How do I decide which Secondary School to send my child to?

When my son was approaching school-starting age, everything inside me wanted to run in the opposite direction. Full disclosure: I’m a former primary school teacher who was unhappy with the direction education policy was headed in when I left the classroom to have my son, I also inherently dislike regimented routine and had thoroughly enjoyed the time-freedom those early years at home with my son had given us. We thought seriously about home educating our children instead, but went along to look around the local primary school with a very long mental check-list of ‘things I am going to have to see here if I’m even going to think twice about him going to school.’ I