Should the school insist on this?

[thequickbrowndog]

My daughter is starting grammar school in September. She has done amazingly to get there. She is very anxious and has come from a tiny close knit school. Luckily a few kids from her primary school are going to the same school. They have all been split up in different forms, and my daughter is in the other half of the year to her school mates so won't even be in any of the same classes.
Am I wrong to insist that she is moved to the half of the year her friends are in? Surely her mental health is more important than their rules? She will stress all summer about this and is already saying she doesn't want to go to school in September.

Am I wrong to insist that she is moved to the half of the year her friends are in?

You don't get to insist anything, I'm afraid. It is the school's decision, not yours. You can ask, and they can choose whether to grant your request or not. Parents don't get to dictate how schools organise their classes or staffing.

At that point he was waiting for his ASD assessment so he was really quite fragile and his older brother hadn’t coped at secondary so was home educated from half way through year 7 and we didn’t want a repeat of that !

That's fair enough. I would definitely have moved your child to accomodate his needs.
I hope he's progressing ok.

OP - with respect. Are you sure you are not projecting your anxieties to your Dd?
Instead of making it a positive experience you seem to be focusing on how wrong it is, and how you need to fight the system. This is not how you help her grow up into a resilient individual.

And as to being the only one from her ethnic group - this is you. Kids do not care unless you make them think it matters. You’ll do your kid a disservice if you make an issue of it.

I get it that its your first child and you are over protective and anxious. But try not to make her more so.
My kids school always separated kids from same primary school. So that everybody starts fresh and gets to know others.
And they mix with more than just their class anyway.

Try to just enjoy the summer and do fun things. She will be fine

Something that’s not considered and you don’t hear often on these threads is that the other parents might have expressed really good reasons for NOT wanting your child with theirs. It’s not a nice thought but has happened on lots of occasions ime.

Don't be that parent. Your dd will be fine. It's grammar school. There's going to be a lot of rules and parents are expected to support, not hinder. Your DD tried really hard to get in so now you get with the programme. Thus is the way they do things. Your DD will thrive. She needs to learn to get on with new people and make friends. Stop talking rubbish about mental health. Ds is in grammar and he had no one from his primary in his school and he knew 2 lads from football but not in his class. He was fine. In fact he loves his school friends.

You don’t ‘insist’ because it’s not your decision

It seems a strange approach. My daughter is also starting at a grammar school in September and is the only one from her primary school. However she does know a couple of other girls and the school has gone out of its way to make sure all the girls from our area are in the same tutor group. Seems really sensible to me.

I think that my first port of call would be to hae a quiet chat with whoever deals with secondary transition at the primary school, to ask whether they had been asked for their views on possible form allocations? I am assuming that the grammar school hasn't asked parents for info re other pupils their DC would like to be / not be placed with.

I'm also assuming that it's not something as prosaic as alphabetical order? (Which was how we were allocated to forms n our first year at my school; as it was predominantly boarding, girls mainly came from quite disparate primary schools, bit I can't remember a peep out of any of the few in my form who had come through the junior department on the subject of being separated from their friends).

@thequickbrowndog When you decided that your DD should sit the entrance exam for the grammar school, you must have been aware of the possibility that she would be separated from some if not all of her year 6 friends, depending on which of them did or did not qualify for a place. what outside help is she getting for her extreme anxiety over transition?

A lot of presumptions made here. I would not have known about the ethnic grouping situation had she not come home with concerns that she had been left out on transition day. It is your presumption that it came from me. It is also your presumption that I have made a big deal of it and am being negative. In fact I haven't even mentioned my concerns to her, I have said that it's great to be able to make new friends etc. Also your presumption that she is my first child going through secondary.
I am actually a secondary teacher myself and know how peer groups work, especially in regards to ethnicity

How rude. Talking about my child's mental health is not rubbish

It's quite normal for secondary schools to mix it up.

You can ask. But 'insisting' will get you no where.

I think there is a balance here.

With mine moving up at secondary, pretty much always being the only ones they knew, I told them to just try for the first term, and if there there were significant issues after that, then we would then talk to the school.

The first term often has a lot of movement within my city, and the kids could move through those natural emotional bumps with a bit more security that there was a back up plan and they had my support in working towards solutions together.

For all the posters saying the OP’s daughter will be fine, she may well be fine but I can guarantee that the school would rather know now that she is anxious and worried so they can support whilst term is still going rather than it build into a big thing over the summer and have a bigger situation to deal with in September. This is why they have someone in charge of transition.

OP I would contact the school and ask if whoever is in charge of transition can give you a ring as your DD is unhappy after transition day. Much easier to do it as a discussion rather than emails which can often be misinterpreted. If they say an outright no to moving then you can move straight onto asking what else can you do to support. The secondaries in my area do enhanced transition and support for pupils who are anxious and worried.

This happened to me, but after a term my two best friends, from our previous school, and I went to the head of year and I was able to move.

Bear in my mind that when in classes students don’t ever get to sit with friends at secondary - seating plans will be random or alphabetical. They’ll be sitting, listening and working during class - not chatting with friends. As long as they can spend time and break and lunch it’ll be fine.

I've worked with children going up to secondary school for years they all make totally new friends in the first few days. Try not to be anxious it will make her anxious

Thank you, I will call them Monday

If it were me, I wouldn't intervene. My child went to secondary last year and there was no-one in her class at secondary from her old primary class. It has been fine, she still has her 'old' friends but lots of new ones too!

I would definitely ask. When my DS went up to secondary, we were told just at the end of the term before that he would be in a different form to all his friends (who were together) and in the same form as the boy who had bullied him throughout primary and made his life an absolute misery. He was desperately worried about it. I contacted both the head of Y7 and the wellbeing lead, and he was moved immediately.

Interesting. Surely, as a secondary school teacher you know that children adjust and make friends in secondary with ease. And those skills and experiences are actually good for them. Plus - as a teacher you must understand that rules ate there for a reason, and you cant start bending them every time an anxious parent demands it for their little darling.

As to somehow evoking MH on this. Sorry. Being anxious about meeting new kids while starting a nee school is NOT a diagnosis. It does not require a helicopter mother intervention to try to fix the world so that the child does not have to learn normal skills of living in a society.
Its something you need to help her with by filling her summer with fun activities.

The assumptions i made - are because you sound like its your precious first born starting school. If it is not - and you are a teacher - it sounds even worse.

Our children (at least in earlier ages) are a reflection of us. If you think they should form friendships among ethnic groups - they will.
For eg - my kids have racially and ethically diverse friends. While in primary - they couldn’t even tell you what their school cohort was ethnically. I know that because an Asian friend was considering the ethnic ‘balance’ in their school before moving her daughter there - and my kids didn't understand what she was asking them.

You are not in a position to "insist". And lots of children will be separated from people they know. In a grammar school there will be lots of children who are the only child from their primary there. And not being in a class with people from her primary school is not a danger to her mental health. You are going to sound silly and dramatic. All children are a bit nervous at starting secondary school. She will know people in her tutor group within the first week

I'm going to assume that you are a miserable person with nothing better to do that be an arsehole to people you dont even know for the sake of something to do. I feel for you, it's a sad existence. Good luck with finding a more friendly hobby

They might have to move someone else if they move your dd.