7+ Exams for The Coveted Habs, Latymer, etc.

[crazymumw5]

Hello, we are in the gruelling 7+process and have sadly got a rejection from St Pauls for our eldest son. We are still waiting to hear back from HABs and complete a few other schools but I was wondering:

• How many of you went through the 8+ process after 7+ and how did this fare on you and the kids? Our son has been a pretty good champ through all this but not sure if it's fair on him to spend another (tougher) year on prepping him or take a break and pick this up again in a few years. His prep school ends at 13, so this is still a good option.

• How long did you prep for the 7+ and / or 8+? I've seen several mixed posts on this - we have done about 6-12 months prep and ramped this up in the last 3 month but our son's current prep school works heavily on the 11+ and 13+ exit point. The competition seems REALLY tough, and not sure how to navigate him / our family through this now. He is a really smart boy and the headmaster encouraged us to do the 7+ based on his stats and performance but we underestimated the pressure here.

Thanks !

Tough one. Out of all the routes and based on the numbers accepted, 7+ feels the best route and we are under the feeling that if he gets into a through school at 7+, then we will stop there....obviously we will aim for the top 2, but will also do others such as Highgate, UCS etc. Only if he has a total mare, then we will look at 11+. 11+ is much more competitive, 8+ only appears to take 1 class, so again ratio is tough. We are going through this process next year. It does seem to be getting harder and harder, as kids are getting more and more prepared.

Thanks, we thought the same for 7+ based on feedback from others but it did seem a bit different this year, and all these kids appear to be at similar levels with the same tutors, home prep etc. so not sure how they are distinguishing them !

Prep, tutors etc....no longer the distinguishing factor they once were, as you mentioned everyone is at it. I think now there are some "extension" questions, where the "naturally" bright boys will be able to do and others wont.

I also wonder with the certainty of a Labour government and the likelihood of a 15%-20% rise in school fees, whether there will be less demand for these schools. WUS is going to be getting to 30k+ in fees....but that's another debate.

Option is 10+ for City of London Boys and Emanuel.
11+ very competitive but from 10+ feedback (if no offers) was useful to prep for 11+.
13+ very few places unless boarding school route.

yes thanks, have been looking at these various entry points. This all feels like another FT job on top of the real one !