Moving to Swansea with kids

[smallfry78]

Hi, We would like to move to Swansea with our children (yr 2 and yr 5) but I'm struggling to find any schools that have places in both years. Yr 2 ok but yr 5 seems full or oversubscribed (looking around Gowerton/Dunvant/Sketty and other areas). We are interested in either Gowerton high school or Olchfa so looking at feeders for those.
Has anyone managed to do a mid year transfer with more than one child? The schools say you can appeal if you don't get a space but we'd be worried about uprooting our son and him not having a school to go to. Ideally they would be starting at the same school at the same time so they have each other and he can make friends before high school.
I'd love to hear your experiences. Did your children settle? Is there anything you wish you did differently? I'm starting to think this might be a pipe dream and not actually possible!

Hi smallfry78,

Thanks a lot for posting - we're unable to offer any useful insider tips sadly but we wanted to say hi and give this a bump for you.

We hope some of our users in the local area will be along soon to offer you their advice.

Good luck finding school places

Thanks @IdrisElbow, that's really helpful. Is Three Crosses a feeder for Gowerton? I can't find the info. We did consider Bishopton but the house prices around there are outside of our budget, unless there's a cheaper area within the catchment that I've missed?

From experience, if they have space in one year, you can appeal the space for the other year based on already having a child in that school.

@IdrisElbow how old were your kids when you moved and how have they settled? Three Crosses seemed nice when we visited but wasn't sure if too rural for us. Is there much going on in the community?

@MumandnotMum how long did it take for you to get a space after appeal? Schools have said there isn't much movement so quite possible my son wouldn't get a space. How did your kids get on with the move?

@IdrisElbow

Hi *@smallfry78* going on the schools you have written, are you looking to move to those areas in particular? They are pretty big schools, esp Dunvant and Sketty, with large catchments. You may have more luck if you look at slightly smaller schools in the area such as Penclawdd Primary, Three Crosses or Cila in Upper Killay. Further over the other side, nearer Mumbles, I know Grange Primary is pretty low on numbers and is an absolutely gorgeous school, really lovely and highly rated by many. It struggles because of the Welsh school next door. And I have also heard that Pennard primary is quite low on numbers, though that is then more out on Gower and is catchment for Bishopston (which is also an good school).

Good choice to move to Swansea though, it's a great place to live

Hi IdrisElbow (and Smallfry78)

I know this is probably a mute point for you both now as thread is relatively old, but I wanted to say that I've just moved my child from The Grange School and I had a very different experience from the one painted by IdrisElbow.

Also, wanted to point out that numbers aren't down due to Welsh school, Welsh and English medium schools have a very different catchment group. There are three schools in a row with the other a Roman Catholic, so they all offer a very different education. (It just seemed a bit unfair to just blame the Welsh school)

If I were you I would not consider The Grange, very underfunded and few full time teachers. Just a heads up.

And yes, Swansea has so much to offer, brilliant place to live esp if you like the outdoors lifestyle. Good luck.