ADHD Grey Court School Richmond/Kingston

[Teenymalini]

Does anyone have a child with ASD and/or ADHD at Grey Court or TKA? I was wondering what you think about the SEN support as we need to choose which one to go to. My son enjoys sports, he likes maths but struggles with English writing and comprehension. He likes French and apart from academic challenges he is happy go lucky child with no social problems, he has friends etc. Thanks!

Did you managed to get any insight into your queries?

@Turquoiseturtle3 , No, unfortunately not. We visited both schools at open days and liked Grey Court better, they seemed to be more welcoming. We are planning to organise a 121 meeting with their SEN as well to have a more bespoke discussion around my son’s needs.
Do you have any preference? Or any other schools that you are looking at?

Sorry to say that the SEN is not great with either school. This partly a wider issue and nothing to do with schools - under funding by government etc. TKA has a brilliant reputation with SEN but even they have struggled from what I understand. I have also spoken with many parents at GC who have been unhappy with the SEN support. Sorry I know this is particularly helpful.

Thanks @Ladybowes. Both are quite big schools especially GC and this is the challenge. Not sure what the alternatives are. Private/Public schools have exams and my boy won’t be able to pass these; there are no smallish mainstream secondary state schools in the area. I heard that a new school for autistic children will be opened in Chessington this autumn maybe this is what we need to think of… In the end, the question is where is he going to thrive, learn the most and which school will motivate him to work harder, trigger his thirst for knowledge and help him get a level of qualification to be able to get a job with or without A-levels etc.

Has he got a EHCP as so that makes the whole process so much easier in theory? Although Teddington has not been so popular in recent years it has a fantastic SEN department. I would definitely recommend making appointments with all the schools and their SEN departments. It is so tricky.

Yes, we’ve got an EHCP but we have been let down by the resource and the execution levels in the current primary school -TAs going on sick leave without proper replacement etc. I really hope at secondary school (GC or TKA) the discipline to be much stricter. Will check Teddington too and will definitely make appointments with the SEN teams.

thanks!