Parents who only put one school choice down

[womblesofwestminster]

AIBU to wonder why some parents only put one school choice down when they fill in their primary school application for their child? I've heard several parents claiming to do this. Why put all your eggs in one basket?

Are they that confident their child will get it? Why risk it?

I did it for DD's junior application.
I put down our catchment school - she was 99.99% likely to get in (school routinely takes 25% of intake from out of catchment, so as a catchment child with sibling she was as near a dead cert as possible) plus we had no realistic options for any other choice - all our other local schools were heavily oversubscribed and couldn't take even their catchment children, so would have been a wasted choice. I could have done lots of research and worked out which of the miles away schools she might get into was best - I chose not to waste my time.

Am I the only person who didn't have an option to put more than one choice on the form?

We were given the option of (A) catchment school or (B) designated bilingual school for the county (ie Welsh medium).

That was it!

The system takes preference into account only when your DC qualifies for more than one school. In those circumstances, you get an offer from the school you lasted higher up the form.

A school is not told which preference it is on the form. Every applicant is ranked on how well they fit the admissions criteria, then LEA uses that info to turn it into single offers.

it's not that risky - with Primary the head told me to appeal if we didn't get a place and he would accept her

with secondary none of the schools are massively over subscribed - the only people who don't places are those out of catchment and she already attends for Maths and English so again they know her and want her there

Come to that we didn't even get to fill in a form when dd started primary - she was in the playgroup and we got instructed to send her along for a taster just before she got to school age, then a letter telling us when she should start . . .

Softly - That's a weird list. You have siblings out of catchment in it but not siblings in catchment. So if you are out of catchment being a sibling counts but if you are in catchment it doesn't count for anything? I think that's pretty unusual.

It varies all across England, but many areas don't have official catchment at all. So our area is:

• Looked after children, children with SEN whose statement names the school, etc;

• Siblings of children who will be at the school when the child being applied for would start;

• Anyone else on distance.

That's a really common, non-church school, list for England, though by no means the only one.

To those who think putting 1 option is risky if you don't have a "plan B" (home ed or private) - what do you do if you have no realistic chance of getting into any other school? I could have listed lots of schools DD didn't have the faintest chance of getting into, but not sure how that was any better than just putting down the 1 she was likely to get into?

I only put one choice. We live in rural devon , the year group is undersubscribed and the form said not to put schools down that you weren't considering. Our nearest other schools are both 7 miles away and I am not prepared to drive that every day.

redsky - If there is no realistic chance of getting in I suppose you lose nothing by leaving the form empty (although no realistic chance is not no chance, you could have a fluke year).

What often happens though is that people without a back up plan put down one school because they don't like the other local schools. Not realising that, if they don't get into their preferred school then they will get an undersubscribed school (i.e. probably just as bad, if not a whole lot worse than the local schools they have rejected) which could be miles away. Better at a bad local school whilst waiting on a waiting list/considering other options than at a bad school which is also five miles away....

penguins had to go get the school file --dig through the paperwork mountain underneath the "to be sorted box"- out now and check -

I was wrong it's:

Looked after and medical grounds children
Pupils in catchment with siblings
Catchment children
Outside catchment on medical grounds
Outside catchment siblings
Everyone else

Panicking now! Though definitely not on distance from gates so how do they choose between catchment children if there are too many?

They probably do catchment children by distance too (well, catchment siblings by distance, then catchment others by distance as they are two categories). It'll be buried in there somewhere. Either straight line or shortest walking route usually.

Penguins, I didn't explain that clearly enough. You're right, of course. This is slightly complicated because it's a faith school, so the school rank applicants in order according to the faith criteria (and they have more applicants who fit the criteria than they do places), and then the LA takes over their list and applies the parental preferences, so it's possible not to get a place even though you fit the criteria, unless you've put them first, because they are stupidly over-subscribed.

Oh I hate this, roll on March.

I don't understand it either. I'm in the catchment area for my first choice school and it's not usually oversubscribed, but I still listed 6 choices in preference order as advised.

I only put one choice for ds2 (going into Reception in Sept).

It's not our catchment school...there is actually a school at the end of our road which I definitely didn't want him going to. When I phoned them to register ds1 and arrange to go see the school, I was told by a very confused sounding receptionist that they didn't 'do' viewings of the school or meeting the teachers, but I would of course 'get a glimpse' on ds1s first day.
I wouldn't leave my dog in a kennel without viewing the kennel so there's no way I'd leave my child inva school i've never seen!

Ds1 is in the same school we applied for and also the classes are consistently undersubscribed. There are 25 in ds1s class and about 20 in ds2s nursery so I can't see it being an issue.

Takver, I'm also in Wales but there wasn't a split option of Welsh or English medium on our form.

It was just 3 empty lines, with guidelines to apply for your top 3 preferences be they English or Welsh.

Where in Wales are you - are you very Rural by chance?

Dance - but that isn't about preference is it? If the person who came top of the faith criteria had put the school second, but not got into their first choice, they would still be offered a place. It's more that you only ever get one offer,so you should put the schools in genuine preference order. You are right that, however high you come up the faith list, if you get into a school you've listed higher then that's where you will be offered.

Wedding - yes, very rural - and also pretty much all the schools undersubscribed apart from the one designated Welsh med. school (which to date you are guaranteed a place at).

I'm sure if you wanted to send your dc to another secondary school you could, IYSWIM so long as you were prepared to drive them. But no need for lots of options as it is hard to imagine a first choice you couldn't have, if that makes sense.

Yes, that's it, Penguins. The catch, as it were, is that there are a couple of schools close by that are ranked Good by Ofsted, but tend to be people's second choice because there are also a couple of Outstanding schools, one of which is the faith school. So if people are feeling nervous about their chances of getting into the faith school and put it second, putting one of the good schools first, they've got a decent chance of getting in if they're in catchment, and their child ends up somewhere else even though they fulfilled the criteria for the faith school. So the better tactic is to put the faith school first and the catchment school second. I accept that this is rather particular to our area, but I don't suppose it's amazingly uncommon in London.

My mum only put one school down for me, it was a church school approx 8 miles away but it didn't have a catchment, entry was awarded on a points system so the more points you got (out of 32) the greater your chance of getting in, I had 32 points so my parents were pretty sure I would get in (previous years cut off had been 29)
If I hadn't of gotten in then the other option was a local private school that I already had a place at as a back up
The local state schools where I lived were rubbish at the time!

To those who think putting 1 option is risky if you don't have a "plan B" (home ed or private) - what do you do if you have no realistic chance of getting into any other school? I could have listed lots of schools DD didn't have the faintest chance of getting into, but not sure how that was any better than just putting down the 1 she was likely to get into?

Where I live, we get five choices so many people list four high achieving schools first but the fifth choice will be an average and under-subscribed school. They do this to avoid being given a place at one of the really bad schools in the city.

I think Takver that pretty much all Welsh medium schools are oversubscribed.

Our catchment Welsh School is huge. We visited when ds1 was coming up to 3 and as someone who attended relatively small schools growing up I just couldn't get over the size of it. There were three classes of 30 for each age group! Ds1 was speech delayed and very shy and I was just afraid that he'd be completely lost in that environment, so we didn't apply.

The English medium school they attend has a total of around 120 pupils, with between 10 and 25 in each class and only one class per age. There's a lovely sense of Community which I just don't think you'd get in a huge primary with 500+ kids.

Gosh what a minefield.. luckily with mine being in welsh medium education my choices are guaranteed. I wish you all good luck. My brother who lives in london is not having such an easy time of it. They live in a hip and happening part of london but the borough has terrible schools.

As someone who clerks school appeals, I come across parents at appeal hearings wondering why they didn't get the only preference they put down, but the school 5 miles away!

It's because the school only has a certain admissions number I.e 120 places, and those places have to be filled using the set, published criteria, which not everyone will fit into. So, if you don't get the only preference you put down, you will get a place at a school which is least oversubscribed with a place available. If you live in an authority which is over populated you are unlikely to get your only preference unless you live on top of the school. It is therefore advised that you put down as many preference as you are allowed.

As a parent it is your obligation to ensure your child attends school. If you don't want the child to attend the school they have been offered then it is the parents obligation to educated the child. If you choose to home ed then there are rigorous rules in place, and the authority will check you are home educating to such standards. If you choose to keep the child at home without a proper education, then the authority is well within its rights to prosecute.

The LA's obligation is to make a school place available, and once they have done that they have met their legal obligation towards the child. The rest is up to the parent.

If you do just put down one school on the application you must ensure you put your reasons for doing so on the application form. That way if you do end up in an appeal (especially infant class size) you can argue that the authority did not take your reasons into consideration when offering a school place. The Panel can then review the authorities decision I.e they had all the facts in front of them yet they didn't take them into consideration, therefore it was perverse not to offer a place - Of course, your reasons for an infant class size have to be extenuating, as the test for allowing is extremely high.

I would always always advise friends and family to put down more than one preference, as I see the results of those that don't, especially if you have more than one child and they end up at different schools, in opposite directions!

Apologies for any mistakes, using iPhone!