Sherborne Girls as a day pupil

[m0therofdragons]

We are considering Sherborne Girls as an option for dd. She’s very academic and I fear our local comp will see her bullied as she’s so focused on her studies. However we definitely aren’t looking for boarding options. As such a large number of pupils do board, is there a segregation between boarders and day pupils?

Can anyone recommend a school in the area that would suit academic day students?

Where are her friends going? Where is she now?

As far as being a day girl at Sherborne it rather depends what house you are in. We've found it excellent, but the day can be long if your dd does sport or music or one of the (many!) academic clubs after lessons, then wants to stay for supper. Some day girls go in for breakfast too. So plenty of driving!! You can follow a 'normal' school day and collect at 4.30 if you wish.

going but if you look at state school A level results in the area, the Blue school which has a similar sized 6th form got 45% A-A compared with Millfield 38%. And 84% A-C compared with 78% at Millfield.
That’s not great academic results when you think of the extra facilities available and small class sizes. Having said that, I know several people with children at Millfield and they love it. It’s probably got the best facilities out of all the schools around here.

I have a friend with a dd at millfield. She is severely dyslexic and apparently their SEN provision is excellent. I think there is a fair proportion of kids with some sort of SEN

I have a friend with a dd at millfield. She is severely dyslexic and apparently their SEN provision is excellent. I think there is a fair proportion of kids with some sort of SEN

Batty I also have a very academic DD, and we've rejected Bruton Girls, because it's not at all selective (and more focused on Leith's diplomas than university places). Seemed intensely complacent. Are you within reach of Bath? KES and even the Royal High would be much more challenging.

We’ve stayed with our local school for now greyfriars, DD was keen to make local friends as we’re fairly new to the area. We figure we can always move her later on if needs be, there always seems to be a lot of movement in year 9/10 for GCSEs. KES got (I think) the top academic results for the area this year, had forgotten about that one!

KES looks really good, we looked at it years ago. Now don't live anywhere near sadly. I agree with what the pp says about Bruton, we thought Leweston was similar, although this was a few years ago now.

Her friends will be going to a spread of schools so we’re not too worried and neither is she. We’re about 15 minutes from Sherborne.

The Bruton website didn’t grab me but I’ve not ruled anything out at the moment. I went to a girls school so that’s probably why I’m leaning to Sherborne. It’s a new area for us to be honest so just finding our way. Some really helpful comments on here - thank you very much!

I know this thread is a few months old but I'm in a similar situation and wondering which school you have gone for (if any)? I have visited Leweston and St Mary's Shaftesbury so far and there was no competition - St Mary's won hands down. In fact we loved it so much that we are considering not even visiting SG or Bruton, but I know that would probably be silly. I imagine we will end up going for St Mary's though, even though it's the furthest away from us - we are also Somerset. Would be interested in your thoughts on the others if you visited.

We did visit SGs and felt the pastoral care was brilliant but the focus was very much arts and music to the point we had to ask to see the science facilities. They vaguely mentioned "women as leaders" as being a new focus for them but then had no evidence how they planned to do this.

My dd is very academic with a love of science and maths so it really didn't feel like a good fit. We're visiting millfield next weekend as DD's other strength is her equestrian interest.

Sadly Shaftesbury is a bit far for us.

Whereabouts in Somerset are you? We are near Ilminster so it is a fair old trek to Shaftesbury (although not as far as I thought, only 50mins on the a303) but I loved it so much that I think it would be worth it (unless there is something out there that ticks the same boxes but closer!). My dd sounds similar - really academic and into science and maths, but isn't really sporty so I don't think Millfield would work for her. But would still love to hear how you get on there and if the academic provision is good for girls. Thanks for the feedback on SG, for some reason I am not as keen on there as I am St Mary's anyway, so I might just give it a miss. But I will go and check out Bruton. I definitely want all-girls.

@AKH123 I'll pm you

You'll get a much more rounded education at the Gryphon. Sherborne Girls has issues with drugs and anorexia and seems to work hard to retain average teachers. I've had kids at both schools so speak from experience.

We are south somerset near Sparkford and had very similar issues. I visited MANY schools ! My DC have ended up with an incredibly long school bus journey to Wellington - south of Taunton. Excellent academic - in fact a proper all round school. Mine have started in year 7 and year 9. So far so good. PM if you'd like to know more. I highly recommend a visit.

Ive heard really good things about Wellington, I hope your DC enjoy it there :)

When I was at school Leweston wasn't very academic. We used to play sport against Sherborne and it had a good reputation and the girls seemed happy and normal.