Camden School for Girls - Information needed

[MissScotland]

Hi mamas,

My daughter is in Y5 and we have kicked off the process of looking into secondary schools. Both our children have attended private schools from day one and so we have been focusing on private secondary education but then came across CSG which looks like it may suit her very well.
We do not live in the catchment and do not intend to move there (we are quite close though).
So we are aiming at entering through the music channel. DD is uber musical, currently working on Grade 6 piano and Grade 5 theory and will most certainly progress to Grade 7/8 before finishing primary school. She's a gifted little composer too. We (and her teachers) believe that she has a strong shot at getting a music scholarship or a place at a school based on her music skills and potential. She's also an excellent student academically and loves school.
I have read the information on the CSG website but would like hear more, ideally 1st hand, about the music application process and the aptitude test. The website is rather vague.
Anything you can tell me about the school would help, tips and insights are welcome :-)

Thanks in advance x

DD sat the CSG music scholarship last year.

The aptitude test was fairly long and from what DD reported back covered 4 sections. It was all things like saying whether a note was higher or lower, or a phrase was the same or different.

If you scored in the top 50 (and there are hundreds who sit the test) then you are invited back for a performance section.

Until that point there is nowhere that you indicate what level your child is at or even what instruments they play etc. The scholarships are based on aptitude not prior attainment.

Having sat a lot of music scholarships (state and private) I would say that the CSG one was one of the better ones, but definitely not the one that covered the most areas - some had written tests, aural tests, interview and performance - some only had a very cursory aural test.

We liked the school, but it wasn't the one we eventually went for - and we were looking for a school that prioritised music. There are a lot of very good options if you are happy to travel.

Thank you so much OhCrumbsWhereNow, this is very helpful.
We are looking at other options. I'd love to hear what schools you think are best for a gifted little girl.

OP, just a word of warning - these aptitude tests don't always work for accomplished musicians. My daughter failed to get a music place and she had Grade 8 in violin/Grade 6 piano/Grade 5 theory and was a Saturday conservatoire student. Ditto an older friend of hers, who's now a professional musician. I don't know why this is - but one of her teachers said it had to do with the test being digital and used electronic sounds rather than acoustic instruments. Who knows?

That said, you have nothing to lose by going for it, and wish your DD luck. Have you considered St. Marylebone - they also have admission via the music route?

Thank you!
Yes, I have listened to some of the exercises and indeed they use an electronic sound, not a musical instrument so the person taking the test can't be familiar with it. My daughter did pretty well on all 3 sections except the texture which is apparently the hardest one.
I'll have a look at St Marylebone, thanks!

DD got a music place at CSG and attends the school now. She does a lot of music (was probably grade 7 when she applied and now attends a junior conservatoire) but, as others have said, sometimes the electronic test they use throws even very musical kids. The girls who score in the top 3 get an automatic place without doing an audition but DD wasn't one of those so she auditioned. There will be lots of accomplished musicians auditioning but my impression was that they were more interested in how much the girls enjoy playing and if they're going to contribute fully to the music life of the school. So, there are girls who get places having not much training or done exams but who have a natural aptitude and enthusiasm (i.e. have written something themselves to perform).

The aptitude test is a bit of a lottery though I think. We did a bunch of practice tests on youtube - DD particularly hated the chord ones, which are weird because you can get sort of 'ghost notes' but in the event she said that nothing we had tried came up in the real test anyway.

I know of a few girls who didn't get through the musical aptitude test for CSG but got places at Marylebone or Dame Alice Owens. So definitely worth exploring all options.

Good luck!

Thank you so much. This is very helpful! Will keep researching :-)

I just remember the rest takes AGES and some of DDs friends gave up because they just couldn’t concentrate for that long.
It can absolutely be prepared for. It benefits children who have played and listened to classical music, particularly stringed instruments.

Interesting, thank you!

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I am another person with children who have obtained music scholarships at private schools but failed to get through these electronically administered 'aptitude' tests. It was a bizarre process - there are posters on here whose children have, I think, made it through these tests for Herts schools.

It seems a very odd way, IMO, to introduce selection into state schools. There is no requirement even to participate in the life of the music department after you're in at the schools we tried for although that might be different for CSG.

Thank you @OVienna

Do people know if tests in St Marylebone and DAO are similar to CSG?
#cingolimama, that’s bonkers that your DD didn’t get in. That test can’t be right. Sounds like Mozart might have not made it, due to lack of familiarity with digital sounds

The Marylebone and DAO ones are similar but I know several kids who have failed the CSG one and passed those. But maybe it varies year on year.

To be fair to CSG they aren't trying to recruit people who have lots of musical training, quite the opposite, they are trying to make sure at least some of the places go to people who haven't had the benefit of expensive lessons etc but have musical potential. And the tests do seem to do that so, as much as it's annoying for people whose children already do a lot of music, they tend to have other options available to them.

In response to an earlier comment, at CSG there is an expectation that students with music places will participate in the music life of the school.

Thank you #Entreprecurious.
It’s an admirable motive that they’re trying to enrol students that haven’t had the benefit of early musical training. However, if the purpose is to grow musicians, for the majority of people it’d be too late to start at 11. There are very few musicians who started that late. Whilst I appreciate the idea I’m not sure what the expected outcome is. I think it’s a well known fact too that talent (in any area) makes 1% of success and 99% is practice. Those kids who put in hundreds and thousands of hours of practice don’t get in and kids who may have natural ability but may be completely uninterested to practice for hours do. If only natural ability counted all conservatoires around the world would be doing that test instead of auditions.

Perhaps that’s the clue though, that CSG is not a real avenue for the majority of “seasoned” 11 y.o. musicians.

I would be concerned that your DD has only learnt one instrument, particularly as it is piano.

She plays the violin too.

More the case that state schools cannot recruit for anything other than 'aptitude' as to do otherwise would be an unfair advantage for those children whose parents have the resources/time to facilitate a certain level of expertise.

However, having sat a lot of these last year (or rather DD sat them), there is a huge range of what different schools deem to be included in 'aptitude' testing.

My preference is for the schools that combined performance, interview, live aural tests with a piano and the MAT electronic tests into one.

I would also say that there is no guarantee that a very musical child will do well on the tests that are primarily MAT only.

If you have a specific school you are after and need to get the music place to have any chance of getting the school, I would also advise checking the dates for the MAT testing and sitting for a few as a practice run if they are earlier.

Camden are able to select on ability as they had the criteria before the rules changed. But only a certain number of places. The rest have to be aptitude.They got pulled up on it by Schools Adjudicator when someone complained.
You can of course train for the listening tests otherwise no one would bother to teach ear training.

@Frogusha I guess it depends what you mean by 'is not a real avenue for...' Clearly just attending CSG is not going to get you a place at a conservatoire. The ones, like my DD, who are interested in a career in classical music tend to go to conservatoire JDs (or attend other similar provision) but then my experience is that the same is true of students with music scholarships at top private schools like St Pauls etc

And of course people whose kids have reached a high level at 11+ do just use the music places as a way of getting their child into a good state school that they wouldn't otherwise have had a hope of a place in due to teeny catchment. (Guilty as charged on that front.)

But, the ones who get an aptitude place without oodles of formal trailing (even if they aren't going to go on to be professional classical musicians) do get (a) a place at a good school that isn't dependent on living next to it or having to pay for two years tutoring (b) access to a much higher standard of music provision than at most state schools thus giving them the opportunity to develop their natural talent in that area.

The suggestion that kids who haven't reached a high standard by 11+ are "completely uninterested in practising" implies that parental input has nothing to do with it, which obviously isn't true. My DC are genuinely interested in careers in music and the older one now puts in a lot of work independently but I'm under absolutely no illusion that she would have got where she's got to without a naggy parent such as me behind her, great tuition and money spent on instruments, music, summer courses and whatnot. The same is true, quite literally, of every young musician I know playing at that level. It's really not fair to suggest that kids who aren't great musicians aged 11 simply can't be arsed to put in the hours.

I don’t have an experience getting a child into CSG but I did go there myself. If you were originally thinking of private school and can afford it, why not do that? Leave a space in a state school for someone accomplished who doesn’t have the option of private school. The disparity of students at Camden is just hideous - some students in £££ houses/ with so much academic support vs. some of the more “local” students from modest backgrounds. It is so polarised.

The snobbery of Frogusha‘s post just shows, why should a student not strive to improve their musical ability at age 11, just because they haven’t had the means to be coached extensively earlier in their life?

I’m sorry if this came across as snobbish. And I do agree that without nagging there’s no practice for most kids. However, it is also true that many kids with means do have early years musical training and nagging parents, and achieve absolutely nothing. I know personally a few of those, e g a privately educated girl who did grade 1 for about 7 years. Whilst money and nagging helps, if the child has no desire to play they won’t achieve anything.

My previous understanding of music places at state schools was that they are designed to grow musicians - people who go on to higher education to train as musicians, and later on choose it as a profession. There’s of course a possibility that a child will be sick of it and choose something different, but at least they’d be on track for that route. However, based on the above posts it appears that the design is to give potentially underprivileged children exposure to music. Which is why I was surprised but stand corrected by you.

@Entreprecurious, I did not say “ that kids who haven't reached a high standard by 11+ are "completely uninterested in practising". I said they MAY be. Because we don’t know whether they will practise or not, do we? If they didn’t have a nagging parent before they might still be not motivated to practice on their own accord. It’s a bit of a chicken and egg thing.

If the aim is to give “local” students a chance to go to school that does music at a higher level it really should start earlier than at 11.

Finally, one shouldn’t assume higher income of children that achieved high grades at 11. They might not have expensive lessons, they might have parents who teach them (like me).

@sickofthetories I agree that it's polarised but do you think that's worse than just having schools for rich children and schools for poor children? Do you think that if everyone who could afford to go private did so then poorer students at CSG, Latymer, DAO or any other popular state school, would have better schooling? Because, as much as you may be scornful of the middle classes who dominate schools like CSG (and I agree that they do) there are benefits that come with them being there e.g. a lot of additional school fundraising that isn't just channelled towards their own DC.

@Frogusha agree that starting earlier would be better. And, happily, I think there are efforts underway (as you'll have seen too) in the music world to make that happen through outreach programmes starting earlier. It's wonderful that you and other parents are able to teach your children - I mean that genuinely, it's a great gift to be able to pass on to them. But that too is a different sort of advantage that they will start with, not just the teaching but the understanding at home of how much work goes into developing those skills, the encouragement, the right conditions for practice, the support getting to rehearsals, the access to people who can play accompaniments etc all that social capital. My kids have it too - I don't play to your level but I'm enough of a musician to 'get' the amount of work it takes and to be able to help in some ways - and I'm so glad for them that they do but music is such an uneven playing field (like education generally) and I'd like to think that schools who use things like MATs are at least trying to address that. Maybe I'm just being naive and it's simply selection by stealth as others have suggested but I have seen kids who don't have the kind of support we're talking about benefit from the system. Now, you could say schools committed to this stuff should find a way to only recruit those kids but I don't know how that would work in reality and I think having some kids in the mix who already have some training does pull up the standard, which benefits everyone.

@Entreprecurious No I don’t think it would be a better situation if there were only schools for rich and poor students. But I do think that most of London and especially Camden is diverse enough to still have a mix of backgrounds just on catchment and that it is a shame that scholarship places are generally taken up by pupils that have had very advantageous primary schooling and would have the means to have advantageous private secondary schooling. Let’s face it - if a working class child didn’t get the scholarship and lives in a crap area for schools they are off to a crap school.

And whilst @Frogusha you teach your child musically, I think it would be naive to assume that that is the case for more than a tiny percentage applying for places. It’s generational too - unfortunately many of the parents of less advantaged children aren’t going to be talented enough at music themselves to teach their children, so the cycle just continues.

It’s the same for faith schools at primary - used a a vehicle for middle class parents to get their children into a non fee paying selective schools. And the selection criteria of being present every Sunday and Volunteering etc is at the detriment of low paid workers retail/ shift nurses etc that have to work on weekends and those from chaotic backgrounds.

The system is just so totally broken for working class kids, I just think it’s worth thinking about.

I agree with much of what you say @sickofthetories about educational access for poorer children, generational advantage etc – it is a broken system.

(Though I don't think, by the way, that the majority of people who get music places at the kind of schools we've been discussing could afford private school fees – there's a massive financial difference between paying for music tuition and paying the £25k odd per year with all the extras that it costs to send just one child to private school).

But I do see that music/language/drama/faith are all forms of selection. If they didn't exist though you'd still have all the people who could afford it renting or buying in the catchment of schools that get good results - and I don't see that as being any better than other forms of selection. You're still buying an advantage.

In an ideal world, all schools would be well run, adequately cater for all abilities and everyone would just go to their nearest school. But we live in the real world where schools do vary enormously in quality, results and how they tackle behavioural issues for example. People are always going to use whatever means - be they financial or not - to access the best education they can for their child. I know well the only local school that my DC would have been guaranteed a place at and I was not willing to send them there if there was an alternative.

I completely agree with you! So many parents on here bragging about their child being Grade 8+ etc etc. CGS doesn’t care! I’ve emailed the head of music and he said that he didn’t care about the grade but the musicality of the child. So any parent out there who can afford private schools, or are thinking of moving house to get their child in should have a real think about who truly deserves to go there! The school is honest & fair! Like it or lump it