Musings on class sizes

[Spindelina]

Our nearest primary schools (in distance order) are:
A: CoE VA, PAN 60, very oversubscribed, we might or might not get in.
B: CoE VC, PAN 30, offered 17 last year.
C: CoE VA, PAN 30, even more oversubscribed, we don't have a hope.
D: CoE VC, PAN 60, offered 40 last year.

As far as I can tell, B & D are perfectly good schools, which end up admitting under PAN because of the two very very sought after schools.

What's the deal with undersubscribed schools? Is this a good thing (smaller classes) or a bad thing (fewer resources)? Or does it completely depend on the school's handling of it?

Here, there are 3 schools, all similar ofsted. 2 oversubscribed, one not. I went for the undersubscribed one because I felt DD might get lost in a full class of 30 (her class is 22), as well as a bunch of other reasons - she's only been there a week but all is good so far!

If anything I would say that undersubscribed school just has slightly less well-off parents, more single mums etc, than the other two, which are in slightly more pricey neighbourhoods.

You may find that by September that B and D are full or as near as makes no difference. In dd1's year they only offered 40/60 but had 28/29 in each class by September.

My concern on B and D if that is what they get regularly is that you could end up with shared classes. That might not be a problem as such, but obviously you'd have roughly full sized classes.

Dewe is right. It's very unlikely a school can sustain a class of 17. They might just in YR because of the EYF. But they will run combined classes after that.

Check carefully, both my DDs were in well sub 30 year groups. They have never been in sub 30 classes (their school normally runs YR/Y1 Y1/Y2 so even reception isn't small).

Money comes per pupil, overheads come per school and per class, small classes just cannot be paid for!

tiggytape, A usually admits all siblings and those meeting faith criteria, plus some (us, maybe?!) on distance, so those refused are either local ish or giving it a punt. Lots go independent, with the others mostly going to B, D or E (yet another CoE VC in the other direction from us). B has quite a 'mixed' intake, and didn't have a great reputation until recently when new head has (according to the grape vine) done great things, so I think there might be quite a lot of snobbery going on. Many who want A (or C?) would put D or E above B, I think, partly because D and E are in naice areas.

C usually admits siblings, but some faith applicants often miss out, so they might end up further afield (and probably quite a few into independent too), but I don't know the school as well.

The undersubscription is particularly noticeable this year, but the general pattern has been there for a while.

TeWiSavesTheDay sounds very similar in terms of types of areas and Oftsted. A & C have been Outstanding for a while, D Good, B was Satisfactory but recently Good.

I've just checked on the websites of B & D. They don't explicitly say what their class structure is, but they do have one (or two) teachers per year, which suggests no mixed classes.

I'm sure it will all come out when we visit, but it's nice to have my thoughts in order so I know what to be on the lookout for!

The DC's school is also undersubscribed despite many oversubscribed schools locally. This means that they've ended up in classes of around 26/27 rather than the 33/34 in the other schools (this is junior level so no infant class size). (this is even after DC's school picking up the overspill)

As far as I can see the preference for the oversubscribed schools is repuatations that won't go away and snobbery. The DC's school used to be awful - but that was some 12 years ago and nowadays that really isn't the case. Also DC's school takes children from a very mixed catchment whereas the oversubscribed schools are all in "naice" middle class areas, hence some turn their nose up at it.

Another thing to add: it would be pretty hard to meet the faith criteria for both A and C. You'd need to live in the overlap between parish C and radius X from A, and attend two churches (one for each school) regularly. So they are probably not picking up very many from each other.

Yes, both A & C do give priority to siblings (above faith). And, thinking about it, there are a lot of flats in parish C (naice flats in converted old buildings, of course!), so I can imagine people moving out as their families expand. And it's the closest of the five (A-E) to the centre of town, so could be a pretty convenient drop off depending on where you need to get to.

I'm pretty certain it is historic reputation that causes the differences, but my concern is more the consequences. Things to find out are how big are the classes in reality, and check on mixed classes.

In fact, A has a bit of an issue with spaces in years 5/6, with several people going private at that stage!

I found with the oversub schools that a lot of the classrooms were very small, computers were in odd places (including hallways!) Because they were not designed to have so many dc in them.

I think snobbery/out if date reputations and geography are the biggest factors where we live.

You just have to look and decide for yourself basically... classic MN advice of looking at the loos was very helpful!)