Winchester or Alleyns

[tungkaryee]

I need some advice here from the experienced mums here please. Alleyns offered my son academic and music scholarship plus bursary and he got a friend from primary school there.
Dulwich College also offered him music scholarship and bursary place.
Meanwhile,Winchester College’s offered him music scholarship even he missed the audition because I forgot the appointment. They called us for audition again and gave him music scholarship a week after. Maybe it’s the recommendation of his current music school’s head who just changed job to teach at Winchester college. He specifically talked to me for 10 minutes that he will flourish at Winchester compared to other schools according to his characters.
He is not very independent at the moment and not confident that he will pass the entrance exams in May. He tried the Geography and History papers and thought that it’s difficult. He’s in grammar school at the moment and he’s quite academic.
I believe that he will be mature faster as my kids are very easy to blend in the unfamiliar situation. The problem is he depends on me too much. I believe boy should go out exploring and find their own ways. Staying with me will lower his confidence and creativity and spoil him to be mummy little boy instead of a ‘man’.
Hanging out with educated teachers and ambitious peers at WC will be more beneficial in long term.
In order to gain entry in WC, he needs to pass May entrance exams but the deadline of accepting offer in Alleyns and DC is March! Accepting music scholarship at WC means giving up Alleyns and DC.
Any thoughts from mums as I’m very frustrated now. Many thanks for your help!

First of all OP - congrats - you clearly have a very bright and talented ds! Secondly, I know how incredibly stressful the school choices thing is, I was pulling my hair out when it came to my ds. My advice is that they are all really fantastic schools so you have to go with what works for you practically and what feels like the best choice to you. They really are fantastic schools so I think the decisions come down to whether you want your ds boarding or not (I presume your ds would not be boarding at Dulwich or Alleyn's but would at Winchester) and then whether you want co-ed or single sex. If you both prefer co--ed then that rules DC out (that's where my ds is and we turned down a scholarship at Alleyns for one at DC). If you'd rather he didn't board then that rules Winchester out. With regards to making him a 'man'. I don't think you have to send him off to boarding to do that, it's just a matter of giving him more independence and responsibility. The other thing you want to think about is how you both feel about him having to sit exams again for Winchester.

In your position I would go for DC or Alleyn's simply because I wouldn't want ds going through more exams unnecessarily but I haven't seen Winchester so it may have something you love! Whatever you choose I think you can be confident he will do well academically so you need to really think about where he is likely to fit and be happy. Good luck!

Yes thank you so much for your advice. We will go for Alleyns as it's too much risk to take as if he fails the exams in May, he will need to travel 3 hours back and forth to grammar school every day again which will seriously affect his study. That's one of the reason that we want to try boarding as it saves lots of time and can do lots more different extra-curricular activities and build confidence.
It's nice to have some mums support here, first time. We're not alone

I presume the travel to Alleyns will be OK?

London has such brilliant extra-curricular opportunities for talented musicians, CYM, Tomorrow's Warriors , many targeted programmes, ensembles and orchestras etc.

I do not believe boys learn to become men by wrenching them away from their security before they are ready and unhappiness is not a foundation for confident learning. IMO.