Hi,

My husband and I have 2 children aged 7 & 9, they currently attend a catholic school in the UK.

We are currently considering a move to Sydney, but we wanted to find out what the schooling is like compared to the UK if better/worse and if like the UK Faith schools are preferred than the mainstream schooling.

Can anyone give me a steer to what they think and if they know what the Catholic schooling is like.

Many thanks

Willow

A good percentage of kids go to private schools and there is a Catholic system which roughly parallels the government system - fees are around $3-4k per child pa. if you bring references of previous Catholic education you should have a better chance of getting an enrolment

Chances are they won't trust you so you'll need to have paperwork of your child's baptism. On top of that expect to hear that you have little chance of getting in unless you live very close to the school. Most of these places open their doors to local residents first and only then branch out.

I wasn't impressed with the two that I recently visited, and also found the level of indoctrination to be a bit vomit-inducing.

Private schools are seen as "better" by many locals and the Catholic schools are the cheaper of the "private"schools here. Some locals look down on the level of education offered at Catholic schools - IME. Aussies are not a particularly religious bunch per se - people I know send/sent their kids to (Anglican) private schools for the prestige and networking in later life - not for the religious instruction.

Catholic schools have to take a certain percentage of non-catholic children to receive their government funding. My kids have been to a couple of catholic schools and are not baptised, nor are either myself or my husband catholic.

I think the key to how good a school is depends on a number of factors, mainly the demographic of people within its catchment and those in charge of the management of the school. So if you live in a pretty good suburb, chances are the school will be okay whether it's state, private or catholic. There are some great catholic schools and some are dire. You have to check out each school and go with your gut in my experience.