Nightmare - School closing down from September Woking area

[Krisis]

We got a letter yesterday to say that my daughter's school is closing as of September. She goes to a very small private school outside Woking, and we now have to try and find her a place elsewhere.

The real added nightmare is that we moved her from a state school as she was so unhappy, and she has absolutely loved where she currently is.

We went and looked at Ripley Court, but it is so hard to choose a school with no pupils in.

A lot of the other local private schools have no spaces, so we are looking at Ripley Court, St Georges in Weybridge or possibly Notre Dame.

Anyone have any advise, or know anything about these schools.

My daughters old school was so small and nurturing, I'm just worried she will be lost in these bigger schools.

Hi just to say that Cobham Free School is taking intake for not only reception but also Yr 1 and 2- and as titchy said reception has got a waiting list but there may be some places for yr 1/2- I'm not sure if you mentioned your daughters age.

Shocking that they would tell parents in the middle of the holidays, leaving them about 2 weeks to find somewhere. They must have known in April at the end of the financial year surely? Did they think they would get less hastle this way. OP I hope you find a school you love.

Maybe they were holding out hope that the bank would extend their overdraft? Perhaps they were hoping to pick up a couple of new pupils over the holidays!

News like this never comes at a good time, and there will be places for the affected pupils in other independent schools. As much as it seems like it, it is not the end of the world.

Isn't Oakfield also a secondary school up to GCSE? It will be even more of a nightmare to get senior school places in the area, state is either faith-based and way over-subscribed or else not very good and poor students in the middle of GCSE work will have to deal with finding space, changing at a difficult and unexpected time and still managing to do their subject combinations. On the other hand, I live in the area and always wondered how they could maintain a senior school on the number of students enrolled there.

I have a DS and DD at St Andrews in Horsell which I can highly recommend. There is a message on the St Andrews website for Oakfield parents saying that the headmaster is around throughout the holidays to show parents around and there are some spaces in some year groups.

Good luck - what a nightmare.

My mother used to work at Oakfield long ago and still has friends on the staff. They have been thoroughly stitched up too - may not even get their August salary let alone their contractual entitlement to the end of December. It has been noticed that the houses on either side are, I am told, on the market - a cynical mind might look out for a combined development project on the sites in the next few months. The school property isn't owned by the school but instead held directly by the owning family, although some years ago this wasn't the case.
It must be such a shock to the parents, although, like an earlier poster , I have wondered how they were managing with such diminishing numbers over the last few years - weren't they planning have a merged class somewhere around year 4? I think the move to igcse 's a couple of year's ago was a fatal move away from oakfields's core market.
The quality of teaching was good and the atmosphere very gentle, and combined with your recent move you must be very disappointed.
Rolls have been drifting down for a number of schools in the area, so the places are there, albeit it is indeed a tricky time to be selecting schools (announcing at half term or at the very least as soon as gcses were over would have helped). I understand that Ripley Court are offering to take all refugees which might at least suggest a reasonable number of chums, but of course this is secondary to your thoughts on the school.
Good luck - I hope it all works out for you and the others left in the lurch.

Manby Lodge Infants is lovely and not too far from West Byfleet.

I have sent you a long PM as we have just looked at all the local schools for our daughter, so told you what we did/didn't like about them and why we made the decision we did.