On page 26 of the booklet it sets out the following figures for the distance away (that the furthest child that was offered a place lived) at local schools. All distances are straight line distances, apparently.

Dalmain 586m
Elliott Bank 467m
Fairlawn 377m (or for last year when it had a bulge/extra class 783m)
Horniman 680m
Kelvin Grove 641m (bulge 1211m)
Stillness 645m

So quite close really and a lot will depend which schools, if any, have 'bulges' this year.

Howden,
A bit speculative but we are about to put our 2 bed ground floor flat on the market which is about 20m from Fairlawn if that is the type of property you are looking for?

Thanks for the info re distances Satchers - that's very useful to know

Domc - thanks, but ideally we are looking for a 3 bed house with a big garden - we may have missed the boat slightly though. Houses are coming on at v optimistic prices (IMO...)

Houses in Forest Hill are still better value than most other parts of London, especially outside the yet-to-be-fashionable South East.

- What in your opinion, apart from exam results, makes Fairlawn a good school?

A bit late with the reply, but I came across this whilst looking at Fairlawn School. Apparently they have really good ICT facilities:

Fairlawn Primary School Wins National Award for Best ICT Facilities in a UK school

Also some more information here:

Information on Fairlawn's ICT Facilities

Thanks for that - we are still looking around so its all v helpful

I'm sorry I missed this thread, especially when the debate turned to local secondaries - but better late than never...thought I'd share our experience. Our daughter just finished GCSEs at Sydenham Girls, and came out with 13, 7A*s, 5As, rest Bs (I mention this purely for illustration - facts are better than anecdotes!). Of course we've supported her but the school can take a bit of credit! She had loads of support and opportunities - academically doing extra lessons like Latin; in music, singing at National Theatre - and is now in the joint sixth form with FH Boys.

It does frustrate me when people moan about local schools and knock them. It's always worth checking whether they're talking from personal experience, or simply repeating anecdotes (why does this nation love doing itself down..?). Of course, as parents we're concerned about our children, and secondary transfer is pretty stressful with the first. And no school is perfect - even if you pay fees. But there are good secondaries here, we're very fortunate to have community-minded schools like Sydenham/FH Boys.

Final thoughts - remember these schools cater for the whole community and I'm glad they do. This does mean, they take all abilities and are unlikely to get overall results as high as selective schools - but from our experience kids with potential will be spotted and supported. And secondly - if after reading this you still aren't keen on the students you see, it's worth asking which ones you're looking at. Of course there may be stragglers who turn up late, or noisy ones, so you don't notice the decent majority. But the schools start early, and loads of kids will go in 30 minutes before this to do extra-curricular stuff. If you see the early ones, often loaded down with books, violins etc, it's a different demographic, and you might appreciate the schools genuinely reflect the whole SE23 community. And remember - they are teenagers, they're supposed to be lively.

Guess I'd better declare an interest - when my daughter joined the school, I volunteered as a parent governor. I figured if I care about this area, best approach is to get stuck in and support teaching staff who are trying to do a good job. Hope I didn't get too preachy - but I think we've got great schools in SE23 and they're worth backing - and sending your kids to.

Indeed, but provided they don't all start turning into academies as I don't think this will benefit the community as a whole. It may mean that they benefit their self selected student base but thats not entirely wonderful if your child has special support needs or has been turned down for entry in the first place. Its no secret that Fairlawn has expressed interest in the academy process and is keen to move away from local authority control. I personally don't see anything wrong with local authority control or the national curriculum and would prefer to maintain this level of accountability rather than the alternative. Schools should be accountable to the community not make their decisions on some arbitrarily agreed standards.

What if the arbitrarily agreed standards do a better job at educating the next generations than local authority controlled standards?

How would you be able to rely on something which may not be consistently or reliably applied and stipulated by governors and parents rather than educationalists? Don't get me wrong there's always room for improvement but I am wary of locally determined standards in many things as I believe it raises issues in respect of equalities.

Perhaps some of the governors and parents are also educationalists?

Perhaps they are but they won't be in a position to act as such in their roles as parents and governors.

Bit of a sweeping statement, Roz. Please elaborate - why not?

How a sweeping statement? Parents and governors don't usually have much of a say in the educational approach of a school- thats the remit of the Headteacher and senior management team. If you disagree why not outline alternative reasons why academies and removal from any local authority control, and potentially an eventual digression from the National Curriculum, are a good idea?

Wasn't disagreeing with you Roz, just wondered why you thought that some professional insight other than on the teaching staff was all in vain. I would have thought it would be helpful to have some expert knowledge in governing boards.

On the other hand, nor am I agreeing with you either. Particularly in that education should be under local authority control. Health isn't, so why should education be? (and in fact, I think a lot of social care functions exercised by the local authority should be transferred to the NHS too).

Healthcare follows government directives. the point about academies is that they will follow the directives and educational philosophies of a relatively small number of people with unclear accountability to the community in which they reside. Going ' off curriculum' may be manna to some and a pretty poor outcome for others.

Don't be too taken in by Ofsted. They aren't accountable and are often box-tickers who work to a pre-conceived agenda. Who inspects the inspectors?