Best secondary schools in London 2017 (girls and co-ed)

[Toriali]

Our daughter is in year 4 and we're starting to look at secondary schools in London. I know we still have to pass the 11+...I've heard it's been really hard this year...

Which ones are your favourites?
Which ones do your children go to?

• Anywhere in London is ok
• Co-ed and all girls schools both fine
• Private is ok

So far, we have: CLSG, Latymer Grammar school, Alleyns

I'd really appreciate any recommendations.

Alleyns, St Paul's, JAGS, Latymer, Henrietta Barnett.

ahem...

You: what is the London school that offers academic excellence, good facilities and good teaching. But doesn't specialise in art or drama and mustn't be a hothouse.

Us: try to understand your needs a little better

You: MN is very tense and not listening to what I need for my DD

Us:

FWIW Alleyns considers itself an arts and drama specialist so might not suit you?

It's all down to priorities. You list academic excellence first so surely that's St Paul's, NLCS, Habs, JAGs and CLSG? No idea which if any of those are hothouses?

Then all the GDST ones - South hampstead, Wimbledon, Putney etc.

Where are the other kids from her current school going? The usual leavers' list might prove a good starting point?

Er, OP you didn't post a 'personality profile' of your daughter, you posted a list of her academic aptitudes. Personality would include whether she was robust, sensitive, quirky, outgoing etc. My youngest is very confident, could probably go anywhere, my elder daughter is extremely highly strung and for me a lower incidence of eating disorders is paramount.

So if it's academic excellence above all others then just look at the league tables - the ones above are a good starting point, plus Henrietta Barnett. Latymer Grammar, despite how hard it is to get into, doesn't have crazily good results because from what I gather they give less homework and are a bit more rounded.

sorry OP you are either researching an article or for a schools guide.

"London" "anywhere" is NOT a location on which to choose a school. Where do you/your dh work?

I don't actually believe you can choose to live ANYWHERE in London. That your dd is clever, sporty, creative, drama, and you think she can get into any school.

Or you are just deluded.

and i think the PP have been way more helpful than i was prepared to be until you gave some half decent information. Your response frankly is rude.
Go and get the good schools guide.
Go and get your dd assessed / get input from current school.
Look at the league tables.

No one can help you.

Wow. Just wow.

?

My daughters are being excellently educated at their local south London comp, if that's helpful?

OP my children are rather older than yours - one has left school, one will do soon and the third is happily ensconced at one of the schools on your original list. It's a very good fit for her and I'm pleased she's there but would she be going there if it wasn't easy for her (and us, don't forget parents' evenings, concerts, sports fixtures etc etc) to get to? No... she'd be going to one of the many other very good schools in London and no doubt we'd be equally pleased.

What I've learned over very many years of having children at schools in London is that the differences between these very good schools are minor. There are slight differences in emphasis or ethos - some will place more weight on sport, others on overall happiness - but a bright all-rounder will do very well at any of them and none is worth moving for...

For an academic child, I would not rule out a school you like on the basis that it is too hard to get into. For example, my DD has a friend who got offers from NLCS, SPGS and Wycombe Abbey but not CLSG, plenty who got into CLSG but not South Hampstead and vice versa. I also heard of people being turned down for Channing but getting into higher rated school.

I would not rule out distance as a consideration, e.g. colleague's daughter is at a super-selective which has children travelling in from a very wide area and she finds it frustrating socially not to have more local friends.

My more academic DD1 sat for 2 top tier, 3 next tier down (that felt about right but was less than 5 tests because of the consortia, but appreciate that there are fewer schools in the consortia now than there used to be)
DD2 sat 1 top tier (DD1's school), 3 next tier and 1 banker.

Of the private girls schools i know I would rank them as follows:

SPGS, NLCS

CLSG, JAGS, LEH, G&L

Various of the Highs (SHHS, Wimbledon, Putney)

CHanning, Francis Holland, Surbiton, Notting Hill, Queens (some here harder than others)

Of the co-eds, I would say Alleyns, Highgate and and LU are the best.
Emmanuel probably more of a banker, but increasingly harder to get in to.

I should point out that I live in Islington so there are almost certainly some excellent schools in west / south west London (someone mentioned Putney, Wimbledon, Godolphin & Latimer etc) but I don't hear very much about those. A friend has sent her daughter to Habs but that isn't really in London (closer to Harrow).

why not prep and apply to them all then move once you have an accepted offer?
it doesn't sound like money is an issue.
www.tatler.com/guides/schools-guide/2017
it's interactive (you can pick location, single sex etc)
and if nothing else makes for fun online (the paper copy isn't as helpful) reading.

It's tense because you don't sound like you know what you are talking about and are unwilling to take advice

And by the way, she doesn't 'have t pass the 11 plus' to get a good education. In London, more than in anywhere.

Of course I don’t know what I’m talking about! I’m new to this!

So you think I didn't listen to your advice, I guess you mean the advice about location and the advice that you need to first profile the child, then look at the school?

Here's why I just gave general info about what kind of school we need...Even though there's 1000s of us, I didn't want to out myself and describe my daughter's abilities/personality. I was after a general discussion about which schools you think are the "best" and should've not mentioned my DD actually that's a total red herring. It's fair to do research my way, starting with looking at the schools, not your way starting talking about my daughter?

I probably shouldn't have used the words "best" and "schools" together.

I still refuse to take the location thing on board…I’m honestly taken aback that there’s so much resistance to my statement that location doesn’t matter for us.

I also don’t think that I’ve been bragging about my daughter’s abilities? Why did that get someone's heckles up so much? Doesn’t every child applying for ultra competitive secondaries in London have -at least!- the skills I listed for my daughter?

Me: I’d like her to have a shot at getting into a "top" school. If it doesn't work out then she'll go down a different route.

Someone: I don't actually believe you can choose to live ANYWHERE in London. That your dd is clever, sporty, creative, drama, and you think she can get into any school. Or you are just deluded.

I’m bowing out now, so again, thanks for all your input, also for opening my eyes to the fact that different schools cater to different personalities.

So thank you, all of you, for your input. I appreciate you taking the time.

Really, you have to choose a school for your child. The best school might be the worst school for her. Make a list from the Good Schools Guide & go & visit them.

You need to stop expecting other people to do your own work for you. Especially when you keep asking more and more of them, only to diss them. Go and do your own research, visit the schools and do your homework like the rest of us mere mortals. (I bet you are a parent from hell in the staffroom gossip btw).

OK.
So chances are you are currently living abroad and therefore really have no need to be tied to one location or another. I can see why for you that means that being anywhere in London is a good starting point.

This may certainly be the case for many major cities but the transport system in and around London is based on a Victorian plan that is antiquated at best and can lead to seemingly short distances taking a ridiculously long amount of time.

Also, what is considered a great school could actually be within the suburbs of London and beyond which again come with a vastly different set of expectations for living expenses, housing and transport. Alleyns, for example, would be impossible to get to without considerable angst if your jobs were based in North London. Some of the most academic and central schools are actually crammed in to a physically small space and so sports facilities etc are another journey away.

That's another consideration - do you want a school with plenty of land for sports etc? Do you want a school with a focus on extra curricular enrichment or for all children to have access to non-core subjects within lesson time? You mention STEM - are state of the art physical science labs a priority? If you are happy with girls schools and with mixed schools, would you prefer girls schools with a strong link to an equivalent boys school for enrichment programmes? These sorts of questions people can help you with.

Socially, are there 'types' of people that you as a family would feel most comfortable with? This is not about snobbery or race or even class, this is about your daughter feeling comfortable and her expectations of holidays, homes etc being appropriate. Or put it another way, do you want her going to a school where she will have local friends or a school with a wide catchment area where she may end up seeing friends only in holidays?

When it comes to your daughter's skills, I would read the Guide posted above, see which schools feel right as a starting point and then start investigating how they test for entrance. You might be surprised that some will not have any creative writing papers whereas others will consider that to be a very high entry criteria. Have a look and see what that means for the focus of that school.

GOod luck

Hmmm, best, top etc.

For people who care about these things there are really only a few. SPGS, with NCLS and perhaps City. Or Wycombe Abbey if you can face boarding.

Best for an individual child and you get a much, much longer list. Your best approach might be to buy a subscription to the Good Schools Guide and see what appeals and then go and visit. The more schools you see the more you will get a sense of what matters to you/your daughter.

I've been thinking about this thread. I think the PP is right - the OP is living in another country and therefore perhaps doesn't know a whole lot about London schools.

OP - from speaking to parents with children about to sit the 11+, it is worth registering for four or five schools. Demand for places outstrips supply and none of the schools mentioned are easy to get into.

Do you think a list of your child's personality and abilities would out you?

Well, a theoretical question 'which is the best school in the world' and a practical 'which is the best school for my specific child' is such a different question.

However, the question cannot be purely theoretical, because there is an actual child involved and so as many have pointed out their individual personalities, skills and practical issues will mean some schools which are best for some children are not best for others. When actual children are involved, the same answer cannot apply to all of them.

I agree that OP needs to do some first hand research, which involves visiting and probably taking child too. OP will have to choose and that needs to be based not just on info about the school, but OPs response to the real life schools, not just what other people say about them or what is said in a glossy brochure.....and of course, on her knowledge of DD, which the rest of us simply don't have.

OP I hope you are able to make those visits which will allow you to make an informed decision.

Hothouse? What does that even mean? I can't think of a single school that I would call a "hothouse."

I notice it's usually used to describe prestigious schools that individual parents don't believe their children can get into or keep up with.

One of mine is at one of these 'prestigious' schools. It has been mentioned on here. One is at a good Comprehensive

I could not tell you which was the best school. I can tell you that each school suits their (very different) personalities and interests. And they will, I predict, do equally well out of their schooling

And I think the OP's daughter would probably do well at either of those schools too

I think "top" in OP's world is somewhere she'd mix with the right sort of people