Scholarship results, and where Year 8 went

Thirty-one children left Year 8 this summer. Twenty-six went to their first-choice senior school, four to their second, and one moved out of the county for reasons that had nothing to do with the list.

The awards

Nine awards were made across the year group: four academic, three music, one art and one all-rounder. That takes the total to twenty-two over the last three years, which is the figure on the front of the prospectus.

What the figure is worth

Not as much as it looks. A scholarship at thirteen is a snapshot of one week in February, and half the children who win one were not the obvious candidates in Year 6. The other half were, and did not.

What matters more is whether a child goes to a school that fits. We spend an hour with every Year 7 family talking about exactly that, and sometimes the conversation ends with us arguing against the school on the parents’ list.

Preparation

Scholarship sets in maths, English and science run in Years 7 and 8, inside the timetable rather than bolted onto the end of the day. Nobody is put in a set because a parent asked, and nobody is kept out of one because they were slow in Year 5.