Help for private school for kids

[worriedtwinsmum]

I have twins - girl and boy who are in Year 6 in a state school.
I live in hounslow and I am concerned about the lack of good secondary schools in the area.
I applied to hampton boys and LEH and, KGS but the kids didnt get through.
The last year has been somewhat difficult as I unexpectedly fell pregnant and, both my inlaws were very ill through the year. They both passed away in december - during the days of the private school entrance exams.
I am desperate to get my kids into a good school as them being in a class of 30 children is not helping.
Please advise how I can get them into a good school or private school for Year 7 in Sept this year.
I know its late in the day but just need some advice and guidance as to what I can do now.
Thank you in advance.

private is not automatically better than state. What are you looking for in a private school? That makes a big difference

If you want a private school for September you could call round to see if anywhere will accept late applications. Schools which are not heavily oversubscribed are more likely to be open to this. Maybe try newer schools like Kew House or Radnor House.

Hounslow does have good state secondaries. Look at the Progress 8 results to compare how well pupils progress and see if there is a suitable choice near you.

Good luck!

If they are in yr6, have you not already applied for state options for September?

Phone the ones you are interested in. Yes, it could make a difference them being in smaller classes with a wider range of activities. Best of luck sounds like it's not been a good time for you

Look for a prep school that loses pupils to good state schools in year 7. Then you can apply for public schools during the second round of entrance exams in year 7 & 8.

The state schools in Hounslow are really not as bad as you seem to have decided. My son is doing very well in a Hounslow school and I know a large number of kids in Hounslow schools who go on to top universities. Which schools have you put down on the state application?

Look in bucks. Due to the 11+ system there I don't think the private schools are as competitive to get into.

Hmmmm - what private boys senior school is there in Bucks that you could travel to from Houslow?

Could you start in a Hounslow school and if it isn't working look to move either to private for 13+ or to one of the Slough Consortium Grammar Schools as they do occasionally have spaces outside of the usual 11+ some of them have General Admission areas that include Hounslow postcodes.

As a secondary teacher who has taught in a variety of schools (private, religious, state and academy) but who went to a private school, I would say I agree with the above comment about private not necessarily being better than state. It is about finding the right fit for each child. Progress 8 is a much better measure of a school as it tells you how far a child has progressed in the school, ie were gifted children pushed just as much as those struggling. Those so called good schools have ended up doing badly (as I always knew) with new progress 8 system, they did not put in much effort and good results were due to parents. Also please note that certain Universities now positively discriminate so if your child struggles academically, you may want to consider a deprived state school if you want them to go to Uni. Just so you know, after my parents wasted hundreds of thousands of pounds on my education, my brother went to a rough state school and is a Doctor running his own GP Practice. I don't even earn a fifth of his income.

This is for this September 2017 intake though, if her kids took the entrance exams in January, so even the less competitive Bucks schools (whether you can get to them or not from Hounslow!), have done their testing and will be offering places out come 1st March.

As I've said before, which places did you put on the Secondary School Application form? If you didn't think the Hounslow schools were any good (not even Lampton...??) why didn't you try for some of the Richmond schools, like Christ's, which a fair number of Hounslow kids head for? Or Tiffins? Or did you not do a state application at all and now you are stuck?

Hounslow schools' Progress 8 scores were pretty good when the tables came out recently.

Genuinely puzzled as to why you think Hounslow schools are bad:

www.compare-school-performance.service.gov.uk/compare-schools?phase=secondary&selectPhase=true

II out of 13 schools have a positive Progress 8 and the other 2 are only slightly in the negative zone. And only 2 schools out of thirteen get less than 60% English and Maths GCSEs. I'm not quite sure what an Education Authority has to do if this is not "good enough" frankly.

A lot of Hounslow secondary schools are good. Especially when you consider several of them have Highly mobile populations and pupils who don't have English as a first language and arrive with a low level of English . However lots of the parents value education Highly which helps pupils excel. If you are in Chiswick the local population is different to Hounslow.
If you are set on private look at preps e.g. Newland house in Twickenham. I think they only take boys at 11, The Mall Twickenham, (boys) or for both of them Newton Prep but that would be a schlep from Hounslow. Clifton Lodge Ealing
Also contact schools such as Kew House, Thames Christian College, Halliford (boys) St James, St Catherine's (girls) but you have left it a bit late.

I looked up Lampton state comp in Hounslow that someone mentioned and it is top 5% of schools in the country for Progress 8. (Well above average.) Plus sent 7 kids to Oxbridge. Are you in the catchment for it?

You could try ringing some of the GDST schools for your daughter
www.gdst.net/find-a-school/hounslow - they may will willing to offer a late test. Even Wimbledon would only be a 30 minute tube ride away I think.
Prep schools tend to have more boys staying for years 7 and 8 in any case and so finding something suitable for your son shouldn't be too difficult - he can then reapply for a private senior school for year 9. Twickenham Prep has a school mini bus to Hounslow but I don't know how academic it is.

As for the state schools:
Christ's School in Richmond only take church going kids from Hounslow.
Likewise, 4 of the top performing schools in Hounslow are faith schools - 3 Catholic Schools and 1 C of E Foundation school.
Lampton's last offer distance was less than 1.3 miles last year, Heathland's was less than a mile and they appear to have 40-50 appeals for places each year. Three of the other Hounslow secondary schools have GCSE rates below 60%, another scrapes 60% (Chiswick) but has a grade 3 Ofsted from 2015. Then there's the fsm rate for the remaining schools - a mixed school with over 40% fsm wouldn't be my obvious alternative to LEH or Hampton either despite an 'outstanding' grading.

That isn't quite correct about Christ's school only taking church kids from Hounslow, clavinova. I have two friends whose children are in on no faith places - in Y7 and Y9 at Christ's and another one who is in Y10 on an another faith basis.

Well, ok - there were 34 non-sibling, non-church 'open' places allocated to Christ's last year - last distance offered just over 1.4 km. Is the Year 7 child a sibling?

The catchment maps on the Richmond council website for Christ's showing category 4 allocations (open category) in 2013 and 2014 don't seem to indicate any kids getting in from Hounslow in that basis. There aren't maps for more recent years.

Admittedly that only covers kids who put Christ's as their first choice.

With the school increasingly popular with Queen's school parents in Kew (many of whom got their kids into Queen's on church attendance) I think getting there from Hounslow is a slim chance.

Yes, the Y7 child is a sibling.

OP, can you tell us which state schools you have applied for?

OP has been incredibly quiet since starting the thread so I'm not sure we will ever know.

The thing about Hounslow is, of course, that if you are actually in Hounslow itself then you are a very great deal further from, say, Christ's (4.9 miles) than you are if you live in the borough but at the foot of Chiswick Bridge (1.6miles). If the OP went for LEH, KGS and Hampton then she might well be that side of the borough and whilst some feel that the schools in Hounslow are shockingly bad, others can see their kid's good results, even in schools where (gasp) there is a high proportion of FSM.

Thank you everyone for the response.
I was unwell last couple of days so couldn't reply.

I have applied for the state schools:
Isleworth and syon, lampton, green school for girls and boys.

My son has been one of the top students in his class at the current juniors state school however, the twins sat for the 11 plus exams and didn't get through any school.
My daughter is weaker in studies and I think I wanted the private school more for her as she does better when she is taught in a smaller group.
I always hear that anyone can study in any school but for me education is not just academic as well.
I work full time and to give them a broad and varied outlook, I take them for extra curriculum activities after school.
With the baby now, I feel I don't have the time and strength to pick and drop, manage the house and also study with them as I feel the school doesn't do much.
I was hoping that a good school would help ease the pressure.