I wonder which one will turn out to be the evil twin?

They don't have school buses in England?

Bedstead Polisher: They don't have school buses in England?

Nope. Most people live within walking distance to school.

/they don't have a car-centered infrastructure.

Strong work.

CruiserTwelve: Why not send each of them to school on alternate days? If they're twins, who's gonna know the difference?

Sounds like a plan.

Why coundn't she just send them both to the "other" school rather than her school of choice. It sounds like she is complaining that she can not take up two slots in the good school.

If all the schools are full, what happens to the superfluous neighborhood children? Medical experiments?

TWO MILES?That's like, 1 billion feet, or rods, right?

egomann: Why coundn't she just send them both to the "other" school rather than her school of choice. It sounds like she is complaining that she can not take up two slots in the good school.

FTFA: "No other schools nearby have places for both of them

It sounds like each school had one open spot.

Get a bike, get a child seat for the bike. Average bicycle speed: 15 km/hour if you take your time. 2 miles apart, so at worst you'll have to travel 4 miles (Home to school 1, back to home and on to school 2 and back to home, assuming the house is on a route from school A to school B). 4 miles is roughly 6.4 km, 60/(15/6.4) = 25 minutes. if you have time to homeschool one of them, you have time to spend 25 to 40 minutes getting them to school.

/Second hand bikes aren't that expensive.

rubi_con_man: Bedstead Polisher: They don't have school buses in England?

Nope. Most people live within walking distance to school.

/they don't have a car-centered infrastructure.

Okay, makes sense. Perhaps she could send one son to school with a neighbour and then take the other to the school 2 miles away? She has to have some way to get there, her whole life can't be within walking distance, can it?

rubi_con_man: Bedstead Polisher: They don't have school buses in England?

Nope. Most people live within walking distance to school.

/they don't have a car-centered infrastructure.

2 miles is walking distance.

namegoeshere: egomann: Why coundn't she just send them both to the "other" school rather than her school of choice. It sounds like she is complaining that she can not take up two slots in the good school.

FTFA: "No other schools nearby have places for both of them

It sounds like each school had one open spot.

Yeah, both schools had a spot for one kid, but no schools had a spot for two kids.

What to do, what to do.

fracas: I wonder which one will turn out to be the evil twin?

Dow Jones and the Temple of Doom: DerAppie: Get a bike, get a child seat for the bike. Average bicycle speed: 15 km/hour if you take your time. 2 miles apart, so at worst you'll have to travel 4 miles (Home to school 1, back to home and on to school 2 and back to home, assuming the house is on a route from school A to school B). 4 miles is roughly 6.4 km, 60/(15/6.4) = 25 minutes. if you have time to homeschool one of them, you have time to spend 25 to 40 minutes getting them to school.

/Second hand bikes aren't that expensive.

In jolly old England, bikes are known as "merryjiggers" and child seats are known as "tootsiestools." FYI

I read that in Ferb's dad's voice.

Dow Jones and the Temple of Doom: special20: You just know the one on the left is the gay one.

In the UK, gay men are referred to as "knobgoblins" and lesbians are called "snuffamuffalouses".

I did not read that in Ferb's dad's voice.

What about public bus?

namegoeshere: If all the schools are full, what happens to the superfluous neighborhood children? Medical experiments?

Silly, of course not! Have you not read Oliver Twist? That stuff still goes on over there, guvnuh!

Can some British Farkers shed light on this? Here in the US, students in the same neighborhood go to the same school unless their parents send them to private schools. If she's home schooling the second, that suggests there are no public schools around... why is the British school system different?

rubi_con_man: Bedstead Polisher: They don't have school buses in England?

Nope. Most people live within walking distance to school.

/they don't have a car-centered infrastructure.

Except for the inconvenient fact that they do have car-centered infrastructure.



In most of Europe, well over 70% of travel is by car. The average is only 5% less than the US. The simple fact is that cars and the freeway/paved road made passenger trains obsolete as both are cheaper and more versatile than trains. Subsidizing the buggy whip industry with gas taxes collected from car users isn't going to change that.

Curious: this is a private or public school? the google is failing me.

I can help confuse you if you like?

In the UK, posh schools that you have to pay for are called Public Schools. Public Schools are private schools. If you go to Public School or Private School you have to pay for it - they are the same thing.

Free (i.e. you don't have to pay) schools are State Schools.

You are guaranteed a place in a state school, but not necessarily the state school you want your child to go to. They are not allowed to "select" their intake, it's generally done via proximity unless they are a "grammar school", in which case I believe their are academic tests which need to be passed.

Generally speaking, there is so much demand for good private schools that you need to pass academic tests to be admitted.

/is aware that I have played fast and loose with capitalisation but can't be bothered to fix it.

fracas: I wonder which one will turn out to be the evil twin?


funny, i watched this last night

DerAppie: Get a bike, get a child seat for the bike. Average bicycle speed: 15 km/hour if you take your time. 2 miles apart, so at worst you'll have to travel 4 miles (Home to school 1, back to home and on to school 2 and back to home, assuming the house is on a route from school A to school B). 4 miles is roughly 6.4 km, 60/(15/6.4) = 25 minutes. if you have time to homeschool one of them, you have time to spend 25 to 40 minutes getting them to school.

/Second hand bikes aren't that expensive.

Are you drunk or just a terrible human being?

Studies have shown that people cannot talk on a phone and drive a car at the same time. Do you actually expect a person to be able to pedal and balance at the same time?

Bicycles are deathtraps, and while we can ignore the tragedy of the average adult cyclist falling into the meat grinder that is the ground, think of the child.

Imagine if schools in the US tried to follow the 30 students or less limit they seem to have going on in TFA.

And just so we can be clear here...

1 - one place became available and she CHOSE to send one of her children, thus creating her problem. If she was that worried, she could have home-schooled both until two places became available somewhere.

2 - "The only place available to Ben was at another school nearly two miles away."

Yes, that's probably too much for a child of that age but SERIOUSLY? Two miles = impossible to sort something out? Is it really easier to home school one of your children than work out some way of transporting them to and from the school? My primary school was over a mile from our house, and we always walked there and back. This is not a particularly unusual situation....I know we don't have school buses but a regular taxi wouldn't cost that much, especially if it enabled you to work more hours (assuming longer hours are available).

My suspicion is (and it's just a suspicion) that this woman is kicking up an almighty media fuss with the intention of forcing the local education authority to back down and magically find another place so that both children can go to the same school.

My only sympathy comes from the fact that the article claims that ""No other schools nearby have places for both of them" - if this is true (and I doubt that it is) then she has a point. But I really can't believe that the authorities are claiming that no school nearby can take both of them.

Two miles?
Sheesh, when I went to school I walked 10 miles uphill both ways.

And I liked it !!

Fissile: Hearing something like that makes me so glad we had a revolution back in 1776.

notsureifserious.jpg

Crosshair: rubi_con_man: Bedstead Polisher: They don't have school buses in England?

Nope. Most people live within walking distance to school.

/they don't have a car-centered infrastructure.

Except for the inconvenient fact that they do have car-centered infrastructure.

[www.nomisweb.co.uk image 552x339]

In most of Europe, well over 70% of travel is by car. The average is only 5% less than the US. The simple fact is that cars and the freeway/paved road made passenger trains obsolete as both are cheaper and more versatile than trains. Subsidizing the buggy whip industry with gas taxes collected from car users isn't going to change that.

[webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk image 541x307]

No you moran, they drive cars in non-car-infrastructure. There is a difference. The difference in city planning is apparent when it comes to kids, who do not drive, going to school.

Couldn't she just sew the kids together, claim they came out like that and send them to share a desk at the good school?

Crosshair: Except for the inconvenient fact that they do have car-centered infrastructure.

Well that's hugely fascinating but why would you link to stats about people travelling to WORK when the discussion is about travelling to school?

Schools = placed in residential areas and intake determined by proximity,
Work = placed in economically sensible locations with people choosing how far they wish to commute based on the perceived value of their employment.

According to this website, in 2009 in the UK 50% of journeys to school for children aged 5 - 10 were made on foot, which is hugely different from what is implied by your graph.

Also, the average length of the trip to school for children aged five to ten increased from 1.3 to 1.5 miles between 1995/1997 and 2009.

So in other words, the school "just under two miles away" in the article would be about average or just over average in the UK.

I'm not completely without sympathy, it sucks that the twins can't go to the same school nearby but that's just tough. In my town the schools are so oversubscribed that we'll be lucky to get our daughter in the school 100 yards away, so how why should the rules be changed for twins?

She made the decision to send one twin to the school - the local authorities aren't insisting they are split up.

CruiserTwelve: Why not send each of them to school on alternate days? If they're twins, who's gonna know the difference?

I clicked on the link, with this idea, thinking I was immensely clever. You, sir or madam, pipped me to the post! Congratulations.

ronnie spleen: Couldn't she just sew the kids together, claim they came out like that and send them to share a desk at the good school?

Works for us.

Done in one. If she has time to homeschool one of them, just alternate who goes, and supplement for what each one missed.

Why not send some other kid to the other school? 2 vacancies at the one, and 0 at the other.

Gyrfalcon: Whatever else might be at issue here, nothing irks me more than when officials of any stripe say this:

"However, legally, we have to abide by infant-class-size legislation."

It is ALWAYS official-speak for "we don't want to have to think of any way to make this work, because it's so much easier to blame it on the rules and force the mother to do all the compromising."

"That's policy," is the last refuge of the lazy or cowardly bureaucrat.

Maybe if the kids would learn to comb their hair properly they would have more luck.

/get off my lawn