G&L, CLSG, SHHS, Highgate? Your honest opinion is needed?

[NewMum112]

Good Morning , I’m reposting this again as you advised
We live in NW London, we didn’t have a chance to visit any school only through virtual openings, so I need your honest opinions about CLSG, G&L, SHHS, and Highgate please.
With the exploding offers we need to make a first and second choice at least, please if you have any experience with any of these schools or any +/- information please do share, I value the views of parents more than any information I could get from the school itself. Thank you.

Are you sure all these schools are doing exploding offers? I wasn't aware of that. Would you be able to confirm where you heard this from. Thanks

Hi @NewMum112!

Is travel a consideration for you: safety, convenience, commuting time? It was for us, so I did 'dry' runs during school run time to check the reality. (We also reluctantly ruled out the North London Collegiate offer as it would mean a 7 am start and us having to do evening runs after activities.)

@dazedandconfused11plus
I heard about City exploding offers but I’m not sure if that’s going to be the case this year with the current circumstances nothing is certain, and Highgate on their website “Highgate does make more offers than there are places available, so as swift a response as possible is advised.”

@JBX2013
I know that will be another issue as well, but it really depends on the offer and the school, if my daughter is going to be happy there then I think I’ll have to make the sacrifice of driving, but if we have an offer from a shorter distance to us I think that will be ideal.

G&L and Highgate are quite far apart. Where are you located as journey times are important to factor in, also that kids might be local to both of them. SHHS, girls do tend to live fairly local. City , girls do come in from all over.
All are great academically. Highgate has the most superb facilities, and is excellent with sport. Co-ed as well, so if you think that might be good. It's also a very large school and year groups.
SHHS and G&L and city are also fantastic academically. The new head at City is amazing and used to teach my daughters English before she arrived at city.
They are all good options whichever you get!

CLSG and Highgate have both caught people out with exploding offers in recent years. Channing is the other school which I recall having actually withdrawn offers. I haven't heard that G&L or SHHS has, but I believe that they do reserve the right to in case they get too many acceptances.

Logistics are very important, both from a day-to-day travel perspective and a social perspective. CLSG, G&L and Highgate are about as far apart as you can get in London. Very few girls from year 7 upwards are dependent on their parents to drive them to and from school each day.
As has been mentioned, CLSG has made the national press for its exploding offers... Highgate has also employed this ill-thought out policy in the recent past.
G&L has always honoured offers.

[quote NewMum112]@JBX2013
I know that will be another issue as well, but it really depends on the offer and the school, if my daughter is going to be happy there then I think I’ll have to make the sacrifice of driving, but if we have an offer from a shorter distance to us I think that will be ideal.[/quote]
It's not just your sacrifice is it though- it's your daughter who will ultimately make the sacrifice if she does a long drive, after school activities and manage homework expectations. I really think you need to do journeys to each in rush hour (and once we are out of lockdown to get a better idea) to see if one is unrealistic.

@afewtoomanychoices
Thank you very much for your response, we live in NW area so the maximum journey time by public transport is 45 mins to City or G&L, driving is around 20 mins, SHHS and Highgate are closer to us.

I wouldn't drive to City, traffic is a nightmare round there in normal times.

20 mins driving to city from now London in rush hour. I think you are seriously underestimating the journey time.

NW London that should be

@user149799568
That’s exactly my point with exploding offers, it feels like we have to accept the offers as they come, it doesn’t sound right, and it really shouldn’t be this way. I’m extremely worried.

I cannot stress this enough - you can't drive your secondary school aged child to school in London. It's just not a thing.

There are lots of reasons. Firstly the traffic. If you're in, say, West Hampstead (no idea if this is true) and you drive to City and back twice a day you're looking at 3.5 hours a day.

Then, the cost. Do you want to pay the congestion charge for City? For the others, you'll have to pay parking.

Car use direction of travel. Low Traffic Neighbourhoods are sprouting up everywhere. The streets around schools are being closed to traffic at certain times - this is definitely true of SHHS, wouldn't be surprised about the others. The congestion charge zone might well expand.

Most importantly, your child won't want you to. They'll feel like an infant. I wish my children could walk to school but given that they don't, I'm glad that they have a relatively easy (5 minute walk, 12 overground, 5 minute walk) with loads of other kids. Honestly I can't think of a single child at my kids' two North London private schools who is driven. One had a driver at the beginning (super rich) but now goes by tube.

Have you contacted City and Highgate to ask about exploding offers? You won't be written off as an annoying parent, just say you love the school and want to know how quickly you need to act should you be so lucky as to be offered a place for your daughter.

Given what you say about where you live, I think SHHS or Highgate would be a no brainer. It's not like the other two aren't great schools, they're just not great enough to merit the extra travel. At this level they're all more than fine.

I also give a lot of credit to schools that don't do exploding offers so depending on the response you get, that would sway my decision. It's so rude, given that you're going to paying shedloads.

Almost all the girls at City travel by tube. I did when I was a pupil and at that point even most of the Preps did from the age of 7.

Exploding offers don't mean you have to accept the hour the offer is made. Talk to the schools who can advise. You sound excessively panicky. If you are concerned call and speak to the admissions staff.

In general I'm assuming that when you applied to the schools you did so having got a bit of a sense of each of them even if you couldn't visit in person. What does your daughter think? Is she at a prep school who can advise?

Without knowing your daughter no one can really make a recommendation - let alone how you prioritise co-ed v single sex, whether it's all about the academics or whether sport, outside space or music are priorities. Is she happy with a commute? How much would it bother her if her friends were spread over a wide area?

I know three of these schools pretty well. They are all great but right now you haven't even got an offer from any of them so my advice is wait and see what happens and take it from there.

Pretty certain that City no longer has exploding offers. Lots of students from NW London, nearly all of them get there by tube.

Exploding offers don't mean you have to accept the hour the offer is made.

At 10:00 on 9th February 2018 (the Friday before the half-term holiday), we received an email from CLSG offering DD a place. The email stated that there would be an offer holders tour on 20th February (the Tuesday after the half-term holiday). The email further stated that the school preferred for the acceptance form and deposit to be returned in person and that it would be open from 9am to 3pm Monday to Friday during the half-term week to facilitate this.

At 12:45 on 13th February (the Tuesday of the half-term week), we received an email from CLSG informing us that our offer was withdrawn. Fully three weeks before the nominal deadline and one week before the offer holders tour.

One family that we knew claimed that they had posted their acceptance form and deposit on Monday, 12th February, and had them returned because their letter arrived too late on Tuesday!

So, no, you didn't have to accept the hour the offer was made. In 2018, you had almost one and a half working days as long as you went to the school in person.

CLSG received a great deal of bad press that year and I know that at least one parent in 2019 took great pleasure in informing the school that they were declining their place because, as they had the luxury of a choice, they preferred a school which honored its promises (I know, I know, the school did make clear that they would withdraw offers once they had enough acceptances). CLSG subsequently stopped over-offering by such an enormous margin and started using their wait list again.

I'm not saying that something similar will happen this year. However, I know that something similar could happen this year, so I agree with OP that it's best to be ready to make a decision quickly.

@Stokey
I wouldn’t be driving to City unless it’s absolutely necessary, I take your point it’s a nightmare.

@user149799568
That’s really scary 😟
I really hope it doesn’t happen again, it’s really an unfair process.

I really don’t think you need to worry. As @user149799568 says in Feb 2018 there was a big issue with exploding offers at Channing and City specifically. People lost their places at these two schools who got a lot of bad press. The schools who suffered were those who decided to honour all the offers they had made. These were Francis Holland Regents Park and South Hampstead High School who each took an extra class - FHRP had 4 instead of the usual 3 start in September 2018 and SHHS had 5 instead of their usual 4 form entry. As you can imagine all schools have learnt from this and there were not exploding offers in 2019 or 2020 - Channing were chasing people up last year two weeks after offers went out to see if they still wanted the places that they hadn’t accepted yet. SHHS, FHS, City and Highgate have all gone to waiting list even if only. by a few places in the last couple of years. So I think 2018 was a bit of a one off and I don’t think it will happen again - good luck and let us know how you get on on offers day

These are all great schools that are very similar in profile apart from Highgate which is co-Ed but very similar academically to the other 3. Personal preferences usually determine choice if you have it and them.

I can not stress enough though the importance of getting to school easily and fully independently from the get go. E.g if you are in West or South Hampstead, SHHS is a few min walk away which is a godsend. CSSG is 20min by Met line, also easy. Highgate is quite difficult as driving across could take 40min instead of 15 and public transport is poor. GL is pretty difficult too unless you commit to driving most days because the 20min train to Olympia is not for everyone and tube takes 40-45 min vs 25 driving. If you are in the village, Highgate is much easier I guess both in terms of both car and bus.

Choose Highgate as you're closer.

Yes just to add that aside from not thinking exploding offers is something you will need to worry about this year - as the others have said, just go for the closest/easiest to get to of those that offer you a place. I know parents with children at all of them and every one of them is really happy - people talk about finding the right ‘fit’ for their child. Truth is if your child is academic then any one of these schools will suit them academically as they are all strong. When it comes to friendships then it’s basically a matter of luck as to what friendship groups they get into. Any year or any class can have a child who causes problems/bullies. My understanding is that in Recent years all of these schools have improved their pastoral care and their offerings when it comes to mental health etc. So you can’t really make a bad decision if it’s between these schools. Go for the best journey. Having local friendships is a nice to have. If you end up with some wait lists you should target the school that’s easiest for you and let them know you are their most local option and that you’d be ready to pay a deposit straight away if a waiting list place comes up - hopefully you’ll have the choice on offer day - good luck

If you have a strong preference for co-ed, then you might have a clear first choice. As for the girls schools, while I agree that all three are in the same league academically, I don't agree that they are practically identical. For example, my recollection is that when we looked at the numbers, we found that a much larger fraction of girls took STEM subjects at A Level at CLSG than at SHHS, with G&LS in between. Also, G&LS offers the IB at 6th Form which none of the other schools do.

As for non-academic issues, I very much agree that friendship groups are mostly a matter of luck. However, there are other relevant considerations. When we spoke with the girls at the open days, we came away with the impression that CLSG had the largest effective catchment area, with many girls taking the tube for an hour (or more!) from all points of the compass, whereas most girls at SHHS lived far more locally and G&LS in between. This can make a difference for how easy it is for your DD to meet up with other girls on weekends to form and sustain strong friendships.

As for "fit", our considerations included how much the schools engaged with DD's interests, and there were major differences. As an example, we came away with the impression that a girl who wanted to do a lot of sport might prefer G&LS to CLSG. G&LS just seemed to do more of it and have more teams than CLSG, besides the differences in facilities.

Finally, at the open days, it was clear that the schools had substantially different mixes of ethnic and national origins. SHHS was the most white and British and CLSG the least of each. Furthermore, while it wasn't visibly obvious, we certainly had the impression that CLSG was more economically diverse than either SHHS or G&LS, with a larger fraction of girls coming from state primaries as well as a larger fraction of girls on bursaries.

It's up to you how much you care about these various differences and, if so, which you prefer; but they do exist, or at least we thought that they did three years ago.

That’s interesting @user149799568 - I think some changes since the three years since you looked. SHHS on their website say it is evenly mixed 50/50 between those doing science and those doing arts/humanities A levels. At 11plus though I would only be looking at GCSE results as they may want to move to a different environment at A level. Would be interested to know the Highgate split and whether girls are as likely there to do science subjects as boys.

I think all the schools mentioned are trying to improve diversity particularly in the last year. Highgate has reached out to individual parents of ‘diverse’ backgrounds to ask them what they can do. Other schools getting alumna back to talk about their experiences and see what can be learnt - but I agree I think City probably has the best diversity currently of any of these schools.

Also something to think about is how big the school is - how many forms per year and how many in a form. For example I know not mentioned here but I was surprised to discover that Habs Girls has I think around 30 kids in some forms and not much smaller than a lot of state schools. Highgate I think has around 180 per year which is also huge. So I guess the size and environment is something to consider if you get the choice.