Getting rejected from schools

[cantstopstressing]

As is the case for many others, we are expecting to hear back from two schools tomorrow and one next week. I am not that hopeful mainly due to sheer number of applicants. I am wondering what to tell DS if he gets rejected. I don't want to kill his confidence as he is a bright boy and worked so hard. Any advice on what to say?

@CaravaggioLover

OP you say the "whole process is pretty horrendous" but you went into it willingly and paid for tutors etc. Your complaints about it being unfair are hypocritical - if you see it as unfair, why be complicit?

Selection is 'unfair'. Private education is 'unfair'. Having a snipe at another pupil who ' got in' when your ds didn't is 'unfair'. As soon as you embarked on a selective route you opened your ds up to the possibility of not getting in.

Many people have no idea what the process involves until the end of it. Had I known then no I wouldn't have put my DS through it. But he's a bright boy, exceeding expectations in everything, tutor recommended certain schools, state options are dire, so why wouldn't we?

As for it private education being unfair, I would say the state system is also unfair. Grammars are unfair. It's unfair that some kids by dint of living in a certain postcode get an amazing state school and others (like us) get a shit one. I would have been delighted to have a decent state option rather than work full time in a tough job with long hours in order to send my son to the best school I can. I was planning to afford this by stopping paying into my pension and foregoing other luxuries. Can you tell me exactly how that is unfair?

@leeloo1

I sympathise op, as I went through this last year with my ds and I feel like there is a real grieving process to go through when the results aren't what you wanted.

I spent months feeling traumatised... hoping the wait list would change, emailing admissions offices, clutching at straws etc. In the end I noticed a late round of scholarship interviews at a school in a different catchment area to where I'd been considering and applied. My son ended up getting a 25% fee reduction and is really happy there. I still shudder at the memory of what we went through though!

I really hope it works out for your ds.

Thank you Leeloo1, so glad someone understands and happy your DS ended up in a good place! It does sting, rejection is so hard to take, especially when you just have to swallow it and put on a brave face for DS.

@cantstopstressing would you mind sharing which schools you applied to? I know that acceptance and positive feelings for the offer school would be the best course (and, officially, I think you should probably try and do that) but I wondered whether anyone might have a little insight on the WL and rejection school.

Contact the wait list school and find out where he is on the list and what his chances are.

OP, I do think some of the posters here have had a bit of an empathy bypass. We are all just trying to achieve a reasonable education for our kids and the lack of clear and transparent feedback is very disconcerting. Your reaction is only human.

If it is any comfort, we are in a similar (worse?) situation. We only applied to private schools because our local London secondary is well below average on every possible metric. We could have moved to the doorstep of a very popular school, like lots of people do, but I don’t necessarily see that as the morally superior thing to do. We have been waitlisted by our first choice of school, which is pretty academically selective, and have an academic scholarship for a school that was a bit of an emergency application. Normally, you’d assume the best fit school would be somewhere in between the two, but this year has not been normal and very few schools ran anything resembling their usual exams.

It’s hard not to obsess about this when we are all still locked up with nothing to do, but I am sure that there are lots of others in the same position. Unfortunately they are just not posting about it on Mumsnet - only the people agonising about which of their four fabulous offers to accept.

I taught in the London independent sector for some years before moving out of London. It’s a pressure cooker and the combination of anxious pushy parents and inter school competition makes it an unhealthy environment in my view. It’s very easy to get bogged down in it and see it as the be all and end all but your boy sounds like he will do well wherever he goes.

Just as long as you hide your disappointment from him it will all turn out fine. Just be really positive about the schools that have offered - barring a very few, they are really much of a muchness in the grand scheme.
It's a brutal system and it's so easy to get caught up in the madness - and madness it is, especially in London - but the kids are way more resilient than we think and if he's the kind who's clever and good at extra curricular he'll throw himself into any school that was good enough to be on your list and do just fine.
Also for the sake of your sanity, try not to talk too much to the parents who are obsessed, humble-braggy or faux-concerned. The majority of the kids going for places at these schools are bright, tutored, play music, do sport. Don't compare yourself and don't allow others to make you feel bad.
He's done really well to get a place and if you're moving from state, as we did, you will I'm sure be delighted at the offerings of any private school, and he will be helped to flourish.

Many people have no idea what the process involves until the end of it. Had I known then no I wouldn't have put my DS through it.

You mention kids earlier. What are you planning to do for your other children?

I can tell you what we did. We left London and put him into a prep for 2 years for 7/8 (St. Hugh's) then he went on to Abingdon School for senior school. It's an absolutely amazing school with amazing grounds and fantastic teaching. Half their intake is from state schools. They have a MUCH broader intake than any of the selective London schools and yet they do better at GCSE and A level. They have an other half program with ever imaginable activity. Live near Didcot and you're in London in 45 minutes. The school has a huge network of mini busses. We still kept in touch with our old london friends but the quality of life is much better here and the schooling we just couldn't have gotten in London. There's so much less pressure. Good luck OP!

@SoupDragon

Many people have no idea what the process involves until the end of it. Had I known then no I wouldn't have put my DS through it.

You mention kids earlier. What are you planning to do for your other children?

Why does this concern you SoupDragon? What point are you trying to prove? That this is all my fault for daring to put him through some tests?

For my younger DC I think we will have to move although girls have many more options in our area - there is one state (all girls) school we may get into that I would be happy with.

A few years ago, my DS sat for a number of London indies and only got an offer from our bottom choice. I have to stress he never knew it was our last choice as we never discussed our preferences. He went there, much to the sniffy response from some other parents, exclaiming ‘oh’ when it was mentioned as it was considered a definite B league school.

The first couple of years were a bit average but then he settled down and we never looked back. He is about to graduate from Cambridge this year!

My daughter went through the awful 11+ process this year and I SO sympathise OP!!!

The thing with my daughter is that, although she's at a North London prep, she's not the brightest tool in the box and definitely no high-flyer. She's extremely average in academics with English being her worst and Maths her best subject. Verbal reasoning was a killer for her (and me!). She had lost motivation to prepare for the 11+ pretty early on into the start of year 5 and all the best laid plans of a year of preparation went out the window with covid. 11+ prep became a battle-ground at home and I just gave up and left her to go to the tests as unprepared as she wanted to be (for the sake of my own sanity).

My parents were telling me to not even let her sit any of the tests, as rejection will be awful. But I thought that given that all her friends at the prep were doing the 11+ she would feel even worse and lose all confidence if I didn't believe in her enough to even let her sit the exams.

The one good thing about my daughter is (given that she's generally not fussed about academics) she doesn't get nervous before assessments, has a lie in and is pretty laidback about it all. She's also quite a lovely polite girl and interviews well (not sure what weight that has though).

So my tactic was to apply to as many schools as possible including some of those that have lower entrance criteria and are considered "back-up schools" in the hope that at least one school will accept her and she can be proud of herself and gain more confidence in her abilities /motivation for learning. My expectations couldn't have been lower though. We also didn't go for completely hopeless academic schools like Habs or Henrietta Barnet or schools that had a second round (because it would have been awful for her if her friends were invited to the second round and she wasn't).

Between October and January she must have sat about eleven 11+ exams (grammar and indie) and I signed her up for a few art/drama/dance scholarships so she had to do those tests/interviews as well. She saw it all more as an inconvenience rather than anything stressful and bizarrely actually enjoyed most of the interviews (an opportunity to talk about herself).

At the end, she didn't get into the top-top indie schools like Highgate and is sadly too far down on the waiting list for the grammars, but shockingly got offered 5 indie schools (including a 10% fee-reduced art scholarship at one of them) and is 3rd on the waiting list for another indie school. All those 5 schools aren't considered to be top academically but are still great schools (Aldenham and Queenswood being two of them).

Now my daughter is super proud of herself and I think this has given her a boost to think that she can "do it".

My approach was not to tell her about rejections (lie to say she got onto the waiting list) and really talk up the schools that offered her a place.

I agree it's a completely horrible unfair system though OP!!

Why does this concern you SoupDragon? What point are you trying to prove? That this is all my fault for daring to put him through some tests?

I'm not trying to prove anything. It's just a question. You said you wouldn't have done it if you'd know and I was curious whether you would do it with and subsequent children given the base reasons (average state school) won't have changed.

It is your "fault" though. Just as any stresses mine went through were entirely my* "fault" - however, I own my fault and don't try to pass the buck onto perceived unfairness. It's not the fault of the school system at all. But you don't want to hear that.

I've suggested phoning the school(s) for feedback and to find out about where he is on the wait list but you don't seem to have taken any notice and just Cherry picked stuff.

I'm out. I hope your DS gets the right fit of school for him. Most bright kids will do well in most schools.

*and dear god, there were stresses...!

@SoupDragon

Why does this concern you SoupDragon? What point are you trying to prove? That this is all my fault for daring to put him through some tests?

I'm not trying to prove anything. It's just a question. You said you wouldn't have done it if you'd know and I was curious whether you would do it with and subsequent children given the base reasons (average state school) won't have changed.

It is your "fault" though. Just as any stresses mine went through were entirely my* "fault" - however, I own my fault and don't try to pass the buck onto perceived unfairness. It's not the fault of the school system at all. But you don't want to hear that.

I've suggested phoning the school(s) for feedback and to find out about where he is on the wait list but you don't seem to have taken any notice and just Cherry picked stuff.

I'm out. I hope your DS gets the right fit of school for him. Most bright kids will do well in most schools.

*and dear god, there were stresses...!

I disagree. It is the fault of the school system. It's a shit system that judges kids of 10 and causes people like those on this thread to categorise them as smart or stupid and that creates so much stress. All schools should be of the same good standard to avoid situations where people move to live in the catchment of a decent school or bankrupt themselves going private. We all pay the same tax don't we so shouldn't we all have a right to a decent education for our kids? Other countries DO have a more balanced system.

I disagree that any and all stresses my kids go through are all my fault. I think most parents try to do the best for their kids. Are you saying that parents who live in grammar areas who put their kids in for those tests are also at fault? We do our best to ease those stresses but they are often beyond our control.

I don't need your advice to do basic things

Its not fault OP but it is responsibility. DD went (albeit successfully) through the Grammar process and although she has always expressed a wish to do so I was aware of the system and the pressures and it was my responsibility.

I will not be putting DS through it because it isnt fair on him.

But actually none of this is about dealing with your DS stress and upset - by your own admission he is fine. It is you who is feeling it and whereas the system isnt fair and the stresses involved are outside of your remit it was your choice.

I think the 11+ system is brutal and both my DS went through it, however they got in to the schools and I didn't have to have any coversation with them about not getting in. I know of several that applied for 10 schools and got none. Awful. I don't know what the solution is though.

I can see both 'sides' on this thread. Having been through the 11+ process twice, for both state grammars and independents, I agree that it's a horrible system. We ended up with the results we wanted, but it was still stressful and we realise we were pretty lucky. I wouldn't 'blame' you for deciding to embark on the process, even though I agree that is of course ultimately your respinsibility. And yes, it is unfair that state provision is so variable in different places.

However, it is also true that the children that the system is most unfair for are those who don't have any other options - who don't have parents willing or able to support them through the 11+, and who don't have the money to pay for a private school or to move to a better area in order to escape a crap school. So yes, the 11+ entry system is unfair, but the unequal state system is even more unfair for those who have no option at all to influence their school destination.

@rezoom you’re absolutely right. The kids who have less parental support (for whatever reason) are the ones that are really being failed by the system.

OP the only one who has labelled kids stupid or smart on this thread is you. No one has called your son is stupid, they have just (correctly) said that other performed better than him in the numerous schools exams that you sat for.

I believe you said you actually behave two offers. I hope your son gets on well at the one you choose and you eventually look back and think it was ultimately the right school for him. Please stop blaming the system though. You played the game and didn't quite get the result you wanted but that is the chance you take applying for selective schools.

I honestly think it may be time for us to emigrate to a country with a better and fairer education system

😆

The irony of this coming from someone paying for schooling has given me a proper chuckle this evening 😂

You're paying to get your child into a school millions of kids could never hope to attend because of parental income.

Is it fair you can buy a better school for your child when there are many kids just as, or more, intelligent and academic than your child, who'll have to settle for their local under performing state option?

There's nothing fair about the education system. It must bite when you realise you can't quite buy your way out of it completely!

This honestly reads to me like nicer problems to have. Your son is clever, sporty and has parents wealthy enough to afford a private education for him.

You need to let go of your furious indignation and work on acquiring perspective. It was really shitty of you to correct someone's grammar up thread.

@cantstopstressing

I understand you are really full of rage but absolutely no one has suggested your child is stupid. I sympathise with you as rejection is horrible and painful but someone rejecting your child is the worst feeling in the world.

The unequal quality of state provision isn’t fair but your are in a good position and the offer you have is sure to be better than an inadequate state school so you are fortunate you have a way out.

London has enough private school places (there are still schools that struggle for numbers!). It’s just that everyone seems to go for the same schools making the standard required for the most popular very high.

Also, don’t ruminate about the girl in his class. The reality is you don’t really know anything about her. She might be brilliant but lazy in class. Comparison is the theft of joy so try to focus on all the good.

I absolutely get where you are coming from op, but please do try to count your blessings a little.

I have a dc with mild SEN who is very bright but would never be accepted at or manage at any of the schools you’ve named.

This feels very hard right now, I’m sure, but do try to feel thankful for your bright child who will no doubt thrive at school and in life.

OP I could have written your post myself this time last year!

I was absolutely gutted for my dd1 not getting the schools I had hoped for her.

But you need to believe that it will all work out in the end, as it was meant to be.

Touch wood, I think my dd1 is at the right school for her and so will your ds be next year 🤞

Apologies if this has been said further up thread but please please remove the notion of being ‘rejected’ this is not healthy and can destroy an otherwise bright child’s self esteem.

Talk about ‘fit’, talk about numbers / competition. Big up the schools they do have access to. Be vigilant to occasional offers if it means enough to you. But don’t frame it as rejection as that sounds like failure and they have all worked so hard in such an awful year.