SW London private schools - looking for opinions?

[TheBlonde]

I have the good schools guide and have been to look at them but wondered if anyone had experience of the following schools

Broomwood Hall
Finton House
Hornsby House
Thomas' Clapham

[wilbur]

Fair enough, Blonde - that's the one drawback for us. Oh for the days when the school run was a walk across Battersea Park. We take the train a lot now, and that works well, but it's tough with a pushchair.

Hi page62 - I like the mix at NP too, we are v happy with it and ds1 and dd seem happy too. Whereabouts do you live?

[Page62]

i live in clapham (do you know abbeville road?)
DD is only in nursery at the moment but we fully intend for her to go to reception there from Sept
DS is turning 2 next week, 95% certain he will go from nursery too.

Very happy there,really good mix.

[wilbur]

I am pretty close to you then (and so is TheBlonde) as I am just off Cavendish Rd in Balham. There are a few NP families in the Abbeville area - I know ones on Lynette Ave and Rodenhurst Rd.

[Page62]

Just so you know, there is a mumsnet meet up happening on April 18 in Tsunami (off clapham high street) - so if you or TheBlonde are interested, you're quite welcome to join us!

[TheBlonde]

thanks for the invite page62, hope you all had fun

any opinions on Eaton House the Manor?

[TheBlonde]

I have now seen Thomas' and was very impressed
Alas we are not on the list

[badkitty]

You all seem to know what you are talking about so I wonder if you could give a bit of help to a clueless SW london mum-to-be!! I had never even begun thinking about schools, but DH has been told by someone at his work that baby has to be registered ASAP ie immediately after, or even before it is born... We had scoffed at this idea as being ridiculous but then I had a look on the website of Finton House (the school lady at work had mentioned, which is quite near us) and they also say register soon after the birth. To be honest we don't even know if we will go private or not but would like to keep options open. So I just wanted to ask if this is really the norm at least in SW london?! Should we get baby registered at for instance all the schools mentioned above just to keep options open? Then we go and look round and pick one nearer the time? Also how much does it cost for the registration?

Sorry for being so clueless, it just seems so bizarre to be thinking about this before baby even arrives, and it would never even have occurred to me, but I don't want to discover a few years down the line that we completely missed the boat!!

[TheBlonde]

badkitty - Finton and Thomas' you need to try to register while baby is tiny
The others you need to register before they are a year old

When I went to see Thomas' some of the other 'viewers' were pg

Registration is usually 50-100 quid

[irisha]

Some schools are non-selective, i.e. first come first serve (e.g. Hornsby House, Finton, Eaton House the Manor, Hurlingham Prep, etc)- for these you have to register as soon after birth as possible. The phenomenon of people sending letters of application on the day of birth is not an exaggeration.

Some do an assessment, but only of children who are on registration list, i.e. they will not assess 500-1000 so they keep a registrtion list of say 200. For these, you also have to register soon after birth, e.g.Thomas', this will not guarantee a place,but will guarantee an assessment.

You can also view schools now, don't need to register. Some schools you won't like the look/feel of and then no point wasting the registration fee. As a matter of fact, I would suggest doing it now, as you will have your hands totally full once the baby is born.

Also, you need to start looking at the nurseries - for those, you really do need to register straight after birth. Eaton House and Thomas' apparently have nice ones, but plenty of local options. But again, you need to go and look NOW while you have the time and the energy. Quite exhausing actually, this looking around stuff

[badkitty]

Thank you. I can't believe I don't even know what colour I'm painting the nursery yet and already having to think about schools! It is a good job somebody mentioned this otherwise we would've been completely out in the cold in 4/5 years time!

I am also quite relieved to know that the schools won't think I am completely bonkers when I phone up for prospectuses/registration forms for my as yet unborn child...

[badkitty]

By the way, TheBlonde, which school did you end up going for, out of interest?

[TheBlonde]

we were too late for Thomas'
although we could join the list and take a chance on our child getting an assessment interview, they don't interview until after the other schools have already offered places

we are now simply waiting until Sept when we will hear if we get offered places at Finton, Broomwood and Hornsby

Then we will decide

[badkitty]

Good luck with it - hope you get somewhere you are happy with.

[northernrefugee39]

Someone I know had children at Broomwood. Apparently they sent a letter to parents asking them not to pick up their children in jeans
Falls into the pattern of checking out your house .
That should be all the information you need to know about them......

[irisha]

Jeans at Broomwood is bullshit, DD had a trial session there so witnessed dropp off and pick up: plenty of jeans and jogging pants/sweatshirts.
And nobody checked out our house to get a place there, and BTW we live in a flat - seemed acceptable, surprise, surprise

[northernrefugee39]

Maybe it's changed irisha, this was about 8 yrs ago. There was certainly a letter though.

[irisha]

Well, 10 years ago to a reply of a prospective parent "why there are no coloured students?" The answer was "The diplomats live rather far from this area and they are the only we would consider"
I suppose leopard doesn't change his skin, but the snob element is less obvious hopefully

[northernrefugee39]

From Broomwood? Crikey! Ooh Balham isn't what it was.....
The word "coloured" grates too.

[northernrefugee39]

God, actually that makes me so angry; how on earth do these bloody snobby racist schools think they could get away with something like that?

[janinlondon]

Actually our school (SW London independent primary prep) was once referred to as being "too black" by a local mother. So they're not all the same.

[northernrefugee39]

Oh I know they're not Janin
But the proportion of white middle class kids in most private schools is very high isn't it? A shame particularly in an area like Balham/Tooting which has such a mixed population with enclaves of very high house prices.

[janinlondon]

You are probably right. We chose ours partly because of the extraordinarily good racial mix.

[northernrefugee39]

Yours sounds a great choice

[badkitty]

Which one is yours janin if it is not too rude to ask (sorry - being nosey again)? Sounds good.

[irisha]

it was 10 years ago! I don't think anybody would say anything like that now, of course doesn't mean they won't think that.

Re Broomwood, from reception photos it does seem like they have some diversity - one Indian girl and one black

TBH, if i were black i would never send my children to broomwood, would probably be too tough to be the only one

if you want ethnic diverstiy go to streatham and clapham high (girls only though) - whites are probably in minority