This paper explores issues of choice and opportunity in Jersey schools. Within a 'closed' island context, it gives voice to concerns that families have about the schools their children can attend, the subjects they can study, the extra-curricular activities they can pursue and the wider opportunities they perceive they have (or do not have) as a result of their education. Data collection was undertaken across both state and private sectors, primary and secondary schools, and included questionnaires, focus groups and interviews with school governors, headteachers, business leaders, teachers, pupils and parents. The authors' findings, which have application to insular communities around the world, reveal restricted outcomes associated with the reputational stigma of some schools, the limitations in how subject choices are actualised in schools and unequal academic attainment across the system, especially for the children of immigrant workers.