Hills Road Sixth Form College

Still better than no one though I had to start from scratch

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Not great but not terrible I suppose know some guys pretty well from lessons and know one guy really well that I meet up at lunch with and play tennis twice a week.What about you?

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Mr Ian Lee. Yours?

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wondering how Hills is for applying to univerisites abroad??? looking at going to germany/switzerland maybe?

Im not too sure! They help with applying to the States, with SATs and all. Not sure about Germany.

Mr Ian Lee. Yours?

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Rereading this old thread, just joined the school and he's my tutor

Alright this is so weird because he's my tutor too! (trying to work out who you are now..... guess I'll cross-examine everyone at tutorial tomorrow!) And we 'met' on here months ago when I replied to your thread! So funny...

Whaaa no way! I only have EP tomorrow though? My tutorial is on Thursday so we might be in different groups

I'm a Yr11 going to school out by Addenbrookes, would you recommend Hills, I'm tied between Hills the UTC and Parkside IB. I knwo people that do the IB at Parkside but don't really know anyone at hills anymore.

What do you think?

Hey, sorry I only just saw this, barely ever check this account any more! (was just looking to see chumnies and my old reactions to each other.... turns out we are indeed in the same tutor group and we had a little irl "reunion"!).

Anyway, I'm a bit tired so maybe not this won't be a good response (do ask if you have any more questions), but yeah I think on the whole I would recommend it, obviously it isn't perfect but I've enjoyed it well enough.

PROS: In fact, I knew literally no one at all at Hills, being homeschooled and having just moved into the area. Nevertheless, I made pretty good friends in my classes fairly quickly and managed to get into someone's friendship group - granted we have all fallen out now but it is definitely possible! Although obviously people do know each other, they're still friendly on the whole and happy to meet new people so as long as you talk to tons of other people in the first few weeks you should be fine! I even got in a relationship pretty quickly which was totally unexpected haha.

The teachers are super enthusiastic (maybe a little too enthusiastic sometimes, one of my history ones loves to go off on tangents but he's great), and you get the sense they really are clued in and everything. Most of them don't hold grudges; my grumpiest teacher used to tell this girl off all the time but come progress review and she was really nice to the girl so there you go.

There's lots of societies and enrichment and stuff so plenty of opportunities to meet people who like the same stuff.

There is a lot of support though you will have to ask for it.

The sheer numbers might sound daunting, but it's a blessing in disguise - rumours don't travel easily at all, it's easy to 'get lost in the crowd' if you fall out with someone and there's also always lots of new friends to be made.

As long as you're doing something you enjoy, it's pretty fun. They do push you a fair bit but it's not all that bad unless you fall behind and then it can feel pretty relentless. They do have extra workshops and stuff if that happens so you can catch up though.

You get lots of free periods which are quite nice (although honestly, it's best you use them to work. Stops you from having to do homework at home).

No uniform, and you can leave and come in whenever you like (if you dont' have a class until 11.35 you don't have to be in til then) - quite a bit of freedom.

CONS: The EPQ seriously sucks. It's almost unbelievably stupid and bad, and 100% everyone's least favourite thing, and they make you spend an entire session on it each week. On the plus side, despite what they say no properly good university even looks at it so it isn't a huge deal if you don't do amazingly.

Because of the number of people, it can feel pretty intense. It also means your teachers won't necessarily notice you struggling, and you'll have to tell them if you don't want them to just assume you're slacking.

The food is super expensive and gross, it's way better value supermarket-eating.



So yeah, that's just about everything i can think of! If you have any more questions as I said, just ask haha.

Oh yeah, another con - it's stuffed with overachievers. People who did 12 gcses and stuff like that, have loads of hobbies that they're amazing at and that sort of thing. Again, they're quite nice but you have to kind of ignore their achievements if you want to stay sane lol

Only doing 7 GCSEs (and 2 equivalents) but I have a feeling I may fall into this category

Oh honey, just wait till you meet the parliamentary speakers and seven a-level takers.