Common Entrane Exams

[Uloves]

Do anyone know whether DS can be registered for both Academic Common Entrance and the Standard Common Entrance exams for different schools? The Academic one is in May and the standard common entrance is in June. I want a guarantee of having secured a school from my second choice school before sitting for my 1st choice school in June.

MolliO if your DS is joining in yr 4 then your head should have plenty of time to assess him especially if your looking for boarding. Ok you may have or about to have missed the registration for places like St Paul's boys but most of the super selective interview in yr 6 and registration can easily take place in yr 5 and if your DS has a late birthday as late as yr 6 for Eton. Most of the other schools selective or less selective have a much later registration. Also most heads are pretty good at assessing children and advising them about schools if not your in the wrong prep. Lets face it thats what they are there for; my DS for example joined his prep in yr 3 and within 8 weeks we were advised by the head to send him to Win Coll. It does help if you have some idea as to where you want to send him.

Radley or Bradfield are my current favourites. He's on the waiting list at Radley as I didn't register him early enough. According to the head Radley would be possible but not Eton (which is very local but I can't picture ds going there).

Mollie - is your DS year 4? You have lots of time! The Radley wait list will move so keep the faith! Radley and Bradfield are very different! Have you looked round Marlborough and Wellington. Could be 2 more coed options in a similar geographic area.

Ds is in yr 3. I think Radley would suit him. They said we'd stand a better chance via the Warden's List or scholarship. No idea about Bradfield other than it looks nice and is close. Wellington seems very London-centric although an option for a low CE pass (at least that is what Wellington head told our head, not sure I'd like to test that). Not thought about Marlborough. Fortunately we have lots of time to mull over possibles.

We looked at Bradfield for our DS. It didn't suit our family as there were a lot of weekly boarders. One of its selling points that makes it different from some other schools is that all 13+entrants go into a mixed house Faulkners before moving onto the separate houses.

Marlborough is taking applications up until Sept 2015.

You mention that Wellington has a low CE pass mark, maybe they have flexibility but the DCs I know there were all 60% + candidates and once there, it seemed quite a lot of academic pressure was applied. This is second hand information but although I wouldn't expect it to have a pass mark similar to Winchester College I wouldn't have viewed it as a low pass mark either. Plus it may be affected by the fact that they have already selected via pre testing in year 7?

Time seems to fly by when they are at prep school .....

I think the pass rate is lower if you have something else to offer Wellington, eg music, sport etc.

That should be pass mark not rate.

Re: W, I think the something else has to be pretty exceptional ( national sport, gr5++ music). They are (currently) so oversubscribed they can pick and choose. I second what goinggetstough said about pressure pressure pressure once you are there!

mollie you have lots of time. Your DS will change a lot between year 4-8 and so will the schools! Go and see them all and keep an open mind. People chop and change right up until the feb before common entrance ( and sometimes after)!

You are totally correct milkshake people do chop and change up until the last minute as we see on this board but sadly at many of these schools you have to part with a registration fee to be able to do this. These registration fees are then taken over by confirming your place fees often in our experience 12 - 18 months out and they are serious money(or at least they were to us!!).

Thanks for all your comments. Sorry was offline whole of yesterday. Just to reiterate that Head all along has said my son will be ok for Tonbridge and only after Mock that he's said we should look at other school. We have seen head of T and has confirmed that if DS want to sit for school he's registered for 3 years go, he is happy for him to make it his first choice obviously against Prep head's advice. However, we should also have a good plan B (hence my thread of seeking alternative slightly lower academic than T). My thread on CAS was to understand if the same DS can be registered for two different schools one for CAS and another for CE. We have decided to sit for T as first choice and now looking at alterntives to register (Lancing, Ardingly, Epsom and Eastbourne). Stowe we have been advised against as it is allegedly known as a partying school but don't take my word for it.

Tonbridge don't do CAS they set their own scholarship exam which is timetabled at roughly the same time or they take CE - is his T place therefore being assessed on the latter and you want him to sit CAS for another ? Unless he has done CAS syllabus work and practice essays I think you may find it demoralising for him to attempt to do so now and then have to sit CE. Eastbourne and Ardingly are perceived as lesser academically although there will be some pupils who excel and would seem an odd back up choice for a child who is also a Tonbridge candidate. He must have done well in the T pretest to be considered anyway.

LIZS - Yes, I was thinking of CAS for another school and CE for T. He did well in the T pretest. I guess if there is concern at this stage of meeting T CE passmark then the alternative backup plan B will have to be lesser academic hence reason we are thinking of Ardingly, Eastbourne etc.

but those are not really the tier below. Does it need to be boarding ? What about Christ's Hospital or Brighton College?