Is there any way to call for a school to change its admissions policy?

I wonder whether you might perhaps approach from the angle of maybe having a priority admissions area for siblings, or maybe one about priority for siblings if families remain in the same address as when first sibling was admitted?

This was introduced some years ago quite locally, because families tended to do a short-term move to get the eldest child in, then move miles away into cheaper accommodation, with siblings being bussed in for miles and miles while people a few hundred metres from the schools in question couldn't get places.

Parents evenings and other events not so much because there is usually a different day for different year groups anyway.

School A where your year 7 child is decides to ave year 7 parents' evening on the 10th of X.

School B where your year 9 is picks the same date for its year 9 parents' evening.

I tend to agree with you. I think the benefits of sibling priority at secondary level are hugely overstated and can have some perverse, probably unintended consequrences, but it's compatible with the admissions code to give priority to siblings. So, if you want to start a campaign to get the oversubscription criteria changed, you'll have to find some convincing arguments to present to the governors and/or LEA (depending on which is the admissions authority).

If you do not have a catchment, you cannot ban children out of catchment. If you have two children very close in age, moving for three years, say, is not a huge hardship. Then they move away. I do think catchment is important and should come before lottery.

Have 2 schools in my area like this and yes it is a tiny percentage who actually get a place under the lottery criteria.

There are other criteria that can come before the lottery. Chorister (if its a religious school), specialism like music, staff/employees of the school, medical/social need (not so secret way for professionals to use a few letters from their chums to get priority), ... Some schools seems to get the lottery places down to just a few children.

My DC school got rid of the siblings criteria for children out of catchment. That stopped those wealthy mobile types moving in for a year just to bag the school for all their children.

60% of DSs year group at school had elder siblings - I can believe it happening.

In a big city having kids at different schools can work
in rural areas - catchments many miles across - its a nightmare

There is a problem with this admission policy in that the first child of a family living right next door to the school may not get in if they do not win the ballot. Lots of parents would not be happy to find ballot winners living 15 miles away getting in over them if they lived very close to the school and it could be considered their local school. A catchment area would help with this. The Governors could consider this amendment.

Should read "I don't think the main difficulty is necessarily the sibling places...."

If it is the school within my LEA then there are also places allocated in other categories as well e.g. specialist places. Most of the dcs I know who go there seem to have been offered places under this category.
I don't think the difficulty is the sibling places necessary but
a) this school has a smaller number of places available for Y7s than most other secondary schools locally. Schools with small PANs do seem to be affected more by the sibling link than other schools.
b) they take applications from a large area (including from the LEAs just outside our city).
I think that there should really be a distance limit for category b applications and perhaps this is what the OP should campaign for.
However as OPs ds is still relatively young, there are no guarantees that the application system for the school won't change anyway.

But if it's a lottery for the rest of the places - then surely without the sibling rule it would be very difficult to get both your children into the same school (even if you lived across the road)...

I'd check other years results as well to see if this is an anomaly - but overall it doesn't actually sound unfair to me.

I presume that children from the attached primary are not going to have first dibs on secondary admission, or there really would be an outcry.

I don't know what school it is but a lot of schools do have direct feeder schools and they are usually pretty high up the admissions criteria. There is one near my parent's that has a direct feeder school.

If proposed locally I would certainly oppose breaking the sibling link for all of the reasons talked about up the thread.

I don't see how it is unfair for parents with only 1 child. You still have the issues of getting the pfb in whether eldest or only.

Its interesting that siblings take up so many places. At the school my eldest DD has just been allocated siblings places counted for less than 20% of the total allocation and its an outstanding school. I think so high a % is very unusual.

I have two children (currently at primary) and I agree with you OP, sibling rules for primary are fine but not necessary at secondary. My 2 siblings and I all went to different secondary schools (due to living in an area with grammar schools and many single sex schools) and it wasn't a problem, not that my parents had any choice in the matter. Secondary school aged children mostly take themselves to school. For the summer holiday it would be mostly the same, fair enough there might be the odd week here and there at Easter / half terms which don't match which is a bit of pain, but all in all I think the system is unfair for non-siblings.

Was there a massive party one year when all the parents got drunk and had sex when they got home? Hence the enormous sibling numbers for that year?

If it's the school I think it is, the sibling priority works in both directions. I know families who have got places for the younger/youngest sibling, which then puts the older sibling at the top of the waiting list for any vacant places coming up in other years. Do teachers' children still get priority too?

To be honest, that school is so popular that whatever admissions system they have, some people are going to be unhappy/disadvantaged. I presume that children from the attached primary are not going to have first dibs on secondary admission, or there really would be an outcry.

I'd say there's no harm in trying, but given that sibling priority is pretty standard at secondary level, I wouldn't rate your chances.

I think sibling within a certain distance is fair. Having had 3 dc at different schools for a couple of years (infant/junior/secondary) even though lots of children every year do the same route of schools, you end up with clashes and difficulties. It's not just getting them there/picking up-for example I ended up with a clash this week where I had one coming back from a school trip late at the same time as my oldest finished a GCSE revision class-no buses at that time (and my other dc was finishing a physio appointment shortly before, 10 minutes away from either school, which are also about 15 minutes away from each other.) If they were the same school, then I could have done it myself, as it was not a chance.

I still find it amazing 73% of children are sibling or above unless you have particularly large numbers of large families. I know dd2's year is regarded as sibling heavy and they were only just over 50%-although the year above me at primary was entirely 2nd children (although severely undersubscribed by today's standard) so you do get blip years.

Having gone and looked at statistics for one particular county, not one school had siblings + looked after etc as more than 50%, most were down at around 30%, so if 73% is true for your school then I'd assume it was a blip year, and you'll be down to normal levels next year.

Also I think to be fair, if you had two kids you're view may be very different, in that you also may want sibling priority and to get your kids to the same school. I know i would.

So I think it depends on your perspective,,one kid, limited places you think it's unfair, two kids, and you think it's totally fair as you don't want to be forced to two different schools.

I do think it's less fair if there's no catchment area. However you are right, if only 27% of the intake are eldest/only and say a third of those are only children, there will be fewer sibling entries in a couple of years time. It might be worth looking back a few years to see if there's any sort of cyclical pattern.

does your child have a younger sibling?

No, only one year per parents evening. But they wouldn't schedule two parents evenings for the same night, or a parents evening on the same night as a concert, whereas two separate schools could mean a concert at one on the same evening as a meeting at the other. Mine are at separate schools at the moment (yr6 and 8) , in different LAs due to SENs and will be separate for the duration now, I have had clash after clash of events, differing half terms, differing holidays, it is a PITA.

My neighbour has 3 secondary aged children at 3 different schools. They manage fine.

"no clashes of parents meetings, sports days etc"

What, so your secondary does parents evenings for different years on the same night?

I agree. Siblings priority is unnecessary and indeed even damaging at secondary school ... it might be nice, and convenient, for some families but it is MASSIVELY unfair for everyone else. The sibling priority makes a mockery of the catchment area at my local secondary and is downright ridiculous at the school which admits by lottery ffs.