Parents of children who have recently or currently attended Varndean or Dorothy Stringer, please talk to me!

[GoldenCheeseTriangles]

In advance of hearing which school my DD will be allocated to, I would really welcome hearing your experiences of the two schools .

In terms of presenting themselves and in terms of results, Dorothy Stringer seems to be 'better', but what are the schools actually like? What are their strong and weak points? What do you think and what do your children think?

Any tips about dos and don'ts? What have you learnt that you didn't know before your children started? What do you wish you had thought about/been told before your children went?

Any and all views welcomed - thank you!

Ds1 went to Dorothy Stringer. He really enjoyed it and did very well there. It's a really good school with excellent pastoral care. No school is perfect but we were very happy with it.

Don't know much about Varndean but have heard good things.

Hope you get the result you want and all goes well for your DD.

Not a parent, but our good friends have DCs in both Schools - I've been interested myself as its also DDs catchment area, so have had a lot of chats recently with our friends over the 2 Schools & have been very reassured that they are BOTH equally great schools

Thanks both . Not long for DD and I to wait now! Any top tips to share about starting secondary school?

Top tips er... it was a while ago but mainly make sure you DD can get to the school by herself, go through the route with her. Is she travelling by bus? If so top tip from DS1 is sit downstairs.

The first few weeks they don't tend to get any homework but then it starts and by half term they normally get at least one big project so probably best to be prepared to spend time together planning out the workload.

Top tip for you is to enjoy it all, it goes in a flash and she'll be off to uni before you know it.

Oh and 14 is a fun age no really it is

Good luck again and I do hope it all goes well. I remember it being a very tense time waiting to hear. Not looking forward to doing it all again in a few years.