To ask your choice of school?

[Blooperpenguin]

I’ll not go into the details but which of the following would you go for if your DD was looking at secondary schools:

1. A girls grammar school, with an exceptional reputation, located about 5 miles away but linked by a regular school bus. It’s possible some of DD’s friends may also go to this school but its not guaranteed, and most won’t.
2. The local state comprehensive school. It’s 10 minutes walk away. It’s not got an outstanding reputation but it’s not awful; its reputation is satisfactory. The likelihood is most of the kids DD knows will go here.

Will the bus route also take her to see her friends from the grammar school? Or are they the other side so say 10-15 miles away and you'll need to ferry her around to go and see them?

Assuming they will be accessible, and she wants to go, I'd go for the girls grammar. But she should have a big vote given she'll be the one there for years and years.

Option 1 every single time. You’d need your head testing if you go for option 2.

Not enough information in your OP. You don't mention your DD's personality.

How confident is your DD to go to a school which involves significant travel, and where she might not know anyone? Will she embrace making ne friends or will she struggle?

Where do her siblings attend - is this a factor?

Does her personality suggest she will thrive and a school where she is challenged and unlikely to be at the top of her cohort, or will she be happier in a more comfortable setting where she can shine amongst her peers?

When making decision about which school is best for your DD, it's not just about the school's reputation (as your post suggests), but about which school is the best fit for your DD's personality.

Definitely 1. If she has been accepted and it’s very selective she is obviously the right fit for it. She is unlikely to remain close to primary school friends anyway once she starts secondary so I wouldn’t let it sway you how many of her current friends will go there.

Where does she want to go also? Being somewhere she doesn't want to be will have a big impact on her experience.

I don’t think 5 miles is too far. There are schools I’m considering for my son which are 6 miles away on one bus (I live in a big city and that’s not an unusual distance to travel). I think more important is if they would suit the grammar school and are keen to go there? If yes brilliant put it first but if no and they’ll be miserable then I’d think really hard about it.

The grammar school.

I wouldn't even question it tbh.

How confident is your DD to go to a school which involves significant travel

This made me laugh because I think the poster is actually being serious.

Five miles is a stone's throw and there is a bus going there every morning.

My kid's primary school was five miles away and I drove them there every morning.

Option 1 if your child has got a place and happy to go there.

We had a similar choice with our daughter although in our case the grammar school was a half an hour car/bus journey.

Our daughter opted for the grammar. She didn't know anyone there, and it took her the first half-term to properly settle. To be honest for the first couple of weeks I thought we might have made a mistake.

However, she did settle and she never looked back. Academically, she did very well and when she went to university she shared a flat with a couple of her school friends. After university, she moved to London, and she also shared a flat with several school friends. She is 29 now and her school friends are still enormously important to her. They meet up regularly, and she's currently going to a lot of their weddings.

I would absolutely go for the grammar option. In our case, we didn't regret it. Good luck.

The Grammar option. Absolutely.

By October half term it’s likely that she’ll have made some new friends, and all the perceived benefits of being with an existing friendship group will have evened out. And then she’ll have 2 groups in her life!- new school and OG friends. This was pretty much the scenario for both my DD’s; one is very introverted, one is quite sociable, but it actually worked out much as I’ve described for them both.

Grammar without even pausing for breath.

Grammar, I wish we had them where we luve

@Blooperpenguin Oh yes grammar school all day long. Good luck.

Option 1of course.

If DD passed the 11+ without being hothoused, then the grammar school. If she's needed to be heavily tutored to scrape through, then the comprehensive.

This assumes that the great reputation includes a great reputation for pastoral care and isn't a breeding ground for mental health problems as schools with great academic reputations occasionally are.

My younger daughter who went to the catchment comprehensive with the rest of her primary school cohort has probably experienced more friendship issues than my older daughter who went up to grammar with hardly anyone she knew. Both neurodivergent, neither is typically confident or outgoing socially. The key difference at the grammar is the overall type of social background, philosophy and focus of the students and for that reason I would choose it every time. No personal bias here either - I went to the catchment comp myself!

Definitely 1
She willake a new set of friends even if she goes to the catchment school, so that shouldn't be a deciding factor for it.

What does your DD want to do? Does she like school/ academically interested?

Forget the friends for now. DD will make new ones where ever she goes, and look at what kind of school is best for your DD. I will just say that grammar isn't for everyone - I think people see grammar over comprehensive and think loads better. In many cases it will be, but some children it just doesn't suit. I live in a grammar area and know loads of kids who have left excellent grammar schools because they made the children deeply unhappy.

If she doesn't pass the 11plus option will be the only option by looks of it

Option 2
I would not choose all girls.

In a similar-ish situation we are planning option 1 as first choice. I have some reservations. Option 1 is slightly nearer (3.5 miles) and we hope to give lifts for about 40% of journeys to reduce the travel time (if she gets a place).

If your DD hasn't passed her 11+ yet keep it totally open. There's absolutely no point in either of you getting your heart set on grammar if she can't go.

Well, we did chose our not-outstanding local mixed comp over the outstanding girls school for our DD, and she’s thriving. Very happy there, with a nice group of friends, and predicted grades 7-9 for GCSE.

Having said that, we knew the mixed school prioritised student happiness and well-being over academic achievement - that’s why we chose it. We knew our clever and sensitive autistic DD would only thrive if she was happy.

Presuming you wouldn't be asking this unless DD was actually intellectually able to get to the grammar, how do children of her intelligence actually perform at the local comp? Are there many of them, or do they all go to the grammar? What do they do in terms of stretch and challenge activities? I know a few children in my son's year group, now year 8, who passed the grammar test but failed to get a place on numbers (our nearest grammar is quite far away) and they are happily in top sets, where their are other children on their level, and they are also in a stretch and challenge program. These children are obviously having a very different experience if they were consistently working on work that was to easy for them with other children who found this work too hard.