MEET THE PARENTS

Watch our brand new video of pupils from local secondaries talking about their involvement at our events.

Meet the Parents gives primary school parents the chance to meet parents and pupils from the local secondary schools, and get frank, first-hand information on their experience there.

“Meet the Parents is a brilliant initiative, which should help applicants to state secondary schools feel more confident about what they would be experiencing as students in those schools. As part of a comprehensive-educated dynasty, I hope it becomes part of the fabric of the education system.”
Robert Peston,  Political Editor, ITV News and founder of Speakers for Schools (www.speakers4schools.org)

Labour Leader Jeremy Corbyn lent his support to the scheme back in 2013 at the primary school where it started – Yerbury school in his own Islington North constituency.

“Meet the Parents is a fantastic idea. Education is about growing up with children from different communities. And that is the huge role of comprehensive education in creating real social cohesion.”

The idea is simple: to fill an information gap between the increasingly slick secondary school open days on the one hand and the rumour mill on the other. The project is growing steadily through the Meet the Parents social enterprise. This year is our fourth year running events in Camden’s primaries.

As our communities become more fragmented, it is harder for some primary school families to get to know children at the local secondaries. So parents find themselves relying on gossip and age-old reputations instead of getting “the story” on what’s happening in their local school. In today’s educational landscape schools can change – and improve – extremely quickly. Parents’ views can often lag behind: Meet the Parents is there to ensure they catch up.

Prospective secondary school parents get the chance to ask the sort of questions they can’t ask on a school visit or open evening. They go to their children’s primary school one evening, and informally put questions to a panel of parents and pupils who have committed to the local schools. Afterwards, they might have the chance to chat more privately to secondary school families during a “mingle” in the school hall over light refreshments.

The events are organised not by the secondary schools but by Meet the Parents staff. This way there are no vested interests from the secondary schools: they realise that families are talking frankly and what they say is unedited. The aim is to give primary school parents information they can trust in a down-to-earth setting.