6th form - how far is it reasonable for pupils to commute?

[newhouseplans]

There isn't a 6th form where we live.

Two 6th forms DS is interested in are a train ride away, one is a 35 mins on the train, the other 20 mins.

But once you add on the bus to the train station, a short walk either end etc, it's more like 1.5 hours for the further one (with 2 trains every hour) and 1 hour for the nearer one (with 3 trains every hour).

So, both are a fair distance.

Do you think the extra half hour each way makes much difference?

There are lots of other factors involved with the decision, but just wondering what others think?

If the further one suited DS better, could it be worth the extra hour's commute every day?

They don't. A levels are A levels wherever you sit them.
But in college there is no compulsory PE, or assembly or XYZ.
You are in for lessons. No lesson, you can stay at home, go out, work, whatever.

@arethereanyleftatall local school with a-level run from 9 to 3, or 3:30 the latest. That is 6.5 hours, not 8, and already includes some study time.
College is even shorter, so your calculations don’t hold.

Thanks for all the replies people! The thread didn't get any last night and so I wasn't expecting many today. Will have a read...

Additionally, the exercise comes with the walking at each end of the journey, so isn't extra.

He keeps changing his mind!

He wanted to go to the one further away, now he's favouring the nearer one but it's not a done deal.

He's done the journey to both, but not first thing in the morning. Nor on a rainy day!

20 minutes of the shorter journey / 35 mins of the longer journey is by train and could reasonably be used for revision. The bus is just 7 mins. The rest of the time is walking or waiting for the bus/ train.

Will DS actually use if for revision? Hard to tell!

Oh yes, of course he CAN do it. That's not what I'm asking though...

I'm wondering if the difference between an hour each way and an hour and a half each way is significant enough to be something we need to take into consideration when making the decision.

We can't afford to run a family car atm, so unless he magics up a pot of money from somewhere he won't have a car next year.

Also, I'm not sure I like the idea of him driving on a busy A road with heavy traffic every day, so soon after passing his test. (Perhaps this is a me issue though?!)

The one thing no one has mentioned is the college opening times. Our was open 7.30am - 5.30pm with lessons starting at 9am and finishing at 3.40pm. Time after lessons staff were available for any homework support needed. They sold breakfast items too so some children's buses arrived quite early giving them time to eat there and perhaps do some work before lessons started.

I think they are both long commutes, I know my sons had friends who travelled an hour to college and used college free periods and after lessons to get work done so their commute was their down time.

Good point.

The one that's furthest away is open 8:30am - 5:45pm, and it looks like the core hours for lessons are 8:30am - 3:45pm, with 3:50pm-5:45 being for any extra meetings etc.

I can't find times online for the nearer one, but I think it starts at 9am. (Not 100% sure though!)

If he's unlucky with his timetable I guess some days he could end up going in for a single lesson, all that way.

@newhouseplans sorry, that came over wrong! I meant to say that a 12 year old is able to organise reading/homework into his commute, so your 16 year old should be able to as well once he’s settled in. The 30 min difference won’t make a massive difference if its the better college!
Being time poor definitely helps to develop organisation skills :)

He’s not likely to be in five days a week so perhaps that helps? And he won’t always be travelling at rush hour. Can you find a typical timetable for the subjects he wants to do?

Ah, I see! Yes, I would hope so! Thanks for your message :)

There are good things about both colleges, I'm not sure which is a better fit tbh.

Wow! Just looking at trains. To get to the furthest away 6th form for 8:30, the train gets in at just after 8am. So if he had a Period 1 lesson, he'd have to leave here at 6:30am.

Currently we live a 5 minute walk from school, so that'll be a bit of a shock for him! He currently leaves the house at 8:30 (10 mins before registration!)

For the nearer one, he'd have to leave at 7:30am.

If he's staying to the last lesson there's not much in it though. From the further one, he'd get home at 5:30pm if he came straight home. It's about the same for the nearer place too I think.

My Dd has a 25 min walk followed by a 45 mins bus ride, or, 40 min walk followed by 20 min train then 20 min walk, each way (she normally does the bus). It is an early start and ends up being a long day but it's either a sociable journey or a chance to switch off completely, depending on who is on the bus! And for us it's a dedicated college bus.

The biggest issue has been the bus getting caught in traffic on the way into college, especially during winter, meaning she has often been late for lesson 1. Possibly something to consider when trying to coordinate bus and train travel?

It can be a long way if they only have a single lesson that day but it means she makes the most of the study areas and therefore has less to do once she gets home.

I think if they want to make it work then they will and they start to appreciate the parent taxi when it's available!

The teenagers I’ve known in my life who struggled the most with college were the ones who went to colleges out of area and so had a long commute.

When it came to picking colleges for my two teens we only looked at the ones in our town as fortunately the two colleges here offer subjects they were interested in. One goes to one and has about a twenty minute walk or ten minute bus ride and the other will start at the other one this year and will have about a 30 minute journey door to door on two buses or a 40 minute walk.

@newhouseplans What do other dc do? Are they all leaving the school and commuting? Seems odd if no nearer 6th form in a school. Is this a subject issue?

None of our local state schools have a 6th form.

Our nearest college is vocational (Btecs, apprenticeships, adult education etc). It does do A levels but a limited selection and it's not a 6th form college primarily. Some DC go to that.

Most who want to do A Levels travel . There are two other 6th forms I've not mentioned which DC from our area also go to, but both still out of town, both roughly similar commute times. They're not DS's favourites so I didn't mention them.

It's frustrating, yes! One of the local secondary schools did want to open a 6th form a few years back but they didn't get permission, so they opened an extra primary instead. I have no idea what the reasoning was behind that.

The reasoning would be taking dc from other 6th form provision and risking low numbers and subjects closing. Primary is to reflect birth rate or a new estate or even rural primaries closing. Not linked to secondary planning really.

So if dc travel, he has to travel. Why not go with friends?

Why was it wasted time? They could have incorporated it into homework / study time; and freed up the time later in the day.
Sometimes you have to think outside the box? 🤷🏻‍♀️

90 min seems to be the maximum expected for a lot of further/higher educational things... Dd was told max 90 min commute expected for teacher training placements, her cousin told the same for engineering placement, and my sister the same for midwife placements. So depending what they want to go on to, it is not unusual.

Eh? How many 16-18 year olds do you know who get 10 hours sleep?

My teens need to be up at 7 for school and they are definitely not going to bed at 9pm.

Also, they're not at school for 8 hours a day (40 hours a week) when doing A-Levels (I need to keep reminding myself this!).

They're timetabled about 5 hours for each subject, an hour for tutorial (if the college does them) and then perhaps a few hours for other stuff like enrichment activities / clubs etc, and that's it, it can be fewer than 20 hours a week of structured stuff, the rest is free time.

Both colleges encourage the students to do at least some of their homework at college, however.

They could study on the bus - and did so, but it isn't the best environment and often the bus internet or mobile data was dodgy although they'd download stuff beforehand.
The journey would be a short walk, 40 to 50 mins bus then either 30 mins walk or wait and further 15 mins bus (that one was often full hence the walk - which is good exercise).
Again not ideal for study.

They couldn't do a lot with the 45mins to an hour at the beginning of the day (enforced by the bus times), as they weren't allowed into college until 15 mins before the start of the day, the gym wasn't open, most kids came from other areas which have better transport so weren't there as early etc.

They couldn't really socialise on the bus, as to be honest the village bus was pretty empty. I'd say on average they'd have a friend on the bus once a week.

So yes, a lot of it was wasted time.

Of course it’s possible.

I had a two bus and a Walk 1+ hour journey to sixth form in the 80s. My DDs both had over an hour as well. We all survived and got Great A level results.