Jumping back in between calls!
So overall it's been an incredibly positive experience for DD, she really enjoys it and doesn't want to consider somewhere else for 6th form, even though we gave her the option of moving to a day school or to another boarding school. The things that she really loves are numerous (they're also the things I love).
She loves the teachers. She finds them to be extremely passionate about the subjects they teach, and creative about how to teach pupils with different learning styles, they've been very approachable when she's asked for extra help (which translates to "explain this to me a different way because I don't understand the way you explained it to the class"). They seem to genuinely care about the pupils - we frequently get OOO communications from her teachers on both positive things and constructive suggestions, both in academic and pastoral care.
She really enjoys the sport - feels like she's getting great coaching, and she's gone from being very meh at most sports to regularly making the top tier of teams. The only thing she doesn't like is the rotation from hockey to netball (1 sport per term) because she'd prefer to play hockey right through to the summer. She also does a few random side sports - racquets being the most obscure!
Art, music and drama are equally loved - she does backstage for drama (tech crew) and they have loads of art events and musical ensembles (she plays an instrument to diploma standard). So lots and lots of opportunity.
Really strong bonds between the pupils - usual drama, but nothing like at some other schools, and certainly amongst the girls, bullying isn't rife, and is cracked down on very quickly. She's got a great social circle (who seem to descend on my place during the holidays as a pack!), all of whom seem to be really supportive.
Things she doesn't like:
It's a bit strict - especially around cross-house socializing after school, which means she can't see her friends from other houses after dinner unless they're doing an activity together.
They hugely restrict device usage and internet access - which means she finds it harder to stay in contact with her friends from prep at other schools. And it means we have to plan our calls (we talk almost every evening) rather than her just being able to spontaneously call.
The food. She describes it as beige slop. Her house doesn't have a big kitchen so limited opportunity to supplement that with in-house food.
The houses are vastly different in terms of facilities, so choosing a house was a challenge (ethos vs facilities vs location - some of the houses are a fair distance from the main school)
Things I'm less keen on:
The fees have gone up a lot over the last two year. COL impacting schools as much as ordinary households.
The parents can be a bit cliquey (geo-based), but I think that's all schools.
Communication about events can be a bit poor - so a bit of last minute change of plans are sometimes needed.
But overall the pros outweigh the cons for her.
It is very much a boarding school (albeit geared to weekly) - so I'm not sure it's right for a day pupil unless very local.