Hi all, we received the following statement from St Catherine's.
Mumsnet has offered St Catherine's the right of reply on this thread.
St Catherine's make a limited number of academic scholarship offers. In all our offer letters, we ask parents, where they are in a position to do so, to confirm or decline our offer as soon as they are able and in advance of the final acceptance date. The wording we use is: 'The absolute deadline for acceptance of this offer is 12 noon on Monday 3rd March 2025, as agreed by all Schools in membership of the Independent Schools Council (of which the Girls' Schools Association to which we belong is a member as are almost all other independent schools via their own associations). We all abide by that deadline to allow those genuinely in any kind of dilemma to consider their choices carefully without feeling under any pressure. However, if you confidently know we are your first choice, or if you know you will decline our offer, please can I urge you to confirm this so that I can manage the long waiting list of applicants that I will be running this year. I would be most grateful'. We do this out of respect for those families who are keen to join St Catherine's but might be on our waitlist. For families where St Catherine's is their first or only choice and who can confirm immediately or prior to the final acceptance date, this allows us to put other parents and their daughters at ease by effectively managing our waitlist.
For scholarship offers, the wording we use is: 'May I ask you to respond now to this offer ahead of the usual agreed final date for the acceptance of a place if you possibly can. Should you have selected another School for , her place in the St Catherine's community can be passed on to the next most able and deserving candidate on our entrance examination waiting list. I would therefore be very grateful to receive your written acceptance of this award by Monday 3rd February 2025 or earlier. If you have any queries about 's Academic Scholarship Award, please do not hesitate to contact our Registrar Mrs Clare Woodgates'. This is because should a family inform us that they do not wish to take up a scholarship offer, in advance of the deadline, we are then in a financial position to be able to offer it to the next deserving candidate. In the current economic climate, we appreciate that finances are a key decision-making factor for families.
We abide by the five Head's Associations Code of Practice, with a final acceptance deadline of all offers being the first working day of March each year, in this instance Monday 3rd March 2025. This year, we can confirm our admissions team have made no direct contact with any of our scholarship offer holders whatsoever since despatch of our offer letters, nor have we received any enquiries from parents holding scholarship offers regarding the acceptance deadline.
We are therefore concerned about this discussion and feedback and will certainly review the wording in our offer letters to avoid in future any possible interpretation that a scholarship offer would be withdrawn if not accepted by Monday 3rd March 2025. We acknowledge from this discussion that parents have felt ambiguity and concern and it was with regret and concern that we read this thread.
If any family holding an offer at St Catherine's has any queries relating to the admissions process and offers made please do contact us. Mrs Woodgates, Senior School Registrar, would be delighted to speak with you on 01483 899609 or via email to [email protected] We look forward to welcoming families, who have both accepted our offer and those who are still considering their options, to our Offer Holders Event on 30th January 2025.
We must reiterate that there is no pressure whatsoever to accept an offer of a place for anyone who is not ready to do so, and we abide by the Code of Practice deadline of Monday 3rd March 2025.