Peter Symonds, Winchester- your opinions?

[LittenTree]

DS1 is in Y9 so whilst we are a way off yet, he is about to choose his GCSEs. He is erring towards science but has already 'decided' he wants to go to PS rather than Barton Peverell 6th form...

Obviously it is early days, and lord knows, there is time for at least 3 major educational shake ups before then at the rate we're currently experiencing them, isn't there?

My question is, is PS a good place for identifying a DCs best choices for suitable uni/FE?

I read all the time on MN how 'good' Prep school Heads direct their DC to the 'right' public school for them; well, does a top-performing 6th form like PS do the same for uni/FE?

I am not for a second suggesting Barton Peverell doesn't help their DCs make the right choices of future direction, only that DS is probably destined for Science at a good uni, and a school like PS surely should have that correct 'insider knowledge' to guide him, shouldn't it? I am asking in the same vein as the 'problem' of poorly performing comps in deprived areas not even assuming a DC of thiers might aspire to Oxbridge, etc, as it is 'beyond their ken'.

If you think about the recent rise in student numbers - 1600 last year; 1900 this year - the catchment is larger, if anything. Stagecoach's general crapness is the main barrier to further expansion.

i think that entrance grades are same everywhere - certainly are where we are looking for dd
you get lots of folklore about how great/hard to get into ps is tbh

Ah maybe their dc just aren't predicted high enough gcse grades and the 'harder to get in' lore is a cover story

I used to get the train from Fareham to Winchester; I shudder to think how much it must have cost my parents. On top of 5 years train fares to Southampton!!

Whatever - KES?
Just that good friends of mine pay for HCS and they have done the maths and school fees plus travel are cheaper than moving into guaranteed catchments (for one child anyway)

St Annes talkin my dm wanted me in an all girls school and we couldn't afford Wykeham House or Portsmouth High!

:-) I used to live in Milton Road - the tales I could have told the parents about what their girls got up to !

i used to bus home with a few st annes girls..wild times

Definitely not saintly My poor mum thought she was giving me a nice convent education

Whatevertheweather I went from PSC feeder school to St Anne's 6th form - lasted less than one year and transferred to PSC - wish I'd gone there straight from school rather than waste a year with Sisters Jo and Francis Xavier! Sorry to go off track - were you there when they had the toilet nun?

eatyour the legend of the toilet nun. Before my time I'm afraid, only 1 teaching nun when I was there Sister Mary Oliver. She was 70+ and still teaching RE and she was my year 7 tutor. She used to confiscate our things and make us give money to cafod to get it back and cry if she saw any food thrown in the bin at the end of lunch. Loved her!

Sorry for hijack OP

The funny thing about St Anne's now is that its full of Muslims because its the only single sex girls school in Southampton!
And the skirts are as short as they ever were

OP
if you live in southern Hampshire, rub your hands and take your pick
the more I read mumsnet the more smug I feel about where I happened to come to uni nearly 30 years ago!

DS is year 9 as well & all these are options for him. Interested in views.

He's thinking engineering, but he's not top set, more middle set plus dyslexic which disadvantages him.

We chose not to go to HCS or private as state schools are so good.

Sister Mary Oliver was 70+ even when I was there! (v early 80s)

1992-1997 I was there. She is timeless

Scary - I probably saw both of you going to school, eatyourveg when I was a student and whatever when I owned a student let!

Eve good call TBH - HCS do great things with some kids but their results still do not compare with the big comps in the breadth of education on offer.

LOL, I'm much older than any of you - St Anne's was direct grant when I started in the mid 1970's (eek!), i think it went fully comprehensive in about 1977. And yes, I had Sr Mary Oliver as my Year 7 teacher (1st year, in old speak). I would have had her as about 65+ then. I also remember the toilet nun very well - she used to sit in there and knit. They used to open the different toilet blocks on alternate weeks - never sure what that was about?!

The toilet nun in my day stayed in the loos off the vestibule - open all hours from what I remember. Sorry OP for hijacking. Stick to PSC, my dad went there when it was a grammar during WWII, db1 was in the last grammar intake in 1972, db2 me and db3 went too as well as dn 1 2 and 3 and my mum still invigilates there. Are you picking up that at least as far as my family goes - its great!

But does PSC have toilet nuns, I ask? Mm?

now THAT is a thought to conjure with!
maybe Taunton's do ...

No but PSC surely has the ghost of old Miss Taylor the Latin teacher - the scariest woman I have ever met - the knitting nun in the toilet never spoke, Miss Taylor didn't either, she growled and roared. Fabulous woman - if only I had thought so when I was 16.

PSC doesn't have toilet nuns but it did give the world Jack Dee (and I think I read somewhere Chris Martin) and my A level history teacher Andy Norriss who wrote .

BUT BP gave the world Colin Firth. He and his mates locked my bestie in the cupboard in the Geography A level room once.

And I thought that smarmy git Chris Martin went to some cathedral school out west?

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Symonds_College#Notable_alumni
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barton_Peveril_Sixth_Form_College#Alumni

Colin Firth's brother, Jonathan was in my year at PS

I'm crap at Slebs. I'd only heard of 2 people on the PS wiki list, and one on the BP one!