outstanding to good school status

freeisgood

From newspaper article

.........
"Parents are paying a 'premium' of up to £300,000 extra to buy homes near leading state schools, research out today suggests.
Property prices in sought-after catchment areas near Britain's best performing 100 schools cost on average £91,000 more than surrounding areas.
Those wanting to secure a place at a leading primary rather than secondary face forking out even more, the survey by PrimeLocation.com revealed."

And the catchment for these schools are often 1/4 of a mile!

hazyjo

A school's reputation counts for a lot too. If it's been consistently 'the one to get into' for donkey's years, I doubt it'd make much difference if downgraded to good. Probably wouldn't take it long to get back up to an outstanding anyway.

I don't have kids and am not sure that 10% would be knocked off the value of my house if the local school downgraded to a good from outstanding (no idea what the ones near me are!). But then it's a commuter area and not such a family orientated area (not saying it's not a good area for families, but doubt the school's status would make a massive difference).

I can understand how certain areas would be affected.

Jx

gazter

freeisgood wrote: »

From newspaper article

.........
"Parents are paying a 'premium' of up to £300,000 extra to buy homes near leading state schools, research out today suggests.
Property prices in sought-after catchment areas near Britain's best performing 100 schools cost on average £91,000 more than surrounding areas.
Those wanting to secure a place at a leading primary rather than secondary face forking out even more, the survey by PrimeLocation.com revealed."

And the catchment for these schools are often 1/4 of a mile!

"Up to" are journalist words for "we are making this up"

tom9980

Ofsted doesn't really mean a lot IMO either, only to those who dont look at each school individually which is something all of the league tables and inspection measures do not take into account.

Example: A Child who is autistic enters school at 4 years old they are mostly grading at around a 2 year olds skill levels. At the end of the school year that child has caught up and have made excellent progress BUT due to their autism they fail the social and emotional parts of the grading system and due to the new Early years assessment this child is deemed to have been failed by the school. Everyone involved in the child's welfare from parents, school and outside professionals are very happy with the progress the child has made.

This particular school is graded as "good" and league tables for the county only suggest it is slightly above average. However it is oversubscribed and in a fantastic location. 19% of the children at the school have special educational needs which is way above normal usually around 2-5% in the county. So is the school failing?

Another thing to consider with Ofsted to maintain an Outstanding the school must not only maintain their performance they must in fact get significantly better than when they were last graded. It is in fact nearly impossible to sustain that level of progress over more than a few inspections. The one thing to look for is reading all the reports VERY carefully looking at changes in leadership especially to try and see why the school lost outstanding status. But in all honesty the best bet is to talk to local people and see what they say.

Rain_Shadow

gazter wrote: »

"up to" are journalist words for "we are making this up"

:rotfl::rotfl::rotfl:

Too true

ViolaLass

The department I work in tends to get graded as good by Ofsted. One reason is that we do not "significantly improve" our results year to year. In some exams, we get such good results that there isn't space for us to "significantly improve"!

You have to read the stats carefully to make sure they're saying what they claim they're saying.

pinkteapot

We're looking near primary schools at the moment. A drop from outstanding to good wouldn't worry me at all. Read the Ofsted report - they're available online and it will tell you why it received a 'good' and what its areas for improvement are.

Ofsted have made their assessment criteria more stringent this year so a lot of schools are dropping a grade, even though nothing has really changed.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/educationnews/10204001/Top-schools-downgraded-in-tough-new-Ofsted-inspections.html

If it dropped from outstanding to poor I might think again.

abankerbutnotafatcat

Is there a list of the schools affected?

freeisgood

This is a property thread not an education thread. So £££s do matter in this case, as things like that do affect house values. As do catchment areas, if your house is just outside certain catchments, even by one street, the value is lower.

I would pay a lot more to buy a house near a good to outstanding school as it is all about catchment areas. People would rather do that than have to pay for private education.
I am not alone in this, especially in the cities. Paying through the nose to get your child into a good school is common place.

DRP

Anyone know a good tool to identify school catchment areas?

For example , year by year movement of the boundary? we're buying a house that we're told most years is within a boundary.

Most years.