year 9 moving school

[susannah32]

Hi there,

My son is in year 8 and is increasingly unhappy and not doing well. We are considering moving him to another school & have applied to a few that we like.

Please could I have any success stories as we are on a waiting list for all. Do many students move schools in year 9?

It partly depends on whether it’s a school that starts GCSE courses in year 9. If so, it’s a bit tight.

People do move, but it’s much more preferable to move before the start of exam courses.

Yes, loads move. As above, check when they start their GCSE's. Where are you on the waiting lists and are you likely to receive an offer by September?

Following as my same age dc is currently on the waiting list for another school. Ideally I would have wanted them moved before the end of year 8, but I don’t think that’s going to happen. Dc is 10th on the waiting list so I’m trying to be realistic in that there’s a chance they may never get a move, I find it unlikely that that many children will leave the year group so i’m mostly relying on others dropping off the list which also seems unlikely. And of course there’s every chance of moving further down the list.

If it gets to the end of year 9 and we’ve heard nothing then depending on how dc is doing, I may just remove them from the list at that point (begrudgingly) and try to support them through GCSE’s at their current school as best I can. Not ideal and I dread the thought of dealing with this school for that long but there’s not much else we can do.

Changing for y9 isn’t unusual. They won’t have started GCSEs yet. I’d try and work out why DS doesn’t like where he is and do make sure other schools are better. You cannot control the quality of teaching or other dc. So, there’s some risk and DS must be up for it and make the best of anything another school offers.

A long time ago but I moved at the start of year 9 because we moved house. In my new school I was ahead in some subjects, like maths but behind in others, like English. My parents were weird and lots was going on at the time so they never bothered to help out with the subjects I was behind on. But that's obviously something you could do for a bit if they need it.

From my perspective though, I went from a school where I was bullied and ostracised to one where being bright wasn't seen as a bad thing. It was a massive relief and I finally got a friendship group. From memory there were one or two subjects I couldn't choose in my options because I'd not had experience of them in year 7 or 8 from my old school but it wasn't many.