Do we try for 11 plus/more academic school?

[ConfusedSchooling]

Looking for thoughts here as my mind is all jumbled.

Currently in private in North London and DD is towards top ends of classes. School goes all through. Kids are happy. School isn't as academic as id expect and a couple of kids I know are prepping hard for the 11 plus/other indies.

I feel NLCS/Habs is far unless on the coach and ive heard it's tough. I havent heard great things pastorally about HBS or Channing even though i liked the latter a lot. We have been recommended City but I don't really like the location having grown up in London myself.

But, when I hear others talking about the 11 plus and also exam prep, I start wondering whether im doing the right thing and being too lax. Should I just prep and try everywhere? Plus it's the cost of tutors when I don't really have a fixed goal in mind.

I didn't look at Oxbridge rates as my DC is into music and likely to end up at conservatoire, not uni.

SPGS has a wealthier intake so they're not fazed by non-practical or niche degrees, and getting into BA Italian or Nordic Studies at Oxbridge is much easier than Maths, CompSci or Medicine, the standard desirable options of NLCS intake.

I wouldn't say City is more academic than say WHS - it's just two very different sets of parents, very little to do with the schools themselves.

My point is stats data per se can be misleading.

Re. moving within the same tier - yes, academically maybe pointless, but there are other factors e.g moving between NLCS and City would mean choosing between predominantly British S Asian community and largely international one, and the choice obviously depends on the family and their aims for DC.

My DC was at school that probably sends 15% to Oxbridge but we felt not supported with her music as it's not their priority. So it depends on the child's interests too.

Yes, my list is strictly focused on academics, as this thread is all about trying for an academically better school.

There are indeed too many variables to juggle—location, ethos, music, sports, and of course, fees. If you get into SPGS but also secure a 40% scholarship at a GDST school, the financial contrast is massive—the fees at SPGS would end up being double what you would actually pay at the GDST. Also, top-tier grammar schools with zero fees are tempting, which makes the whole decision very complicated.

Regarding SPGS, while it’s true that many of their girls choose humanities at Oxbridge, roughly half of their Oxbridge placements are still in STEM.

I've actually just been to the WHS open day. I’m not sure WHS belongs in the same category as City, but I know that's your perspective. I also remember you mentioned before that WHS is more "mathsy" while PHS is not. To be honest, looking at them closely, I think neither of them are math schools—if you are aiming for a top-tier university maths degree, neither will quite provide the hyper-specialised push you need. Conversely, you could see both of them as such, provided you are simply looking for a solid maths education platform and do your own extra maths work after school. As I said, once schools reach a certain tier, the actual academic differences can be practically small.

Tier 2: NLCS, Godolphin, GHS, City (20%)

@swdd what is GHS?

Guildford high school. It is in Surrey but accessible from some part of south/SW London.

Yes, the thread is focusing on academics, that's why I didn't comment on it. I think it's only a basic starting point in schools comparison.

We used to live in Putney so we never even applied to PHS :)

WHS and City feel different at open days precisely because they are pitching to very different sets of parents - ultra competitive and pushy City types vs more relaxed and settled London burbs MC. WHS academic and GDST ethos is still there though.

No school from your list provides hyper-specialised maths education, you'd need specialist schools for that and in the UK it's only 6th form as far as I remember.

No school from your list provides hyper-specialised maths education, you'd need specialist schools for that and in the UK it's only 6th form as far as I remember.

@Ubertomusic I think this school is opening in September.

https://1729mathsschool.org.uk/

It has been at Mill Hill for a few years I think, I certainly heard about it a couple of years ago, but I don't know anyone who went and I'm not sure it's a proper school and not just a really big maths circle. Russian maths teaching is usually solid and I'm curious why we don't hear more about their results.

Sounds cool！

"
The "School within a School" Model
The institution operates on a unique hybrid model partnership with the Mill Hill Education Group:

• Math and Sciences: The school provides its own separate, highly intensive math and physics-focused syllabus. Students spend roughly 11 hours per week purely on mathematics, which is approximately three times the volume of a standard secondary school timetable.
• Broader Curriculum: For all other non-mathematical academic subjects, sports, arts, and extracurricular activities, students are fully integrated into the existing 120-acre campus communities of Mill Hill School and Belmont Prep. Optional full boarding is also available through Mill Hill's facilities.

The school is led by Founding Head Nick Hamshaw, a highly experienced mathematics educator and former senior leader at Haberdashers' Boys' School and St Albans High School for Girls. The founding faculty includes specialized curriculum leads with backgrounds from advanced mathematical institutions, such as Moscow's specialist School No. 57, the Higher School of Economics, and the London School of Economics. The teaching style leans away from routine national curriculum repetition, favoring university-style lectures, problem-solving seminars, and preparation for high-level mathematics competitions and Olympiads. The name itself pays homage to the famous Hardy-Ramanujan taxicab anecdote, where the number 1729 is celebrated as the smallest integer expressible as the sum of two cubes in two distinct ways (13 + 123 and 93 + 103)."

Ah so it's effectively a maths and physics stream within Mill Hill School. MH will improve their GCSE ranking then :)

Actually, where it is actually necessary rather than just desired I think SPGS does provide quite a lot more than just the curriculum. I know of a girl who went there who was working at A Level standard when she started and although she attended regular maths classes with her peers, she had separate work provided for her all the way through. But she was a true outlier and the vast majority of children simply won't need this type of thing.

Gerko's people have been working towards this for several years, and I know that they've held a few events under the brand, but I believe the first students aren't starting until September. So you'll have to wait a while for the first results.

I don't know if their results will be incorporated in Mill Hill's. AFAIK, they have full control over their admissions. They're just outsourcing the non-STEM portion of the curriculum to Belmont and Mill Hill.

That's an unusual arrangement in terms of reporting but there is no reason to think it won't work. Maths circles (not their project but also Russian) took off nicely. There is definitely a gap in specialist maths provision in middle school in the UK.

Have you had any experience with the London School of Mathematics and Programming? They run weekend Russian Style Maths Circles, and I am thinking of enrolling my DD there once the 11+ is over.

No personal experience as we're more into arts but lots of friends from top schools mentioned on the thread are doing maths circles now. Children seem to be enjoying them, the circles focus on more creative, olympiad style maths, not the boring rote learning and gcse drill you get at test centres - at least that's my impression from what I hear.

@CurlewKate I think there isnt a stretch for those trying to get better results. Its more getting the lower performers upwards. So we arent too bothered about Oxbridge, but certainly trying to bring out better grades. We have a few in class who are strong at English but just left to their own devices. There are streams as the children get older but the school doesn't strike us as anything more than mixed ability

As @lanthanum asked, yes, my worry is then less of a peer group to encourage other people to do better. I feel places like South Hampstead would have this.

We've tried LondonSMP. We prefer the math circles at We Solve Problems.