Good Mixed Secondary schools in Buckinghamshire or Hertfordshire

[EUTOLONDON]

Hi all,
We will be moving to England in about 2 months. Our areas of interest will depend mainly on the shool place and safety. My daughter will go to year 9 in September 2020. We still have to finalize a rental place. Please suggest out of Buckinghamshire and Hertfordshire, which place has better secondary schools with a good chance of getting a place ? Your suggestions will be helpful for us to decide.
Thanks!

Not exactly Waddesdon is it? Although the catchment area for there appears to shrink every year.

I hope I haven't offended you if your DC are there but I have lots of family in that area and none of them are falling over themselves to get their DC in Cottesloe!

I agree that non grammars are shit in Aylesbury but more are heading for schools in other areas. My cousin's DC got into a great school 30minute drive away.

Again, no offence meant but by all accounts, both past and present, it's not a school I would ever consider. It's okay if we don't agree.

Keep looking OP. You've got some great options in Bucks.

We don’t have to agree but the stats for the Cottesloe school back up my position rather than your relatives’ views. Aylesbury people want good secondary moderns because the 11 plus pass percentage is low in the Aylesbury Vale area. The vast majority go to the secondary moderns. Cottesloe is better than the Aylesbury secondaries. Most people won’t get into Waddesdon unless they pull the CofE card. Many don’t bother and, yes, the catchment for Waddesdon is a few villages. They select on religion! It’s way better than The Cedars without a grammar school cohort.

John Colet at Wendover is always popular. They also get the fall out from Aylesbury. Their data is very similar to The Cedars and again has no grammar DC. It’s a secondary modern. Lots of Bucks Secondaries have over 30% high achievers. That is on par with many average comprehensives. Bucks has a significantly higher percentage of 5-9 GCSE passes (60%) as compared to Beds (41%). It’s a very different county in many ways.

I have just checked back on this thread and seen its kicked off a bit! In Leighton Buzzard, Vandyke is now the sought after school and has been very slightly oversubscribed the last couple of years so they increased the admission numbers. Cedars has plenty of spaces but is a good school. It is a true comprehensive and they are not particularly pushy in subject choices for DC and probably wouldnt say anything if a very bright DC decided to do the fewest and least academic GCSEs for example. Behaviour is good and my bright DD is doing very well there.
LB usually has 3 or 4 kids from each middle school taking the 11+ to try to get into the grammars but obviously from that self selecting group not all get in and maybe only 2 or 3 each year then leave. So the uppers are about as fully comprehensive as it can get. I think results drop as the uppers only have the children for 3 years up to the point of taking their GCSE so dont have as long to work with each child.
I would definitely consider LB though OP because the social advantage of joining a school at the same time as the rest of the cohort is invaluable. But consider looking at Vandyke also.
LB is a nice place to live. The linslade side is the nicer area and there are some gorgeous period properties and streets around the station. As it is closer to the station, that side of town tends to be more expensive but I dont know what your budget is.

@Techway

You could also try Chesham Grammar, I know they had some movement so could be lucky with places.

Is there any faith connection as that open up other schools. Is private an option for 3 years, circa £15k p.a?

@Techway which privates are £15k per annum?

@Mustbetimeforachange and @ItsHAVEnotOF what's with Khasla school please?

The Khasla Academy in Stoke Poges got rated inadequate about 3 years ago and the academy trust who run it got kicked out by the dept for education. It was still being shown to have safeguarding issues at the last monitoring visit a year ago. If this is a school you are considering I'd do some heavy googling first and see if you can talk to local parents.

I have to go to watford quite often for work, and the new school in maple cross seems to have some happy parents. I did hear one rumour about Amazon vouchers in exchange for merit points, which seemed popular with parents and pupils!

@MillicentMargaretAmanda thanks. It's the first time I've heard of the school.