How far do your children commute to secondary please?

[sockrage]

Miles and time wise please

Trying to work out if a potential school is too far.

1.5 miles 30 min walk according to google maps. She sometimes gets the school bus door to door though. It's up a long steep hill as we are at the bottom of a valley

We rejected a school (with an 8 hour school day) that was also minimum 75-90 minutes each way (blend of travel modes).

DC go to secondaries that have 6-6.5 hour days, 9 miles away, mix of walk-bus-train, about 40 minutes each way.

Ds goes to the nearest school. The station is 8 minutes bike, 15 minutes walk or 4 minutes car and the train journey is 8 minutes. Then another 5 minutes walk. So maximum half an hour.

You need to think of cost as well as time. And you need to think about getting back after clubs and matches and rehearsals. And as they get older, you need to think about parties and so on. My dd went to a school an hour away- and when she started to have friends an hour in the opposite direction it was a serious pain in the neck.

11 miles, 30 mins+ in car, 1 hour+ on bus home (convoluted route with many stops).

DSs school is a few miles from here. Is catchment school and so there's a school bus. Takes him about 15 min on the bus. When he's at his dad's house then it's a 5 minute walk to school.

1 min to the school where I work. (not UK)

Both DD's come home when they need to. We also go to school at different times when it suits us in the morning.

I may well have exposed tmi

40 minutes door to door on one train (20minutes) with seats always available

3 miles?

15mins on a bike. 45mins on at least 2 buses. 45mins - 1 hour walking.

7 miles, maybe 20 mins by bus (though she has to leave home 55 mins before school starts because of bus times). That's our closest secondary, the other local option is 12 miles but bus leaves 10 mins later.

As others have said, context makes a massive difference. 7 miles to the catchment school in a rural area where there's a free school bus is nothing (and in dd's case, there's a regular direct service bus too if she wants to stay after school).

If you have to pay a fortune / there's no bus service / you're tied into driving, it's a very different decision to make, even though it might still be the best option.

DC are ten miles away at an out of catchment school. Thirty five minutes on the dedicated school bus £750 a year per Dc. This year has been great as DS1 has been driving them all.
It is a huge rural catchment, friends can be a lot further away in catchment and take over an hour on two buses.

Just over 13 miles, DD gets a bus which takes about 40 minutes then a 5-10 minute walk.

15 miles, about 30 miles on a school bus

15 miles, over an hour by bus/train/walking.

A mile or so. He walks (fast).

25 miles which takes 35 mins by car and 1 hr on the school bus (various stops enroute). DC takes the school bus.

For one very tough year, but for an excellent school, we did a 100 mile round trip which took at least 1.5 hours in each direction, and more during Christmas shopping season. In retrospect, we were bonkers... and exhausted.

20miles through 3towns though so takes 45minutes by car, worth it though for us anyway, but is a massive commitment and only possible as I'm a sahm.

4.5 miles, he gets a free council provided mini bus to school and back, as we are in catchment, takes about 30 minutes as he is the first one picked up and the bus stops off at several other houses en route. It's very reliable and free!

4.8miles/ 25 mins on (circuitous) local council bus which stops outside our door.

21 miles, c.35 mins: 2 trains, (10 mins, faff/wait for 5-10 mins, 10 mins) then 5-10 min walk.

Train costs a fortune but it takes longer to drive there!

13 miles as crow flies.. Takes 5 mins to drive to village then 45 mins on a coach.. That's the furthest distance the council thought was acceptable for secondary ( we got a place at appeal)

I'm a little sad - when we chose for DD a few years back, I did a spreadsheet with how many miles and how long it took. Am in London area and in a school-free zone, so none of the schools seemed to take less than 30 mins, with most more like 45 in the morning (by bus: you have to get there early to be sure of actually getting on one. Probably quicker coming home in the afternoon to be fair - say 25 mins) to do about 2 miles, so the fact we picked one that is more like 12 miles away at 50 mins seemed ok to us. DD has weathered it well enough anyway, loves the place

Forgot to say 5 mins walk, then 25-30 mins train, then 10-15 mins walk