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Primary education

Join our Primary Education forum to discuss starting school and helping your child get the most out of it.

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Original poster

Saffron walden

7 replies

Grace16 · 29/08/2017 18:36

Any experiences from mums in saffron walden of schools in area both independent and state and of parks and places to go with children. Looking to move somewhere lovely with good schools and nice parks and children centers etc xxx

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ifink · 29/08/2017 19:21

yes its a lovely lovely area with great schools which are all very oversubscribed. I currently have a child in a nearby village without a school place for this September. Yes I'm bitter!

Hertsmum765 · 30/08/2017 16:29

I find it surprising that Friends School closed Down given the shortage of school places in the town.

Original poster

Grace16 · 30/08/2017 17:39

Thank you so much. You've both been so helpful xx

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tulippa · 30/08/2017 20:39

I grew up in a village very close to Saffron Walden and hated it. If you move there from elsewhere (like my parents did) will be forever an incomer and not accepted as a proper resident of this peculiarly cliquey and insular area. I am speaking about how it was 20 years so hopefully it has changed!

There are no parks to speak of. Bridge End Gardens, although lovely, doesn't really count. Audley End House is nice - I think owned by English Heritage.

Also there has been a huge amount of new housing developments that have sprung up over the last few years with no additional schools built to support them as far as I know. I have heard the secondary situation is even worse than primary. I didn't realise the Friends School has closed down. That's nuts considering the pressure on all the other schools!

Hertsmum765 · 30/08/2017 21:09

There is a lovely playground on the common.

Yes Friends closed this year due to falling numbers but the state schools are full to capacity. A lot who go private opt for the Cambridge schools and Dame Bradbury is now part of the Stephen Perse group based in Cambridge.

Original poster

Grace16 · 31/08/2017 08:03

You have all been amazing and informative, thank you. So great to hear what it's actually all about. Thinking cambridge would be lovely, except it's too far for my son to commute to Gordon hill for 7am! seen lots of other villages and nothing else really feels right so probably stay put now xxx

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ifink · 01/09/2017 19:33

Yes totally nuts that they continue to build and build and approve planning applications and yet no more schools have appeared in SW or elsewhere. There is now a consultation on the local plan to put a town of 5000 houses near Great Chesterford....without any assurance that a school will be built in the first phase....

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