To say that the English system of school allocations seems bonkers?

[Edinburghgirlie]

I have been reading with interest the threads about school placements and potential appeals and find it bonkers. Here in Scotland you live in a catchment area and you automatically get a space at that school...no question. If you want to go to another school then you put in a placing request and if they have spaces unfillled by catchment children then they consider siblings already there and proximity to the school.
It’s very clear cut here, although it does lead to house prices being pushed up if they are in the catchment of a ‘desirable’ school. I really don’t envy people down south not knowing which school they will get in to.
AIBU in thinking the English system seems bonkers?

YANBU at all

It was brilliant when we moved to the US, as the district we lived in had exactly the same process as you describe: you live in street X, you go to school Y. If you have a compelling reason to go to school Z, send in your reasons and we will consider them

So much simpler!

To be honest I don’t see that the English system is that different. I don’t have a child at school yet but isn’t the criteria usually
1 Looked after children
2 catchment
3 siblings or church attendance or something

So you will usually get into your catchment school. Whether that’s the school you want is a different matter.

I know up here you just go to nearest school. My primary was 5 minutes walk with no roads to cross and secondary was 20 minutes walk (25 really but I had to really haul ass as usually left late).

The English system tries to get round the post code issue. Ie people move near good schools and if you can’t move you’re stuck with a crap school.

I certainly wouldn’t favour the American system. In America schools are funded by local taxes so the amount of funding your school gets is directly dictated by the cost of local housing. Rich areas with pricey housing have much much better funded schools.

Too many houses, not enough schools.

It also depends if you favour a policy of parental choice or state control. Do you really want to have no say in your own child’s school place?

In theory, the idea of giving people choice is a good one that I like. It's just a shame that in reality it doesn't work so well!

Yanbu, I live in the south East and I guess we've been lucky that my local schools have a policy that places are allocated firstly by catchment areas, then by siblings and then any other criteria although those cases will often need to appeal. It works well.

Here in Scotland you live in a catchment area and you automatically get a space at that school...no question.

I assume either the Scottish government provides funding to deal with the resultant issues or it causes big problems?

In England that would lead to 45+ in a class in some primaries and far more children than will physically fit in some secondaries. LEAs can't get funding to open new schools where needed and most existing schools are cutting jobs and combining classes.

The millions in salary for top staff and tens of millions in administration costs for these academy chains running each handful of schools have to come from somewhere.

The English system does nothing to avoid the postcode issue. Children mostly are admitted by distance from the school (or at least the eldest child is). It just makes the whole thing more fraught that it needs to be. And it creates the myth that parents have ‘choice’, when actually all they’re able to do us express preferences.

There is a degree of parental choice here though as you can apply to any school you want but at least you are guaranteed a space at your catchment school if you are unsuccessful.

I don't think the English system is vastly different to that. Criteria for schools is set by the local education authority so that might be one of the biggest differences.

But most schools have 1.cared for children 2. Siblings 3. Catchment.

Some areas might put catchment first which would mean there is the potential for siblings to go to different schools depending on the intake for different years

@**donquioxtedelamancha
We don’t have academy chains here or governors. Every school is directly run by the local authority. Catchment areas can be changed if there are too many children for the school as a result of house building but this is rare. Schools in Edinburgh have had to expand and use portacabins or temporary classrooms to accommodate catchment children.

Siblings ahead of catchment, please. It reduces school running and the stress which that causes to parents, and school parking and the stress which that causes to locals; see MN time and time again.

Some councils try - unofficially - to avoid sending teachers' children to their parents' schools and a good thing too. When my DF taught my DSis it led to regular rows at the dinner table.

But I have read about some years catchments being only so many metres from the school? This sounds like the catchments change? They are permanently fixed here (can change but takes a couple of years of consultation)

Most people still do go to there nearest school. They certainly do in rural areas. An increasing problem is large number of new houses being built and no new schools/health centres to service them. Then you get the situation where the the school is over subscribed. Sometimes siblings end up in different schools.......which at primary level is a nightmare for parents.

Rural England is not a great place to be. Crap public transport, libraries closing, polices as rare as rocking horse droppings and village kids not getting into the local school.

I agree.

I read threads here about 5year olds being tutored for exams at 7 and trying to get into the best pre prep blah blah blah. And the politics of which school you put first and how you measure distance. I even see people complaining that it’s unfair that children in care get priority!

I don’t understand why these parents put themselves and their kids through it. I did ask once ( on a Mn thread ) and was told patronisingly that it’s because they care about their children’s education .

So I guess they are so narrow in their outlook they can’t accept that there is any other way to educate their children . Or that life exists outside North London.

I feel so sorry for these children tutored and examined endlessly. And of course at 18 they will head off to uni alongside Scottish kids who went to their local schools, spend most of primary having fun and didn’t sit a single external exam until 4th year / aged 15.

The catchment system doesn’t work where I am (south East) in the same way as others describing, as whether you get into your catchment school is also dependent on how many children are in the catchment and how far you live from the school.

I’m well in catchment for a school but have not been given a space. More children live closer than I do, so I’ve been given a school a few miles away instead.

Choice is meaningless unless you can afford to buy/rent in the roads immediately near the school.

I think the Scottish system works well. My DC don’t go to their catchment school, I had them placed in a smaller school better suited to their needs and it’s perfect for them. We don’t have huge class sizes - classes are capped at 30 but my DD class has 17 pupils in it. If anything there’s more choice because you can request a place at any school and you’ll get it providing there is room for your child.

Some of the stories here about parents not getting kids into school 5 minutes away because it’s full just wouldn’t happen here. If it was the catchment school you’d get a place.

It amuses me when we inevitably get these posts from people saying the Scottish way is better. I suspect they all live in an area with a good school-and often have chosen to live there for that reason, producing the same postcode expense as down in England.
I have many friends and family up in Scotland who are parents and teachers and most of them would not agree with the OP.

although it does lead to house prices being pushed up if they are in the catchment of a ‘desirable’ school

This is why that system was done away with down here. Some people thought it elitist, you know, live in a naice middle class area, with a good school next door, the council 'erberts were denied access to privilege.

Certainly in London, there is a scrabble for decent school places. My nearest school is a complete shit hole I wouldn't kennel my dog in despite it being a traditionally blue collar area. It never fails to exceed expectation, is resolutely bottom of any league table you look at no matter how you try and coax the figures. Not an ethnic minority face to be seen - and this is south London, with a large Indian subcontinent population - it is a know racist hive. So over my dead body were my children going there.

Where we live children don't always get into catchment school.

Edinburgh,

The issues are
a) population density
b) a culture (relatively modern) of 'moving to get into a good school'

Some years ago, local 'priority admissions areas' changed. At that point, they modelled that these areas were of the right size to produce around the right number of 11 year olds for each school.

The problem is that one of these schools is considered 'better' than the others, so families moved into its priority admissions area in large numbers. New houses were also built.

So 3-4 years down the line, far more 11 year olds lived in the priority admissions area as were initially modelled. Siblings within that area get priority. So about 100 11 year olds on the outer edges of the 'priority admissions area' [would be called catchment in Scotland] weren't allocated places in that school, because it couldn't suddenly magic up 4 extra forms of entry.

Meanwhile, across the town, 4 forms-worth of places in other schools would have remained unfilled if all 'catchment' children got a place at the desirable school.

This would rapidly snowball - the following year, knowing that 4 forms of entry DID get in, then 5 extra forms would be required due to even more families moving in etc etc.

Essentially, the Scottish system relies on a) slightly excess capacity (so a few more people applying in a given year CAN be accommodated) ab) lower population density and c) less high-stakes comparability (there may be an 'unofficial' pecking order of schools, but not the high stakes Ofsted-and-league-tables thing), which is what drives the flocking of parents to specific schools.

n England that would lead to 45+ in a class in some primaries and far more children than will physically fit in some secondaries

It's common in many Scottish schools to have two P1 classes. They don't just all stick into one class.

Also catchment areas take into account the number of kids in the area, so your catchment area would be different to what it is now to deal with how many kids live in an area.

Occasionally it can be a bit weird looking - new build estates can be catchmented to a seemingly random school, but that's to deal with the numbers issue.

ExFury,

If the primary I worked in accommodated all children who applied to it, either at the beginning or as in-year applicants, we could easily have 150 pupils in each year group (it was originally build as 2-form entry, ie 60 per year group). There is simply not enough physical capacity to build 2-3x more classrooms per year than we have at the moment.