Choosing secondary school - what do you wish you'd known?

[Waitingonasunnyday]

My eldest is in Y5 and I am vaguely aware I should get to know a bit more about choosing secondary schools.

Obviously we will look round them, visit websites and possibly read their Ofsted reports (don't have a lot of faith in Ofsted though) - but please tell me what do I REALLY need to know?

Each school 'aims for the best' and all that bollocks, I mean stuff that really matters day to day, that will affect DC enjoying school and getting the best from it like
what's the cost of uniform and sports kits
are students allowed out at lunch time
are the sports facilities open to everyone or just the 'top'
etc...

Fab questions thank you. Will have to get a dog!

Here's the list so far if anyone wants to use it too:

SECONDARY SCHOOL VISITING LIST

Ask for options information for Y9. What is on offer? How much freedom do students have to choose? Can you mix pathways e.g. science & art? Can you stick to one pathway if you prefer? Is final say school’s choice, or students choice? When do they choose?

How long do students study GCSEs? 2 years or 3? If 3 years, what are they missing that they would have been doing?

Is PE streamed? What sports and facilities are there and who gets to use them when?

How long do students have for lunch? Is there space for them all to sit down to eat?

What is the policy on bullying?

Ask students what is done about bullying

What trips are there? Does everyone get to go? What do they cost?

How easy is it to travel to/from school?

What’s the cost of uniform? What is the footwear rule?

What sports kits are required & what do they cost?

What SEN provision is there?

Do all students receive usable lockers?

What links does school have with business / technology / internationally?

Is website up to date re. VLE/subjects/homework info?

How do teachers, students and parents communicate – direct emails? How promptly are they replied to?

Ask students: what is the head like? Do they walk round school and get involved?

What is staff turnover like?

Ask for copy of this term’s actual programme for clubs / extra curricula activities

When are students streamed? How often are moves possible?

Ask for actual exam results (by grade, by subject)

AND FINALLY... What are the toilets like? Are they clean and do they have soap?!

I don't mind if my two end up at different secondary schools. Have done combinations of infants/nursery school run, juniors/infants school run so am looking forward to them getting there under their own steam I must admit!

That's going to be a lot to ask, but it's a good list!

You can probably tick off some of it from the school's own website (see if you can download the extracurricular activities brochure, or the year 8/Year 9 options booklet, for instance).

One of our 'possibles' had an open evening at which there was no time for questions to staff at all, and all tours were conducted by pleasant but gormless Yr 11 girls who didn't seem to know any of the answers.

A lot of questions! Enjoy your visits.

Enjoy your visits - try to visit in the daytime! - but don't get bogged down on the stuff like lockers... Look around, watch to see what the kids are doing, are they happy, shouting, smiling, are there lots of teachers about when the class changeovers happen?

One big one for me was when I stood by the reception and saw kids opening door for others and teachers - and BEING THANKED by the teachers too. 2 schools we visited, the teachers just went through the doors with no acknowledgement.

Guess which we chose? And we are very happy with our choice despite it not being "outstanding" or even "good". It is however, nice. Oh - and they actually had girls (from the school) in the A-level Physics class at 6th form - showing they are encouraged to study sciences.

WHEN are options chosen? Yr 8, 9 or 10 or in all three years. Try and think what would suit your child - I know its difficult but in some cases it is obvious.
When are GCSE exams taken - end of year 11 or end of year 9, 10 and 11, again what wouls suit your child.

The scenario for the above two points is when a school runs GCSE courses for mixed year groups (often called immersion). So your child could do German&RE in year 9, History&Product Design in year 10 and core subjects plus others in year 11.

When does school stream and/or set. Setting is by subject ability, streaming by general ability. Is there any mixed ability teaching.

Will students be in different groups for different lessons or with the same group for all lessons (can happen in streaming).

I wouldn't credit that about when options are chosen very much, schools have fluctuating targets to meet & may change their GCSE strategy by time it affects your child. The underlying philosophy about their purpose and the HT's quality of leadership matter a lot, though.

My DS's school has short lunchtimes, which they've said has reduced the incidence of bullying and bad behaviour - though they deny this was why they did it in the first place. It's not a good thing though I don't think - they try and run a few clubs at lunchtime but DS has school dinners which he has to queue for, so by the time he's queued and eaten he says there's only 5-10 minutes left of the lunchtime so he never does any lunchtime clubs.

There are 2 things I look for when choosing any school.

First one is a big thing for me because we are not near any public transport and that is how easy it is to park close to the school. After school activities and second child to pick up mean a quick get away is vital.

The second is are the receptionists friendly and easy to talk to.

The latter I think is a good guide to the general feel of the school.

The school I volunteer at has short lunch breaks which they say is by parental demand, so the kids finish by 2.30 and can collect younger siblings from primary or work for parents in the afternoon.

It's rubbish trying to run a lunchtime club there as even the committed students can only be there for 25 min while also eating, many drop out as it's too hard to get lunch, and the ones who try hard end up demoralised when they meet their equivalents from other schools who have achieved twice as much (because they've had twice the time!)

For the same reasons there aren't many after-school clubs. It certainly puts me off that school.

Also might like to ask the students how much sex education they get - this school did only one lesson and the students were convinced that related to a very high level of student pregnancy (and was down to a general attitude of teachers not trusting the students).

I should add that I only have one DC, so no problem for subsequent children, but it is something I warn friends about when they are looking at high schools. It is a very good school with excellent results and excellent pastoral care. But it is jumping through hoops to comply with (IMO) damaging government whims and dictates. (For eg. they wanted to introduce the Bac until that idea was dropped.)
The other nearest school to us was in special measures when we were choosing, so it was a bit of a no-brainer. My DS is not a high flyer and by repute only the really brightest kids did well in that environment - lots of gangs and general disruptive behaviour at the lower levels that dragged the whole school down. It now has a good headteacher and is being turned around. Schools can change quite quickly it seems. So, choosing one is really about what suits your individual child rather than a one size fits all.
DS is very happy at school, feels safe - no bullying etc, and is being taught well as far as I can assesss. But as a parent I still feel this drive for academic achievement is damaging for most of the kids in any school.

Kitties

Any bloody silly rules on footwear that mean you spend half the summer seeking the impossible combination of H-fitting, full lace-up, leather, and no decoration

I feel your pain

Quitethewoodsman -- they can only get half the school at a time (it's grown a lot) into the dining hall. Hence two different short lunchbreaks, and no clubs.

I'd like lunchtime clubs, but it's not a dealbreaker in the way that bad behaviour, disillusioned staff or bullying would be.

I agree with what others have mentioned about lunch at my daughter's school they have to spend break time and lunchtime outside no matter what. She dreads bad or cold weather, and I'm worried about the negative effect of repeated numb fingers (she has tried skipping eating keeper fingers warm, but was just too hungry).

A lot of the extracurricular clubs are just offered for one term or for one particular year, so there are not anywhere near as many as it appears from looking at the list.

The behaviour of the kids; you can see this especially before and after school, when they are off school grounds. (We were positively influenced by this, and it has proven to be an accurate pointer to the general good behaviour of the kids.)

I wish I had known what proportion of boys and girls were in the top streams for the different subjects. Our school seems to downgrade the generally "clever" girls for science and the "clever" boys for languages and English. I'm not sure how widespread this problem is, however. It never would have occurred to me to expect it and look into it.

I wish I had known that the good GCSE results are much more the result of parental effort, and the fact that the parents in this area are mainly from scientific and technical backgrounds, and the school relies on them to provide a lot of home support. It's not exactly a problem for us since my husband is a scientist, but one of the reasons we chose the school is because it's supposed to be so strong in science (which our daughter was keen on in primary school), but between the discouragement of girls and required input of parents, we would have been just as well off elsewhere. It was not really the advantage that we thought it would be for this school.

Do go with your gut feeling, as someone else said. This shouldn't be the only criteria (you have to look at concrete things like available subjects and overall achievement), but will give you an idea of whether the school is the right kind of place. Overall, I think the instinct/gut feeling impressions we had were right but the impressions we had based on how the school presented them turned out to be inaccurate.

Good luck!

A red flag for me is a school which has to segregate different years into different areas. Seems to exacerbate bullying hugely from what I've heard. My dc's school has no such rule amd the different years rub along well and naturally together.

Also from a wander around, you can pick up how well staff seem to know the kids, basic manners, cordiality. And whether staff send their own kids there! Also local rep of the school - not just parents who have kids there already (who can be incredibly defensive/accepting of a less than good school once invested in it)

The grounds are also a bit small, I'd guess.

I looked at the other parents and children looking round the school, did they seem interested in their children's education and supportive. Also if a school is doing well in results as pp have said it's often down to the involved parents as much as the school.

Your list is very comprehensive and very good as you should know all this.

Look at the deal breakers and find the school with none or the least of your top 10 dislikes about schools.

Go for the one that best fits your child, it might not be the best on paper.

Our school separate Y7 so that most of their classes are in a single area of the school - gives them more time to settle in and seemed to work well with my 2.

In terms of lunch re enough tables etc; most schools have too many students to enable them to sit them all would be physically impossible, so a better question would be how lunch is organised. For example a lot of schools operate a year rota, so on a Monday yr 11 first, then on Tuesday yr 10 first etc

A lot of questions on the list need to be viewed as that current years policies and not thought of as what will actually be the case when you DC are there. Too many changes take place in education at very short notice; subjects can only be offered if they have the staff to deliver, government changes (ebacc is a prime example).

What year students take their options is another hot potato our yr8 parents would not have imagined that their DC would be choosing their options in 2 months time which the majority of staff don't agree with, but SLT seem to think its a good idea

My yr7 dd's school only allow children to eat in if they buy food but packed lunch children have eat outside. However she got a lot friends and she s still happy at school so for me that the mean thing.

My son's school has two 20 minute breaks - all the clubs take place after school as they start at 8.30 and finish at 2.30. It seems to work well.

But the locker point mentioned above is a pertinent one. DS has a locker as he is in Y7 but there are no cloakrooms so most kids never wear a coat (the majority of kids seem to walk to school as well). But from Y8-11 there aren't enough lockers, it's first come first served so goodness knows what DS will do with his stuff then, especially if he has PE and cookery on the same day!

But the school is good, attainment is good, behaviour is good and DS seems to be happy there. The locker issue is the only negative.

That said, I'm interested in the comment above about science teaching. DS had an end of term test in which he got 18/47. He said that the lowest mark was 11 and highest 25 in his class. That seems very poor and either the test was too hard, or the teaching had been inadequate. Or both. DH and I are not scientists, we both did humanities/MFL A levels and degrees.