What would you do to get your child into a good school?

[bossykate]

guardian article

nothing we don't already know of course, but still interesting i thought, especially given schools are clamping down on dishonest parents.

I used to hold the support your local school views aswll until it came to ds.we were living in london and he was at a lovely school in reception We then moved and the closest school to us was a lot bigger and he was only 5 and we left him in a classroom with what would have been his peers while we looked around.We came back to find him cowering in a corner (he is not a timid child)with some boys laughing at his sandals and asking him which team he supported After that my leftie liberal tendencies went out the window and we persisted with another school still quite local and he has loved it I AM A HYPOCRITE!

It's a bit nerve wracking isn't it!

Catholics are tax-payers too, though...

Yes! Although because the head visited to check I lived here I pretty much know ds1 is in for Sept - the head told me that there were not more applications than places and that he could pretty much tell me not to worry (the school takes in 70 so unlikely not to get in anyway).

I still am a bit worried though until I get the letter!

Yes, and they can go to state funded schools! That's the whole point. My kids wouldn't be able to go to a Catholic school - even if it was next door to my house - that's where the discrimination lies.

Frogs - yes, and they are therefore entitled to state education obviously, but non-catholics are tax payers too and are 90% funding a school they have no hope of getting into due to their religious beliefs and that just can't be right.

roisin - what's his name? where does he live?

seriously though - you all have my sympathy - when mine were little they went to the nearest school - end of story.

Were there tables then? I don't know, it probably wouldn't have made any difference. Maybe I'm looking back through rose tinted glasses - but it all seemed so much better then. Good teachers and discipline and imho parental back up makes all the difference, unless kids get that they'll always be at a disadvantage (in my opinion!)

I also live not too far from an amazing all-girls grammar school which gets 99% A-C grades, etc. But the present system means either the brainy child gets in or gets a rubbish school which you never chose. So like Gobbledigook you only apply if you already have the means to send you child to a private school as a second choice. How discriminatory is that? It seems Labour's education policies have been right of Thatcher's but even fewer people are benefiting. Because the schools in the middle are all so mediocre and those standards just don't seem to move.

Joolstoo - I do actually know his name! Or at least I knew who it was 3 yrs ago when ds1 surprisingly got into yr1 at an oversubscribed primary school with a long waiting list ...!

well as my leftie friends would point out, muminlondon, the grammar school system creates problems for local comps because it's creaming all the academic children off the top.

I don't personally disagree with grammar schools but I can see why they cause problems for the other schools in the area. It is really like having a 2 tier system - in fact, didn't labour at some point vow to abolish the grammar school system or am I remembering wrong?

We are in what should be the catchment for a beacon school, but because of people renting flats on the doorstep for the few months when applications have to be in, the chance is v slim indeed.

In the money/principles argument, I would much rather parents who can afford it use their money to excercise choice and pay for education than use their money to temporarily rent a convenient address and effectively take up a place that could have been offered to a child from a less economically flexible background. It does make me sick the way the system allows the rich to colonise the best of everything.

If I was a school governor, I'd try and do something like use land registry records to find out if applicants in the rented flats nearby were owners of properties elsewhere - and insist that was counted as their main residence! The estate Agents make a fiortune, renting and re-letting following the applications timetable. You can see it from the boards going up and down.

I don't know if it's different in other parts of the UK, but here it is very strict. We live in an area where there are 2 very good and very over-subscribed primary schools. We moved to the area for that reason. You apply, and the council check every application for address verification. They are relatively small schools - and if anyone did slip through the net somehow, it would be very quickly noticed by the other parents, and be dealt with by the council.

Should have added that it is vitually all owner-occupier here, hardly anything for rent, so that probably makes it harder to trick the system.

Blu - our LEA asks for proof of a 12 month rental contract as minimum if you live at a rented address and apply to the school - presumably to try and avoid people just renting a property for 3 months and not even live in it.

They also check the electoral register and obviously you can only be on that for one address, the one where you live.

I agree with you but what can you do about it? It's always going to be that the better off have more choices.

LIke I said earlier - the head turned up on my doorstep to check I was here as they used an old electoral register to verify addresses! So they do make strict checks here.

GDG - I'm going to write to our LEA and suggest that! Except fro Foundation Schools, the LEA decree the admissions policies.

How sad that all these extra man-hours are having to be used up just to check that parents aren't being deceiptful.

I don't agree with selection either on the grounds of ability or religion, foxinsocks. This is making me depressed - I live in a nice area with great primary schools but the secondary schools are either below average, faith schools or selective on ability. I guess it's the same for everyone and even worse in some areas.

3 poor children in a primary in Dulwich village were pulled out of school in the middle of the day, no warning, because it was discovered that their parents had applied fraudulently!

And is making disruptive kids stay on until 18 (in the Labour manifesto) going to make things better? I think not. Just older and more agressive vandals to police around the school.

bit harsh on the kids that!

parents should really think long and hard about the consequences of their actions!

Agree Beatie - the head as well!!! I bet he had better things to be doing than driving round the area checking addresses for the LEA!

They do that here too JT - if they find out you've lied they just take the kids out of school !