After school clubs

[onebigdilemma]

I know a lot of children travel to school by bus. I know with our school bus company that if a child wants to do an after school activity they then have to find there own way home! With work commitments I know this is going to be difficult and I can't be the only one.
Do you feel your child has missed out on after school activities by not attending a closer school?

[guest201]

At my daughter's school the activities are at lunchtime for this very reason. It means she has about 15 mins to get her lunch but she doesn't mind.

[tense]

I think it's one of those things you have to factor in when weighing up the pros and cons of a school. If the further school was a better fit for my dc overall, I would go for it.

After school activities are fun and beneficial &, to be honest, I would have hated my dc to have missed out on them. But I would never have sent them to my closest school (failing at the time) just so they could go to clubs. So it depends what your options are.

You may find you can alter your work pattern a bit or work from home occasionally - you will probably meet up with other local families & be able to share lifts. I have done all these things, although of course I do appreciate that not everyone can.

[Guest55]

It's not just clubs but matches (which are always after school), concerts, rehearsals etc.

In addition, factor in parents evenings, information evenings, fund raising events and all the other activities that are part of a school. Obviously the closest school may not be appropriate but do think carefully about keeping jounreys as short as practical.

[tense]

do think carefully about keeping jounreys as short as practical.

Absolutely! I certainty didn't mean to imply that distance was no object. As the OP mentioned school bus I assumed it would be fairly local but I guess that isn't necessarily the case.

[onebigdilemma]

School is 10 miles away, 20 minutes in car. Not too bad just opposite direction to my work!!

[equilibro]

It's simple, "you pay your money you make your choice"; I've never known a forum where there is so much unnecessary agonising. Make your mind up, move on

[onebigdilemma]

The original question was only asking peoples opinion if they thought their child had missed out on doing after school clubs.
Not sure what "you pay your money, you make your choice" has to do with it??

[southbucks3]

Basically if your child is sporty, musical or loves drama, then after school clubs will be important. My eldest sons only come home on the school bus journeys three times a week between them, they walk, bus, share lifts or call the mum taxi on other occasions. Unless it is a match or race when I am unfailingly, if they don't clash, watching quietly from the side.

I do not believe anyone is agognising, just asking experienced parents for advice and guidance which is far better than jumping into the sea without a life-jacket because no one told them they would drown.

[clearsky]

This is a very good question, one I'm asking myself when choosing school for Ds, we live in Birmingham and Ds likes King Edwards Camphill boys which is also 10 miles away, it means no after school clubs for him and also I'm not too keen to travel so far as the traffic is extremely bad around there. We are considering another school that's 6m away but even then we have to be careful with after school clubs. However after speaking to some schools there are many lunch time clubs as they know boys travel from far.

Also I find I have made many difficult decisions, however when it involves your child, you want to make the right choice because they worked extremely hard to score well on these exams and therefore its just fair we select the right school for them.