Moving back with primary age kids

[PottersParties]

Hi everyone,

Im sure some overseas families are grappling with this right now - due to Coronavirus we’re considering doing something we never planned on - moving back close to family in north west England. We previously had quite a good setup with grandparents/siblings visiting 2x year, and us going back at Easter and Oct. Now that travel is limited, and the GPs are all in 2/3 risk groups (age, medical backgrounds), we are missing family a lot and looking at how we can be closer. We’re both wfh (non-essential jobs) and could possibly do this from the UK.

We’ve got 3 kids (5, 4+2) in nursery where we live in Sweden, and had originally planned for them to go to the local school at age 6 (which is the usual age they start here). The older two are doing school-type activities that they would do in reception/y1 anyway, so I’m not too worried about how they will settle if we move. But I’ve got no idea how to go about applying from abroad.

We’d like to have some sort of plan and try and maintain financial stability, so will probably aim to move early/mid 2021. We have the possibility to live with family in Cheshire for six months.

Does anyone have any experience or advice about what steps to take next? I know things are really up in the air with the current situation but any pointers would be so helpful.

Thanks!

kids1
Today 09:59 PottersParties

Hi everyone,

Im sure some overseas families are grappling with this right now - due to Coronavirus we’re considering doing something we never planned on - moving back close to family in north west England. We previously had quite a good setup with grandparents/siblings visiting 2x year, and us going back at Easter and Oct. Now that travel is limited, and the GPs are all in 2/3 risk groups (age, medical backgrounds), we are missing family a lot and looking at how we can be closer. We’re both wfh (non-essential jobs) and could possibly do this from the UK.

We’ve got 3 kids (5, 4+2) in nursery where we live in Sweden, and had originally planned for them to go to the local school at age 6 (which is the usual age they start here). The older two are doing school-type activities that they would do in reception/y1 anyway, so I’m not too worried about how they will settle if we move. But I’ve got no idea how to go about applying from abroad.

We’d like to have some sort of plan and try and maintain financial stability, so will probably aim to move early/mid 2021. We have the possibility to live with family in Cheshire for six months.

Does anyone have any experience or advice about what steps to take next? I know things are really up in the air with the current situation but any pointers would be so helpful.

Thanks!

Whoops don’t know what happened there!

The way the British school system works, you can't actually apply for a place until you are resident at an address in the UK.

If the area you are planning to move to has schools which are not full, this should not be a problem, but if you move to an area with limited or popular schools, you could find yourself with no school place at all (particularly at reception stage) or somehow having to deliver children to two different schools in different directions at the same time.

I had to move back to the UK mid-year when my DC were 8 and 4, and it was a nightmare of trying to juggle finding somewhere to rent close to a a school which might have a place for the 8-year-old in time to meet the deadline to apply for a reception place for the 4-year-old. I managed it in the end but it was very stressful, and as far as I know the rules haven't changed. In our case, the school bent the rules slightly to confirm a place before I had actually signed a lease on a house to move to - I think the head felt particularly sympathetic as I was newly widowed and was trying to arrange it all while back in the UK for DH's funeral.

If you are likely to move in with family to start with, maybe you could get them to do some research on local schools, how oversubscribed they are etc?

Briefly, you cannot apply for local authority school places until you are resident in the area and can prove this, unless you are with the armed forces (possibly also other government overseas postings but not sure about that).

So you need to decide where you want to live, look at the schools in the local area and find out which ones have spaces for your children. Up until year 2, there is a maximum class size of 30, so if the class is full, they cannot admit your child. Once you have a space for one child, you may get sibling priority for the other children, should spaces become available.

Depending on the exact ages of your children, it is likely that you will be looking for places in year R and year 1 but it could be year 1 and year 2

Yep, as above, you wont be offered a school place in a state (government, free) school without an address - and once offered, you need to be able to start at the school pretty quickly - we had to be in school in 3 weeks or the offers would be withdrawn.

If you have a pretty small geographical area you are looking at, the local education authority (LEA) MIGHT let you know which schools currently have spaces, but they are under no obligation to tell you, and just because there is a space when you ask doesnt mean it will still be there when you apply.

How old will the elder 2 be on 1 September?

Hi both,

Thanks so much for this, it’s really helpful to have clear details. Sorry for your loss @exexpat I’m lucky to be considering moving in quite benign circumstances considering.

We’ve also thought of the possibility to sell here (fingers crossed the prices aren’t too badly affected), rent while I finish work and at the same time try and buy in the UK. Would this help or do we need to be physically in the UK for good before we start applying?

Do I need to do an application a long time in advance? And is it a good idea to speak directly to schools before we move? Or is it literally just move, speak to schools most likely to have space based on our research and go from there?

How do I know which schools are over subscribed? Is there somewhere with waiting list numbers I can look at?

Thanks again!

Oh x-post @KittenVsBox thanks that answers some of my questions above!

The older ones are March and Feb birthdays so will still be 5 and 4. Would it be better to aim for a Sept 2021 start when they are 6/5 and push the move back a bit, or homeschool for a few months in the UK?

We moved back last summer, with slightly older, primary aged, kids.
Due to the way school summer holidays worked, we finished the school year in old country, and moved in June.
We contacted the LEA a few days before we actually flew (the day before the packers came in and packed the computer and printer) and they actually let me apply then-we needed proof of right to live in UK (British passport), already having an address and flight tickets. We started school before the summer holidays-giving the kids a few weeks to find their feet in the wind down to the end of the year. imo, it worked well, and we queue jumped over all the people who moved over the summer. If you are thinking next year, I highly recommend coming before the schools shut mid July to get a chance of looking at them. It also gives you the summer holidays to fill in missing gaps.

Depending on how full the schools are in the area you move to will affect how long it takes. A friend moved on very similar timescales to us, and got the kids in on the last day of term - mine had 4-5 weeks schooling. You can start at any point in the year. Dont force the move to fit the school years.