Hi everyone,
Just wondering if anyone here from Colchester considering Westcliff/Southend schools. I am aware of the tremendously long journey (about 1.5 hrs each way at the least) from ours to either of those schools but wondering if anyone else is considering it all the same?
Thanks.

Please don't take this badly, but the only thing that springs to mind is a phrase containing the words 'stark', staring' and 'mad', in precisely that order.

_________________
Outside of a dog, a book is a man's best friend. Inside of a dog it's too dark to read.Groucho Marx

I'm not from your area but I want to urge you not to consider schools that are at least 90 minutes away from your home. Because:

- Your child will be exhausted and therefore unable to benefit from the education on offer at the school, no matter how excellent the GS's education would be
- Your child will find it difficult to participate in the after-school activities that are such an important part of their education and personal development
- Your child's friends will live miles away and so it will limit your child's ability to socialise with them outside school
- You will find it difficult as a parent to attend school events such as parents evenings, productions, Christmas fairs, etc
- Your child will never spend less than three hours a day travelling but may well spend longer than that, given the unreliability of roads, trains and transport.

What about your local schools?

We have been talking about this when we received the result. I was very brave to suggest that I would take DD to Southend and pick her up everyday for the next at least 5 years. But I just found out today, the school bus from Chelmsford to Southend pick girls up at 7 o'clock in the morning, and Chelmsford is almost half way from Colchester to Southend already, isn't it? So i truly think it is far more than 90 minutes single trip if you drive.We have just moved from the other side of Essex to Colchester last month

Quite. And then - does one hang around in Southend for the duration of the school day (happy to suggest things to see, places to go, cafes to hang out in, if one does intend to ), or drive all the way back to Colchester, get a bit of housework done, perhaps, then drive all the way back for pick up time?

Yogurthoney, your post on another thread should perhaps run as a ticker across the CSSE website, along with, Results will be available on... etc.

https://www.elevenplusexams.co.uk/forum/11plus/viewtopic.php?f=15&t=52190&p=637868#p637868

_________________
Outside of a dog, a book is a man's best friend. Inside of a dog it's too dark to read.Groucho Marx

In the first couple of weeks, I took DD1 to Colchester from Waltham Abbey and the came back around 10 o'clock but I feel I had already spent half day and should lie down. My hubby did the afternoon run and he complaint that his leg hair has all gone without paying for waxing. Truly speaking I did think and am still thinking sometime now if I didn't screeze DD2 into any of the grammar school means that it is a failure. But if they are doing well, always on the top set, what is the difference to be in a local School with 25% grade7to 9 and a 80% grammar? For children, time is irreversible.