Graveney - Renting in catchment for admissions purposes

[StockwellLiving]

I am thinking about renting for a 12 month period or so from this summer to cover up to beginning of Y7 for DD in Sept 2013. And then moving back out.

I know (most people think) renting is wrong (and often discussed here). I actually also think its wrong, but I also know others do it (and not sure why we should be the only one not "playing the game", and I do want to avoid my local catchment school (have no religion, no money (for indies), average DD with no chance of her passing selection tests).

I am not starting this thread to get into the rights and wrongs of it - I only want to ask the very specific question: Do "renters" get caught and are places actually withdrawn?

I am asking about Graveney, not in general. I know from threads on MN that some LAs do try and look into short-term renting. But somehow I think that this particular school and this particular LA don't really care (happy to have aspirational middle classes moving into catchment) ...... so do they look into whether the rental is permanent or not, whether the renters have an owned (proper) home (rented out for a year)

Just wondering as it seems its increasingly popular to do this ....

Ignore spelling of perform - Must preview before I send:)

In fact, thinking about it some more, what the OP is possibly really looking for by mentioning skiing, is that she's looking for schools where the kids have a similar culture?

EDU - Caribbean and African girls do routinely better than Caribbean and African boys. And earn more in their lifetime than white women from similar social backgrounds. Basically because they are more likely to work full-time after having children.

Caribbean boys do ok in primary, but often perform very badly in secondary stats.

I used to teach GCSE English retake in an FE college in South London. My class was full of black boys who were bright enough to pass GCSE English but had done bugger all work in school for years. Many had poor basic skills.

Someone mentioned the mothers of these boys being strict. Well yes, they were all frightened of their mothers, who would berate them in front of me in parent teacher meetings. Did it make any difference to their willingness to get their heads down and do some work? Errrr, no. It was profoundly depressing.

Maybe the schools, dominated by white middle class teachers, inadvertently and subliminally turn boys from Afro-Caribbean boys off education?

Have heard it said before that women from Afro-Caribbean backgrounds outperform all other groups in terms of earnings and achievements - so one gender is switched on to achieve and the other is switched off achieving....hmmmm

I wonder how well schools like Graveney and the Bolingbroke Academy will reflect the cultural diversity of London and do working class white boys and Afro-Caribbean boys (both groups appearing to be disadvantaged by the current system) who are at these much sought-after secondaries outperform peers at less prestigious secondary schools?

On other issues the "birds of a feather" scenario is I'm sure true - children (as generally adults) with similar backgrounds/outlooks/experiences will cluster together.

Personally, I do think a lottery system is highly desirable though - for all non-selective secondary schools. All children deserve the best education available not just those whose parents have the money and/or know-how to play the system to their DCs advantage.

What I think is a crying shame is children in care who are the first priority for entry to a lot of secondary schools. They deserve and need the best education to off-set other disadvantages stacked against them and yet I wonder how many children in care are at the best secondary schools in London - do the children themselves determine what secondary school they attend or do their guardians, based on locality of schools etc...?

@Shangmundfrued Thanks for the further statistics which I wasn't aware of. I do quite a bit of voluntary work in diverse primary schools hence my interest. The strict parenting thing is quite true. What is also true, based on research, and little is mentioned about is that their educational expectations for their kids, is also extremely high. When I spoke to a friend of mine who is black and runs a Saturday school, his view is that the parents of the kids who don't do well, similar to those from the lower working class white groups, are simply too trusting of the teachers/school system and are under the illusion that the work they do in school is enough to make a change. The thought is that good parenting is deemed as the kids being clean and tidy, not allowed to stay out late, and having nutritious meals. There is less parental involvement from these two groups, which as most MC parents know, accelerates learning. Compare that to say Indian parents where there culture as such where your success as an individual is sole based on your education success, means that their kids doing 3/4 hours extra work after school, especially if the aim is Grammar school, is not unusual. The Chinese Tiger Mums, I remember reading, wrongly or rightly (that would of course depend on your values), with exception to Music, care little for creative subjects such as Art and Drama, for example.

@gazzalw Thank you too for your post which was also really enlightening. Too many great points to mention. I think there is a self fulfilling prophecy happening, fueled by the media which impacts, teachers and peer groups. I remember one Mother of a young black boy telling my about her son who'd won numerous awards for his reading ability in his previous private school. She had to move him to a state school, where his fabulous reading, a good 4/5 years ahead of his 8yr old self continued and congratulated by a fab teacher. When he moved into the next year however, the teacher put him into the middle ability group for reading. When she questioned the teacher as to why, she freely admitted that she hadn't even heard him read, but made the decision based on the size of the huge novel she saw him with, which she felt, at his age, would have been far too much for him. So put him in a lower group so he could build up to it. She of course wondered that if he had been white, if she would have made the same assumptions? Had she not been on the case, only heaven knows what other assumptions/holding back would have happened.

Equally, I agree too that from my experience, the secondary schools being selected by those that need the most help and especially from these two groups is often based on locality as opposed to academic achievements/pass results etc. Often too, they will pick the 'church school' because it is just that, a church school. Unfortunately however, there are good church schools and poor achieving church schools.

@gazzalwForgot to mention too - Honestly, like you, I agree the lottery system is the only method that will bring about fairness and a change. I simply would never have been able to afford an expensive house near a good school, which means for someone like me who values education but who is also far from wealthy, under the current system of most schools, based on catchment alone, my ds would suffer.

In the schools interest, I would have thought that it must reduce the number of appeals also, because the system is so much fairer.

Compare that to say Indian parents where there culture as such where your success as an individual is sole based on your education success, means that their kids doing 3/4 hours extra work after school, especially if the aim is Grammar school, is not unusual.

Oh geez, should have read...Compare that to say Indian parents where, their culture determines their individual success, based on their educational success, which means, their kids doing 3/4 hours extra work after school, especially if the aim is Grammar school, is not unusual.

"There is less parental involvement from these two groups, which as most MC parents know, accelerates learning."

Often because the children spend very little time at home with their parents because the parents are out at work ALL THE TIME.

So children are going to after school club, breakfast club, being picked up by grandparents, aunts, siblings etc.

Also many West Indian and African children being bought up in single parent households, far more than the average (46% of children in Caribbean households as opposed to 25% average). And very high percentage with working single mothers.

I see these women at the school gate occasionally and honestly I don't know how many of them cope with their lifestyles. They work SO BLOODY HARD. Yes, they may have good networks of extended family support, but even so, I imagine it's a struggle. Particularly when the culture their young people are often buying into is so violent, so materialistic, so highly sexualised.

Going back to OP's issue. She seems to have choices of schools which may be one or other of the two schools that had DDs involved in a brawl last week BrawlThread

What should she do if she likes the area she lives in but wants to avoid these schools (and can't afford to pay)? Would any of the people critical of her decision to rent short term like to swap school places with her DCs?

Do we know which schools the brawlers were from or which High St?

OhDearConfused -would it be more moral to push another child who lives near Graveney out because OP has the money to rent a property there? No.

I have posted on another thread but repeat here - I have previously seen girls from Greycoats which I think it is desirable school brawling with Westminster choir boys. At my DD2s school the behaviour was appalling a few years ago, but has now improved thanks to a robust head.

Did anyone here actually witness the brawl? Yes there may be a disruptive minority but there may well be at Graveney and most other London schools. How the schools deal with it going forward is the main thing.

Blu: The two schools were Lambeth Academy and Chestnut, at least one of which I am guessing is one which OP doesn't like the sound off ...

Witnessed by my DH, who is now adamant that we should not consider these schools further. As I said in the other thread we will see what other options are achievable for us. OP didn't seem to have the money to go private though.

Not saying its moral of course ...

aha. On reading the OPs responses I don't think it is these schools.
And anyway, Chestnut Grove is really competitively sought after now, and I know families who are really happy there - though I don't know it myself - and locally Lambeth Academy doesn't have a bad reputation. It isn't discussed at dinner parties as a top one to go to, afaik, but it isn't viewed with horror, either!

S London has a highly mixed population. Where in London would ANY school have a catchment that didn't include some badly behaved kids as well as some paragons of academic virtue and innocence?

I agree. My guess had been Stockwell Park, which seems to have resorted to advertising on the back of buses, and Charles Edward Brooke and maybe one or two others.

Chestnut Grove is not in Lambeth and someone from Stockwell would be doing well to get a place.

I thought (at least some parts of) Stockwell was within catchment of Lambeth Academy (but of course not chestnut). But perhaps wrongly ....

I have been very pleasantly surprised by how good the behaviour is, on buses and out and about, of children from all the local schools, especially when I was grappling with small children.

Chestnut Grove has (or had, I have not checked recently), specialist places so it takes children from a wide area. But I am not sure the speculation about which schools the OP was referring to is helpful, to anyone here or to the schools so fingered.

I'm afraid I haven't read all the replies to the OP so apologies if the conversation has moved on but I just wanted to say that this happened in my county last year and yes they were found out and yes the school in question withdrew the place.

Because of her comments about Lambeth Academy, I assumed she meant Stockwell Park and then either Lilian Baylis or Evelyn Grace depending on which direction. Actually she only talks about one catchment school she has doubts about.

It's funny - my friend put Chestnut Grove as top preference and was to have been offered Dunraven, as her 4th choice after Kingsdale and Elmgreen - she had heard one story of bullying a few years ago and discounted it. Another put her super bright top scoring DC into the Graveney test as a contingency against not getting into her nearest comp, Dunraven, her first preference.

Different poeple, different views, different hearsay.

Everyone has different buttons I suppose, and information about schools dates fast, and is also complicated. I have heard hearsay go round the block and come back very different, but recognisable in peculiar little details....

Just wondering if OP did in fact move to within catchment?
Are you there now?

Well i did it. But we actually moved into the house lock stock and barrel and let out our 'real' house on a 6 month let.A friend just moved out and didn't let the 'real house'. It is perfectly legal and morally fine too I think because you are actually living where you say you are.
I don't understand the bit abut the primary school address being different? Why wouldn't you give the primary school your new address too?
I don't know how the council can check what other properties you own because as far as I know you can't search the land registry by owner.
All they asked for was to send Council tax bills, NHS cards and utility bills (showing fuel usage) at the new address.

Just to let the skiing enthusiasts know, Lambeth Academy does offer a skiing trip - last Easter they went to Andorra and shared a coach with Kingsdale School. They are planning to go to Andorra again next Easter.
As to Chestnut Grove, people from further away can get in because they have a music and language special selection test, so they select a number of kids that way. It certainly has plenty of kids from Clapham going there.

That would be telling.
Actually, I will admit that I called Wandsworth as part of my research, and they confirmed that all they do is check that you are in fact living in the rented house (as catwoo says). None of this checking whether you retained ownership of an old address and so on, which other posters suggest above.

I am surprised that Wandsworth don't take a more robust approach. My own borough (RBKC) clearly state in their secondary transfer booklet that moving to a temporary address and using that for application purposes, while retaining a permanent residence elsewhere is against the rules! They also ask for details of all properties owned or rented.

I am not sure if LA have access to Experian or the Stamp Duty Land Tax database but those are very easy ways of checking residence or ownership of various addresses.

Wandsworth probably turn a 'blind eye' because it suits their purposes. I'm sure if you did a maping exercise of socio-economic backgrounds of the pupils attending the state schools in Wandsworth they would be very skewed!!

Does anyone know if the Bolingbroke Academy is up and running yet or is it due to open next academic year?