Village or city school?

[Maveta]

I posted this in chat last night but no responses and on second thoughts really should have put it in here...

I am outside the UK and about to start the application process for a september start for my ds (3).. dh is keen for ds to go to his old school in the lovely, old, quaint, quiet, small etc etc village where he grew up, he has 3 cousins that go there and it is a 20min drive from home. It is in a roundabout way en route to dhs work (a further 20mins) so he would take him and presumably pick him up, though I am not sure how this would work at the moment. My main concern with this is that dh is tied to driving every day when he infinitely prefers getting the train 80% of the time. There is not a train route to this village so he couldn't take ds by train and then continue to work. And of course all of ds' friends would live in the village, not near us. Is this even an issue? Not now but maybe when he is older??

Of course the obvious alternative is that he goes to one of the schools near our house but these are very inner city schools - squashed between other buildings, traffic noise/ congestion outside etc. And we don't have enough points to give us a fighting chance at the better schools.

Is sending him to the village school a total no-brainer? Or does it matter more than I think that dh will have to drive him every day and his friends won't live nearby? I just don't know! can anyone help?

If the school's a 20 minute drive from your home and you live near or in a city, are you even sure you'd get into the villag school?

I am outside the UK and yes we would be able to get into the school...

Emmmma and lizipads - I know plenty of undersubscribed very good village schools. if people from the city near me wanted to come to one of them (and drive 20 mins) I very much doubt it would be a problem.

op - have you considered living in the village? sounds like distance wise, for work, etc, and for your son's social life, (and quite possibly yours too) it would be better than living in the city.

if that's not an option then I'd think really carefully about what you're proposing - do you drive? if not it could be really difficult getting dcs to school and back everyday, relying only on one driver, who works. and the social thing will be difficult too - like you say your son's friends will all be distant, adding to the potential driving.are the city schools really that bad? you only talk about their environment rather than their actual teaching.

Another thing to take into account is that the school will have changed, since your dp was there, and so too have expectations of schools. a village school can be very different from a city school - in both positive and negative ways. they can be more cohesive, becaseu of teh small numbers - with kids playing with each other across year groups, whi, imo, is great. but also you have a small pool of potential friends - which for the less gregarious can be hard. often there are less after-school activities and clubs - be cuase there just aren't the numerbs to sustain them.

where are you moving to btw...I ask because it sounds vaguely like it could be near me (the distances, and teh fact the village school has space, for example)

Hi Hatwoman, I live in spain, not sure where you are?

thanks for your pov.. all good points.. do you think a 20min drive is a normal or excessive commute for a young child, I don't know if lot of people do it..? I do drive so I could do some school runs too to share the load, we don't reeeally have two cars but I mostly have free use of the company car on an informal basis during what would be term time so I could speak to my boss and see about making it a more fixed arrangement. Though if dh is to have the car to pick him up, he'd have to have it to go to work too so he couldn't get the train on those days anyway iyswim? Though yes we would at least both have transport for emergency pick ups etc. I guess, is that more what you meant?

Moving to the village is really not an option right now, we moved out of another village back to the city a year ago as it was the only way we could get on the property ladder - village properties around here are quite pricey as they are high demand and they were certainly out of our price range. Now I do wonder if we made the right choice choosing the importance of buying a house over continuing to rent but staying in a village atmosphere for our son. But we were very isolated in the village and would probably be, maybe marginally less, in this other village. We do also very much enjoy living in the city and ds has been very happy in his nursery here. So while a future move is always possible it won't happen in the next year that I can see.

Oh I don't know. I do know their classes average about 27 at his age and in the city it is nearer 35.. I am not aware of any kind of Ofsted rating system here so not sure how to find out about teaching. We know lots of primary teachers and they say only one or two schools are known to be good (no chance of getting in) and the rest are generally poor. Its a very unhelpful blanket statement but it is what they all say. The general consensus is that village schools are better, but I don't know if that is based on fact or just local opinion.

My 2 go to a very small village school - but it is right across from our house and teh children all play with each other after school. Playing with their school frinds is very important to them. The school is lovely with a great atmosphere - but there are no after school clubs and facilities are limited (ie no gym hall so they are bussed to a hall nearby for PE, school dinners are made at another school and brought in, no staff room for the teachers) etc. My 2 love it and I am very happy they are there - but I am sure if we lived in a city they would also be happy at teh local school as their friends would be there.

sorry - I thought you were moving to the UK...I am nowhere near Spain!

Could you rent out your city house and rent something in the village or nearby instead?

If it were me, I'd go for the village school anyway. I don't think 20 mins is too long, however is your DH really going to be able to do as many of the drop offs as he thinks? Surely the school day is shorter than the working day....?

hatwoman - lol ok

Well he works pt 10am - 2pm so drop offs fine and pick up - the idea is that he would go eat at his mum´s and prob have his siesta there and be ready to pick up ds at 4ish, he likes the idea and his mum would be ecstatic.

i think the friend thing worries me, like someone else said all play dates and parties etc would be there too.. but mind you maybe by the time that is an issue we would consider moving out nearer there..

.. ds isn´t even 3 til next month, i can´t believe we actually even have to think about this!!!