Cheapest independent secondary schools in London?

[SaturdaySunday]

Can anyone point me in the direction of "most affordable" independent schools in London for my DS entering Y11? I'm only finding schools that are around £20k but figure there's got to be other options?

Many thanks!

Trinity School in Croydon - basic fee is under £14k. Plus decent scholarship fund.

Where do you live? St James in Ashford is v reasonable, your DS can catch the tube to Richmond & then overground or catch a school coach from Hammersmith. I've just seen you've put entering yr11, does he really need to change school half way through GCSEs?

Thames Christian College in Battersea? Fees are £3900 per term
(£11 700 per year).

Merchant Taylors (met line) £16,600 including lunch fee
City of London School £13-14K

All the west London indies are under £20k. Are you looking for one year GCSE courses? In which case you are talking about the colleges in London that tend to be known as crammers, that cater for those whose needs cannot be met in the mainstream indies/state. They do tend to be expensive. There are various threads on here about what options are available to students coming into the British School system for year 11. Going straight into A levels /IB at further ed colleges etc. Search on those words and you should find them.

The only London independents i can think of with fees of around £20k are Westminster and St. Paul's - even KCS is 'only' £18k - however the vast majority are around the £13k to £16k mark

But a bigger hurdle I think would be getting a school to take him halfway through the GCSE years

Have you thought of commuting south? Reigate is about 40 minutes south of Victoria and London Bridge by train and it has 2 independent schools. Dunottar Girls School and Reigate Grammar.

I think you'll struggle to find any school willing to offer a one year GCSE. Even with iGCSEs which are predominantly end of course exam based he'd only really get 2 terms to cover the syllabus. Some also take GCSE exams and do assessed coursework in year 10. 15-20k is typical for London/SE independents. Could you manage an American school (ie Cobham) for just one year then apply for a 6th form place or maybe another offering IB Middle years programme here. Otherwise negotiate for him to start in Year 10 (dd has a girl in her year from HK who is "back" a year), although he may then be almost 2 years older than the youngest.

Yes, I understand difficulty of placing him in at Y11. I've been looking at 1-2 year GSCE programs at colleges and they seem to run around £16k a year. Which is very expensive. I did find a school that would take him and start him at Y10 but we must pay tuition of £10k up front. Later discovered Ofsted gave this school horrible marks.

To further complicate things, it needs to be a school that can sponsor a Tier 4 student visa. To our surprise, ds was denied visa with rest of our family. Even though we jumped through every application hoop on this, he was denied because it was determined that his birth mother (I am step mother) can adequately care for him in his home country. The only way for him to stay with our family (and his two siblings) is a student visa. So now we are rushing to find an adequate school for him to apply to and one that doesn't completely wipe us out financially.

We were interested in living in Hackney but realize that we might have to reconsider based on our options, but we'd like to stay in London proper if possible.

Any other suggestions are appreciated!

Seems to me that you won't have many options.

Start with this list of Tier 4 sponsors, and look for London based school able to sponsor children.

Then see if they offer the course you want. Then apply...

I don't understand the refusal reason - did the Home Office say that they didn't believe your DS was a genuine student? And presumaly you had a school lined up to sponsor DS, so not sure why he isn't going there still? In any case, you may find it hard to get another school willing to sponsor him now, I'm afraid

We are under my husband's Tier 2 visa. We were planning on DS going to community school, and, yes, we knew this would be tough on him. Unfortunately we were not aware of this strict law regarding children of separated parents... so now we must pursue independent school to sponsor his student visa.

Maybe get him into a college just for the GCSEs and then apply to Independent Schools for 6th form. As that is an accepted entry point.

Have a look at Hackney Community College and Hackney UTC - they are Tier 4 sponsors I think and also free.

There are a number of private tutorial colleges such as Ashourne College in Kensington which offer GCSEs in a year. If a student is motivated and bright they achive results every bit as good as leading indies. And their fees compare well.
You wont get the wider school life but in Yr 11 the focus is exams anyway.

is there a reason he can't stay with his birth mother (or other family) for a year to finish that phase of his education ? That would at least buy you time to find somewhere suitable for A levels/IB/Pre U etc and he could visit in vacations . Presumably most boarding schools could sponsor a student, perhaps even if day pupil/casual boarder?

Hi, I am looking at an affordable, independent secondary school in Southeast London for my 13-year-old son (to start this spring term 2022, possibly to start this month of March). He unfortunately had to experiment the most disgraceful bullying from a group of kids in his former school, and my husband and I are now looking to move him into an adequate school(he is at home now suffering with a severe headache due to the pressure he endured).He spent all primary and secondary schools up to year 9 in outstanding Catholic schools, and we would prefer to keep a descent standard to his education. All the options we are left with are terrible public schools and really are hopeful to find the best school for him.

@Nogreaterlove, you will have a much better chance of getting helpful responses if you start your own thread. This thread is nine years old now.

Okay, thanks for the advice. I'm new around here my first time posting.

Yep, start a new thread. The suggestions above are all sensible, although the fees are a bit of out of date.

I don't think there are any 'no frills' private secondary schools in London. You do get a few 'faith schools' of various stripes which can be really cheap, e.g. you might have heard of the Catholic Laleham Lea primary school in Croydon. At the secondary level there are certainly a few Jewish & Muslim schools whose fee rates are in some cases much lower than the places listed above. I wouldn't say that they have universally good reputations.

Reading that Trinity in Croydon was £14k per year and my heart leaping...

Only to realise that the it was written in 2013.

Inflation eat your heart out.

Thanks for your reply. You're absolutely right; I have checked, and all the above schools have higher fees, which make sense after 9 years.

@nogreaterlove Bishop Challoner school near Beckenham meets what you are looking for, definitely worth a look.

@Nogreaterlove alongside bishop challoner in shortlands there is the Cedars / Laurels near Crystal Palace

Maybe Thames Christian ?