private, the parent is more of a 'customer' and expects/receives better 'customer service' vs. in a grammar/state system where such a financial transaction does not take place! I do find the pearl clutching hilarious amongst some of my indie prep school friends...along the lines of 'why would you go grammar if you can afford independent?' :)

Indeed, it is easy to take for granted the access to grammars that we have in our part of London - private is the only way if local state offering is not suitable for what the child needs

Sorry I may have jumped the gun there and been a bit dismissive as sports / sporting facilities have not been a key consideration for me, but great to hear of all these sporting achievements at the school! From what I have heard, only a few girls get to play sport / represent the school unlike at privates which have teams D/E/F still representing their schools at various tournaments...I would like a wee bit of balance wrt sport for my daughter but academics and music are her main preoccupations.

It's interesting you mention that - I'm certain there are national level sporting stars at all grammar schools, for eg Emma Raducanu went to one near me (academic and sporting excellence usually go hand in hand).

But what I am not sure about is whether grammars cater to children who want to play sports but who are not stars - for eg, my local grammar only has a football A team, my DS will probably be in the B or C team but LOVES football. Going from a prep with two days of sport plus a weekend school fixture, I thought it would be a major cultural shift to say he will only play in an afterschool club and never ever be in a match against another school. It really would have devastated him. I'm just saying this is something all prep school parents consider when they look at grammar. If you are likely to be a national level star, absolutely, grammar or private is fine, wouldn't make a difference.

In case of interest, the latest OFSTED report on Tiffin Girls, published today

The Tiffin Girls' School - Open - Find an Inspection Report - Ofsted

@sevensister I can obviously only speak from personal experience at TGS but the netball teams range from A-E and pretty much all of them (particularly in the first few years) get to play matches.

I wouldn’t say it was a fab school.

Did your dd get into Tiffin OP?

Yes she did. TGS was nominated as choice 1 in our household but we have just under 15hrs to revisit this decision so I've told her to think hard after our celebration dinner meal :)

Whatever you go with I’m sure she’ll
do amazingly. We were in a similar-ish position (not quite so many options!) but went with GH and my daughter loves it and has absolutely flourished.

Congratulations and good luck!

Well done to your DD. As is probably obviously my DD is there so if you have any questions please feel free to message me. It’s a truly fabulous school, I have been blown away by it. (And I went to SPGS 😬)

Wow, she's done really well! Enjoy your meal!

It is so good to hear from someone who knows SPGS and TGS closely and has this to say about the school, I might well DM you for more guidance!

Thank you. Honestly all of these schools are so good, such a privilege to have such options at hand

It was really scary to turn down all the amazing offers and scholarships but we have finally picked Tiffin Girls over all the other choices :) Thanks everyone for the robust discussions on this forum. Also managed to connect with a fellow parent in the incoming class and a parent with a happy girl at the school, what a fabulous forum Mumsnet provides!

great choice.

well done OP!

So, as you suggested, we strip a bright child of their hard-earned grammar school place—simply because their parents could afford an alternative—and hand it to someone with lower test scores? That sounds more immoral to me.

I chose grammar for my DC despite being offered an excellent independent scholarship. The academic standard of the grammar exceeded that of the independent so it was the best choice for us at the time. DC was not particularly interested in sport so that didn’t factor but the independent would have been better if it did. In hindsight I do wonder if pastoral care would have also been better at the independent as it was definitely lacking at grammar. We had a few issues with mental health (not SEN) that could have been handled better so occasionally wonder if I made the right choice.

This feels like a moot point. If we wanted to go private in the first place, we wouldn't put our daughter through the grammar prep (intense workload for a few months). We wouldn't be second guessing our decision on these "moral grounds" only after the results come through

Is it an option for you to revisit the decision and explore the independent route if you are not happy with the grammar choice? I consider that as a potential option, always.

Pastoral care is always a key concern and it varies so much between schools. What did the Ofsted report actually say about the grammar school you chose?

I think you've made a great choice. Interestingly, my DD in Year 5 (and the rest of our household) also prefers Tiffin in 11+. However, as she’s already in an all-through private school, we won't be putting her through a whole string of exams—just Tiffin, as she’s so keen on it, and St Paul’s more for the experience (maybe with an eye on 16+ later on).
Congratulations again to your daughter！

Thank you. And all the best to your daughter. After preparing for Tiffin, my daughter found all the other exams very easy TBH. We had never intended to look at SPGS but the TGS prep held her in good stead there too, so sounds like a good strategy for your daughter, good luck!

Interesting. I’ve always been under the impression that the SPGS entrance process is academically more challenging than Tiffin’s. Given that Tiffin has a catchment area and a larger intake (180 vs 110 at SPGS), it does make you wonder if the competition pool is 'narrower'.

If a girl is already at the top of a strong private prep, I’ll admit I was previously very optimistic about the Tiffin process, especially since we are essentially competing against a pool that includes many state primary pupils where the curriculum isn't always as intense.

However, you mentioned your DD's grammar prep as ‘intense workload for a few months’ and she found all the other exams very easy after preparing for Tiffin. Since Tiffin exams purely on English and Maths without VR/NVR, I’m genuinely wondering if I’ve missed something crucial. What exactly does that intense preparation involve? Is it about a specific level of speed and accuracy that even a top prep school student might be missing? I would really value your input on this.

A couple of things to note here:

1. SPGS round 2 written papers are definitely quite hard and uniquely designed to test for ability to learn quickly, so you are right in that it is indeed challenging. But while the intake admits the brightest girls who write the papers, you have to remember that it's a miniscule portion of society that can afford the fees of £37k+/year/child, so the pool of candidates cannot be as broad as TGS'. Last year TGS had some 1600+ candidates writing exams for the 180 spots. The kids who write SPGS tend to be highly prep'd, often studying at highly academic junior schools such as NLCS, so the fact that my daughter was obviously NOT prep'd for their interviews in particular ended up being an asset I think

2. Grammar exams happen right at the start of Y6, 2 to 3 months before the private process kicks off, so the timing is a bit 'off' wrt prep school timelines who assume 1st round of exam mid/late Nov for most private secondary schools - this is why we accelerated learning of concepts so she could start doing mock exams comfortably over the summer. Also, her practice papers for TGS and SPGS from resources like ExamPapersPlus were much harder than practice papers for other schools. TGS prep requires some dedicated effort over and above prep school curriculum IMO

3. The cutoff mark for TGS has been steadily increasing every year in the past few years due to increased interest in grammars following VAT for privates, so we were quite diligent in ensuring she was set up well to pass grammar exams. The day we finished round 2 papers for Tiffin Girls on 8th Nov, she completely stopped studying beyond what the school sets as homework...we are now 4 months in and she is getting quite bored in fact!