Anybody got kids at Hockerill Anglo-European College?

[VirginBoffinMum]

We're applying for a place at Hockerill for DS1 for September 2009, but DS1 would have a longish commute by train. I am wondering how this would fit with his homework commitments and any extra-curricular stuff. I am also wondering whether the teaching is just good in languages, or whether this applies to all subjects, and how the new head is doing. The Open Day was a bit of a free for all so it was hard to get a real handle on things.

I know several people who've sent their kids to the Ingatestone one, and one who was applying to Hockerill.

I would be a bit cautious about v. long commutes -- I know people do it, but it does impact on their quality of life. Anything over an hour door-to-door is too much imo.

It would be 50 minutes (the local secondary is 25 minutes anyway).

50 mins is within the pain threshold I think, but do check that that's door to door, how often the trains run, how full, how reliable, etc. I'm very mildly cynical about hugely over-subscribed schools, but that may just be the Groucho Marx in me.

You could try the frogs patented school vetting method -- phone up incognito to ask some mildly dozy question about the admissions procedures, and see what kind of reaction you get. If they give you the 'oh god, not another stupid parent wasting my valuable time' routine, then think long and hard, as that is also how they will react in three years time when your child is an unlovely 14yo who has made some minor but significant error of judgement and you are trying to sort it out.

Yes, it's 27 mins on the train and a bit of walking either end, so 50 mins all in maximum. DS1 is mad keen on the place. I think the fact that it's smaller than a lot of our local schools appeals to all of us as well.

Very shrewd observation about the school vetting method frogs ... when I have phoned up, they have been pretty good actually. There was one notorious interaction when I inadvertently phoned a housemistress at the weekend with a general admin question, when the office was closed. Even she bent over backwards to try to help. I am taking this as a sign ...

Ah, sounds good all round then. If he's mad keen then that's a great place to start from. And if the school are friendly that's even better. Wrt my secret vetting plan, it interestingly doesn't divide down state/private or over/undersubscribed lines.

Anecdotally, it does seem to be quite indicative of the school's generall attitude to parents.

I think they are quite responsive and sensible, which is one of the reasons people like it - it's not just the league table issue (it takes more than a league table to impress me).

I liked the confident and friendly attitude of the kids as well. At our local school they seem to just mooch a lot, whereas at Hockerill they really engaged with the adult visitors and had interesting things to say.

Interestingly I phoned up a leading private prep school recently about one of my other kids, and they couldn't even be bothered to show me around, and expected me and DH to commit to £72k worth of school fees on the basis of a tour from a ten-year-old at a time convenient for them rather than us. We scarpered sharpish (we couldn't really afford it anyway). Apart from anything else, why wasn't the 10-year-old going to be in class if his/her parents were paying that kind of money???