Sending a child to the best secondary Vs the nearest school

[Losoph]

Having a bit of a dilemma and wonder how many people here put the quality of education first before any other consideration.

I have an opportunity to send my DD to the best school in town - not catchment but I teach there. It is a very strict free school (silent corridors, dedicated reading time, calm atmosphere, disruption dealt with super efficiently). I strongly believe the school is great and serves it's purpose of educating kids well, particularly from a very deprived area (inner city).
My DD would receive great education in a disruption free environment. There are some negatives however

• school day ends late-4pm for all students and I would not let her come back on her own in the first two years. We walk/cycle through a rather rough patch of the city and my DD is tiny. This means she would have to wait for me often till punishing 5pm.
• sports facilities are awful, only a tiny courtyard to use. No real pitches, etc and my DD loves football and other sports
• when she makes new friends, they will all live far- I will end up driving her around
• very academic, so only traditional subjects to choose for GCSE

-i may end up tied to the school for longer than wish for Our catchment school is a large comprehensive, 'good' according to Ofsted but the behaviour is just as in many schools (a lot of isolations, exclusions, etc). The results are fine, not as good as in my school but fine. A part of me really wants to provide my child with a normal teen experiences that I had as a child

• she can walk to and from the school with her friends, half of the estate end up in that school.

-She will make friends who will most likely live locally so they can see each other after school- she is big on being outside.

• they have tones of after school activities and sports to choose from.
• wider GCSE subject choices

In general, my DD and then my son who will go to a secondary a year later are pretty good kids who are obedient, well mannered and do their homework without nagging. I wonder if they really need all these routines that are designed to support the children from unprivileged backgrounds. I hope they can do well anywhere. But some part of me worry that I may make a wrong decision which will impact their life😏

Local school unless it is awful, which it sounds like it isn't.

Another point to consider is what happens if you change schools. Sounds like it will become a logistical nightmare.

Go for your school.
She can always do football and other hobbies at a club. It's far better to have an education which isn't constantly interrupted and dominated by a negative few.

OK. That's what I understood from MN. How does it work?

Loads of very useful comments, interesting that the overwhelming majority would go for the local school. Though I do appreciate the merits of my school...I am curious of what my daughter says when we visit both schools.

In this situation local.
It sounds like your local is fine and your children would have local friends.
Obviously your school is strict to deal with the local demographic from what you describe.
So how do you really feel about your child being mixed socially with that demographic? How much do you really know about the local community?
I ask because we have one school near us that is very strict for that reason ( also gets great results). But socially issues have existed outside school and I certainly know of some very upset middle class parents when their child started smoking cannabis around the local rough estate.
You are no doubt able to support education at home. So go local and if needed tutor. But do a tour and see what is in place and also if it even needs to be as strict.

I would go for the academic school because the environment sounds much more conducive to learning. The only caveat would be if the curriculum is too rigid to allow any strictly non traditional courses at all. Do you mean that they don’t offer art, for example? Or just that they don’t do things like digital media?

But for me education is too important to risk not getting the best school you can. Yes, the social aspect will need more thought but they will find a way around it.

I am in a minority though clearly.