Questions about out-of-county entrance (Maidenhead)

Eleven Plus (11+) in Buckinghamshire (Bucks)

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ReadingVeracal
Posts: 4
Joined: Tue Jul 17, 2012 1:51 pm

Questions about out-of-county entrance (Maidenhead)

Post by ReadingVeracal »

Hi all,

I'm new to this forum (but am so glad I found it - what a treasury of information you have on here!)

I'd be ever so grateful to anyone who could answer the following for me:

Children living in Buckinghamshire who pass the 11+ seem to be guaranteed a place at one or other of the grammar schools. But what about the children who live "in catchment" but out-of-county (e.g. North Maidenhead)? Presumably they are not guaranteed a place at the Buckinghamshire grammars? Or are they?

The reason I ask is that I currently live in Reading with my husband and DC (DD is 8, DS 1). But both my husband's work and my work have moved offices further away from our home in recent years. The travel (which was once a strain) has become virtually impossible since the arrival of our DS. My husband works in Buckinghamshire (Gerrards Cross) and I work in London, so a move to the Maidenhead/Taplow/Burnham type areas would be most sensible for our family. But we don't want to lose out on schooling for our DD due to the county divide.

I know that there is obviously no guarantee that DD will pass the 11+, but her teachers certainly regard her as grammar school material. We have pretty much lived on the doorstep to Kendrick School for many years now, and I don't want her to lose out on the chance of a really good grammar place because we have to move just when she is coming up to secondary school age.

ReadingVeracal
Sally-Anne
Posts: 9235
Joined: Wed Jan 11, 2006 8:10 pm
Location: Buckinghamshire

Re: Questions about out-of-county entrance (Maidenhead)

Post by Sally-Anne »

Hi Readingveracal, and welcome!
ReadingVeracal wrote:Children living in Buckinghamshire who pass the 11+ seem to be guaranteed a place at one or other of the grammar schools. But what about the children who live "in catchment" but out-of-county (e.g. North Maidenhead)? Presumably they are not guaranteed a place at the Buckinghamshire grammars? Or are they?
There are no absolute guarantees of places for any child, regardless of which county they live in. In practice, however, children living in Buckinghamshire invariably gain places at a GS somewhere in the county.

it would be illegal to discriminate against children because they live in the wrong county (the Greenwich Judgement of 1989), but under the Rotherham Judgment 1997, schools may give priority to children within a defined catchment area.

So, provided you move to within the catchment area for a Bucks grammar school, regardless of which county you are in your application would be considered equally with those of children applying from within the county. Catchment children are currently the first priority after exceptional cases for all Bucks GS.

Whether your children then gain places is down to distance from school gates. If you take a look here you will see the sort of distances that have applied in recent years for schools such as Sir William Borlase, but please do read the update at the top about distance measurement: http://www.elevenplusexams.co.uk/school ... n-profiles" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

That is a starter for ten - hope it helps.

Sally-Anne
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