Secondary school open days: what questions to ask?

[ParentOfOne]

We will shortly be visiting some state secondary schools (no private ones).

Do you have any specific advice on what questions to ask?

I have seen plenty of parents ask questions which are easily answerable by looking at the related policies on the school's website (from admissions to uniforms).

I was thinking of:

• If they use streams, sets or nothing at all. This is a factual question, and in my experience this type of information is often not on a school's website

• some probing questions to students on how many kids tend to leave the school: this could be anything from disruptive students made to leave, to the school having a draconian, "my way or the highway" type of approach (e.g. our child is happy at her primary, but many were not and left in droves)

• some probing questions on summer uniforms and discipline: for me it is crucial to strike a reasonable balance, and avoid both the schools with lax discipline but also the authoritarian ones which traumatise children (e.g. no toilet breaks during lessons not even for girls on their periods, blazers compulsory in heatwaves, detentions for looking at the clock on the wall, and bs like that)

• any questions on the curriculum which is not clear from their website, like which subjects are compulsory at GCSE

Of course I appreciate that open days are pure marketing, that children will be on their best behaviour, they will most likely have been coached on what to say, etc, so everything must be taken with a truckload of salt

Homework volume & policy.

Balance of results oriented v whole child.

Pastoral care.

I would also be looking to see if the school's approach to trans pupils aligned with the recently clarified law and general safeguarding. Including toilets.

On homework: very true, but not easy to assess.
Last year I saw some schools which made it very clear that they take a gradual approach to homework, increasing the workload gradually, as not all students will be used to the same amount of homework (primary schools vary hugely on this). That's good.
But I also know a few families who have regretted sending their children to a harsh school, because the homework is so much that the children have basically stopped reading and stopped doing afternoon activities, plus the teachers sometimes assign homework on a Sunday (online), and none of this was of course mentioned nor implied at the open day.

On pastoral care and balance of results: in theory I absolutely agree, and in fact finding the right balance is crucial for me. But that's very hard to assess at an open day. Do you have any specific advice? May I ask how you went about it?

How do they timetable GCSE options? Do pupils choose their options and the school builds the timetable around the preferences, or must the pupils choose one option from column A, one from column B, & one from column C? (This could be an issue if all of your child’s preferred choices are in column A.)

I’ve just had a Quick Look and many of your queries can be found on the school website.

Certainly, GCSE pathways, home/school agreement, pastoral care and often, information about sets and streaming will be in the information about transition.

@Bluevelvetsofa Last year I visited 3 schools whose websites made no mention of their approach to sets. I even asked if it was in a section of the website that I may have missed, and they said no. Not just that, but one specific school gave a different answer to me and to a friend (they told me they use sets for maths only, they told her they don't use sets at all).

And this is a very factual piece of information, not open to interpretation nor opinions.

As for pastoral care, yes, there will be boilerplate language on their websites about that, but that's a bit like saying that every employer brags on its website about its values and how much it cares about employees' wellbeing - we all know that that can often be bs and the reality very different. That's why I was asking for feedback on some specific questions or ways to probe / look into these matters.

Some schools might have mixed ability groups to begin with and then move to sets after their initial screening process or after in house tests. Some may group according to SATs and regroup later. Certainly it’s common to set for core subjects and humanities, languages etc might be mixed.

It can also depend on how many forms there are in the year group. Six or eight form entry may have half year bands. Larger schools could have more.

You may want to know whether there is a counsellor in school, whether the school can access outside support, whether there is a ‘safe space’ for pupils who need extra support, how the SEND department is involved in pastoral care, whether there are mentors and what is the pastoral structure.

PS another question to ask in some cases is how much the waiting list moves between March and September. Some councils publish this data, but not all.

Pastoral v results.
We have 2 schools near us. One HT talk was all about results and high achievements. The other much more about helping everyone do their best.

I like asking the kids questions about their day, their lives at school etc. some of the responses have been very very revealing. I’ve also started asking about what happens at lunch and break times and whether they can use the loo when they want.