Moving from an English to a Scottish secondary school age 15

We plan to move as a family to Scotland (sell our home in England and buy in Scotland) as soon as my daughter has done her gcses in England next spring/summer 2020.
We then hope she can do three years in a Scottish school ie repeat her 5th year of secondary school doing some Scottish gcse equivalencies and then two years of highers as she will only turn 19 on the 25 June so she will still be 18 when she takes her highers.
Then we will have lived in Scotland for 3 years so she should be eligible for free tuition at a Scottish university and if she could find a suitable place she could start uni that autumn straight after highers alongside classmates.
Is there anyone relaxing this who has done similar or are there any Scottish secondary school teachers reading this who can confirm whether this would be possible?

Ps my husband, myself and daughter were all born in England and the only connection to Scotland is my husband’s half brother who lives in Glasgow.

Reply 1

Maia_

I moved from year ten into S4 and think it’s definitely worth sitting GCSEs as well as sitting the Scottish equivalent (national 5s). A lot of the content for subjects is learned in previous years and the formulas for answering questions is completely different so it’s worth having a year to get used to them. National 5s are harder than GCSEs but Highers are easier than A levels. In Scotland they have an extra year in primary so English year Eight is their first year in secondary which means that the fifth year of Scottish secondary isn’t the same as the fifth year of English school. I’m pretty sure it would be possible, just explain that you wouldn’t be comfortable with your child doing highers without sitting the national 5s first and I’m sure it’d be fine.

(edited 5 years ago)

Reply 2

Tld37

Thanks that’s really helpful

Original post by Tld37

Reply 3

Naz ghanch

Hi, We are thinking of moving to Edinburgh next year after my daughter finishes her gcses.My question is how old are they in Scotland when they do national 5? Would it be better to do Nat 5 before doing highers?

Reply 4

gwynmor1234

National 5s (4th year) are age 15-16, highers are age 16-17 (5th year) and in 6th year (17-18) you usually do advanced highers to get into university and highers. If you plan to go to a university in scotland the degrees are 4 years instead of 3 like in england and wales. However in 6th year you can do advanced highers which are basically 1st year of university which allow you to skip straight to 2nd year.

Its definitely worth doing national 5s before highers because there is quite a large gap between gcse and higher and it would be hard to cope with the workload.

Reply 5

Maia_

People are usually 15-16 in s4 (when most sit nat 5’s) but you can sit Nat 5’s up until the last year of school (s6) and it’s not uncommon to do so (many retake maths) but these are usually being retaken. It’s definitely worth doing Nat 5’s before highers as so much of the content is taught in Nat 5, and higher just builds on these topics.
It’s still mildly inconvenient to move to a Scottish school in s4/s5 because some content is taught s1-3, so you will have to catch up on that, but it’s not difficult and it’s easy to find what you need to catch up on but it’s just a case of doing it

Reply 6

1582

Volunteer Team

Original post by Naz ghanch

I found in moving from England to Scotland in secondary school that the Scottish system is typically behind Englands - this is probably due to English secondary schools starting from Yr 7 whereas Scottish schools start at S1 (which is equivalent to Yr 8). Whereas when I moved in the other direction (Scotland to England) I was lagging behind in the English curriculum despite being in the top sets in Scotland.

GCSE is the equivalent of National 5. Your daughter would essentially be going backwards in her education to do Nat 5s at this stage. Scottish Highers are equivalent to the first year of A Levels, so that would be the next logical step.

Reply 7

gwynmor1234

Gcse isnt equivalent to National 5s. You only do 6 national 5s compared to however many gcse you do in england. National 5 is more in-between gcse and a-level but is definitely more complex compared to gsce.

Original post by sinfonietta

Reply 8

sa18beckp

Original post by Tld37

hi there i was born in england and moved up to scotland 4 years ago today. i am in 4th year but i am thinking of going to college this year and moving up was hard it must of been hard for you to but you all did it and i am glad that i moved up to scotland as england was not the place for me

i hope your daughter gets into uni
and keep smilling because you deserve it we all do