Brigidine School in Windsor Berkshire...HELP!!!!!!!!!!!

[Mrssa]

Hello,

I really hope you ladies can help me.

I visited Brigidine School in Windsor, last year on an open day.
We are planning to send our daughter to prep school; (year 2) we live in Burnham and visited a few local schools. We really liked Brigidine School in Windsor and have been back this year a few times to speak to the head teacher who i think is not really being honest. (It just seems and feels like something is being covered up OR MISSING)

I have done lots of researches and cannot find much about the school. The girls in the school seem really happy and teachers seem committed...However the class numbers are really small in year 1.
6 in a class and the school has reduced it fees nearly 30%. IS THIS A GOOD SCHOOL? Something just does don?t seem right and i can?t lay my hands on it...is Brigdine a top rate local prep school in the community?... what?s the history? where do the girls go on to after? ....please help me....the class numbers just seem right for my girl as she needs to be pushed.

Thank you so much

[Littlefish]

I would be very concerned about the sustainability of any school with only 6 in a class.

I also think that 6 in a class is far, far too small to cater for any child's social development.

[mathanxiety]

My mum went to a Brigidine boarding school in Ireland many, many years ago...

Here is the website of the school.

Here is their Independent Schools Inspectorate Report.

They may well have some sort of endowment that enables them to give out bursaries and scholarships, and they mention in their newsletter that they have reduced fees this year. Perhaps a big bequest? Or maybe the order sold off land or property?

Newsletter.

It is a small school with 250 students in total, both primary and secondary. I think this sounds lovely myself.

However, with such a small school, it's difficult to do much in the way of extra curricular activities, particularly sports and drama -- but the ISI report says they are doing pretty well except for opportunities for the senior girls.

One thing that would give me pause (mentioned in the report) is that parents do not seem to feel welcome to participate in school life although ISI says there seem to be opportunities for them to do so. This is sort of a characteristic of Irish teaching order schools, and even teaching orders that operate in Ireland that are staffed or run by Irish nuns. I know there are probably very few nuns (if any) now involved in the school, and there is a board of governors, but the ethos of schools that Irish nuns have any input into is -- thank you parents, we will take it from here. While there may well be opportunities to participate and have some say in the school, the bottom line often is that your opinion will be duly noted and the management will not take much notice.

This is a 'school culture' issue that can have concrete ramifications. I would try to talk with parents if I were you, to try to get to the bottom of the feeling you have. If the school doesn't have any names for you to contact to talk about the school, I would be a bit . Maybe you could approach someone at the school gates and just ask...

The danger of this is that fundraising is not accomplished to the limits of its potential, communication between school and parents is often of the drip feed variety, and parents are just expected to support the school, send their children off prepared to learn every morning and produce the required homework the next day -- the latter is not necessarily a bad thing and students tend to be well motivated, which makes for a nice atmosphere and classes that are rarely disrupted, but it also means that there might not be much of a feeling of being part of a team.

The convent school my niece attends in Dublin is a thriving concern but there is a persistent niggle of concern arising from that sort of feeling that parents' input and involvement is not really welcome, despite what may be the case on paper.

[orangetulip]

I think there was talk of them switching to be a maintained school a year or two ago, but it then didn't go ahead. Not sure of my facts here as I heard it down a very long grapevine, and goodness knows how it would work, but worth investigating...

[MollieO]

There was talk of it becoming a free school here.

You need to go with your gut instinct. What other schools have you looked at?

[Lonecatwithkitten]

I would be checking it's finances with the charities commission.