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HOW TO CHOOSE THE RIGHT SCHOOL Hannah Helliar, head of St Mary’s School, Cambridge, on selecting the right school for your child and the questions that matter most
I recently received an email from an alumna who left us ten years ago. She was trying to reach a retired teacher, ‘to let her know the ways she changed my life’. A decade on, that is what she still carries with her. I think about that email as open day season approaches. Choosing a school is one of the biggest decisions a family makes, both financially and emotionally, and many start in the same place: exam results. I am, of course, very proud of ours. Exam results matter, but they are only one part of the picture. The measure I trust more is the progress each girl has made, and St Mary’s girls consistently achieve grades higher than initial predictions given when they join us, with our scholars challenged further through our programme of individual research projects and seminars. Even that only takes you so far – exam results are an outcome, not the story. They tell you little about the journey behind them, or the challenges overcome along the way. You can only find that out in person. So, when you visit schools this autumn, what should you look for? Focus on the students more than the displays. Are they happy, engaged and
Exam results are an outcome, not the story . Ask who the school is built for
who emailed me wasn’t reminiscing about her grades – it was the inspirational teaching for which she was grateful. At St Mary’s, our school values are love, truth, justice, freedom and joy, all of which are a feature throughout a girl’s time with us, because when girls feel happy in school, they thrive. I hope you will come and see that for yourself. We have two open days this autumn: Preschool and Junior School on Saturday 26 September, 10am to midday, and Senior School and Sixth Form on Saturday 3 October, 9.30am to 12.30pm.
confident? We work hard on teaching girls to communicate well and listen carefully because, whatever shape their adult lives take, they deserve to be heard. Ask what happens beyond the classroom. Earlier this year, we took the whole school off-timetable for adventure days, and there are photographs of the staff and I tackling an aquatic assault course alongside the year 7 students. Schools reveal themselves in moments like these. The staff who join in are the staff who know your daughter best. And ask who the school is built for. St Mary’s is a school for girls, and everything we do here is intentionally designed to help them learn and grow, ready for the world in which they live. STEM subjects are our most popular at A-level, and 45% of our 2025 leavers headed off to STEM and medicine degrees. Nationally, girls at girls’ schools are more than twice as likely to take physics at A-level. While exam results are a big milestone, the lasting impact of a great education is immeasurable. Ten years on, the student
Register through our website at stmaryscambridge.co.uk or contact admissions to arrange a personal tour
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