Private schools commutable to London

[Greenpoppins]

Our son is 5 and currently in a lovely London prep school, with the plan always be to move out of London. We are looking at moving him for the 7+ or whenever a space opens up. I'm not overly keen on the idea of boarding school and I'm struggling to find places that have a Prep and then good Senior School options nearby. Any suggestions welcome!

Probably worth mentioning we've lived here for 10 years, but we are Aussie so not as familiar with the UK as people who grew up here!

Where there are prep schools there will always be day secondaries either independent or grammar, if not necessarily directly linked. You need to focus on an area and look, or use Good Schools guide. Most preps will be open about destination schools.

UCS, Habs, Aldenham, Mill Hill, Berkhamstead, Highgate, merchant Taylor’s (they have a prep now). Move to another prep and then St Albans at 11

Hertfordshire is a good place to look - numerous preps with fantastic leaver destinations.

11+ and 13+ independents

Merchant Taylors
Habs Boys
St Albans
Berkhamsted
Haileybury
Aldenham

Some of these go all through but a separate prep may be a better route at 7

Preps

• Radlett
• Manor Lodge
• St Martins, Northwood
• York House
• Beechwood Park
• Lockers Park
• Westbrook Hay
• Chesham Prep
• Aldwickbury
• Lochinver House

Having just been through the 11+ here, whilst stressful it wasn’t anything like what my London friends have been through. We applied to two independent and sat the Bucks 11+. Passed for all.

There are lots of options - what mainline station do you (ideally) want to end up at and how long a train journey do want? Then look at whether you want a town/village or suburbia. What's your budget and what do you want for that? That will narrow it down and you'll still get lots of suggestions!

Thanks so much for the suggestions everyone! I"ll get looking into them. I'd originally thought of Sevenoaks or Guildford but Hertfordshire seems to have loads of options.

@GU24Mum Ideally our budget is 700k or something cheaper and we'd like a 2-3 bedroom terrace house. I really liked Godalming but I wasn't sure whether there would be enough choice of senior schools nearby.

Guildford has Lanesborough and Royal Grammar as most obvious combo, although alternative preps might be Barfields, Cranmore etc if you want to live outside Guildford. Sevenoaks has likes of St Michaels Otford and Sevenoaks prep plus Sevenoaks, Tonbridge, state Kent grammars. Epsom might be worth looking at.

Which London train station do you need. Berkshire and Hampshire have loads covering every possible type of school feeding to every possible type of senior you could possibly want.