Cambridgeshire/Lincolnshire living with good schools

[SMJ21]

Hello

Wondering if someone could help us please. We are currently thinking of where to move for better schools and also bigger space

We have 6, 4 and 2 year olds and a safe neighborhood with good schools is key.

We are aware of Lincolnshire and the great outstanding schools including Grammer schools. We are familiar with Cambridgeshire areas such as Warboys, St Ives, Sawtry, St Neots too..most of which have 'Good' schools according to Ofsted but with our budget, we can easily get a very generous sized 4-5 bed with massive garden in Linc's Vs smaller but OK 4-5 bed in Cambs ...

We are mostly working from home and would be for a while etc... Not sure if moving to completely unfamiliar Lincs is worth it or just stick to Cambs..

Help please lol

Lincs might have good schools but nothing else. a terrible place to live in from what I've seen and heard. Racism, unemployment, drunkenness. Cambs is obvsly highly cultured and intellectual, diverse, vibrant, young, and beautiful. No brainer really... Good schools too. In private, perse, Stephen perse, St faiths, St. Mary's. In state, look for St. Albans, cam uni primary, St. Matthews, St. Bedes. Hills Road 6th form. Is it primary or secondary you're after?

@Whatafuss

Lincs might have good schools but nothing else. a terrible place to live in from what I've seen and heard. Racism, unemployment, drunkenness. Cambs is obvsly highly cultured and intellectual, diverse, vibrant, young, and beautiful. No brainer really... Good schools too. In private, perse, Stephen perse, St faiths, St. Mary's. In state, look for St. Albans, cam uni primary, St. Matthews, St. Bedes. Hills Road 6th form. Is it primary or secondary you're after?

I think that’s more than a bit harsh. I’ve worked and lived in Lincs and don’t recognise that. There are areas of high brexit voting so I accept some areas are racist. But there’s plenty which aren’t. I certainly don’t see “drunkenness”. No idea what the unemployment figures are but certainly locally it doesn’t seem to be an issue. 🤷‍♀️

OP, Lincs is a massive county....are you fussed where in the county you’d be looking? Do you want to be in the south of the county? Louth is a nice market town with good schools, think it was recently voted best market town in the U.K. to live so certainly not a “terrible place”.

If I were choosing between the Cambs towns/ villages you've mentioned then I'd rather have somewhere like Stamford with access to grammar schools and a lovely town.

@Whatafuss Cambridge city may be intellectual, young etc, but Cambs as a county certainly isn't- there's nothing vibrant or diverse about sawtry, warboys or the fens. Parts of Lincs are actually very similar to Cambs in terms of the landscape and the communities. All the schools you've mentioned are Cambridge city based which is a fair trek in rush hour traffic from the areas op has mentioned.

@Roodicus21 Stamford doesn't offer very good alternatives for schooling if your children don't make the cut for grammar though. Unless you can pay private of course.

(And Stamford doesn't have Grammar schools itself of course, you'd be travelling to Bourne/Grantham or Spalding)

Lincolnshire is a huge county, depends what kind of lifestyle you want or is it just big house and good school?

South, If you want access to good roads/rail then Grantham would be a good idea. Spalding / Bourne grammars are okay but the towns themselves are fairly quiet and a trek to get out anywhere. Boston has grammars but is a horrible town nowadays.

North there is some lovely areas around the Wolds, Caistor / Louth or even Lincoln itself (which now has more direct trains to London).

There are lots of good access to coastlines, but not all are that nice. Skegness has grammar school (but not that good), but has had a bit of money spent past few years to bring it up a bit. But it really is miles from civilisation for anything other than seaside days.

Oh and as above Stamford is nice, but you pay a premium so depends on your budget.

Lincs isn't as bad as @Whatafuss says at all! I wouldn't live in Boston but generally it's not like that at all.

I grew up near the wolds, went to a grammar school nearby. I had an idyllic childhood. I can't offer much else but can't see Lincs get such bad press unfairly. Highly recommend areas around the wolds too. Beautiful place.

I would go for Leicestershire over Lincolnshire, personally, if you want Outstanding schools.

Lincolnshire is a lovely place but it can be a bit quiet. Parts of it are dominated by industrialised farming and it's a long drive to bigger cities or amenities, that's why house prices are cheap.
North of Lincoln are some very good schools, that's where my parents live. The villages are quite popular and Lincoln itself has a station and is reasonably well connected by road. Unfortunately it's like many places in that if you have money you will probably live somewhere nice and love it. If you're broke it can be grim.

oh yes i definitely meant Cambridge city, not the county - dont have extensive knowledge about the county - except Ely which is also very nice and has great schooling. Nearby villages e.g. Coton etc are also good. Standing by my thoughts on Lincs though, sorry :D

@Whatafuss primary for now... And racism would definitely be a big deal for us but let me see what others in the are thinks too. Thanks much

@Whatafuss I'm not sure what you are basing your opinion of Lincolnshire on, but thank you. With a bit of luck comments like yours will help to hide the fact that it is largely a beautiful, peaceful and safe county to live in and keep house prices low enough for locals to be able to afford to buy here.

Thank you all so much for this insight ... Lots to think about.... Hmmm

Not too fussed what part of Lincs as long as transportation isn't so horrid and with good schools

@Roodicus21 I agree with Stamford and have seen how nice the area is. I think it's right in the middle too and better than bourne itself? Not sure as don't know the areas lol

@CovidCorvid There are areas of high brexit voting so I accept some areas are racist.

Wtf! People who voted Brexit are racist, say what now? I give up.

We moved to Lincolnshire 13 years ago for work and have stayed because our kids were settled in their schools.

Having lived in London previously, Lincs is a very quiet low crime area. We live in a village, that has an outstanding primary school and our youngest goes to an outstanding secondary school. Our eldest went to a different outstanding secondary school.

There is racism in the county, but it’s rife across all the fen counties. They needed people to come in for food production but the existing community felt threatened.

[quote iminthegarden]@CovidCorvid There are areas of high brexit voting so I accept some areas are racist.

Wtf! People who voted Brexit are racist, say what now? I give up.[/quote]
I think you probably need to live here and see what people in brexit capital aka Boston are saying in the street and on the local news, etc. There certainly appears to be a correlation. I'm not saying everyone who voted for brexit is racist... Certainly many may have fallen for the message on the bus. But I do think most racists voted for brexit.

Really hope you're not saying 52% of the voting public are racist.

Not too fussed what part of Lincs as long as transportation isn't so horrid

Getting to and from most places in Lincs is pretty torturous by road.

@SMJ21 Stamford is much, much nicer than Bourne, better connected by train and it's on the A1. It's a beautiful town with a lot of history. But the traffic is a bitch and it is eye wateringly expensive vs anywhere else in quite a distance, you will pay for the post code but unless you send your kids to schools out of town or pay for it, schooling isn't great at secondary.

But Bourne is fine in my opinion by the way! Just not really comparable to Stamford.

@iminthegarden

Really hope you're not saying 52% of the voting public are racist.

As per my previous post, no I'm not.

@Bluesheep8 I think I am becoming to that conclusion....