Should I be able to look round potential primary school?

[happypotamus]

We are considering which schools to apply to for Reception next year. Many of our local primary schools have open days at the end of October/ beginning of November, which is just when we are expecting DC2. Our most local school will probably be first choice, but it is a faith school and DH is atheist although I practise the relevant faith and take DD to church and we meet the criteria to get her in, so I wanted DH to see it and see if he is happy with how religious it is as well as being interested to see it myself. The open day is the same week DC2 is due, so I rang and asked if we could come and look round at any other time. Apparently not unless there are a large number of other families who want to! I was expecting the school to be a lot more welcoming to prospective parent although I understand that it could be disruptive to have people looking round the school all the time.
AIBU or is this normal? If this is normal, we might struggle to visit any local schools depending on the birth, and have to apply blindly without knowing the schools.

You're not being unreasonable, and the school sounds a little sniffy to me. Might be that it's always oversubscribed and doesn't feel it needs to 'sell' itself to prospective parents, but it's both perfectly reasonable and fairly common for parents to want to see a school outside of the 'open days'. I'd press the issue - chances are it's just the school secretary giving you the brush-off, rather than school policy...secretaries are experts at deflecting parents in all circumstances ,

We looked round all schools by ourselves, just called the school arranged a time and went. Got shown around 2 by the secretary and 1 by the headmaster who also took us to the nearby day care that offered wrap around even though it was nothing to do with him. Then he printed off bus timetables for us and showed us where the bus stop was as we were new to the area. Guess which school we picked? (it did have other good points as well btw)

I'm in London, and I'm afraid that your experience was normal for us OP.

I can only assume the school is massively oversubscribed. Personally I would be very wary of any school that refused to show parents round on a normal day. Any school should be able to make itself look good at an open day.

YANBU - whether it's 'normal' or not (and IME it isn't), they should be able to show parents round if there's a good reason why they can't make it to the open day.

We did a mixture of set open days, secretary show rounds and HT appointments. Large over subscribed schools can struggle to cope with the demand for visits - often by people who have very slim hope of a place. I would call again and see about alternative dates. You have til jan to apply

It is quite common for schools not to want to show people around and I can only come to a conclusion that they therefore have something to hide or nothing to show people of any consequence. Whilst I can to some extent understand a school's frustration with having people around the school it sets a remarkably bad impression and like PRH I would be very wary of such a school.

Sets the tone don't you think if they won't show you round or even have you come in for a chat. You'd have to deal with this for years if you got in.

Not normal in our area with some great schools

Ours encouraged you to use the open day but would show you round at other times.

Did you explain about the giving birth bit? I find it bizarre that a school would completely refuse to let you look round any other time. I would expect that if you ring them up after the open day, they may be able to arrange something.

its inconvenient but it might be a sign that the school prioritises teaching existing pupils over 30 mins of someones time to show the school off to someone who may have no chance of getting in.

If i had a child in a school, its what i would want, especially if lots of people want to visit.

OTOH you sound like you are a genuine special case.

just so you know, however, its almost impossible to work out what a school is really like. Youll get the best clues by reading the newsletters on the web. Does it go on and on about housekeeping stuff like parking, is it constant references to religious events or does it demonstrate a strong interest in learning and extra curricular stuff?

I agree with var, the school just doesn't have time to offer never ending tours as they have the core work of teaching to do. At our school/nursery, we offer tours on set days and simply can't veer away from this because of everything else going on. But, in exceptional cases, our head will always try to offer reasonable alternatives, such as tours out of school hours, which mean parents see the school but don't necessarily meet staff or see children at work. Not ideal, but it's something.

Agree with Var123 regarding newsletters. I've looked at some for our local schools and they are a real insight.

One for the school with 90% of children from a non-English speaking background was very basic and amateurish. Which is understandable as most of the mothers can not speak English let alone read it.

One from an 'Outstanding' academy had a few adverts in. I was particularly disturbed by the advert for a local private tutor!

Just to check my own advice, i looked at my DS's primary school website. he is in year 6 so its obviously a school I know extremely well. I'm also familiar with the reputations of some of the others schools around here because I know people who send their children there or who worked there.

DS's school is a faith one and the new HT seems to be driving the school towards being more focused on spiritual development at the expense of all else. Sure enough, the latest newsletter has four different items about church things, two on what to do / not to do around school, three on raising extra funding for the school and one on a trip that's just taken place.

Meanwhile the other faith school, which gets better results, has no mention of religion, gives details of clubs, does some safety housekeeping, explains the new national curriculum and has details of the latest SATS results.

Try an email to the head asking for a quick tour around....

We experienced this with a snappy receptionist so went to the organ grinder.

its true about newsletters,
we looked at not so good undersubscribed primary everyone said was on up.

difficult trasition to academy who normally turn schools around.

as academy had no sats no current osfted to base opinion on.

new temp head seemed nice.

receptionist who showed us round said rather a lot.

it wasent as awful as was expecting.

but few red flags.

were saw staff reguarly smoking at school gates.

most parents seem smoke outside.

caretaker told my eldest child aged 8 cheer up lie could be worse you could go this school.

3rdly as visuted there was newsletters in reception area not sure why but i grabbed one.

there was who peice about please can parents not fight in school playground.

the pta was non existant which seemed odd.

wrap around care poor as very little demand.

i just figured culd change uniform and name but demographics would always be poor the mix was uneven and couldent see how we fit i there.
when looking for eldest had just had baby.

1 school wouldent let us look round with baby newborn so dident go see that one.

one was all singing and dancing impressive open day.

other 2 one oversubcribed up its own arse school and 1 rc school was tour by head.

i have been checking out open days evenings for child no 3 today.

1 school has choice times 2.30 04 4.30 think im ging to pick 2.30 as would rather see kids in class rooms;

also some school receptionists are as scary as doctors ones dont be put off.

I agree about writing to the Head direct and requesting a visit,mexplaining your circumstances.
I am sure they will then arrange a visit for you.

I can see both sides. On one hand, tours take time and manpower. on the other hand, it is vital to visit before making a choice.
I have known schools where someone from the office does the showing round, often not knowing an awful lot about the academic side. When I had a range of questions, they asked me to email them in, which I did.
Another school I asked to visit were extremely welcoming, despite it being very oversubscribed and my address meaning I had little chance of getting in. The Head came to speak with me and an admin lady showed me round.
A final schools said no torus except on the allocated day. I pointed out that I work that day and a teacher so cannot get any time off. They still refused to make a special case. So I wrote to them explaining my situation and how I found them very unwelcoming. They did not reply! I wish I had then followed it up with the Governors, as I thought it was disgraceful, but by then I had lost interest in that school.....probably what they hoped would happen.

I agree that schools need to focus on teaching the current children. However, they also need to find a way to allow prospective parents to visit and only offering 1 or 2 rigid dates isn't good enough.

The elephant in the room is the notion of choice. I notice that new parents often seem to think choosing a school is like choosing where to shop or which supplier to get an electricity supply from, except obviously its a much more important decision.

In many parts of the UK, schools are now so heavily oversubscribed (even the mediocre ones) that often there isn't really a choice at all. All a parent needs to do is to make sure they put the school that they have the greatest chance of getting into on their choice form.

Sometimes you can choose between a faith school (if you qualify) and the nearest non-denominational school, assuming its not oversubscribed with siblings etc. Some parents actively elect to send their children to schools which are not doing well for social reasons or because it satisfies their political beliefs. However, for most people there is almost no real choice whatsoever.

Its the same at secondary (unless you go private of course or you are in a grammar area) but by then the parents know how it works, so they hold their breath and hope they get allocated the best available.

To be honest I think that sounds fine. They could have people ringing up most days and I'll be honest I'd rather hope the staff have more important things to do than give daily tours of the school. However I'd hope they'd arrange separate open dates as a compromise (or take your number til they've had a few requests) but I'm not sure I'd agree that they just say yes to everyone who rings up as they could theoretically be doing several per week.

I agree most oversubscribed schools I know are like this, particularly those with large sibling intake...they simply don't need the effort to recruit new families