Now that we have got the results its time for narrowing down our first and second choice schools on the CAF. DS visited both KES and LSS and preferred KES. With a score of 241, I am hoping that he has a good chance at both even though we are OOC but just in the priority area for Southern. However reading a number of threads over the weekend on here, one thing that emerged was that we need to take into consideration is travel for him on a daily basis and the odd occasion that we may need to pick him or attend meetings / session at school.

With this in mind can I ask of any parents from Coventry who have DS in either of these schools whether there is school bus available for KES from Coventry? For LSS, I think our best option is the train as we the train station is easily accessible for us. Do a number of DCs do this journey regularly?

There's a Ridleys coach that covers Coventry and goes to both SGGS & KES, takes around an hour. I think it's the 525 (it's nearly hit me a few times!!)

But be careful as it is a 'Pass' service. I.e. you book a place and pay for the year. My DD is year 8 at SGGS and has friends that wanted seats on some of the pass coaches, parents assumed there would be no problems but there just weren't spaces last year - cue massive headache of getting them to/from school whilst waiting for a coach space to become available.

Also think carefully about after school activities. From my experience, those girls that stay for the fantastic sports clubs after school at SGGS are only those that aren't relying on a coach to get them home. I know several girls that want to stay behind and do more but they just can't.

Please also note that it is not "the odd occasion" at KES either...if your son is involved with sport, music or drama - and if he is at KES I sincerely hope he will be involved in one or all of these, otherwise he is not taking advantage fully of the educational experience - there is always rehearsals, training etc after school. I have two boys there and have to collect one or other of them every night except for Friday as the after school activities go on past the school bus time home (and there is no other bus feasible to where we live.)

Evening events can go on quite late so it can feel a bit of a trawl sometimes - especially in the winter! Not sure if there are trains from where you live to Stratford? A number of boys wander to and from the train station so that might be an option.

I think that one of the 16a public services also start in Cov (v early start though as it goes through Leamington at 7:35ish)

We're managing to share the after school post training pick ups informally with some other parents and it's working quite well. One really great thing they did at the year 7 welcome evening was to put all the names of the various towns and villages in the catchment area on the wall. At the end of the session everyone went to stand under their respective location and introduced them selves to the other parents (set up whatsapp groups etc) We found it really useful.

Thanks Domino and KCG. I looked up the 525 and it seems to start fairly close to where we live, so it does sound like an option but as KCG says we have to take into account the after school clubs and knowing my DS he will definitely want to get involved in some of those, so I have to work out the options for being able to pick him up.

Thanks Wonky that is useful to know, I did find the bus service X16/16A that you have mentioned. I need to look into it.

Hopefully he will get KES (fingers crossed) and we will have some similar events to sort something out.

I would think with your score he has a very good chance - cautiously very optimistic, if, of course it is your first choice school on your CAF - if you list LSS first then you will likely get that!

Definitely first choice on CAF and yes cautiously very optimistic here as well.

The X18 bus seems to be an option for KES in the evenings, it masquerades as the 16A in the mornings.
https://tiscon-maps-stagecoachbus.s3.am ... %20web.pdf

Yes they've just put another X18 on in the evening. There is a 16A in the evening as well but it terminates on the Kenilworth road between Leamington and Kenilworth. The 16A has been a bit hit and miss to be honest, could be 20mins + late most nights (setting off!)

DS has bee jumping on the X18 most days and it seems to run ok.

If you do get LSS, my son tells me there are quite a few boys that catch the train between Rugby and Coventry every day, both straight after school and after the after-school clubs.