Grammar School Admission

[vansi]

My son is currently in 7th grade at a public school. He passed the in-year transfer exams for Sale Grammar School and Urmston. I once emailed Sale School, and they informed me that there are 31 people on the waiting list based on our current address in Media City.

When is the best time to move to the Sale catchment area? If we move during the summer, just before school starts, will that help him get accepted into 8th grade? Or do we need to move sooner?

When I reached out to them, they didn’t provide a direct answer; they only sent me the catchment area details.

The rent contract of our house is up to the end of August, so we might be able to move a month earlier with proper notice.

It may still not definitely get your ds a place. Others may yet live closer or score higher. Would he be able to continue where he is?

As previous poster says he may still not get a place. Even though he has passed the exam in-year he will only get a place if a space comes up (i.e another child leaves). My children are at a Trafford grammar and there isn't much movement in terms of students leaving and new ones starting.

Yes agree with others, tbh the timing of your move is unlikely to make much difference. You are relying on a student leaving the school which I guess could happen at any time. Clearly it will happen now and then – families will need to move for all kinds of reasons – but I imagine in popular schools like this it will not be very common.

Also yes, to be top of the waiting list and thus get any place that does come up, you would have to be the nearest person to the school on the list. There's not really any way of knowing this, so to sum up, I wouldn't be placing all your hopes on this.

Btw please take this in a helpful spirit as intended: in the UK when we say "public school" we mean a very small select group of fee-paying, private schools – Eton, Harrow, Rugby, Winchester and others – it's a weird (I agree) historical thing (dating back to when such schools were open to all, regardless of parental profession etc). If we mean a free, state-funded school we say state school. And we tend to say year 7, year 8 rather than 7th grade etc. Just wanting to help so everyone knows what you mean.

He is in a state school now , Ofsted is Good