Primary schools in Stroud Green / Crouch End: any recent experience?

[MrsD28]

Hello! DS will be starting in reception in September 2020 and we are starting to look at local primary schools. We live in Stroud Green - halfway between Finsbury Park station and Crouch End, so we are considering:

Coleridge
St Aidans
Rokesley
Ashmount
Stroud Green
Weston Park

(I know that we are unlikely to get into all of these, but we have been told that the baby boom has subsided and numbers are dropping, so it may be possible to get in where it wouldn't have been 3 or 4 years ago). Does anyone have any recent experience of any of these schools? We have started to visit but are struggling a bit - neither DH nor I went to school in the UK so it is hard to know what "good" looks like.

Start by reading the school ofsted report visit the school webpage
Call council ask about catchment area and your location what does it usually get allocated

coleridge

St Aidan’s

Stroud green

rokesley

Ashmount

Weston Park
Ask other parents,local knowledge and 1st hand experience. Although I will add caveat that what is great or diabolical for someone else may not be the same for you

We must live pretty close to you.

A lot of the schools you list, although close, don't overlap on their last distance offered. So depending where you actually live you won't have a choice of all of them. Harringey have a really useful list of the last distance offered for all their oversubscribed schools. Islington have an admissions book you can download which has 2017 data. You'll get access to this year's data in September.

DS1 is starting at Stroud green in September. Have heard good and bad about it, a new head started in 2017. Some love her but there was a high staff turnover and now she is going. I didn't warm to her so am approaching the uncertainty this brings with positivity. This was the only school on your list we would have got but their are loads more worth a look.

Ashmount is currently flavour of the month, with its new carbon neutral building and forest school ethos. Last distance offered has clearly shrunk this year, hearing who is disappointed they didn't get it.

Coleridge is consistently well loved and even with 120 intake has a very local last distance offered.

St Aidan's only took 9 non siblings this year and had a 0.16 mile last distance offered! Very popular. A colleague whose child is there has found it a bit small for her sociable DS, esp in the upper years.

I would start by checking which schools you would likely get into and then start visiting in September. Do book visits early, we couldn't view ashmount as they ran out of spots.

www.haringey.gov.uk/children-and-families/schools-and-education/school-admissions/school-admissions-statistics

www.islington.gov.uk/children-and-families/schools/apply-for-a-school-place/apply-for-a-primary-school-place

The booklet for Islington is at the bottom of the page as an attached document.

Hi, DD will be finishing at Coleridge this year and moving up to secondary. It’s a really lovely school with fantastic teachers and still a lot of emphasis on learning through play in the early years and has nice facilities. The downsides are it can seem a little cliquey with the parents and I think maybe some children could have been offered a bit more support earlier on who were struggling but I think that’s probably true of all schools nowadays with their stretched budgets and on the whole it does well catering for kids across the board.

I think that the catchment has expanded but you still might struggle to get in possibly if you are south of Crouch Hill station.

Best advice for all the schools is to actually go and look round, your gut instinct will tell you a lot. All the schools you mention seem to have quite a good reputation, we are so lucky in this area with our schools!

My son is at Stroud green in year 2. He has loved it, it seems quite child centred. I'm disappointed obviously that the head is leaving.

Thank you very much for your responses - all the local parents that we know have similar aged children to us (babies and toddlers) so it is really helpful to hear views from others!

We realise that we are on the outskirts for some of these schools - though we do live very close to St Aidans so that is probably the only one for which we have consistently been inside the last distance offered!

Another Stroud Green School parent here! Our daughter has been really happy there so far and has made great progress so I can only recommend it.

As suggested above the Head was pretty divisive - some parents loved her and others weren't keen at all. Staff turnover definitely increased a lot during her time there - on the whole I think a fresh start with a new head can only be positive.

Good luck with your choice - I agree that we're lucky as there are loads of good schools in the area.