Did anyone sit the North London Consortium 2 exams this morning ?

These included Northwood College, City of London Girls, North London Collegiate & Channing.

Me and barnetdad sat it, no actually our dd's did! My dd thought the maths was really hard and not at all like the sample paper. We sat at City and there were girls crying outside. My dd would not cry outside an exam in a million years, but she thought the maths was much harder than Owens and HBS and Herts Consortium. She had to guess quite a few. We also can't work out where the comprehension was from at all. Usually I recognise the book the passage is from but I am stumped. City was very decent and invited us in for tea and coffee. The exam overran because so many people including us were late. It took us 2.5v hours to get there, a journey that would normall take about 40 mins because British Rail was running a Saturday service and cancelling trains. All my extra time factoring in for problems was eaten up and more besides. St this rate we will be going the night before for St Pauls on Tuesday!

I found it very tough. And I'm not sure that they bought my disguise as an 11yo girl!

No, seriously, DD thought the same as yours. Maths v. tricky but English easier than HBS (no pigeons).

Home straight now. Just Habs girls and then party time!

Well, the best of luck to you!

I know that last year CLSG had a record number of applicants and I assume that it is no different this year. I wonder therefore if a more difficult exam in combination with the new computerized tests that CLSG and St. P. are doing are not some kind of prelude to CLSG leaving the Consortium and perhaps setting up a new mini-consortium with St. P.? If the exams were indeed harder than last year, they may be looking to reduce the number of girls they interview and if that doesn't work, set up their own exam. It will be interesting to see what the other group's exams look like next Friday.

If you have applied for consortium schools other than City and NLCS it is conceivable that they will not set as a high a pass mark. Perhaps this thought may console some candidates.

I should emphasize that I have no inside track at all - my DD is at a different North London consortium school, I am just speculating. And I must confess that today I was thinking back to last year when we were sitting exams and all the anxiety that went with them and I am so glad that we are through this process!

We have no issue with the exam being harder, but my dd said the maths was nothing like the sample paper. Why have a sample paper at all if it is not in some way like the real thing. Niether ST Paul's or Habs have any type of sample paper thereby freeing them to do what they like on the day. I think CIty and St Pauls should set up together because they seem to me to have much of the same ethos. We like them both very much But St Pauls is on the wrong side of town for us. City is very straightforward for us. I was surprised at how predominantly white City was compared to HBS which was odd because lots of the parents were talking about HBS and having got or not got through to the second round. On the computer tests one of the parents I was talking to claimed that City were going to make the computer test the first round but changed their minds. I wonder why that was and whether they will change back for next year.

The Herts consortium maths paper is generally considered to be very straightforward - basically KS2 maths. I have rarely heard of anyone who thinks their DC didn't do well on it!

Daogroupie - as you are in Herts & therefore only have three "choices" I wondered which consortium school you had gone for?

Sorry I did not reply earlier Tense. We applied for the only one that did not have a catchment area, Clement Danes. We blew all our three choices on entrance exam schools so we have no backup at all.

Daogroupie - it sounds as if your DD has sat a number of independent school exams, so it sounds like you have the back-up well covered!

I am sure you will be overwhelmed with offers come Feb / March!

Thank you very much for your kind thoughts Tense, but we are not counting our chickens. We have not managed to get through to interview stage yet, so we are certainly not thinking about the offer stage! Whatever happens I have nothing but praise for all the schools for the way they handle the process. We have both felt welcome and supported all the way through. I would recommend anyone to have a go.

Apparently the English paper set on 15th was an old CE and some of the girls had done it before, if this affects you, tell your head to get on to the senior schools to sort it out.