Experiences of Newcastle High School for Girls and Westfield

[CallsignCharlotte]

I have a highly academic and bright child whose operating system does not like high pressure or breakneck speed. She would do really well at RGS but feels that there may be too much pressure and I've heard that unless you can really stand your own amongst peers at RGS, especially as a girl, it can be hard graft and have been signposted that NHSG would be a good fit.

Does anyone have any pearls of wisdom what it's like at NHSG behind the scenes?

• what the girls do and don't enjoy about their time there?
• what it's like for the parents interacting with the school?
• what I really want to get a feel for is how kind the school is, and that culture is often spread to the girls from the school's staff and leadership, any experiences with this?
• how are the girls with each other?
• what is the approach to smartphone free childhood, etc?
• how does the school support bright children who may not be overly fast?
• does the school have enough pupils/funding to stay viable in the current climate and with so much recent change in the independent sector locally?
• (aware I can ask all of these questions to the school but I'd really like views of people who have experienced it)

We've considered Westfield as on paper seems like the right one for DD based on nurturing the academic side but we just didn't get the right feel or as good as we did from NHSG and I thought the head of the junior school was a bit odd which put me off slightly (loved the overall head though). I guess Westfield has change afoot now it's combined with RGS and probably has decent financial stability with RGS behind it. I can't understand the rationale for RGS taking it on though unless it was a property/VAT move. Do the girls get to use the facilities at RGS now? Any thoughts on Westfield would also be greatly appreciated.

Westfield wouldn't really be the right fit for a highly academic child.

RGS taking Westfield on is probably a property move.
It's their way of getting early years and KS1 (which they currently don't have).
They can attract children to the Westfield property who want to enter RGS in Year 3 and gradually as time goes on they have a pool of children to choose from. The brightest at the end of Year 2 go to RGS and the rest can stay at Westfield or go somewhere else.
This removes the issue of having their own early years and KS1 where they might take children who turn out to be not as good as their performance on entry to Reception might suggest and having the issue of having to carry them all the way through the school, thus impacting on results, or having to try to "move them on" (ie. get rid of them).
Performance on entry to Year 3 is a more reliable indicator than at Reception.

What about Dame Allan`s?

NHSG: does the school have enough pupils/funding to stay viable in the current climate and with so much recent change in the independent sector locally?
This could be an issue though probably an alternative solution would be found rather than a closure.

I don't know what NHSG is like these days, but it's not the school it was once, apparently.