No school?

Hi, I was in the same situation a couple of years ago; put in 6 schools thinking at least one school will offer my child a place and trusting local council to do the right thing, but no offers in all 6 choices and the council shoved my child into a school that was 8 miles away and notorious for social problems. I turned down the offer from that bad school, I was told that was the worst thing to do and putting my child at risk of having no school places.

The following October, my child was offered places in two of the schools who turned us down.

I can feel your pain at not knowing what to do and getting no help from the council or from the current primary school. I was so angry and sad, my child was OK because his mates were supporting him.

The end of my story was; I looked around the other neighboring boroughs and applied at their schools on waiting list and my child was offered a place in May by a mediocre school which was quite near to were we live. My child is now very happy at this school even though none of his mates from his primary school go there, bonding with the new found friends.

I did do appeals for all 6 schools who turned us down and I went to their panel meeting, all of them, also the council messed up my waiting list applications to the schools in the other boroughs.

In October, two of the schools that was on my CAF list wrote to offer my child a place since they have new vacancies and my child was on their waiting list; I turned them down because my child is happy where he currently at.

I really hope things will turn out better for you and your child, hang on in there and please don't give up, just do it and keep trying.

Clary is right.

By turning down the place you were offered, you have potentially made a bad situation worse. Appeal panels may take a dim view of your turning down the place, because they may interpret it as an attempt to pressurise or blackmail them.

Do you know why you did not get a place in any of the 6 schools you listed? Was at least one of them a school at which you thought you had a good chance of a place or were they all unrealistic choices (eg far further away than you were likely to qualify for on distance)?

Are there any other schools you would be willing to accept? If so, you should make a fresh application to them so that you can join their waiting lists. Otherwise, as you say, you face the possibility of a long time home-educating until you reach the top of the waiting lists for the schools you applied for. Some LEAs limit the number of waiting lists you can join, so you need to seek their adavice on that.

For any appeal, you need to identify reasons why that school is best placed to meet your child's needs, in terms of curriculum provision, extra-curricular activities, pastoral care etc etc. The fact that he hasn't got a school to go to isn't enough on its own to win an appeal.

Sorry to say this but it would have been better if you had not turned down the offered school. The LA has now done its duty in finding a school place for your son, and if you don't get a place on appeal you just won't have a place in September. That's my understanding anyway.

What was so bad about the school you turned down? Was your catchment school one of the ones you applied to?

That said, if there are six schools where you are appealing, you may get lucky. My understanding is that you should focus on why they would be suitable for your son, eg any special needs, any special focus of the school (your son is a maths whizz and the shool has a maths specialism with extra maths clubs etc - you get the idea) rather than why you don't want the offered school.

There are lots of other people on MN who know more about this than me and I am sure they will give you some more good advice.