Choosing a school is an important and consequential decision. Will it be the right environment for your child? What curriculum does it follow? Do the culture and values match your own?
Our advice, as a school (and in many cases as parents who have gone through this process locally), can be condensed down to a few simple to follow guidelines.
- Criteria. What do you want from a school? Knowing that in advance will help the process, and allow you to identify the school that best matches it.
- Research. Read what you can online, check reviews (with the proviso that they might not always be reliable) and, if possible, speak to friends and colleagues for their opinion.
- Visit. Go to the potential schools you have identified. Go to as many as you can and as often as you can. Visiting more than one school, at least, will allow you to have a point of comparison, and, in our experience, really highlight which school seems like the best fit.
- Question. Schools of quality and their senior leadership welcome difficult questions. Each family is different, and so are their needs, so go prepared, make a list and don’t be afraid to ask.
- Trial. The trial day is important for lots of reasons, but perhaps none more so than for finding our whether your child feels comfortable at the school. A child who feels welcome will fit in and begin making progress sooner, and a good school will prioritise their acclimatisation.
Interested families are always welcome to see our school, and to discover whether it is the ideal place for them. A personal tour with a senior member of staff can be arranged at a time to suit you via this form:
Book your Visit
As well as your fact-finding trip to IBIS, you can find out lots of important information about our school in our Welcome Brochure and this video introduction from our Headteacher, Mrs O’Shea.