Greetings,
We are moving from Seattle to the London area and St Albans is currently our top pick. We will be visiting in a week to look at schools, neighborhoods, etc. We only have a few days, so we need to choose the schools to look at ahead of time. We are looking at non-denominational, state primary schools. We have done enough research to understand Ofsted in general, 5 rules (or is it 6 :-) for catchment areas, etc (and we thought primary schools were tough in Seattle. Hah! :-)
But what is difficult to understand from this far away is how to actually use the Ofsted reports; how should one balance Oftsed with other, harder to quantify, factors, such as facilities, sports, music programs, etc? Maple of course has outstanding Ofsted numbers, but lots of people seem happy with Bernards Heath and Garden Fields. What do they offer that Maple does not? What are the softer, more qualitative factors?
For context, our son is 4 now and very active. We will arrive mid-summer 2013 and do not expect that he will be able to get into reception (but if possible, would do so). So this is setup for next year.
Any advice much appreciated,
CKZ