To All

I have been offered a position with an IT company in Brunswick and have been looking ever since for primary schools that are exceptional (great education, sport, drama, individual attention for gifted students) either in the area or surrounds. I have had no issue finding great secondary schools, i.e. Melbourne High School, Melbourne grammar, etc. If anyone can tell me the Australian equivalent of Ofsted, or point me in the direction of any good schools I would appreciate it.
I have 2 boys, one needs to start school (age 5) and one needs to go into nursery (age 2).

Any help would be most appreciated.

Regards
Torien

Hello

First question would be (at least from me) is are you prepared to pay for private school? You mention Melbourne grammar, fantastic school, very, very focused on education and results. Why don't you send them there in primary school. They are just as focused in primary as secondary. Only thing is bit of a drive to Brunswick.

Have a look at this http://www.eduweb.vic.gov.au/schoolsonline/ might give you somewhere to at least start looking. Remember education (at least up to secondary) is totally state based so you will find no Australian (as a whole) equivalent of Ofsted.

If you want personal feed back on schools I can give you some (although this is obviously only an opinion from my years of school in Melbourne)
Good luck in your choices.
Abby

Thanks for your reply.

Any advice or recommendations would be gratefully received. We just need a starting point to start looking. We don't necessarily have to live in East Brunswick, but would prefer not to be too far away.

Cheers
Torien

Just another bit of information to confuse you:

http://www.det.vic.gov.au/edulibrary...inners-rpt.pdf

Many schools out here are excellent but until you've visited them and experienced them you won't know properly. We thought our first school was great but found it to be riddled with problems and issues and not great for the non-average kid.

Please don't tie yourself down to one school and location before you even get here. Your children are young enough to make a change or two while you choose the area you'll make your home and where you can settle most easily.

Thanks Flip .

The thing is we need to research this and at least cut it down to a shortlist so that we can think clearly about our options. Our eldest son starts school in January. He is pretty bright (well that's what his current school tell us) but quite high maintenance - we want to make sure we find an environment which suits him. We are thinking a smaller school will definitely be the ticket.

Just not sure how to find such a thing.

Hi
My personal knowledge is more of the eastern (rather than northern) suburbs, but if you are in the Kew / hawthorn / balwyn area there are some fantastic (mostly single sex) schools and this is easy reach to Brunswick (about 20 minutes in peak)
I still believe that if your kids are above average the private system is most likely to give them the focus that they need. That said many of them run into about AUD$10,000 a year in fees (boys schools tend to be more expensive for some reason).
In that area have a look at Trinity (Anglican), Xavier (Catholic) - both in Kew. Further down the road there is scotch college in Hawthorn.
You will probably find that government schools in the 'better' suburbs are better, so again probably worth looking at government schools in some of these areas, Kew, Hawthorn, eastern suburbs.
You can probably tell this is where I grew up, so I am a little eastern suburbs centric. Sorry for that distortion, but happy to help if I can.
Regards
Abby