Moving into rented accommodation in the catchment area-when can I safely move back?

MrsDeVere thank you so much, that's been really helpful. Is it OK if I PM you?

Surely the obvious solution would be to do what they do in Scotland and everyone go to their nearest school, but the transition would be a nightmare I'm sure.

To those pointing out that you can be an equal distance away from two schools, one good and one special measures, and yet only be in catchment for the SM one, this can be for a number of reasons. If there are more houses between you and the good school, more siblings or more children on the SEN register, then the catchment area will be smaller and you could be out of catchment even though its the same distance IYSWIM.

Oh, and renting out your home whilst renting a place within catchment is fine provided it is intended to be a long term situation. You may have difficulty persuading the LA that your intentions are honourable if the house you own is nearby but if you are renting out the family home in Carlisle whilst living in rented accommodation in Islington that shouldn't be a problem. What is wrong is renting near a school simply to get a place at the school with the intention of returning to your home once you think you've got away with it.

shattereddreams - That would not make the plan watertight.

The question the LA has to consider is whether or not the OP is applying from their permanent address. They don't have to prove she is making a fraudulent application. Reasonable suspicion is enough for them to take action. And, as others have pointed out, most LAs where this happens regularly are now wise to it, fed up with complaints from genuine residents and making efforts to detect it.

It's the moving back into the original home which is the giveaway, shattereddreams.

Have read most of the thread

What is the difference between a longer term rental plan (as OP suggests) whilst renting out the 'family' home AND trying to sell the family but not being able to in time and deciding to rent instead?

So it's legal to sell and buy within catchment? But it's not legal to rent and rent in catchment? To me there is no difference.

OP to watertight your plan, I suggest putting your house on the market at a ridiculous unachiveable price, reject any offers that come in. Then determine you have run out of time to move for your preferred school so go down the rental route.

Stay a couple of years.

"I don't understand why this is the one area of the law people in this country feel at liberty to break-"

People are more likely to break laws when they see them as unfair laws - look at the poll tax.

It still chills me.

Obviously we all want the very best for our DCs but mostly we draw a line at physically pushing other kids out of the way to get ours to the front of the queue.

Law or not, its ethically execrable.

MrsDeVere- it's complicated, originally SS were involved and I was hoping they would take DFD into foster care, but as she's so close to 16 (birthday next week, we were looking into this about 3 weeks ago after she'd been with me temporarily for a week) we were told she was too old for fostering and she was offered a flat in a halfway house type place. DFD didn't want to go in there and I didn't think it would offer her the support she needed, plus SS were reluctant to give her that in the first place because they disputed how 'homeless' she actually is. The end result was we declined the SS offer and went down the private fostering route. As I understand it we've turned down the help they offered plus she's 16 next week so will no longer qualify for help anyway :( Although I haven't heard of Child in Need status, just going to google that now. Thank you.

Back to the thread- Diamond, I couldn't agree with you more. I don't have any friends who have done this to my knowledge, but if I did I would seriously consider reporting them. I do feel that strongly about it. I don't understand why this is the one area of the law people in this country feel at liberty to break- it's illegal, just like stealing is illegal. Just because the system is unfair, that doesn't give you the right to cheat it and deprive someone else's child in the process.

If feel sympathy for the OP.
We all want the best for our DCs & it must be really hard to see an outstanding school that's in reach with a some unethical juggling.
I'm not sure I wouldn't do the same thing if I were in her situation.

One of my greatest friends (of 30 years) did this 2 years ago. She emailed her close friends to let us know how smart she was being.

I haven't spoken to her since and doubt I will.

Shame as one of her DSs is my godson.

Please accept that people, including those close to you, will really judge you for this.

If you are still paying council tax on your old property the council will be perfectly well aware of what you're doing
Do you seriously imagine you're the first person to come up with this ingenious ruse? It doesn't work.

Why not ring up your local authoritiy and ask them. They're the ones who know the rules.

Schmedz- the trouble is that my foster daughter is now in year 11, she's only been with me for about a month. When she was in year 6 she was still living with her parents in a house which had been in the catchment area for the local outstanding school for years, but the area reduced rapidly that year and she missed out by a couple of metres. She ended up at the crap school everyone tries to avoid instead- this is why I get so angry with people trying to cheat the system because I know this goes on in our area, so it's highly likely DD lost out on a place at the good school to these people given there were a couple of metres in it.

My foster daughters life has been completely upside down over the past year or so because she got involved with drugs at this school- the school she narrowly missed out on a place at has no where near the drug issue this one does. So I do have to wonder if her life would have turned out differently.

Even if she was year 5 and I was about to apply for a secondary place for her, she wouldn't get priority because she's in a private fostering agreement, private fostering does not get priority because she's not classed as vulnerable (that's a whole separate issue I could argue all day about). Plus I don't actually know what we're in catchment for here, because I don't have my own kids so it's never been an issue.

The point is, the system isn't fair for many reasons. But just because its not, that doesn't give parents permission to break the law and rob other children.

Yy tiggy- this happened to a friend of mine who rented a flat whilst waiting for her shared ownership flat to be finished- she had bought it off plan, but the company went bust, meaning that at the time she applied for her son's school place, she was unsure if and when it would ever be finished.

In the end, it was finished two months after school places were offered and she moved in. Another parent whose child hadn't got a place at the school her son had, reported her to the LEA who came in very heavy-handed threatening prosecution and investigated for months until finally dropping the case. It was a very distressing time for her.

I should add, the flat she moved into was ten minutes' walk from the school, but would have been too far away to get a place.

On the other side tiggy, if you put on your school forms the address of a house you owned but did not currently live in, which was both on the market and had another family living in it with a verifiable tenancy agreement, you would certainly be commiting fraud.

Schmedz, looked after children only get priority if they are in the care of the local authority (or were, and have been adopted or subject to an SGO)- private fostering arrangements mean that the child is not in the care of the local authority, so does not get priority.

Posted too quickly there!

The other 4 schools have noted bullying issues, thieving problems, drug taking is rife, nobody wants their DC's there.

I lucked into a social housing HA house on a private estate practically on the doorstep of one of the 'good' schools. I wouldn't leave this area until ALL of my DC's have got into Secondary - and as DS3 is just 2yo, that will be quite some time!!

Doing what the OP suggests is immoral, and leaves someone else's 4yo or 11yo having to travel way out of catchment for their local school, and not having local friends.

It's made worse in areas like mine that doesn't even HAVE enough school places for every DC...

Also, in some areas, thanks to families doing this, some DC's end up with NO school place, or one that is impossible to get to.

Simply because families with 3/4 DC's rent one of the 1-bed flats right next to the school, for the duration of applications.

So someone who isn't in the catchment for any other school, but is right on the outskirts of the catchment for the school where large families have rented an unfeasibly small flat end up with either no school place at all, or one that is the next closest 'as the crow flies' (how our LA determines admission distances), but is too far to walk AND is two buses away that with dodgy connections would require you to LEAVE the house at 6.45am to get there for 8.35.

It also means 4yo's or 11yo's waiting around for 30 minutes in the town centre for the next bus.

All because someone decided to try to 'play' the system and rent a tiny 1-bed flat for a large family near to the local school.

Thankfully, my LA has got a LOT stricter on this - those flats are now 'blacklisted', and ANY application from them is treated as potentially fraudulent, meaning that practice is almost disappearing.

The issue is that only two secondaries out of 7 in my town have even a 'good' rating from Ofsted. And the GCSE percentages at the other 5 are dire. They are genuinely 'bad' schools, in ALL senses of the word.

Multiple teachers in GCSE years, in and out of SM, name changes, HTchanges, SLT changes, yet still no real improvement, bar one of them.

So we are heading on the way to a 3/4 split if good schools and REALLY bad ones.

Marinagasolina..don't foster children or cared for children have priority places? In most schools SEN statemented children who name the school or cared for children DO get a priority of a place if you can prove it is the best school for them. Don't worry!

Renting in catchment area to try to gain a place when having no intention of remaining in the area is cheating the system and is rightly investigated carefully by LEAs. The very fact the OP 'dressed up' her question to the LEA indicates that even she on some level knows it is is morally reprehensible.