As the Tiffin deadline looms, is there a girls SW London grammars / indies thread yet?

[FlumePlume]

I just realised that I need to get the Tiffin Girls form in ASAP, and wondered if anyone else is in the same position? I could do with company in this process!

We’re not yet decided but probably applying to Tiffin, WHS, SPGS, Sutton High and maybe one of PHS / Emanuel / KGS.

Am watching this thread through sheer nosiness as went through it all in January. DD about to start at one of your schools and have a year off before the next DD! Easy for me to say but wasn't as bad as I thought it would be!

I've been waiting for this thread to start for ages! For DD we've applied to Tiffin Girls, WHS, Putney, Emanuel and will sit the Sutton SET.

I am in as we are thinking of these schools too. We have some family serious sickness to deal with the last 6 months plus and I was passed on a promotion which was promised few months back(and I have been on 12+ hours/day for it) I havent had much clue how she is doing. My husband has been dealing with the forms and I think we only have the indie forms to send. Last year the Indie option was wide open however since his illness we have to reconsider everything seriously again now. She wants Indie though, she is into music, very sporty and loves science/maths(at the same time is a serious book worm, if we are home she is always with one of her favourite books and/or on her violin/piano).

Greenleave, doesn't your dd have a 10+ offer from Kingston Grammar already if you paid the deposit? Your dd is no doubt talented so must be sitting Tiffin? Are you now focusing on Indy scholarships with KGS a consideration as you are already through to that stage? I'm sorry to hear about your dh and missed promotion but your dd will probably end up with too many options by March '19!

Yes, we have paid for KGS deposit, Sunshine, we didnt think of trying Tiffin last year as we thought we could afford. With the situation has now changed, I have asked my husband to fill the form for Tiffin too. Its free and here is a very competitive girl who doesnt mind exams as much so we think we could just try.

Lovely to ‘meet’ you all. I just did the online forms (thank you, GDST!) for WHS and SHS, and have the Tiffin and SPGS forms in envelopes ready to post tomorrow. Now to put all the dates in my diary so that I don’t miss anything (though putting the stage 2 dates in feels like tempting fate...).

Greenleave That sounds really stressful, I hope things start looking up illness and career-wise for you.

Greenleave, best of luck to your dd and your family, I'm sure your dd will enjoy the challenge of the coming months.

OK I'm in - we are doing the SET and probably SHS and Old Palace maybe. Haven't done the forms for the indies or done any bloody online NVR.

I’m in, we are doing the grammars, WHS, Sutton High, Surbiton High and one more to be decided. Second time in the ring for me, ding ding

Just done the SHS form and then my debit card reader broke and can't pay. Sigh - why are the jobs always half done?

Why are people doing so many GDSTs? They are all very different - is WHS a reach and then the others back ups? For us the grammars are a reach and then SHS is backup.

Christopher Are you doing home preparation, then? We are, so no tutor to guide us on which online NVR websites are the most like the real thing. We’re applying to WHS as it’s closest and SHS as it seems to be lovely and a bit easier to get in to. Tiffin and SPGS are very much wild cards, but we really liked both of them (in different ways) when we looked around.

Jimjam Any wisdom from last time around?

Re GDST's, we did Putney because it's very near and Wimbledon because we really liked it ( also near)- very different exams and suited different children. Sutton was too far but did Surbiton as a back up - although really liked it as well. Surbiton isn't a GDST though but lots of people think it is.
In retrospect not sure why we did PHS as neither of us were keen but DD wasn't fazed by exams and didn't have any others in that week - I think it was the same week as SPGS and G&L which meant it was v busy for some. That is worth thinking about. Ibstock, KGS and Surbiton were all in the first week of Jan this year- none of the prep schools had even gone back but most of the state school pupils had almost a full week of school as well. DD had the kgs exam on the Friday afternoon- she was shattered.

Thanks for sharing Whenwillsumerend, we realised most of our exams are at 1st and 2nd and 3rd weeks of January too. No doubt that a chunk of leave will have to be booked in advance for these days. We are nearest to the Hammersmith schools(3 miles off with direct bus) too but they are also most expensive.

whenwill We really liked Wimbledon, too - the Head is very impressive. And a short commute is a big advantage.

I’ve been mapping out the dates of all the possible exams to help narrow down our applications, and it does crunch in early Jan:
4th KGS
7th SPGS
9th PHS
12th Emanuel
14th WHS

There’s also a bunch in the first three weeks of November - pre-tests for SPGS and WHS, Sutton High exam, Tiffin second stage (if successful in the first stage).

I think Sutton is a bit like Surbiton in that they offer much earlier than the others don't they? It was nice having a Surbiton offer in the bag early on!
Everyone in DD's class who applied got an offer there which was nice for them when offers/rejections came in from other schools...

We are doing a mix (this is so outing isnt it). Group tutoring and summer school and then maths with dad and English with me most days.

Once the Grammar is over we will concentrate on the Bofa NVR.

I have done it once with a boy already.

YY to SHS being early - we will be all done and dusted in November.

Hmm words of wisdom. Probably nothing you don’t already know. From experience I’d say don’t under estimate how much of an advantage it is to go to a school that is nearby. Over 5 or even 7 years the time saving is immmense, esp when the homework load is big, or they are needed at after school events.

@Jimjam68 - yes yes yes to local.

Remember this is a journey your DDs will do twice a day for up to 6 years. Throw in concerts, sporting events and parents evenings and the difference between a 30 minute and one hour journey adds up.

We rejected a 'better' school with a one hour commute by train for one with a 25 minute bus journey. That's a lot of time saved for both DD and us as a family - no regrets!

For us all these schools have direct bus(just 3 mins walk to the bus stop from the house), its a small range of 20-30mins so really, no difference. Its the matter if we could get in and if we could afford it. I might have to switch into contracting for better cash for few years if its needed. All I could do from my side is preparing for leave to bring her to the exams and plan financially to meet the need. We are also applying Wycombe Abbey as we know some girls go there and love it. I dont think we could qualify for any bursary but the £30k is really a stretch. I dont know if I could let her to board to be honest.

I honestly don’t know how she’ll do, so the main plan is to see what offers we get and then think about preferences / distance if we’re lucky enough to get a choice.

I had a look at last year’s CLSG thread about the exploding offers. As far as I can tell, KGS’s bumph says they might use them (although they didn’t last year), but none of the other SW London indies do. Does anyone know if that’s right?

FlumePlume-DD did better than she thought she would and we had a few choices. Completely changed mind about 10 times once we actually had the offers as there was never a real frontrunner and we had a waiting list situation and a good state to add to the mix.
We're all now completely sure she's going to the right one for her but there was a fair bit of angst between her, me and DH!

No other SW indies use exploding & KGS ended up with less take up than previous years, overall they say they were pleased with their selection process as have a good sized intake but many parents thought the tone of the offer letter was poor. It's interesting to note that both Hampton & LEH had more accept than expected & have both put on extra year 7 classes - for LEH it's their biggest intake ever starting next week, LEH say it's great so many girls of a high standard have chosen their school. Putney I heard was hard entry but moved to waiting list in late Spring. I would have thought they will all re-jig their entrance levels because of the above or use scholarships more to get the candidates they really want.

Kingston is a small site. They went over the previous year so I imagine they didn't want that to happen again. Last year was a difficult year with schools over offering and some children who would have normally done well getting shock results ie not getting offers from their 'back-up' choices. 2006/07 was a apparently a bumper year in terms of birth rate in SW London, or so I was told!

We did the whole thing last year. DD got Tiffin and St Paul's which were her top two choices and the only selectives we applied for. If anyone has any questions about the process or anything about those two, I'm happy to help if I can.

Agree that it wasn't that bad, really!

Thanks Galciferous - what prep did you do and what was worth doing? Any tips on the level of maths needed for Tiffin?