Godolphin & Latymer

[esea]

Our daughter received an offer for G&L 2025 entry. We’re looking for some insights to the school as we don’t know anyone from there. We are a working and a very low-key family, trying to give kids best education eg. we would spend money carefully, never go on exotic holidays, etc (not because we don’t want it but financially 😅).

DD is academically bright, quite musical but not a music scholar, not sporty but still would take part. The feedback we received from her current school says she’d be better off in an academic school as it’s not easy to keep her engaged otherwise and likes to be stretched. They also said if not challenged she has a tendency to coast along, which I’d agree.
We haven’t applied to SPGS or any grammar schools as we thought they wouldn’t be the right fit for her.

So my question is, given all of the above, wondering if the school is good academically because of their education or girls highly tutored for GCSE and A levels? Are there working families or is it more like Central London affluent families?

Hi Op, sounds like you are in the same situation as us:) and my girl sounds super similar to yours and we have an Offer - but trying to be realistic… don’t want my girl to feel like fish out of water, as I have heard that most families at G&L are very well off.. we absolutely loved the school - but want it to be the one for my DD. Hope someone might get us out of our misery and share some insights!🤞🤞🤞

Sounds quite similar to our family! We are also considering Godolphin.. Contenders are LU and Putney at the moment..

Academically a demanding school with a lot of very wealthy parents (have very good friends with girls there). Think year 7 and all the mums discussing how their child found War & Peace (and I happen to know said child didn't have emotional capacity to appreciate the book, though laboured through it). One of the girls we know was tutored to within an inch of her life to get in and now has to scrabble intensely to keep up. I hear the parents discuss a lot of ongoing tutoring but I think that's because they need to or their daughter couldn't keep up. As one of our babysitters once said (who had many friends who went there) they've all ended up with the same A-levels and gone to the same universities.
Fundamentally though, school has great resources, field trips, facilities. It's one of the nicest girl's schools in the area for facilities alone.

Linked to something else you said, one of the friend's daughters won't invite her friends around to her house as she's embarrassed they don't have a massive mansion in Holland Park. The families do go on outrageous holidays. But I think that is silliness on her part. Plenty of London families go on outrageous luxurious holidays.

I know many girls at the school very well in all year groups and we also considered it for DD a few years ago but went with LU instead . It is indeed known to have a lot of very wealthy families so that is a fact you can’t get away from. How that will impact your DD I do not know and maybe not at all but I thought I’d give you the facts. Lots of girls very happy there but I wouldn’t call it financially diverse probably the least so of the Hammersmith’s schools.

My DS attends a London highly academic independent school and he has friends who are from very wealthy families. It’s something he deals with. His friends tend to not want to discuss family money. They tend to not want to make it a thing between them and their less wealthy friends. Of course their lives are a little different, but mainly around holidays. For instance, they are all skiing right now. There is a tendency not to want to create an obligation on less wealthy mates so they do their own thing. During term time, I don’t think their lives are much different. Overall, it really isn’t a reason to go or not. As far as tutoring goes, I’ve heard some very wealthy kids were heavily tutored in prep. That would be because they needed it. I wouldn’t consider that an advantage of being wealthy. At the end of the day, she’s clever enough and you’re wealthy enough to pay the fees. That’s all that matters.

I would add that I do think girls are much worse than boys on the wealth front. I think it becomes a bigger thing in girls schools then boys schools -commenting on above posters message. My two cents worth based on experience. My DD attends LU and we are what one would call wealthy but we actually chose LU to try to steer away from our DD seeing this as the norm as it’s not a healthy environment. Still pleanty of that at LU but GL Deff known for that. I don’t think it’s a reason not to choose it if that’s your only reason it might be absolutely fine really does all depend on your child’s cohort at the end of the day and how they all manage that.

I will just jump on this thread as we are in exactly the same situation and trying to decide between G&L and another school outside of central London. Same questions to you OP, academically very capable child who needs to be stretched as getting quite bored in her current school. We have no interest in being in an environment everyone tutors the kids rather than school stretching them with inspirational teaching.

Thanks for all the replies, at least we now know what it’s going to be like. It’s hard to tell how she’s going to take the fact that we’re only wealthy enough to pay the fees really, as not sure what the teenager years might bring.

DD hasn’t been tutored for 11+ and she went to an all rounder school, so I wouldn’t be worried at this time for her to keep up academically but obvs only guessing atm and might prove completely wrong. I’d be also keen to hear if the school is able to keep them occupied rather than all families relying on outside tutors. Basically I don’t want to be in a position where we have to tutor her to top up or even try to understand her level.

I was a bursary kid at a top private school and it was never an issue nor discussed. I went to my friends mansions for sleepovers, and they came to my 3-bed semi! We are still best friends today.

I can just about afford the fees and considering g&l too. I am surrounded by people richer than me, some by some way and others not at all. It doesn’t make any difference unless you have a jealous streak. It really is not an issue.

If all our girls end up going there they will be from a similar background- there may be more girls like them too.. :)

I don't normally post but I had to reply as we are at G&L and we are exactly as you describe: two parents working full time, very normal semi-detached property not in Holland Park!

My DD is so happy. She has friends from all backgrounds, wealthy and not so much, but it barely comes up. Of course you notice the house someone lives in when you go there but DD quite happily has friends over at ours and it is no issue.

We are very happy with the school, DD is quite laid back academically so we find it gives her that little bit of extra push she needs / challenge she can cope with. If she didn't get that I think she might use her brains to get into trouble instead.... None of her friendship group are uber academically focused as far as I can tell, it's all about netball and drama and concerts, they have a lot of fun.

I have a DD in the school. We sound pretty much exactly like the OP. We can just about afford the fees, and it’s tough that they’ve gone up so much (like all London private schools over the last ten years). All my DD’s friends are actually of a similar background. This could be because that’s who she’s made friends with, I don’t know! I definitely don’t see any ostentatious behaviour, but I’m sure there are very wealthy families. We are talking about central London private schools after all. If you want a true reflection of the real world, then in all honesty, don’t send your child to a private school.

LU has a more diverse intake just because of their bursary programme due to their significant endowment. G&L sadly doesn’t have this and their income is from fees alone. The families I know from primary school whose DC went to LU just happen to be the wealthiest I’ve ever met in my life. I guess combined with the higher bursary numbers will make it ‘more diverse’, but again…it’s still a London private school!

On a different question could anyone comment why G&L has much lower Oxbridge offers despite having great A level results? Not that this is a criteria for us but we were just curious

I am in the same situation as well. G&L's recent GCSE and A-Level results have been outstanding, but over the past few years, the number of leavers going to Oxbridge has been less than half that of other schools (such as CLSG) or compared to five years ago. Could this be due to the introduction of the IB program, or is there another reason behind it? There must be a reason for this gradual decline, but I haven't been able to figure it out.

I have pondered that too and I think that’s because some girls who would have gone to Oxbridge have opted for US unis. I know quite a few a level students and over the past few years, the ones who can afford it do not apply to Oxbridge they opt for US. They won’t even consider uk or Europe. I went to Oxford but I would have gone state if I could have afforded it.

We have friends with DDs from GL, the Oxbridge offers had a lot of tutoring and prep outside school. Oxbridge have STEM and humanities own set of exams. This is on top of Alevels and the level of interest is intense and other schools seems to be sending more or the same level. It depends on DC and family support and bandwidth.

I would add to the point on low Oxbridge rates: it seems many of the most high-flying girls at G&L seem to leave for places like Westminster at 6th form. However, I’m not sure why seems to be the case more so than for other comparable girls’ schools.

This is interesting. Any idea why Westminster?

Because they have higher Oxbridge admission numbers so people who care about those things think moving will help them! 😂

Really? What about the child that has to adjust from all the school moving. I mean, if she’s not happy then okay I understand, but to move them for a university that may or might not accept them. 😞

It's the same reason why lots of parents move their daughters to Kings Wimbledon as well...