Advice on Dorset/Hampshire Secondary and Primary schools..

[mazdixon]

Hello, our family moved to Lymington from New Zealand last December. It is lovely here and our 9 year old is enjoying the local junior school. We may need to move closer to Bournemouth to be nearer my Dad/partner's job and are looking at the Christchurch/Mudeford/Hengistbury Head areas. We like the look of Twynham Secondary and have heard good things about it and it has good results. What do people know about it or what are your experiences? The catchment area is quite narrow and being in Hengistbury Head may not guarantee our son a place at Twynham as far as I can tell? What is St Peter's Catholic Secondary like? We are not Catholic or church goers however so it may make it hard to get into and may not be the best fit for our son. What is Highcliffe like? We also have preschooler so have been looking at primary schools. I like the look of St Katherine's in Hengistbury Head. Is it easier to get in if you are a church goer? What are Christchurch Junior and The Priory like? Alternatively we may stay around the Lymington area. What is Priestlands like? Thank you for any advice!

[TaIkinPeace]

Priestlands is fab. I'd stay put in your shoes :-)
Twynham - kids I've met from there seem fine.
Remember the general demographics of Christchurch / Mudeford (its very grey haired)
Catholic schools away from London are not very.

[mazdixon]

Thanks TalkinPeace for your thoughts. What are the Catholic schools like?

[TaIkinPeace]

Not very .... Genuinely
St Annes in Southampton had a problem with the the Sikh girls demanding to wear turbans ;-)

If you go down the stats route of looking at schools you need to be aware that the vast bulk of Hampshire schools are true "comps" - the parental incomes vary from landowners to tied tenants and the academic range even wider

my standard test is ....
sit outside at kicking out time
is the tidal wave happy and cheery - even if its massive
also, in some areas,
what is the mix of catchment / non catchment (the buses / cars balance will tell you)

[mazdixon]

Can anyone recommend good secondary schools in Bournemouth or Poole? We could alternatively move to these areas...

[mazdixon]

And I will go and have a look at schools at home time TalkinPeace..

[Redsrule]

I think St Anne's well deserves it's Outstanding rating (and is in the top 5% nationally for progress ) as does another RC school in the area , St Edmund's in Portsmouth which is a vibrant, multi-cultural success story. Most of the other RC schools in the central south are solidly good. I visited, for work, both St Peter's and St Edward's fairly recently and they were both much improved on some of the other schools in their respective areas I visited.