Small community school or large academy for primary?

[Roses1221]

We cannot decide where to send our DS. We’re lucky to have plenty of options and after visiting nearly every nearby primary have settled on two which gave us the ‘good feeling’. Both have great wraparound care, outdoor space, ofsted reports, distance wise they’re very similar. However, they’re polar opposites in terms of size! Any insights into small vs large, community vs academy would be appreciated from parent and teacher viewpoint…

School 1: community school, 150 pupils, one form entry, mixed year group of 3/4, original Victorian building with extensions (including one temp classroom/portacabin which has been there years)

School 2: academy, 2 form entry, 400 pupils, newer building, purpose built (ie corridor not doubling up as a library)

Appreciate your thoughts!

How exactly are classes at school 1 organised?

School 2 is still small. Large is 4+ classes per year (I know primaries with 6 form entry...)

@Aroundtheworldin80moves ah yes, appreciate that compared to some it is small but near us it certainly feels like the ‘big one’!

School 1 has Year R, Year 1, Year 2, Year 3/4, Year 5, Year 6. Year 3/4 are split in the mornings and I believe it is the year 3 who have lessons in the hall.

The problem with a small school is that if your DS doesn’t find a friend in his class then he doesn’t have many other children to chose from. In a larger school there is more chance of finding a friend.

Also in a larger school they will have more funding and therefore more equipment, be more used to additional need, should he have them,

My DC have experienced both. When younger we all loved the personal and nurturing feel of the small school but now two are in a large primary it’s a thousand times better. More staff mean more things happen. Enrichment, sport, languages etc are excellent. Larger schools have larger friendship pools. One of my DSs ended up with fewer than 15 in his class and some of those were just not pleasant kids. Larger doesn’t mean impersonal, it means choice.

I'd ask if if its always 3/4 mixed, or if its because those two years currently have less pupils

(It just seems strange from the outside they have enough pupils for a while class in most years, but always combine the middle years. Unless the other classes have 15 kids in in. )

I'd say small school is better for staff and children. I like the community feel and nurturing aspects but of course that can happen anywhere. But my personal preference would be go small.

How many in each class? Are they full classes? Id be worried about small friendship pool.

School 2 isnt big. There was another thread someone moving posted about ideal size of school if all else similar and the consensus was 2 classes per year!! Enough they can mix classes if there are difficult friendships but not huge (4 classes plus a year.) Also breadth of expeeience amongst the staff for send issues/extracurricular/etc which is harder with fewer staff.

What seems lovely at 4 really isn't at 11 and getting ready for secondary. However size of school shouldnt be only choice!

Having a library is lovely. And does make "going to choose books" a normal part of life.

Both schools are quite small, what are classroom sizes cause that would be a biggie for me. I'd much sooner my child be in a class of 20 than 30. Also do they have TA's in class?

if there's really nothing in it I would go school 2 based on not having to share school year and separate library.

Thank you everyone for your opinions and experiences.

@WoodenReindeer you make a great point about what is best at 4 isn’t always best at 11. We’ve said that we wouldn’t hesitate to choose the smaller school if it were just an infant school.

I believe there will always be a mixed year group due to not having enough classrooms. 3/4 is mixed currently due to cohort sizes.

@workingtheusername class sizes around 20-25. Backstory is it used to be a school which took those who didn’t get in to their first choice and they were asked to increase to 25 a few years ago. In recent years more have been choosing it as first choice due to great reputation.

Can you genuinely get into both? Have you been to see them (again thinking about the 11 yr olds as well as 4 year olds - the difference between preschool and secondary are huge and primary is transition to both!)

On paper 2 is the obvious choice but there is also distance to your house/ease of school run to consider. (Parking if relevant) And visiting you can get a feel for a place. Also look at the extracurricular/what is the wraparound care actually like and who uses it (at our shcool very few infants use it and they're in with the juniors. It works but again would be better if they had more their own age in a small school this might be a consideration too).

Are they a strict "kept in if homework isnt done" in Juniors or more flexible about home learning projects. Do they do residentials for juniors. All this can change but worth getting a feel overall.

Where do their buddies from preschool go? Have you spoken with parents from either school (I knew parents from toddler groups with kids at each near me.)

All this makes a difference which we might not see with just the facts above

My DS goes to a single form entry community primary school and we love it for caring/family feel. The headteacher knows everyone by name (and also about each child), you just won't get that in a big school. Post Covid disruption, my DS has additional sensory/emotional needs and I know he's well cared for at school.

Agree with the other poster, are you sure you could get into both schools. Usually there is an illusion of choice; apply for what you want, but you'll only be in catchment for one of them. School places tend to be so competitive, I'd be surprised you have realistic chance of getting into two different community primaries - though maybe you're an exception?

I’m not surprised you have choice…we would have got into any of five or six localish schools.

We went bigger…we wanted the big peer group which has meant (pre COVID bubbles) that they could pull out groups of similar ability easily. The juniors also have specialist language, music and PE teachers which the local smaller schools can’t support.

As a teacher if you can get your child into a class of 20-25 I'd definitely go for that as they will be better off.

Go with the two form school. It’s still small but and the head teacher will still know all the pupils by name in my experience.

Funding is per pupil and therefore in a larger school Wilton more modern facilities should stretch further to provide more resources. Also, teachers will share the workload of planning and have more time as well.

If you like both equally and the distance is the same as you say, definitely go for school 2

Depends on the child.

In the small school the available pool for friends is going to be very small. If a child is easy-going, good at making friends and happy to fit in with whatever, then there are certainly benefit from the friendly and family-like ambience of a small school. More quirky kids who find it more difficult to find a soul mate, or those with specific interests or talents can benefit from a larger school as there's a higher probability that there will be another kid like them, and larger schools have the capacity to do things for a handful of kids. 3% of a school of 630 is 19 kids so a special interest that appeals to 3% of kids can be accommodated with a lunchtime or after school club. 3% of a school with a PAN of 15 is only 3 kids so there's unlikely to be anything offered for niche interests and talents.

I found that with my v bright one. At least in the bigger school there were a few like her!

2 classes in a year is still small enough to have the family environment and everyone in the year known.

We have had two experiences of small schools (1 form) and one of a larger (4 form). The teaching was and is so much better in the larger school than either of the small ones (despite their excellent reputation) and my children have found people just like them and friendships have become so much easier.

Some really interesting considerations and lots of food for thought, thank you. I think I’m swaying towards the bigger school… seems like the potential for greater opportunities and stability. It’s also dawned on me that small school might have a quiet year… in which case it might not be 20/25 in the year but a smaller number…

@WoodenReindeer and @yoshiblue yes I am confident that if we named either as first choice that we’d get in. We’re very lucky in that there are 6/7 primaries within 5 mins drive. The very, very oversubscribed local school is the one at the end of our road and we didn’t like it! By pure chance a governor who showed me round one of the schools at an open evening works in school admissions for the county council and said it’s a good year in terms of numbers and siblings, so first choices at either of our chosen two is highly likely to be ok! (Appreciate I can’t predict the future though!)

@WoodenReindeer, the other thread you mentioned was mine - lots of thoughts here, @Roses1221 www.mumsnet.com/Talk/education/4434395-Ideal-size-for-a-primary-school

Thanks @TheFoldOx. Did you reach a decision about what your ideal would be?

Not yet, @Roses1221. All dependent on a house move and ours isn't on the market yet. Size will be one factor, but until we've narrowed down where we're looking to move (still got a shortlist of 4 towns/large villages) and visited the schools themselves, it's still uncertain. Though having read through the responses and the reasoning, and taking into account DSs' characters, we're leaning towards the small schools - c.15 per year group.

When you say the smaller school is a community school, does that translate into more community involvement? Our local school is a smaller community school, and we really like the links - for example they do lots of educational institution walks around the village and get linked in to local events (e.g. creating material to go up at the war memorial for Remembrance Sunday).

With the bigger school, they may have more clubs but I'd just check if there are oversubscription problems. Our closest big school I heard from multiple sources that actually getting spaces at clubs was a big problem.

What sort of child do you have?

I have a kid who at that age was really anxious and shy so I chose a slightly undersubscribed school with a PAN of 45 that meant she would be in a tiny reception class of around 20. I knew if she was in a busy class of 30 and/or a big school she would not have coped and would probably have had an unhappy start to school. As it was, she got lots of individual attention and ended the year as someone who loved school and positively enjoyed going. Not sure it would have been the same for her in a larger class. She is fifteen now and still really loves school even though she's obviously in a busier and more challenging environment at secondary. Building up slowly worked well for her. Throwing her in at the deep end would not have done.

But other children might love the busy feel of a larger school and not be worried by being in a class of 30. Those might be children who would find a small class and small school a bit limiting.

I don't think there is any one right answer!