In year transfer (year 10)

[Boyceyuk]

Hi All,

My daughter is due to move from a mixed comprehensive to an all girls comprehensive (for various reasons) in the next coming weeks. She is in year 10 (eeek i know!). Academically she has always performed well and most of her grades are above average. Does any one have any experience of such a transfer that they could share some advice/stories on?

Best wishes,

Adam.

Find out when the next parents' evening is, and if it isn't for a while then make early contact with each of her teachers in the first 2-4 weeks. If she is changing boards for some of her exam subjects, ask what support they will put in place to ease her transition and what you can do at home.

I work as an academic mentor in a secondary school. In English Dept I supported a student who transferred from another country at the END of yr10!, so had no coursework at all. She achieved her C target grades in Lit and Language. But did poorly in other subjects where she didn't have the same support.

Often the information about the student is quite late arriving at the new school. If you could collect the information about boards, units covered, target grades, current grades, latest etc together and pass it on BEFORE she starts, it will make the transition much smoother. I often have to set a student with very little to go on, and then correct later which is not ideal. The school SHOULD do this, but I wouldn't count on it happening in time.

Thank you both for the great advice. We/she has an appointment with the enrolment officer tomorrow morning, with a projected start date of next Tuesday! What, in your good experience(s), are the downsides to such a move? I'm really worried about this move affecting her GCSE's and also her self-motivation.

Potential problems:

• The timetable structure of the new school may not allow her to continue with all the options she was previous doing
• The new school may be using a different exam board to the first school, so the work she's done may not be relevant and she may have other things she needs to catch up on.
• Even if the exam boards are the same the schools may have taught the syllabus in a different order. So she may have already covered units A and C, but the new school have done A and B and are about to cover C; so she will have repetition in lessons but will need to independently catch up some work.
• Ditto with modular exams - some schools do some modular exams in yr9 or early in yr10.
• Child can take a long time to settle, find their feet, get to know their teachers and make friends in new school.
• Teachers may not be fully motivated/committed towards your child as they always have the excuse "well she switched schools half way through yr10" if that student fails.
• Student can be misplaced in sets, because school didn't have full data available; or simply because the to set (or whatever) was already full.

It could be a success, but there are lots of potential downsides.
Once she's there and has a timetable and allocated teachers, I would strongly recommend making personal contact with each of her teachers. Maybe write a short letter explaining that you are keen and committed to her success; give your contact details - email and phone; and ask teacher to let you know what work she will need to catch up on with their subject, what support the school is able to offer (after school clinics, classes during PE lessons, etc.) and also ask what you can do at home to support/encourage her.

Good luck!