South Wilts Grammar school

[SYV]

Can someone share their view of this school?
has anyone’s daughters found it hard settling in?
my daughter passed the entrance exam but we are not in the catchment. There is a very good school in our catchment.
I am worried if we put SWGs as our first choice and our catchment school as second we would end up not getting in both.
I am also concerned about the travelling and friendship building as we live quite far away from school. Any advice will be helpful. Thanks!

A friend's daughter went there from around 20 miles away. Transport was challenging as they had to leave home at around 7.15 to get to he nearest bus stop some miles away. They had to be at the bus stop for the return trip to avoid her waiting on the road side. Friendships were never an issue, as she had a lot of sleepovers.

She did no better or worse than her sister who went to her local school. I'm not sure it was really worth the effort.

My DD went there and loved the all girls thing and academic stuff; hated the travel (we are as far away as can be). She left because she couldn’t sustain the travel (the school day ends late too). Friendships were fine.

Putting SWGS first won't impact your chance for qualifying for school2.
If you qualify for school2 then you will get it unless you also qualify for preference1 swgs.

If your local school is good, is swgs really worth the commute?

Do you want to say your catchment school?

I am worried if we put SWGs as our first choice and our catchment school as second we would end up not getting in both.

As @TeenToTwenties says, this is not the case. If you didn’t get SWGs you would get your catchment school (assuming you would get it if placed in first). You would need to be sure of SWGs to put it first tho. How far is the commute and how long? I

A few girls go from Romsey by train to SWGS.
I do generally wonder whether it is really worth the effort given we have 2 good schools in the town.

There is a private hire mini bus that runs between our local area and SWGs. I don't know exactly how long it will take but probably more than an hour.
My daughter is very keen to get in SWGs after the school visit to be honest I like our local school because it is more well rounded and minus the long commute. I tried to explain to her my point of view but she is very adamant about her choice 😪

What would be the alternative to the minibus if she was picked for a school sports team / wanted to do an after school club or hang out with friends (just socialising, or e.g. going to the public library to do homework together etc? How would you facilitate her meeting up at the weekend with friends who might live the same distance in the opposite direction from the school?

I usually recommend a Tell the truth and shame the Devil approach to life, but tbh I'd be tempted to put the local school above the grammar on the CAF and be very sympathetic to your DD's disappointment when 'Oh dear, sorry, darling, there just wasn't a space at the GS ' come March 3rd.

More than an hour! Does that include getting to a pick up point? If it is private hire that I guess presumes sufficient parents (currently) happy to pay for it. At least it isn't public transport.

I wouldn't want it for myself personally, what seems fine now may seem less fine in the dark days of jan/Feb.

However if she is keen (what do you think of the single sex aspect?) you could go for it and have plan B of moving to catchment if needed.

If the OP's catchment school is 'very good', then moving to it as an in-year admission might not be that easy.

Agree, but if local and able to wait it out sucking up the commute she would stand a good chance at some point perhaps.

All that time on the bus instead of doing hobbies, relaxing, or even studying peacefully rather than on the bus...

We looked seriously at SWGS and have discounted it for our very academic DD. It would be about 1 hour commute with train and walking both sides. Utterly miserable.
Also didn't actually like it when we went around. Felt rather dated and reliant on a selected cohort of bright girls.
We live in Hampshire and no grammar schools so our comps are good with a very bright top set.Our local school is good with great results and clearly happy kids. Elder son has just walked out with 11 GCSES in the 7-9 category so we are happy to stay local.
2 hours a day can be better spent than commuting.

Hi , My girl just cleared her exams for SWGS. As we are from Hampshire this is outside of the catchment area.
Does anyone know if any girls from Hampshire has got selected into this school in the last or any previous years. It will be helpful to know, and then decide if we have to keep this as first option or not.
@pipmay Could mention which is the local school in Hampshire which you mentioned in the above post to be good.

This is on their catchment page Website-Some-useful-11-statistics-v2.pdf

If you don’t qualify for the grammar but would for the catchment school why would you not get it? Preference only determines which you are offered among those for which you qualify.

The OP was a year ago, but thread has a new poster for this year.