Appeal for Year 7 place at faith secondary school after oversight

And honestly getting a role in year 5 a year 6 usually gets is quite meaningless really, the allocation of parts in a primary school is always mad.

Even more so if there are only 11 children per year - presumably almost anyone who is up for it gets a speaking part with those kind of numbers.

@Mumofteenandtween- I was an LEA governor at a school and was invited to join the pool of panel members and then the pool of panel chairs. My LEA has changed its procedures now, to make them more transparent; every year or so there’s a recruitment exercise, publicised on the LEA’s website.

now that the faith information has been supplied, has your waiting list place been
updated to reflect that and where are you on the WL if so?

I recognized you straight away.
You have been given lots of advice on previous threads.

Nothing is relevant here apart from the fact the evidence of faith wasn't submitted correctly. All the rest of it is just ChatGPT generated waffle that has nothing whatsoever to do with the admissions criteria.

Why haven't you applied to a RC school if you are RC? Isn't there one in your local area?
Also you have applied to and are appealing non-faith based schools too so it makes your argument look weak.

You paid an ‘admissions consultant’ for that? Seriously, just read the relevant admissions policy and explain how you meet the criteria. Presumably for the school which allocates places based on faith, it would mean apologising for your oversight in not ensuring your Priest completed the SIF properly and you failing to attach the certificates of Baptism and First Communion and perhaps a letter from the Priest detailing your Church attendance; for how long have you attended the Church and how frequently. You mention you are RC, but applying for a Church of England school? How far are you from your nearest RC secondary school?

Yeh @OutofIdeas86 no one is trolling you. Just bc they don’t think your appeal will succeed as it stands.

You have been told all of this before but details of your son’s ability and school attitude, lovely as I am sure he is, have nothing to do with the appeal. Schools cannot accept appeals from well-behaved DC and not from rowdy ones. Imagine if they did. Also the logistics of your and DH’s commitments are irrelevant.

I agree btw that the points are contradictory – if your DS really needs to attend the school his primary peers will go to, that doesn;t fit with him being so sociable and confident really.

I am puzzled as to why your error in application is a ground for appeal? Your appeals consultant seems to be a bit rubbish tbh. I think it’s a good line for a WL place tho.

What do you mean by saying the Eng lit offer at the offered school is not as good? In what way? Similarly I would think you need to spell out how the drama offer is better. You have waaaaaay too much info on some irrelevant points and not enough on those points that might help.

ETA: I see you reference the PA Btec at the faith school and that the allocated school offers drama GCSE. You do know tho that drama GCSE has a strong element of performance included? What about the PA Btec is specifically suitable for your ds?

Also I am interested in the Eng lit angle!

Being a “good kid” carries no weight

Also OP some of your points contradict each other. I’d expect an argument for attending the same school as friends is the child is socially non confident. Usually backed up by expert opinion on SEN or mental health impact e.g child has autism and struggles socially. Child demonstrates difficulties with friendships and required high level of support from TA at break times. Child previously has EBSA due to friendship issues. Something like that.

Sounds like your child is socially confident and while it’s nice to transition to secondary school with friends it’s not required, and your child would not benefit from this more than any other child.

You also mention the importance of continuity spiritually, between home, church, and school. But the school is a different denomination than your child. How does that aide continuity and why is it important for your child?

He clearly spends a lot of time at football outside of school. How does this fit in with transport e.g what time is academy training and where is it? And generally at secondary schools involvement with the school play for example will involve after school rehearsals and workshops. How will that work with academy training?

Besides being a generally weak case I think there are a lot of holes.

It's an appeal, not a report. And it is repetitive e.g. re parental commitments. It also comes across as robotic/AI generated.

I would write something that sounds a bit more genuine. Your best points are the admin error, and that this is a good kid who would be an asset to the school.

I wouldn't lead with the point about a parent working full time often at a distance from home (so what? Most secondary age kids get themselves to school unsupervised sometimes involving multiple trains or buses)

When I did appeals it was only really considered if the journey was blatantly unreasonable and the bar was quite high. The only one that was allowed on that basis was where the allocated school was a 45 minute drive away but public transport connections would mean it took 3 hours each way. Blatantly nuts.

I think your appeal is too long and some parts irrelevant, you need to reduce it down keep it concise and to the point that you are making. Remember the panels will have many to read. Also find out your position on the waiting list with the faith evidence you may find that you get a place before the appeal

And has your position changed accordingly? Seems waiting for an appeal may mean you potentially miss out on a wl place should it start to move.

Was this school a high preference on your CAF? If not and you placed non faith schools ahead, that might weaken any argument about the need for a faith school place.

Aren’t they being phased out and replaced with another qualification? If so this may make your argument carry less weight, generally GCSE subjects are always subject to change but especially a qualification that may no longer exist by the time your child reaches that stage.

If it’s that important to your child then perhaps GCSE drama at school and an extra curricular theatre groups for the other elements may be more suitable.

Not that you’ve given any reasons that this is important, you’ve just stated he’s good at it.

You simply do the faith angle for this school. If you meet it’s top criteria - Christian faith then - unless there is someone with better/stronger faith-based criteria and living extremely close to this school - you will be placed near the top of the list as it was an administrative error. A strong letter from parish priest will probably weigh more heavily than any academic interests.

I chair admissions panels for LAs and a diocese. @Mumofteenandtween look on your LA website around admissions for volunteers for panels. It’s a panel of 3 and must be made up of a minimum of 1 education member and 1 lay (non-education) member.
As part of the papers you’ll receive @OutofIdeas86 there’ll be an admissions policy in there (also available on the school website). The onus is on you to ensure all documents required are there. Unfortunately, if you’re going through the main round of appeals, there could be 30+ appeals over a 2-3 days so the bar is high.
Appeals are not won because of inconvenience to the family e.g. transport, working hours or childcare issues - particularly for secondary age. Nor, do we necessarily take account of how academic a child is - that would not be fair on a child with SEN for example. Is the primary school a feeder school? Was it a faith based school? If not why was it not important at 5?
I imagine they’re at/near the top of the waiting list if they have all the documents now. There’s often movement so they may get a place before the appeal date if you’re lucky.

Sorry OP but I can't see anything in there that makes any sort of case for appeal.

Bit confused why you've gone on about how bright the child is when this has no bearing at all on the appeal.

Tbh even the drama angle I think is weak - just because a child seems good at drama, they aren't showing any special interest in it or they'd have prioritised it above the academy football as an extracurricular hobby.

And honestly getting a role in year 5 a year 6 usually gets is quite meaningless really, the allocation of parts in a primary school is always mad. Some really talented kids get overlooked at primary schools because primary teachers aren't all drama /performing arts specialists and sometimes they pick a kid for the main role because they are reliable and well behaved, not due to some amazing talent!

OP, you’ve been told frequently that most of your points are not grounds for appeal, particularly the logistics of travel and your family circumstances. Secondary children are intended to travel back and forth independently. The child can travel to school; just less conveniently from your point of view.

It doesn’t matter how motivated your child is. All schools have children who are motivated.

You omitted the relevant faith based information at the time of applying and that was your responsibility to check. It isn’t grounds for appeal.

Most children will play football and have drama lessons in school. If he plays for an academy, that’s in addition to what is offered in schools and not a specific reason for a particular school.

If you’re doing three appeals, presumably that for three different schools, which weakens your case for needing a specific place.

Apologies OP I missed that. Does the allocated school offer GCSE drama?

Have you subsequently sent the faith evidence to LA or whoever is holding the waiting list, to ensure it is taken into account for the wl position if dc now meets the faith criteria?

I felt embarrassed reading this.
Do you honestly believe that this information matters at all? Do you think the appeal is based on stories of brightness and character? You have included a lot of irrelevant information.
They do not provide places based on character, IQ, or teacher references—are you joking? I would feel embarrassed to submit this. This is not an independent school interview where you provide references. Friendship groups are irrelevant, and the same goes for where the parent works—in secondary school, kids are supposed to be mature enough to take a bus. What does the workplace have to do with it if she is not disabled? They don't analyze bus maps in allocation. It is about the specific catchment and other criteria, like faith and proof of it.
Imagine if that were the case in every instance. It would create a total mess in admissions.
You really have to understand how the admissions process works and what appeals are. You can succeed if you prove that the school can accept one more student because they extended the school building or because last year they managed this many kids, etc.
Or, there must be some very unusual and unique circumstances meaning the child can attend only this school.
What you have provided is mostly irrelevant. Holy communion certificate is not something they ask for.

If you forgot to attach the baptism and Certificate of Catholic Practice then they check when it was obtained- date. If after the right time they will not take it into consideration. If ok they will put you on the top of waiting list and you will get in.

@PanelChair totally off topic but how did you get involved in Panels? Online it seems to reckon that at least one member should not be involved in education? (I am not.) I am a compulsive volunteer who is looking for a new challenge who finds the idea of weighing up the detriment to the school vs detriment to the child really interesting.