6th September 2016

Dear Year 5 Parents

Re: Secondary Transfer

I know your child has only just started Year 5 but I wanted to write to you regarding transfer, so that you are forewarned about what will be happening next year.

You will need to apply for a place at secondary school for your child by October 2017. I will hold a meeting for Year 5 parents about this on Tuesday 16th May at 7pm and then again in early September to go through the application process. If you look on our school website (under the “Parents” tab) you will find the schools children have gone to in previous years. You will notice that there are lots of different schools that children go on to and not just one or two feeder schools. Every school has their own admissions criteria and these need to be studied carefully for each particular school’s requirements.

Things to consider are what sort of school you would like your child to go to; a Catholic school, a mixed or single-sex school, a selective school etc. It is also important to consider the journey your child would need to do each day to get there and how easy or difficult that may be. You will be advised to always include the secondary school that you live closest to on your application form, so if you haven’t already done so, find out what that is.

Catholic Schools require additional forms to be completed including a priest’s reference form which you will need to do this time next year (or during the summer term if you wish your daughter to apply for certain selective schools like St Michael’s).

From this week on and for the next few weeks, secondary schools will be holding their open days and open evenings for you to visit. Each school website will provide information about the dates and times but the following schools have been popular in previous years for St Monica’s children and so may be of interest to you (in date order):-

Finchley Catholic High School (boys) – Tuesday 13th September 5.30 – 8.30pm

La Sainte Union (girls) – Thursday 22nd September 2014 - 4.00 - 7.00

Winchmore School (mixed) – Wednesday 28th September - 6.30pm

St Anne’s Catholic High School (girls) – Monday 3rd October - 6.00pm

St Thomas More Catholic School (mixed) – Tuesday 4th Oct 5.30-8pm

Ashmole (mixed) – Wednesday 5th October 7pm

Southgate School (mixed) – Thursday 6th October - 5.45pm

Enfield County School (girls) – Monday 10th October - 6.30pm

Enfield Grammar (boys) – Monday 10th October - 5.30pm

St Ignatius College (boys) – Tuesday 11th October – 6.15 – 8pm

Highlands School (mixed) – Monday 17th October - 6.00pm Selective school open days have now passed for this year and dates will be published for the summer term 2017 on each individual school’s website. Each school will have all the necessary information on their own school website under the “Admissions” section.

The process for applying for a selective Secondary School changed a few years ago, so if you wish your child to sit an entrance exam, they will be doing it early September 2017. You will need to register your interest for some of these schools during the summer term 2017. If you are not sure whether your child has the level of academic ability required to be successful in a selective school, I would be happy to give you an indication of this based on the assessments we do at school. Lots of children from St Monica’s often sit entrance exams but only a small percentage usually get in. It is very competitive and it would not be recommended to put your child through a stressful process if they are not naturally very academic (and it is worth noting that many children are not!)

Other schools such as Ashmole offer places based on Music auditions; you will need to register your interest for this sometime in May. Dame Alice Owen and Enfield Grammar also have this music criterion.

If you have any questions about the process for transferring to secondary school, I would be happy to try and assist. I have been through the process twice now and I am happy to say we have all survived!

Yours sincerely

Kate Baptiste