Child deferred at school then told to skip a year

[user1485263432]

My son was given delayed entry to school in Scotland (due to a learning delay as he was premature) this has been great for him and he is managing ok ( with a personal tutor and lots of support from home). However we are now in England and have been told that when he moves to high school it is likely he will have to skip a whole year and go into the year with his actual age group. We are devastated, there is no way he will manage to cope. Has anyone experience of this or can help?

If you’re on Facebook, have a look at the group Flexible School Admissions for Summer Borns.

There’s a lot of people in that group and there’s a good chance one of them will be able to offer some helpful advice or have some useful experience.

I second the Facebook group, loads of helpful advice! Have you spoken to your local authority or the Head of the potential secondary school. They have to find it to be in your child's best interests to make them skip a year which unless your child is incredibly high achieving and is socially and emotionally mature, they won't be able to.

@user1485263432 when is his birthday? If it’s between April 1st and August 31st you have a much better chance of your son staying in the cohort he is currently in.

His birthday is October x

Thanks so much I’ll have a look

We were told by our SEND teacher (at primary school) the head of the high school never agrees, and from the SENDIASS lead it was very unlikely as it would affect there academic results - we are so worried!

How old is your dc now? Deferring has only recently become less unusual in the English system and your ds would be one of the oldest in his "correct" year group, so potentially almost 2 years older than the youngest in his current year. Presumably the primary school he transferred to accepted him out of year, does he have an ehcp?

He’s just turned 10, no ehcp (I’ve only just found out what one was)
He’s average in his class, there is no way he could cope in a year above

Yes the junior and middle schools are happy with him in the year below, but told when he goes to year 7 he will have to skip a year (which would be missing a while academic year, devastating for any child let alone for a child who is below average academically, very small for his age and with very little confidence)

An EHCP would help your case and allow you to effectively choose a secondary which can accommodate his needs. If this one is unsympathetic it may not be the best choice whatever the ultimate situation is for his year group. I would suspect the school would argue it can differentiate learning to support him within his peer group,

I would be on the case with this quickly OP since if he is going to have to skip a year it will be better for him if its year 6 and not year 7. Going from year 6 to year 8 would be very difficult for anyone. At least going from year 5 into year 7 he would be starting a new school at the same time as everyone else.

If he deferred for a year in Scotland, did he start in the August before his sixth birthday? Is he currently Y5 in England?

He is currently in year 4 (in England)

Then I personally would get him moved into year 5 and do the catch up now. It will be far better for him in the long run if he is going to have to move up

One of the reasons that secondary schools in particular, don’t like pupils out of year, is that GCSE results only count in the year that the pupil is 16. So he would be 17, nearly 18 when he took them and might do brilliantly, but they wouldn’t count for the school.

That won’t bother you though and there needs to be a way to resolve this before it gets to transition. It seems very unusual that a child who has been deferred a year doesn’t have an EHCP, so it would be a good idea to start planning for that if you can.

This tricky, I think you need an EHCP because it is most likely being an older one in the year group they won't agree to allowing him to start yr7 with his cohort and he will be required to go straight to yr7.
With an EHCP he may be able to attend a secondary school with an ARC (sometimes called ARP) so additional resources/some specialist teaching for those with a certain level of additional needs.

• straight to yr 8 I meant.

My DS has repeated a year (reception) and I would be really upset if he had to move back up. He does have an EHCP so would definitely suggest getting this application done ASAP.