New free school or local comp?

[Snowfire]

DD (yr 6) has been offered a place at our 'good' local comp. The school is pretty big, around 1200 pupils and is quite newly built with really good facilities. It's within walking distance of our house and she would have a few friends there. My worries are that I worry that DD will just get overlooked in such a big environment and I've known other children who have left due to issues with bullying and worry that she may be a target as she doesn't tend to follow the crowd.
The other option is a new free school which is opening in our area. It's currently running as a very small independent faith school and will be moving to bigger premises in September. They will eventually have numbers up to 300 and will limit class size to 20. It sounds wonderful but they will have lots of new staff and there will be ongoing work to complete renovations going on throughout the first year. It just seems a bit of a voyage into the unknown but it could be wonderful!
So now I'm going to have to decide soon & it seems like such a tough decision. I had considered private but that would cripple me financially and with local options it didn't seem worth it.
Any thoughts?

Who is actually running the independent faith school? If it is fundamentalist Christian etc, unless you are of that persuasion I wouldn't go near it. If it can't make it in the private sector, it doesn't inspire confidence. You are likely going to have to deal with the personalities of the people running it on a day to day basis - it may be their ego trip and if you don't see eye to eye it will be a disaster. Frankly having had kids at small independents and large state, I would go with the latter. More choice of friends, subjects etc.

How come that your child has been offered a place yet you can still apply for this other school? Presumably they can pick the pupils now and expect the state to pick up the tab when they turn into a free school in Sept? That also sounds pretty dodgy to me.

beingfluffy: no they can't. Once it has become a free school, the admissions code must apply, so if it's a free school from September, it needs to be on the state admissions code for that entry or it is breaking the law. (Pupils already in the school from earlier years do get to stay put though).

Has it definitely secured premises that are big enough for the proposed size of the free school. I saw something which suggested that there are still a lot running out of temporary accommodation and critics like to portray this as disarray in the whole policy. Whatever your take on that, you do need to find out if there is any lack of readiness for this individual school and this particular conversion.

I don't think the independent school is failing, the reason they give is that as there is no catholic secondary in the area and they want to expand and make it more accessible. The current building is tiny so the only take very few pupils at the mo.

The building was originally the old grammar school but has been used for other purposes until recently. They are currently working to make it a functional space before September but will be building an extension which will be an ongoing project.
I don't believe there is am issue with admissions, they seem to have criteria set out properly through the council.

Presumably you were on the waiting list then and have just been offered.

What are the results of the school at the moment? Are they recruiting a new Head Teacher and SLT to lead the school through the transition? I think that is more important that the building works.

My kids go to a 2000 school, and it is very good at not losing pupils. It can offer more subjects than the alternative 1000 pupil schools, and a much wider range of opportunities. It also has enough pils to be able to cater to those at both ends of the ability spectrum.
A school of 300 for secondary sounds far too small for me, that is only 60 pupils a year if spread over 5 year groups. So even if it has 20 per class, that is only three classes per year. I just don't see how that is financially viable, and I can't see how it will have enough pupils to offer very many subjects.

I would ask the comp about bullying, however bullying happens at all schools, so the crucial thing is how open they are to talking about bullying, and how they deal with it.

No waiting lists in our area. There wasn't an option to apply for this school in October as they hadn't completed purchase of the building so we applied for the local comp but now have an option to change to the new school.
The head has been in post for about 2 years and has (with governing body) done most of the work in planning the new school. I don't think there's anything dodgy or illegal going on, I was just wondering if anyone had similar experiences as I want to do the best got my DD.

Thanks mummytime, I will try and talk to someone at the comp so I can get some idea about how they deal with bullying. I know what you mean about the curriculum, I know the new school are talking about developing partnerships with other schools to share facilities but I'm not sure how this would work in practice. They do offer a pretty good range at the current school though so perhaps that wouldn't be too much of an issue.

I would be worried about the range of subjects - I currently have a DC at a large comp (240 entry) and a grammar (120) entry. Both have a relatively large range of subjects to choose from, - they both do Latin etc. There is also a good range of sports and extra curricula activities. I think there is bullying in all schools - how it is dealt with is important.

Having had experience of a small independent school at both primary and secondary level, I found that any criticism however minor was taken as a personal insult by the proprietor. The personality of the Head is in my opinion the most important factor in any school. In a small school this is even more magnified. Will there be enough money or benefits to attract bright graduate teachers or good experienced staff? What trips or sports will the school offer, how many languages?

If it is remaining a catholic school, then I guess the free school will have the resources and expertise of the diocesan catholic education service available to it. That is a huge amount of expertise, and support. On that basis I think I personally would be more reassured than if it were a brand new free school being set up by people with little previous experience iykwim

I know they will be offering a good range of languages; French, German, Spanish & Latin with possibly mandarin later on. The comp only offer the usual 3 languages.
I have no idea about school trips etc but I'm not overly worried about those aspects as I think expensive trips away can be discriminatory against less well off pupils.
As for the Head's personality, I find him quite pleasant so don't see this as a problem but I do see what you mean as it is a smaller environment.

As you are happy with the faith school by all means go for it, but it might be a good idea to have a plan B if you decide in year 7 or 8 it is not right for your DC. It sounds like it could be a fab school though and as the local comp doesn't appear to be outstanding and you have heard bad things about it, I would probably choose the new school if I was in your position.

If possible get involved from the beginning as a parent governor or in the PTA.

the "Free school" programme is based on political ideology rather than educational need
it is "based" on the charter school system in the USA - but the USA system has NO system of parental "choice" - each charter school merely competes against its catchment school - NOT the case in big cities in the UK
also Swedish free schools did NOT up standards and were largely subsumed back into a better system after ten years - at HUGE cost
and the Finnish system is GREAT at bringing all kids UP to standard
but rubbish at helping those who excel

Gove is an arse
his wrecking of the LEAs will be a boon in London and a curse outside it

go for schools that you KNOW will be there for your kids in 7 years time
or walk away

Go for the comprehensive. Better the devil you know.....

OK you seem reassured by languages, although I would still wonder how they can get teachers for 4 possibly 5 languages with such a small cohort. However what about DT? Or Art?
Never mind the wide range of subjects for the less academic.
Sport will obviously be of a poorer quality, they will only have about 30 pupils of each sex to choose from for teams. A real problem for sports like Hockey, Rugby and Football.
Where does your daughter want to go?

She is also undecided about where to go. Her closest friends will be going to a different school, which neither of us liked when we visited. She loved the facilities at the comp but felt that the small school had a really happy atmosphere.
I've had the same thoughts about sports provision, DD isn't likely to make any great waves on the sports field but I think it's good for schools to be able to compete, it gives them more of an identity.
Staff wise, I know they have a lot of P/T teachers who will be moving with them & some increasing their hours. They are actively recruiting now to have more in post by September.
I don't know about the less academic subjects, I know art, dt & music are covered. They haven't mentioned offering anything like BTEC but tbh, I don't think that would matter for DD, she wants to be a scientist.
I suppose this is about weighing up the risks... Do I send her to the comp & risk her being bullied and getting lost in the crowd or do I send her to the smaller school & accept that she may miss opportunities that may be available at the bigger school.
I think I need to speak to both schools again to gain some clarity.

Why do you think she might be bullied?

I'm sorry, the maths of this does not make sense, unless Free Schools are getting bucketloads of extra money that Gove has not told us about. Whatever the spin is, the school is obviously in the position that it was not financially secure as an independent school - otherwise why consider changing? Are its running costs covered by fees at the moment? Is it being subsidised by the Church or by donations? Are parents fund-raising simply to cover the cost of running the school? Do they think the grass will be greener on the other side of the fence? At the moment do they accept children with SEN? EAL? EBD?

It is easy for a school to make promises and have plans when it does not exist yet - it's a bit like election promises! I don't see (even if you look at practical things like rooms and timetables) how all of that curriculum can be going on - unless they are going to teach mixed age groups.

My DCs go to a big comp and they have fantastic pastoral care because of the house system. I think most big comps are the same. Bullying can happen anywhere - even in a very small school, so I don't think you should use the fact that your child "may be" bullied as a part of the decision-making.

I'm not saying don't consider it. But lots of questions and eyes wide open.

I suppose the reason I worry about DD being bullied is that she had a lot of problems in her old school and I eventually moved her a couple of years ago. She's fine at her current school and has a good group of friends but her old school is the biggest feeder for the comp so I worry about old problems coming back to haunt her.
I had a chat to DD's teacher about it all today, she could see where I was coming from but said that she thinks DD could do really well at the comp. She knows the children who were recently moved for bullying and she says that the school didn't have much of a chance to sort out the problems before the parents moved them. She doesn't know much about the new school but suggested we could have it as a backup plan if things don't work out at the comp.
We also saw a friend's daughter on the way home who is in yr11 at the comp and she was telling DD about how great it is and if she wants to talk to her about it before she goes, they could meet up for a chat!! So of course DD is now totally excited about having a grown up, cool friend and wants to go to the comp so I guess that's that.
I will still keep an eye on what's going on with the free school, Riversidemum, I know they do have provision for some SEN, I guess EBD would be something they would have to have a policy for and make changes for if the need arises. I have no idea about EAL, tbh I don't think the even comp would have much need for that in our area, we're a bit off the beaten track (we all have 6 fingers & webbed toes) but I guess that could easily change in the future!
Thanks for your thoughts everyone, I think we'll go with the comp and see how it goes :)