I know I'm going to get a lot of stick for this post but there maybe someone with same dilemma. The schools in my area are pretty poor. There are only two really good ones that everyone tries for but you have to be a strict practising Catholic and of course many parents just go to church for 3 years to get the practising Catholic certificate - good on them for their stamina I say! Therefore as soon as DD was born we signed her up for the Prep school and she currently goes to nursery there and loves it. At the time I was in a stable job. However I left this job last year for what I thought was a dream role as a Parliamentary Assistant. Sadly I was badly bullied by my employer and had to leave suddenly making me jobless. Knowing the employment market was not great I decided reluctantly to do a state school application just in case I couldn't get another job in time for Reception. On the day I handed in the application I got an amazing job but still had to pass probation. I got my 2nd choice of school (the 1st being an unobtainable Catholic school). It was a school rated requires improvement 4 years ago but has massively turned around and is a far as I know now a good school in all but an out of date Ofstead rating. Nonetheless because of the poor rating it had been significantly undersubscribed for a number of years so I thought no harm in accepting the place, again just in case as I hadn't been confirmed at the time of acceptance deadline. Was confirmed last week but I discovered that there was now probably a waiting list for the school. To my horror the school contacted my daughter's prep school without my permission revealing that we had accepted a place at the state school. The private school immediately got in touch with me to find out what was going on and to ask me to confirm whether DD was attending the Prep school. I promptly confirmed and candidly explained why I had gone through the state school process. Now the cat's out the bag I guess I have to let the state school know. I feel extremely guilty especially as they sent a lot of information to us and asked detailed questions about my dd. They seem such a lovely caring school, I never expected a state school with 90 children and 3 classes per year to actually pay that much attention to the individual children coming to them. I never expected to hear from them until dd was due to start tbh. However, in the back of my mind I still don't want to tell the state school the truth again just in case as my job is a contract which ends in August but maybe extended. However I think my parents would pay most of the fees if the worst happened - dd is their only grandchild and they still work fulltime. Nonetheless I am holding place which some child may need. Feeling guilty but also torn. Anyone else had this? Please no nasty comments about my attitude to state schools. I hope to send dd to a good one for secondary, I just want to make sure she has good foundations as I had such a bad experience in my state school which set me back years.