Schools in Richmond and Kingston area

[GentleMintCat]

Seeking Advice: Moving to Kingston/Richmond Area - School Choices and Neighborhood Recommendations

Dear all,

We're considering to move to the Kingston/Richmond area and could really use some advice from you about schools and neighborhoods. As I developed asthma recently, greener and cleaner areas with good local schools and communities are priority. However, not too high-end as we are looking to rent.

My daughter is in year four, so I look for primary and secondary schools. Catchment areas for both are making it even more tricky. So, your insight and recommendations would make big difference. For me great extracurricular activities and focus on sports, creative subjects, emotional wellbeing is more important than constantly achieving A+.

In this light, I also want to ask about Tiffin's Girls to understand if this could be an option fo us.

My daughter while quite strong academically and very competitive in sports, especially tennis and athletics, she's a bit shy, too polite sometimes, in large settings she might need reassurance for confidence boost. Currently, she's in a very small school and feels happy there. If anyone could comment what is overall atmosphere at Tiffin's, friendly or too competitive? Are girls supportive? Being allways under high pressure for A+, can be unhealthy. I wonder how school is balancing this? Also, it's such a large school, do they take good care of individual needs?

Thanks so much for your help! Your advice will really make a difference as we figure out our next move.

Actually, after your comment I did research on Waldagrave and I'm going there for the open day. If you could share little more about the school, would be super helpful. Also, about the catchment area, I understand they are doing it with the distance. Any insight on that?

It's not exactly distance. There is a specific and slightly odd rectangular catchment, split into two areas. More girls get in from one area than the other. There's a map on the Richmond council website, I think. I will have a look for you.

https://www.waldegrave.richmond.sch.uk/752/admissions

https://www.richmond.gov.uk/media/16462/waldegrave_school_catchment_full_extent_of_areas.pdf

I think it is a very good school, from what I have heard. Many of my friends' daughters went there. If DD had not got into the selective schools she applied for, Waldegrave would absolutely have been my top choice. By the way, my DD did get into Tiffin Girls and is/was neither a genius nor tutored particularly hard.

Well @TheRainItRaineth then you clearly don't see your DD in the right perspective.
If she got in and she was untutored then she is a genius. I know many many very capable and tutored girls who did not get it. They got all 120 score or close to it on SATs but did not get in to TSG. many of them went to Waldegrave, now starting y7.
In the recent year there were above 2000 candidates to TSG

She wasn't completely untutored (and she is in no way a genius). She had a little bit of tutoring but nothing anywhere near the years of it some people seem to think is necessary, judging by the conversation above. It is interesting that like @snellgrove, whose child is actually at Tiffin, our tutoring was mainly aimed at exam technique rather than English or Maths. This is something you can teach a bright child in a matter of weeks.

~2000 is an absolutely normal number of applicants for TGS historically. Some grammars have even higher numbers. For TGS, most do not make it to the second round, so the actual number of competitors for each place is a lot lower.

Maybe people should be concentrating more on exam readiness than on trying to teach actual knowledge since the vast majority of what's in this type of exam is likely to be based on the things a child has already covered at school. And knowing how to sit an exam is a great skill to have for the future in any case.

@TheRainItRaineth take the complement when given- you have a very capable child if it wasn't a huge effort :)
The exams to grammar are taken at the begining of y6 but they include the curiculum of y6 that the kids have not yet had a look at until Spring or Summer semester if they have not done any 11+ tests. Also, it is all about speed and precision. I know three girls who were invited to second round. Only one got in but in her instance she has been tutored since y4.I know a boy who got to Tiffin, Wilson and Queen Elisabeth but also, he even didn't go for school trips because if tutoring...

Also, about the catchment area, I understand they are doing it with the distance. Any insight on that?
If you live in Hampton Hill, Around Stanley School in Teddington and in South of Twickenham you may be in the catchment.

It's not that I don't want to take a compliment on behalf of my daughter (she was the one who did the work and took the exams, not me). But I don't think that the idea that children cannot get into schools like this without loads of tutoring is very helpful, either for them or for future parents/children wondering if it's possible. It is.

With regard to the curriculum, although the exams are taken in the autumn of year 6 in fact a lot of schools will have covered the majority of the curriculum by then. There were some gaps in my daughter's knowledge but not many because from January it was mostly revision and practising how to take an exam. This wasn't a high-achieving SATs-obsessed primary, just a normal school. From talking to friends, many primaries are the same. It made for a pretty miserable year tbh because nobody likes endless tests and exam prep, but in terms of subject knowledge my daughter had covered the vast majority of what she needed to know by the time she took the exams.

A lot depends also on what type of grammar we talking about. If it is in grammar counties with acceptance rate of up to 25 perc of all local kids or superselective grammar like there are in London with 20 candidates per one place. The latter one is really hard to get into without hard work as there is an expectation of passing the tests with over 95 percent of accuracy

I don't have any idea about the percentages but we are all talking about Tiffin here as that is the school the OP mentioned, so yes a superselective with 20 candidates per place (but not really because the first round test weeds out those who have no chance of a place).

The acceptance rate is only low because very large numbers apply, and many of those applicants will be averagely bright, rather than very bright. I don't think terms like 'genius' are ever helpful for children. Einstein was a genius because of what he achieved, but that doesn't mean that everyone with a similar IQ and a talent for doing exams is also a genius.

Some kids are just naturally academic, and they're the ones who deserve the grammar school places (if anyone deserves them) not the children who need to be tutored half to death.

(if anyone deserves them)

Well said. It is often the path with less support than in other schools and a hard work for a parent and the child