Please clarify my 11+ confusion

[ToadMum]

QE Barnet (which was for some years a local comprehensive school, a period in its history I suspect it is keen not to dwell upon), does indeed currently admit in score order only. However, it also only admits boys. As a single-sex school, it is fully entitled to insist on admitting only by biology, so to speak, but I don't know what its actual policy on gender self-identification is, if it has one; perhaps this would be something to look into.

[rainbowpeppa]

I'm a lot clearer than before regarding the school admission. Thx to each and everyone
This is not a question, this is just about my view I've on single sex and mixed school.
I prefer girls school compared to mixed school as I feel that it will make the girls to concentrate more on studies rather than concentrating on unwanted stuffs at that age.
I'm Asian and I passed that stage and I've experienced this.
I took my secondary in mixed school at my 15 and 16 and I gained more marks.
And my friends who were in mixed school at that time didn't get enough marks to secure a place in college and got into trouble.

I'm born and brought up Asian and my thoughts are little old school.
I want to hear your thoughts on this.

[scary mum]

In my view there are pros & cons to both single sex & mixed sex schools and people tend to have strong opinions either way. I went to a girls' school and felt strongly that I wanted to send my children to mixed schools as I felt that real life is mixed, so schools might as well be. We had a boys' school next door & travelled with them, had some mixed lessons in 6th form etc, do weren't entirely segregated. I knew girls at university who had been completely sheltered at school & had no clue how to interact with boys when they got out into the real world - they seemed to think they were a different species.
Anecdotally there can be difficult cliques at all girls schools as well as higher levels of eating disorders. Having said that, all schools will have issues with bullying, and any school which says it doesn't is either lying or ignoring the issue.
I don't think that by keeping your daughter at an all girls school you will protect her from being interested in boys - there may be other things to distract her at a girls' school.
As I have said before, I would look at the school first, regardless of it being grammar, girls or whatever.

[hermanmunster]

I don't think that by keeping your daughter at an all girls school you will protect her from being interested in boys

so true - decades back there were 3 school buses for 2 adjacent single gender schools - one for girls, one for boys and the late bus (mixed). Several mothers used to see their daughters onto the girls bus - the girls got off at the first stop and waited to get onto the late bus to meet with the lads.

[Glos18]

Hopping over from the Gloucestershire board to say that there the glos system is score only so you can apply from London. My DD goes to Stroud High School for girls and really enjoys it. There are many girls there (often from Asian backgrounds like yourself) who take the train from Swindon. You would be able to afford a nice house in Swindon and it is just about commutable to London for your DH.

[rainbowpeppa]

Hopping over from the Gloucestershire board to say that there the glos system is score only so you can apply from London. My DD goes to Stroud High School for girls and really enjoys it. There are many girls there (often from Asian backgrounds like yourself) who take the train from Swindon. You would be able to afford a nice house in Swindon and it is just about commutable to London for your DH.

Oh really. That's a great tip for me.

[SWLMum]

I wish I found this forum earlier! My DD1 took the 11+ exam and we are waiting for the offer anxiously. In a way our situation is a bit similar to OP. We live in Ealing but DH took up a job in Kent last September after a few months out of job. So DD1 took the Kent exam but we used Ealing address on the CAF form. Her scored more than 410 so we are hoping for an OOC place in Kent schools. DD1 also entered Tiffin round 2 but not sure about the results. I think that a long shot. Our backup would be a good local comp where we are on the edge of the catchment. Ideally we would like to move to Kent to join her father soon. Fingers crossed. Our DD2 is in nursery so the the move would be less complicated. If she couldn't get a place in Kent this year, we will try in-year admission next year.

[PettswoodFiona]

410 is an amazing score, you should be fine from your Ealing address for a school like Dartford Grammar or Tonbridge Girls but it is always uncertain until offer day what the required OOC score might be. You would also have needed to have put those on your CAF. If you put on your CAF a school that doesn't go on score, but just a pass and then defined parishes, it doesn't matter how high the score, it is almost certain it won't be offered from Ealing.

None of the Kent schools would be commutable from Ealing so a move would be required.

[SWLMum]

Yes, we Datford is on the list. No way to commute from Ealing to Kent. DH has to stay there on weekdays. It's real hard on everyone, but we decided to get through this. If DD1 gets London school, DH needs to find a job in London.

[Rao]

@rainbowpeppa, we were in a similar situation a few years ago. The resources in this forum was very useful in guiding us through our 11+ Journey. I will briefly explain what we did - hope you can take something out of our experience.
We were living in an area where there were no grammar schools and we were quite unaware of this part of the education system in this country. We learnt about it in passing and then did a bit of research. We basically used the 'find a school' section here to shortlist the schools the we would be ok to commute from and went through the requirements for each of these exams. This was when our dd was in year 5. We decided to move into catchment of one of the grammar schools to maximise her chances during the summer hols after year 5. We made her write a number of exams - Nonsuch, Wallington (yes, Nonsuch and Wallington were separate exams then!), Essex Consortium, Bexley, Newstead, SW Hertfordshire (this was like a mock) and HBS (didnt have any catchment then). When we moved, we also made sure that the house we moved into was in catchment for a good comprehensive school that we liked. Luckily for us, our dd was quite academic and we didnt have to really force her to work hard. There was no formal tutoring for her but both of us worked with her on the basic knowledge and exam skills. She got through all the exams she wrote and was pretty intent on going to HBS. We ended up moving again when she was offered a place at HBS. She did quite well there and is now studying natural sciences at Cambridge. Looking back, i think we under estimated her abilities and could have avoided the first move! We ignored Kent then because we thought it would be impossible to get out of catchment places but I think she would have gotten in Tonbridge if she wrote the exam. No regrets anyways and now we are getting ready to move again for the second one's grammar school!