Ibstock or Alleyn's

[keely79]

For reasons I don't want to get into, we are looking to move our son (yr6) on last minute basis from his current highly selective and academic prep.

Ibstock and Alleyn's have both said they might be able to take him starting September but was wondering which people think might be better (assuming we have a choice) for a very bright 11 year old boy who is outgoing and kind but somewhat young and naive. He enjoys sports (rugby and cricket) but is not particularly sporty - same for music. He does like and is good at building things /engineering/coding.

Ibstock is a lot lot closer (walking distance) but there is a direct school bus to Alleyn's (probably an hour each way with traffic).

Whilst Alleyns is a great school I would go with the shorter commute. You might want to check the balance of girls v boys in the Sept year. 7 cohort at Ibstock as they messed up on their 11 plus offers to girls and ended up offering to dd who had been rejected at an earlier stage.

I'm amazed Alleyns have space as they were very oversubscribed this year.

Alleyns is better school

Alleyns do not play rugby, but he could join a club instead for that.

Alleyns has an enduring reputationfor being more socially sophisticated (which refers to the pupils and the party scene) but I'm sure not every pupil is like that.

The school bus has a social life all of its own (and there will be a guaranteed seat, if your route is not already booked out)

Personally I'd go for Alleyns, but that's based on what I value in a school - but as you are choosing for a boy you describe as naive, then closer to home Ibstock might be the better bet

Most likely a chance vacancy as a result of someone leaving. They will still have to go through an assessment process along with others on the waiting list.

I think the issue with a school that far away is that socialising gets tricky. If he wanted to join a rugby club, for example (as a pp has said, no rugby at Alleyn's), he would have to choose between a local one and doing it with his friends from school, and it limits opportunities for more casual socialising. And while there might be a group that's on the coach together, the largest group will be local to the school. It's not insurmountable, but something to think about.

Thanks to all for your thoughts. We are going to visit both schools with him over next week or so and see which he prefers. He already plays for a local rugby team.

Hi, I'm wondering where your boy finally decided to go as I am in the same situation. IPS is much closer to my place, like 15 mins by car while ot takes almost an hour to travel to Alleyn's by its school coach. Could you please share your decision and how your boy have settled in.

Have you done the IPS school run at school run time?
Do check whether 15 mins is indeed 15 mins when congested

Foundation bus service is reliable (and guaranteed seat) and the time can be used for homework or for making bus friends

I'm a current Ibstock parent and have concerns about pastoral care, sanctions for small infractions and an unhealthy culture around bad behaviour. In our experience, there is ambivalence and a fear of speaking up.

We have close family and friends in other SW London schools and this is not the norm.

I know what you mean but I bet it would never take longer to Ibstock than to any of DC schools. My no1 commutes by FSCS W4 route - no1 had no choice at that time. I am hesitating to put no2 in the same coach because I know how much time kids have to spend on the street while I also understand it is quite normal that seniors commute quite far.
Since you seem to know well about Alleyn's, could you please share your information which makes you prefer Alleyn's. I am just wondering if Alleyn's is that worthy as there is no one who has heard about Alleyn's in my area - further down to the west from Clapham.

Thank you for advice. So much concerned about the school handling those kinds of indents not properly. I am not sure about Alleyn's pastoral care and kids behaviour. So difficult to gather information about the school far out of catchment.

Would choose Alleyns hands down over Ibstock!! I’m current Ibstock parent and have friends with children at Alleyns and they are really happy with Alleyns. I’m not particularly happy with Ibstock and I a lot of parents I know feel the same.

Pastoral handing and Children’s behaviour much better at Alleyns from what I’ve heard from friends. My experience and also heard from other Ibstock parents is that bad behaviour goes often goes unchecked at Ibstock and what they say they do and actually do are two totally different things. Head and deputy head not particularly strong decision makers. Kids were much better behaved at Ibstock under the old head and she didn’t tolerate bad behaviour.

I completely agree. Behaviour is now appalling and never gets addressed beyond constant meaningless detentions. There is a culture of fear over speaking up amongst both pupils and parents.
The management team are weak and mostly quite socially awkward which is bizarre in that line of work and makes it very hard to engage with them over important issues. Sometimes I knew they were lying to me and hadn’t fully investigated an issue I had raised.
The new Head brought in a marketing team which I think papers over a lot of the cracks but they are definitely there.
And academically it is no longer strong either. A constant complaint from parents is that struggling pupils don’t get help in class or from their own teacher but are just told to go to the subject clinic as if that is going to solve everything and absolve them of responsibility.
Subject clinics very much vary depending on which teacher is running them or how many children are there and it is also sometimes hard for a struggling child to actually identify and articulate what it is they need help with.
It is not a school in a good place and there is a definite disconnect between what they claim they do and what they actually do.
I don’t know Alleyns but I wouldn’t recommend Ibstock to anyone right now.

What did you decide in the end?

One thing worth checking on any secondary school (which I wish I had!) is “what do the kids do during lunch and are they allowed in the building?” At Ibstock they lock the school doors at lunch and the kids aren’t allowed to go inside, even in the middle of winter. They’ve made lunches longer now to accommodate more clubs but if your child isn’t in a club every day they have to stay outside the whole time. They can only use one door to access the loos and get shouted at if they are in the building. They don’t let them in before 5 mins until class starts which isn’t a lot of time to go to their lockers etc. Wish I had knew this before and asked the question at an open day. I heard the reason they don’t allow them in the building anymore is because of damage caused by pupils, but it’s not right to make all the pupils suffer for some kids bad behaviour. The teachers can get quite shouty at lunch trying to police the building. Not an ideal culture at IPS sadly.

Also Ibstock have a gorgeous refectory, but it’s not big enough to accommodate all the pupils, the prep school eat 12-1pm and secondary 1-2pm and they split seatings in two. So if your child has second lunch they don’t eat until 1:30pm which is 5 hours after their first lesson at 8:30am and often they’ve run out some food by then so no choices. The Tuck queue is so long at break too, my child has given up trying and is starving by lunch.

Again, wish I had asked more practical questions like these at the open days and not been taken in by the beautiful grounds and building and glossy brochure at IPS.

@Swlonmum@FoxyLoxy25 Thank you very much for sharing your experience. Your comments were vry much helpful.
My no2 had changed her mind every morning and evening for last two weeks and finally chose Alleyn's despite I was on Ibstock side. I'm not sure about Alleyn's kids but, in offer holders session, I felt two schools are not much different but one in SW and the other in SE; facilities are modern, most kids are local, diversity level is also quite similar, school days are almost same including the lunch rotation. Well, Ms Lunon is definitely much more atrractive than Mr Wolsey and her answers to the questions were impressive, such as, "we are not teaching a class but 24 individuals." In line with it, teachers seem to be more enthusiastic and humble than ones I met in Ibstock. I still doubt if Alleyn's is that worthy of one-hour commute every morning and evening, but I just left it with my no2, who goes to school everyday. I am just thinking it is not the final destination and we can change the school when we feel it is not the one.

We went for Ibstock in the end and really happy with our decision. Not sure I recognise some of the above - for example, my son has been able to sit and read in the library at lunchtimes if he wants so you are not “locked outside”. He seems much happier and more relaxed than at his previous school and has been enjoying getting stuck into all the clubs using all the extra time he has due to very short journey to school. So far no regrets.

@B2S Mrs Lunnon is excellent at soundbites. PR is definitely her focus- but after a few years in the school am still not 100% clear what she’s achieved. (Apart from an expensive rebranding/new uniform exercise…..)

@Charlotte120221 Oh no, that is exactly one of my concerns as I had exprienced that kind of head in my no1's prep, which was shut down last year. Well, Ibstock also seems to spend on quite amount of money on marketing and have no noticeable achievement by current leadership so far. So, fair enough - we might have dealth not good deals. I just hope Ms Lunon takes real actions from now on after a few year settlement at Alleyn's.

@keely79 Great to hear thatyour boy is happy at Ibstock. Is your boy staying at Ibstock for senior as well? I might regret whenever I see kids in Instock uniform in my street. I am still ready to blow the deposit money if my no2 change the mind😅