7plus reference from State School

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Hello - Does anyone have any experience of the procedure for collecting references.

DC is due to sit 7plus next year. Does anyone know when prep school will ask state school for reference. i.e at what stage of the application process are prep schools asking for references from schools?

Do state schools just send the last report or an up to date reference from teacher at the time.

Will reference reflect what is in the most recent annual school report?

Is it worth adding other references such as music teacher or swimming teacher as these activities are not done in school but as extra curricular. whereas I assume children coming from private sector will have references from school that include these activities.

Thanks

Depends what school you're applying to ime the schools know state school heads may a) not be supportive b) write a very cursory reference, so they don't pay that much attention to them. Some schools ask for a report instead of a reference from a state school.

If your child is a strong candidate the reference will not be at all important, so I wouldn't worry and don't put in music refs etc, at some other stage you should be able to put across your child is musical/swims and the most glowing reference ever from a swimming teacher won't change anything.

Prep schools will generally forego a state school reference. They will expect the latest report though and ime you would be sending that in. I wouldn't send in all those other reports you have either ( reeks of desperation ). I think the prep will get a sound idea of your child after all the assessments. They will probably have wheedled out of him his musical abilities and hobbies during the interview. Concentrate on having a well behaved, polite child who passes the exams with excellent results.

Thank you everyone.

Worth contacting the school and asking.

When I visited a load of primary schools before applying for DD, I asked all but one if they were happy to supply references for children sitting for selective schools.

The one I didn't ask was because they volunteered that any parents interested in selective education would be pleased to know that they had a strong record on getting children places, some teachers were happy to tutor after-school for the 11+ and that they would of course provide references!

Of the others, 3 looked a bit surprised and said that they'd never done it but shouldn't be a problem - and the other said they didn't believe in selective education and wouldn't be prepared to facilitate in any way...

Given I was still dubious about state education, I gave a couple of schools that have 7+ a call and asked about the HT report. Their advice was that they were used to HTs who wouldn't cooperate, in which case, the previous 3 years reports were fine.

They also said that for both 7+ and especially 11+, whilst they asked parents not to tutor, if your child was at a state primary then it was quite reasonable to tutor to ensure the needed curriculum had been covered for the exam - but to please not tutor on anything like interview questions.

Not sure if that is of any help.

Pyrrah - That's very helpful info- Thank you very much.