Cornton, St Ninians or Riverside Primary School in Stirling. Stirling High vs. Wal

[Sunshine201415]

Hi all, I'm after some advice re primary schools near our new house. driving myself insane with this. Hope you'll have some local insights! Here is our situation: We are moving from the South of England to Blairlogie near Stirling in the summer, my kids are 8, 6 and 3. oldest is super shy and sporty, middle child is quite academic. Don't know much about local schools but looked at St Ninian's Primary which seemed great. Also saw Bridge of Allan which was fab but no after school clubs which is difficult. Looked at St Mary's dunblane which seems lovely but lots of rumours about lack of academic input and it's very (too?) small. I didn't look at Riverside as that seems quite big for my oldest one. Anyone know anything about Cornton Primary?
Then the next dilemma is Stirling High or Wallace High. Wallace High seems better? I keep going round in circles! Arrrrghhh. any help or advice would be much appreciated. Thanks :)

Well Riverside is your catchment school. Speaking as a current parent, it doesn't seem huge. Whole school assemblies are rare. They split use of the lunch hall by year groups (P1-3 together, for example) and the same goes for the different playgrounds. So the size of the overall school isn't as noticeable.
Wallace HS might well appeal to your eldest. It has a School of Sport and those pupils get to do extra sport. I think Wallace is also reasonably academic.

Not sure if you're aware OP Scotland works on school catchments. So every address has 2 catchment primaries and 2 secondaries attached to it ( 1catholic and 1 non-denominational). You are guaranteed a place in catchment school as long as there is space in the class when you move.
Most children in Scotland go to their catchment school.

You can apply to other schools which are out of catchment and they will take you if there's spaces but just be aware that your youngest child is not guaranteed a place at that school when they start P1 if the class is full with catchment children.

Sorry don't have local knowledge of that area but there's several posters on here from Stirling area

thank you so much for your reply! yes the catchment school point makes sense; there is also a school bus with riverside which would pick up the children which would be great. i haven't had a chance to visit riverside but had a look at st ninians which has places for out of catchment students next year. it does seem to have much more outside space and is a bit smaller than riverside which made me think it might be a better fit. but i am favouring wallace as a secondary school. can i ask you how your children have found riverside? i.e. how approachable have you found the teachers? does the autism support mean that there are separate classes for kids with higher needs, or are they in the same class but with more teaching support?

My child is in Gaelic at Riverside - he is very happy there. The teachers are generally very friendly and approachable. Although Riverside has a bit less green space, they also use the local park (less than 5 minutes walk away).
The autism unit is for children with high needs, I think and they have separate classes.

In your case I would stick with your catchments unless anything becomes an issue. Especially with 3 kids you'd be worrying about getting the youngest in and be left with sorting your own travel arrangements.

My DC went to Riverside nursery (though they are adults now) and I know kids who currently go and sent their younger DC even though they've moved out of catchment so they must be happy with it. Stirling High used to be much better academically/reputation wise than Wallace but Wallace is pretty desirable nowadays.

thank you for sharing! that's really good to hear. I think riverside will be a good fit and wallace will be great too. thanks for the advice! I 'might' (..) have over-worried. feeling the pressure of finding a good place for them, they aren't pleased at the prospect of changing schools but will hopefully get used to it quickly.

thank you for sharing, it's great to hear from someone who's got children at the school. we will go with riverside, it makes sense it being catchment and the link to wallace is great too for the future. I might have been overthinking this.. the older two aren't looking forward to leaving their friends but the move brings so many benefits to us as a family. I hope they'll settle in quickly and we can all relax (an ambitious aim in 2022!).

I'm sure you will love it here and settle in quickly. There is so much to do for kids in the area, opportunities for them to get involved in any sport you can possibly imagine plus scouts/guides, arts, drama, computing and so on.

It's a great place to raise kids and I'm sure the Coffee Bothy will be a firm favourite for you.