Possible move to Scotland from England but should we be concerned about education?

[Wouldliketomove]

Hello Everyone,

As the title says, DH and I are carefully researching a possible move to Scotland for our family (two toddlers currently) but I am constantly reading worrying things about education in Scotland. I'm aware there are also soon to be significant changes, which complicates things further and introduces more unknowns.

Can anyone with experience either as teachers or parents offer a perspective on education in Scotland at the moment please or any further insight into what is to come? I have tried to read what is widely available.

Thanks very much in advance

My kids did great in the Scottish school system.

It’s impossible to recommend schools as you need to pick a place to live first. It’s some super high percentage of children who go to their catchment school. Think I know maybe 6 or so who are out of catchment for various reasons so it’s very, very rare. So you pick a place to live and then go from there - your address will determine your school.

Take league tables with a pinch of salt. They’re based on the proportion of children registered in s4 who get whatever marks in highers and advanced highers. A school like ours will always be super low on the tables as half the kids leave after s4. And another half before advanced highers. So we can never have more than 25% success at advanced highers even if every single child in s6 has a perfect score. I don’t know how that differs from England but I think you stream kids at some point so the stats won’t be comparable?

I’ve hear good and bad things about pretty much every school in edinburgh where I have friends. A bright, motivated, socially confident child with an involved family will thrive pretty much anywhere. It’s often just luck - if a teenager finds a good hobby and a few friends it usually works out okay for them.

We found otherwise. There was no difficulty whatsoever at the uni end in understanding or immediate advising on Scottish target grades if not on website and that was at 8 different English unis over two children

Choose your preferred schools first , then look for a house in catchment if you value education.

This is exactly my thinking yes and why I asked if people would mind naming the schools they've had positive experiences with. I asked because schools will be a top consideration in choosing where in Scotland to live were we to move.

I asked if people would mind naming schools they have said they've been very happy with because, given how school admissions work in relation to catchment, we would be choosing a school first in order to decide where to live, look for work etc.

Thank you very much for your reply and advice. Do you have any advice on which stats are the ones specifically to look for when researching schools? Can you look at highers and advanced highers results stats presumably?

In England it's seemingly very easy to start to get an idea because, at the moment, one overall ofsted rating gives you an indication immeadiately and then you can look further into it and go from there. There is some criticism of this approach though.

have Lived many’s places in Scotland and have 4 kids and frankly Scottish education system is broken! Appalling!! Utterly utterly useless! And god help you if your child has additional needs!!

moved back to England and my children have flourished in the schools! Night and day compared to Scotland!!!

Re your concerns about climate change: could you go far north in England, thus staying within the English National curriculum?

Well yes but a city or area would be a good start…

My child has additional needs. She has just passed 5 Highers with high grades and has a place secured at university. There is nothing about the English system that ensures all children with additional needs are catered for properly, just as there isn’t in the Scottish system.

The system is not perfect but to suggest the whole of education in the whole of Scotland is broken and appalling is absolutely laughable. There are some excellent schools in all sorts of areas.

OP are you restricted by jobs, budget or preference for rural vs city? In Edinburgh being in the Boroughmuir High School catchment area is highly desirable but comes with a high property price - and no guarantee they won't redraw the catchment boundaries before your kids get to high school.

This is the main thing to understand. The "system" is more de-centralised in terms of what is taught and school rules on uniform and discipline etc. Family and friends in Scotland have very different experiences within cities never mind across areas of Scotland.

That said, there is more consistency in the type of school. There isn't the variety of different types of schools you get in England. So most people go to the local (catchment) state primary and secondary. There's not academies, grammars etc (most schools that have grammar in the name are usually just normal state schools which were historically selective but not any longer). Private schools serve a small minority (outside Edinburgh).

If you say where you're planning to move to people might be able to give you a more local answer.

I did ok out of it and got a first class honours degree, my brother got a PhD. My friends daughter from a bog standard Scottish Secondary went to Cambridge.

The data published compared achievement between deprivation levels of Scottish pupils in each council area.

The main takeaway I took from it was that it was purely levels of affluence that drove results and they were fairly similar across all council areas.

So councils which tend to have schools lower down the league tables ended up with much the same results as the ‘education powerhouse’ councils when comparing like for like.

This article gives you a few takeaways, but because it’s based on actual exam entries it shows the league tables up for the charade they are.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c3v0dx120nyo

For example East Dunbartonshire (one of the powerhouses) had a pass rate of 77% for advanced higher, whereas Falkirk (which is definitely not perceived as an educational powerhouse) had a pass rate of 79.2%.

The ED Schools are still way higher on normal league tables because they are based on the overall number of pupils taking the exams from the roll in S4.

Basically what I’m trying to say is that if you are able to support your child to study, encourage them and most importantly they are willing to put the work in them unless you are at an extremely challenging school then the chances are they’ll do well most places in Scotland.

You’re on Mumsnet though, so any suggestion of living somewhere outside the catchments for the top 20 schools will be looked upon with disdain.

Also, although many have stated most children go to their catchment school, in most areas there are actually 2 catchment schools to choose from, you have a non-denominational (varying religion influence depending on the school/area) and a Catholic School (Tend to be more religious activities, although some more than others.

Catholic schools are not restricted to baptised children, depending on area a high proportion are of other religions or none.

So you will have a choice of schools without making a placing request.

It really depends on the school/area in my experience.

A rural High School just won't have the teachers to cover every non statutory subject and popular subjects like Computer Science (whatever they call it now) will be vastly oversubscribed and end up like a lottery (or more like the teachers favourites in my experience.....).

You also don't really get a choice of school in rural areas, there is basically one school!

Kids in my area aren't able to take Psychology, Human Biology, German, Economics etc despite this being available nationally.

@Any1ForTennis There's a world of difference between people’s idea of what constitutes ‘Rural’ though.

It could be argued both Mallaig and Uplawmoor are both rural to different extents, but living in them would be very different.

The vast majority of the Scottish population have a choice of two catchment schools.

True but in practice it is rare to apply to an English University from Scotland for financial reasons; but also because any offer from an English University will likely be conditional on Advanced Higher results in S6, whereas a Scottish University including St Andrews will make an unconditional offer based on the Highers Results already in hand from S5. Why would anyone put themselves through that uncertainty level unless it was for Oxbridge/Medicine etc.

No one in the region I live has more than one choice of high school.

Some kids have to travel from their own town (not village or farm but actual proper town) 10 miles to the next bigger town for High School.

The rural kids, miles out of town on farms etc can spend over an hour the school bus.

I’d suggest you narrow down areas a bit first.

Glasgow, Edinburgh and Aberdeen are three hugely different cities. Inverness is different again and you wouldn’t necessarily recognise it as a city. West coast big islands are very different to west coast small islands. Northern isles are different again.

Small rural primary schools very much exist in a lot of areas but rolls are an issue in some places so they may or may not still exist. Some areas pupils board for secondary. Caithness has about half the numbers of hours daylight in winter compared to Argyll.

No one in Aberdeen city or shire has a choice of two catchment schools.

Is this a Glasgow faith schools thing?

@Any1ForTennis That is rare though, maybe not geographically but from a population perspective the vast vast majority of Scottish kids have access to 2 high schools.

Yes they do.

Well my nieces and nephews in Scotland are currently enjoying their free University placements whereas my own children will be paying off their student debt for much of their adult life.

So there is that …..

I’m in edinburgh and everywhere has a Church of Scotland or a catholic school in catchment. The catholic schools cover a wider area.

My kids’ school isn’t well known, we aren’t in a fancy area and it does terribly on the silly league tables but it suits my daughter perfectly. She is bright and loves learning and we do loads with her at home to encourage her. As it’s a large (but not huge) city school they have lots on offer and she is able to do her higher in dance which she loves.

They have loads of partnerships with local builders etc for those children interested in apprenticeships which was important to us to make sure our children had the opportunity to explore all sorts of options for their futures.

it is very diverse (for Scotland) and they have children who speak something like 60 different languages at home. They had a culture day where children could bring in food and traditions from their countries (or parents / grandparents etc) and it was beautiful. As my husband and I are immigrants this was hugely important to us.

These are the sorts of things that were priorities for us but everyone is different. There aren’t that many inherently good or bad options - it’s a balance. And of course, as others said, depending on your budget for a home and what you both do for work you might simply be priced out of some catchments. To get a 3 bedroom house in the ‘good’ catchments in edinburgh is a very different proposition to the same house a mile away or in Aberdeen or Nairn.