Moving a child from England (GCSEs) to Scottish Highers

[SingleDad2kids]

Hello. I am panning to move to Scotland with my eldest daughter in 2024 after she has finished her GCSEs in England. Due to her DOB (Dec. 2007), I have been told by a school that she would not go into S5 but S6 instead.
This concerns me for a few reasons. She wants to go to Edinburgh Uni but the requirements are ABBB at the end of S5 or AAAB at the end of S6. This uptick in requirements might mean my daughter has an impossible hill to climb if the Uni classes her as being an S6 graduate when she has, technically, missed / skipped a year at school. I am wondering if anybody knows if Universities will class her as 'end of S6' or if they'll accept she has only done 1 year of Scottish Highers.
The other option is to leave her with her mum and let her sit her A-levels in England and then come and live with me in Edinburgh after that in 2026. She will be living with me at least 80 days a year if I move without her anyway due to holidays etc. And as I will be living in Edinburgh and she will come to live with me, she will be 'ordinarily resident' in Scotland at that time. She won't have finished her schooling in Scotland but will be UK resident for over 3 years and 'ordinarily resident' in Scotland when her Uni course starts as she will have been living with me permanently from June 2026 to her course start date in October 2026.
There are lots of posts online saying you have to have lived in Scotland for 3 years to be ordinarily resident. But that rule has changed. It's 3 years living in UK and 'ordinarily resident' in Scotland.
So I either move to Scotland with her in 2024 and she might be put up a year at school and then be scuppered getting into Uni because she will be classed as S6 and need the higher grades. Or she continues to live in England and do her A levels coming to live with me in 2026. But then I am worried she won't be classed as 'ordinarily resident' because she finished school in England, turned 18 already, and it could be viewed that she purely came up for the free Uni. Which isn't the case as she and I want to move up to Edinburgh in 2024 and would only hold off if it meant that would damage her chances of getting the lower S5 entrance requirements. I have elderly parents who live in Edinburgh, hence the need to move back home.
I am aware that National 5s are harder than GCSEs but she should be ok if she focusses for a year.
Any help or advice is really appreciated. Thanks in advance. JC

Is there any reason why she has to go into S6 and can't start S5? I would query that with the school, and look at others nearby.

Be aware the new school year starts straight after exams in most schools, so early June. But that's not insurmountable.

Can she not do S5? A lot of p1s defer, so there will be a range of ages in S5. It would be an impossible task to do S6, as only some highers can be crashed and the rest would be studying advanced highers. Also note that the higher curriculum usually starts in May of S4

I’ve just repeated everything the previous poster said 🤦🏼‍♀️ Great minds etc..

Though most schools allow S6 to do Highers with S5s. She also won’t be crashing Highers if she studied the subject to GCSE level. I would agree about asking to go into S5. There is an anomaly in Scotland though - the council is obliged to educate you until 16 but only can educate you after that. This means you cannot insist on a school placement at that age (though you can insist on staying put).

Also beware. Whilst Scottish students don’t pay fees for Scottish universities there are also less places for Scottish students. The number of university places is capped by government and as the fees they receive for Scottish students is only £1820 the universities won’t push to increase numbers as the can’t afford to. They also give preference to students who meet various widening access criteria such as living in deprived postcodes. This meant last year there were nine courses at Edinburgh University, including Law, that no Scottish students were considered for unless they had a flag for widening access but English students without this were.

Agree with others about pushing for S5 or try another school. She'll only be a month older than the eldest in the year!
If she goes into S6 she will among the youngest in the year and will only get one go at exams and won't be able to do Advanced higher.

I would echo PP about Edinburgh uni and Scottish students. They need lots of rUK and overseas students to make up for the low funding from Scottish Gov. It depends on the course and I think there's more Scottish places in science, engineering etc.
Edinburgh Uni publish the offer rate per course so you could look that up.

I think you have to have been living in Scotland for a few years to qualify for free tuition fees if that's what you were thinking!

What does your daughter want to do? I would think that's the most important point. To be honest, she might be more settled doing A Levels as a natural progression from GCSE.

No you just have to be ordinarily resident in Scotland, not just here to study. So in other words made your home here.
SAAS doesn't state a timescale in Scotland but person must have been resident in the UK for 3 years

I think the point about S5 v S6 grades is whether you’ve got them in one sitting/without resitting. So to get in with your 5th year grades you need to do 4 highers in one sitting and get an A and 3Bs. But if you got an A, 2Bs and a C but then did 2 more highers in S6 and got 2As you would meet the AAAB requirement. You would also get in if you got AAB in S5 and AA in S6 - the logic is that it’s easier to get top grades if you are doing fewer subjects at one time. At least that’s how I recall from my uni application days though admittedly that was 20 years ago now. I definitely know someone who failed a higher in S5, resat the course in S6 and got an A and got a uni place on the basis of an A but the uni took into account it was a resit.

So I’d expect if she got ABBB the first sitting of highers she’d get in to a course requiring AABB in S5 - logically it can’t matter if she’s a actually does it in as S5 or S6 because a higher is a higher whether you do it in S5 or S6, she will just have to explain in her application about her move etc.
Also she can do highers in college if needs be.

The problem comes if, having grown up in England, she decides she would prefer to go to an English University, or wants to have them as backup if she doesn’t get into Edinburgh. By going into S6 she will be unable to take advanced Highers and many English universities are looking for Advanced Highers as providing a level of subject study similar to A levels.

You may have to pay fees in England but remember they do three years of study (approx £28k fees) then in their fourth year if they get a graduate job will earn approx £28k. So over the four years it would take to earn a degree at Edinburgh the overall cost would be about the same - although possibly still ahead in England with her first year of employment under her belt.

There's also the issue of topics e.g. History, will include Scottish History and Scottish students will have a head start on that. Similar with Modern Studies (Scottish Politics), English (Scottish literature). So she may find some Highers much harder than if she were doing A Levels.

A lot of eggs in one basket with this plan, totally focused on Edinburgh Uni.

If you cannot find a school which will accept your daughter for S5 entry then you should not move her.

She is in a suitable age range for S5 entry 2024, will just be at the older end. Most pupils her age will be in S6 but it could seriously affect her education and opportunities for some years to come if she enters at that level.

Don't forget she will be in an unfamiliar environment, socially as well as academically.

Whether she gets into Edinburgh uni depends on many factors and realistically no one can ever assume they're definitely going to be offered a place at their university of choice - she (and you) need to look around at other options where she would be happy.

If you cannot find a school which will accept your daughter for S5 entry then you should not move her.

Absolutely agree with this. You need to prioritise her getting her A levels or Highers in S5 over what happens next. I would avoid going into Scottish system in S6.

Also remember many Scottish schools start S5 courses as soon as the S4 exams finish at the end of May. So while your dd is still sitting her GCSE exams Scottish pupils have already started their Highers courses. Prelims could be as early as November/December.

She is only 15. There is still quite a bit of time for her to change both her planned degree subject and preferred university. I know quite a lot of my friends’ children changed their minds once they went to university open days and listened to subject talks.

Early days I know, but what course is she interested in?

Many courses require as a minimum much higher grades than you state (unless contextual).

Edinburgh University is way over subscribed and it can be very hard to achieve an offer.

Agree with others about S5 entry.

In my experience schools can be frosty about S5 transfers so you need to be persistent (in my case despite LA granting place they claimed they couldn't offer key subject combinations). In the event it worked out okay as there was enough movement post Nat5 results. If noticed a big shift in attitude to me and my DD when they had her transcript so if your DD is predicted to do well at GSCEs make sure they know this.

I would consider letting your DD do A levels in England with a view to moving up here afterwards. S5 is an intense school year and it would be a lot for her to settle in to a new school, make friends and sit her Highers all in one year. I think her grades would be likely to suffer. Also, if there is a lot of competition for spaces Edinburgh Uni may only take students who have grades in excess of the minimum on their website.

I would agree with others saying that she should join S5 and to push the issue with school (and/or the local authority) She may be one of the oldest in the year but when ds was at school, there were at least two of his friends who had December birthdays (ds' birthday is in September) and one whose birthday was in November (so they were nearly a year older than him). on the flip side another friend was over 5 months younger than him as his birthday was near the end of February and he hadn't been deferred

It makes absolute sense with her exams as she will progress from doing GCSEs (the equivalent of Nat 5s) onto studying for her Highers in S5.

The only thing she might be upset at is that as soon as she finishes her GCSE exams, you need to hightail it up to Scotland so that she can get a week or so of the end of S4, as by that time they'll have started the S5 timetable (and some schools will even call it S5 at that point ). If she finishes her school year in England, she'll end up only having c3 weeks of summer holiday as the Scottish school start back in mid August.

But if you can't come up early, most schools are pretty good at going back over stuff when they start back in mid August for those kids who have not got the/got better results than they expected and what to change their Higher choices. Although you may also struggle to get spaces in the classes that she wants to do.

She definitely won’t have to go into S6. My DC is currently in S6 and has a friend in the same school year who was born in (early) Dec 2005. I know the kid’s parents and there was no reason for this other than they thought it was best for their DC to be older when starting school rather than one of the younger ones.

If she finishes her school year in England, she'll end up only having c3 weeks of summer holiday as the Scottish school start back in mid August.

In England you don’t return to school after your GCSEs exams before the summer holiday; you normally get an extra few weeks of holiday depending when your exams finish.

Not true. There is a difference between deferring then continuing through the system, and joining the system later. And, as I mentioned, at that age the council do not have to offer a place in school at all (although can and generally will).

This isn’t a routine situation. This is a child moving between school systems and joining at the appropriate stage. I know of someone whose child changed primary school and they repeated a year. This was decided and agreed after dialogue between the parents and school as to what was most appropriate for the child.

It is a very routine situation. Children move between England and Scotland all the time. In this case they are also not of ‘school age’.

Not sure if this would be available to you or would altered chances of getting into Uni ( regards contextual offers) but do some of the private school in Edinburgh still do A levels, I know they used to. Might be an easier transition