Overseas student joining a UK school just before GCSEs

[Grevillea]

Hi there, we're moving to the UK from Australia at the end of the year.

My DD is 15 and is in the last term of Australian Year 9 (school year Jan-Dec 2018). Because her birthday falls at the end of July, the UK schools (and County Council) we've contacted have told us she needs to go into Year 11 - thus skipping Year 10 entirely, plus one term of Year 11.

She will have followed a different curriculum, and although bright, will probably struggle to cram in the new syllabus in just a few months. For example, she's been learning Mandarin as a modern foreign language; she's studied Australian history ...

If we fail to win the argument (and we're running out of time), I'm wondering whether, if she sat GCSEs in Year 11, would she be able to retake any in Year 12? She wants to study law at uni so needs 3 decent A Levels. Does anyone know if students can do three years at 6th form: 1 year for GCSEs and 2 for A Levels?

Good grief. Joining Yr 11 in January - not a hope, realistically, of making up all that lost ground in time to get a respectable set of GCSEs unless she’s a phenomenally fast worker and doesn’t need much teaching. I work at an independent school and we offer a “pre-sixth” course in Year 11, where students who want to join the school in the sixth form join us a year early and study accelerated courses for selected GCSES, but this begins in September, and they study fewer subjects.

Your best bet is to get her into an independent school and joining Year 10 if you are committed to an area in the UK where the state schools have unequivocally said “no”.

We frequently have students out of year group in the state comp I teach in, I have 2 in one of my current y11 classes.
So we would definitely allow her to go into y10 ( assuming there was a space) but private schools are also likely to be able to offer that flexibility.

Have you considered the IB route to university, GCSE's less of an issue for that option.

www.ibo.org/programmes/find-an-ib-school/?SearchFields.Region=ibaem&SearchFields.Country=GB&SearchFields.Keywords=&SearchFields.Language=English&SearchFields.BoardingFacilities=&SearchFields.SchoolGender=&SearchFields.TypePublic=true

I wouldn't. Unless you can get her into Y10 I'd home ed til the following Sept then straight to 6th form and A levels.

Some private tuition centres have a January intake aimed at students transferring from overseas.
My dds sixth form college takes students from overseas and your dd would be able to take a 3 year course the first year would be GCSE/level 2 and then move to A levels for 2 years. She wouldn't be able to start until September though.

She is likely to have covered some of the subject material in her Australian school but you'd have to compare the course requirements for every subject to know where the 'gaps' are. Also, for some courses there is coursework which is collected/compiled over Year 10 and Year 11, so she would have lots to catch up on. Year 11 basically go on study leave in April, so she will effectively have one term of teaching to prepare for GCSEs.
I agree that to go to Year 10 in order to start the courses from the beginning is best OR to go into Year 11 in an international school /non-UK curriculum school. You can take A Levels or IB without GCSE prerequisites but she would probably benefit from having GCSE English and Maths as many universities and employers require a 'C' / 4 in these. That said, at my last international school we took a boy into Year 10 in January who should have been in Year 11 due to age, but school felt it was useless as he'd only have one term before study leave. So he did two terms of Year 10 and then started Year 12 (according to his age) in the new academic year in September - might that be a solution?
If there is any way she can delay coming to the UK until she is in Year 12 (UK year level) that would be best.

If she is planning on living and working in the U.K. then it is probably best she gets the best English qualifications she can.

Rather than rushing allow her to take the longer option and get better grades.

I have recently taught several Australian 17 year olds, their skill level has been excellent but they need to be taught the tricks and techniques specific to the English exam system.

I somewhat disagree, Moussemoose - I only have Australian qualifications and have had no issues living and working here in the UK.

However, if the OP's family is moving here, it does make sense to ensure she gets the best IB or UK-exam grades she can. IB is increasingly popular in lots of top UK schools for Y12 and 13 and is more in line with the breadth of the Australian system.

Thanks for all the replies.
We're moving for DH's work and also for family reasons. I've spoken to a private international school where she can do GCSEs or IGCSEs and join in Year 10, so it looks like we may have a solution. She's only 5 weeks off the cut-off date for her age group and although she'll have missed a term, she's very studious so I'm confident she will be ok.
Appreciate all the advice and helpful comments though :)

Do get the school to send you a copy of the syllabus OP in advance of you moving and sets out for you what the classes will have coveresd between September and December since it may well be that your DD hasn't done the foundation work for some of the GCSEs either which will man that she has more than a term to catch up on. If she starts on the catch up work now then she stands a better chance.

Glad it looks like you have found a solution. Good luck 😊

Come to Scotland OP - we're much more reasonable about these sorts of things. It's not a "UK school" you're having problems with, it's the English system.

Hope it works out for your daughter.

A boy from sri Lanka joined us at the beggining of year 10 even though he was the age to be in year 11. So it's not a hard and fast rule. Good luck, hope your daughter can start year 10 as starting in year 11 is halfway through gcse and must be hard.

Sorry, just read your reply that you've found a solution. I went to a state school but know it was more flexible that others as it allowed me to sit as maths as an extra which my mum taught me to help with physics. I didn't want to originally but found science hard and my mums an a level maths teacher. Also, they taught Latin with just one student choosing it!

Just move to Scotland instead of England . The state schools here are much more flexible. Although by age she should be in 4th year and sitting her National 5 exams in May 2019, they will let her go into 3rd year instead.

She will be the oldest in her year but only by 5 months. And even better, you won’t have to pay university fees if she studies in Scotland.

Only downside is the weather but we won’t mention that.

Just move to Scotland? Why? The OP has said they are moving for her DH’s work. Presumably if that was in Scotland they would already be looking at schools in Scotland.

My "Scotland" comment was in response to many of the posters who talk about "the UK system" as if it's all one homogeneous mass which operates the same as their part of England.

It doesn't, and there is considerably more flexibility in the Scottish system. (And potentially in Northern Ireland, but I'm not as up to speed with how it all works over there).

And we don't know where in the UK the OP's DH is to be working - if it's Carlisle or Newcastle, living in Scotland might be entirely do-able.

Hi there, we're moving to the UK from Australia at the end of the year

My DD is 15 and is in the last term of Australian Year 9 (school year Jan-Dec 2018). Because her birthday falls at the end of July, the UK schools (and County Council) we've contacted have told us she needs to go into Year 11 - thus skipping Year 10 entirely, plus one term of Year 11

The OP repeatedly says she is moving to the UK. Why on earth would you assume periodot1 that this means England ?

Why on earth would you assume periodot1 that this means England ?

Because she refers to year 10 and year 11, not S4 or S5 which is what Scotland refers to school years as...

I assume she means England as I am aware that the Scottish system is different and she refers to Years 10 and 11.

I would totally agree that starting mid way through Year 11 is really not a good idea.

Maybe the Australian curriculum has changed since I took my HSC in Victoria (I know the names have changed) - but I can tell you that my kids in England are learning everything earlier than I did in Melbourne (I remember when I was taught Pythagoras' theorem, for example, and it was a year after my kids were taught it here, and that is across the board). Also so much of the GCSE curriculum involves knowing how they want you to answer the questions - even if you know the material, you have to understand what it is that they want. Even going into Year 10, your DD will need a lot of assistance to make sure she obtains that kind of background as most teachers are going to assume you were taught certain techniques and ways of answering questions further down the school, and are just refining and developing them at this stage.

To be precise, we're moving to the southern part of England.

When I was at school there in the 80s, it was Lower 4th, Upper 5th etc (all very Malory Towers lol).

We have a Skype interview with a school tomorrow so fingers crossed :)

Good luck OP - I swear the GCSEs are equivalent to HSC, so your DD will need all the time she can get on the courses. I'd encourage her to only take 9 if possible.