Aibu as a Scottish person, to wonder wtf at the English school admission system?

[irnbruforlife]

Before anyone starts, I know the Scottish school system isn't perfect. But that's a whole other thread. I'm from north east Scotland. Children go to the school for their catchment area. The odd person will ask for a different school for whatever reason (such as bullying etc.) Their request is accommodated do far as reasonably practicable, but not at the expense of someone on that catchment area. There is no school lottery that I seem to be reading about in England, with children ending up with no placement, or having to go to school 2 hrs away despite living across the road from one, or siblings going to different schools.

"This is nuts. In Glasgow you will get a Catholic and non-denomination school in each catchment"

What happens in a rural area? Where I live in England a lot of the village schools are c of e schools and if you don't want that you may have to travel 10 miles to a large village or town.

They must, but there are still schools that are better or worse at providing SEN support be that formally or informally. I chose a small local school to meet my kids needs in a way the closer, bigger school couldn’t - both are considered to be good schools but one has a better nurture programme than the other.

I don’t think we have a massive number of religious schools. For example in the area I live there are 4 non-denominational schools and 1 Catholic.

In the town I work there are three non-Dom and one Catholic. Next big town along there are three non-Dom and one Catholic.

The flow of movement between them is fairly fluid to be honest.

YADNBU
I posted similar last year. I’m in Edinburgh where there is a lot of pressure on schools due to rising population but even so, if you are in a catchment then you are pretty much guaranteed to get in. Many placing requests are being refused at the moment as the demographics change and they only have capacity for catchment children only. It dies lead to high house prices in desirable catchments though!

“Does scotland have lots religious schools?”

Most areas have catholic schools, usually one for every 3 or 4 non religious ones... they’re not as strict about the religion of the pupils as English ones seem to be but are more likely to be oversubscribed so you’re not as likely to get a place if they are and nobody is a practising catholic.

We have been in the situation where there were too many children for catchment (central Scotland, new build houses everywhere). People had to go to the nearest primary which was 2 schools away (next nearest was full too). A few then transferred in to the catchment school in P2 when the class size goes up to 30 from 25.

In most cases kids in England do go to their catchment and closest school (although in my town your catchment school is not necessarily the closest due to where the line between the two secondary schools is drawn and it plays out in primary school allocations too). The problem comes because as others have said, you have selection (grammar or faith schools) and so you can't go to your nearest school and of course because there are too many people moving to an area which means the catchment has too many kids in it.

Where I live there is ample school provision despite lots of new houses, but people don't like the fact that one secondary school is expanding rapidly (one has 1100 pupils and can't expand (unless they build upwards), the other getting on for 2000) and so try to get their kids into other schools. Really the size should not matter, it's a good school.

In Scotland they keep an eye on birth rates and plan accordingly

That's fine unless the children weren't born here. When families immigrate there's no time to plan like that- the children must be accommodated immediately and new places can't always be created fast enough.

I think the west coast and central belt tend to have more RC schools. May be wrong.

“What happens in a rural area?“

The place that’s closest that has more than one school will have a catholic one... village ones would be non denominational.

There might not be a catholic secondary school, depends how rural, where, population.., stuff like that.

Wales has the same stupid system as England but our local education authority has from this year implemented a new system where you go to the school in your catchment area. We were given advance notice that this was happening (we have two secondary schools) but still a few people are moaning. Both schools are very good so I don't see the problem and I'm sure it's a fairer way.

All schools in Scotland are religious to some extent or another. It's usually Church of Scotland but some councils provide Catholic schools too (hope I've ducked opening than can of worms).

The head has some discretion over which churches come in and how often so it can match the local community. For example, at my local primary, religious assemblies are run by the Free Church but the Free Chrurch (Continuing) is never invited.

I think it's a population thing. We love in North East England and I work as an education advisor for a national charity .. virtually all our enquiries are from the south east )not all but most- local to me if you put a choice down that is pushing it like a church school miles away when your child isn't baptised you might not get in but generally if you put one of the local schools you will. Last year we put 3 good/ outstanding primary choices down for our DTS and they would have got in to any of them

“That's fine unless the children weren't born here. When families immigrate there's no time to plan like that- the children must be accommodated immediately and new places can't always be created fast enough.”

A certain amount of spaces are kept free for in year movement like that or looked after away from home children.

Or... they’d be offered a place in another school that isn’t their catchment area school.

Immigration can be an issue... but, you’d need a large amount that also have school age children year on year for it to really stuff up the system.

“Does scotland have lots religious schools?"

We have 2 Catholic schools and 6 (I think) non dominational schools, my dc go to the local Catholic because its closest to home.

From my birth group lots of the English mums seem to spend a lot of time examining ofsted reports and get very concerned (school two minutes down the road with ofsted goods while school two bus rides away gets excellent - what to do!) I have often wondered how much anxiety breeds anxiety. People feel like they are failing their child if they don’t examine the minutia of a school report and make lots of decisions which may actually not come to fruition. I am not sure how many parents I know would even know how to find out about an education Scotland report.

I am not saying that information is a bad thing at all. But it all seems to angst ridden.

Another thing we need to remember in Scotland is that social demographic groups tend to be closer together - SIMD from 1 to 10 are close together in many areas. This generally means that where parents opt for their local school they are socially mixed. I think this is less likely to be he case in England where population is higher and you will get schools which serve only one demographic

I'm in Scotland and my kids went to the catchment primary school. I did have to do a placing request for both of them to the secondary school as our catchment secondary school was further away than the other school.

In dds P1 year there were 60 children so they had 3 P1 classes. In P2 the class size went up to 30 so dropped to 2 classes. Sge was never in a composite class. Ds was in a smaller year group and was in a composite class 2 or 3 times over his 7 years there

In rural areas, we watch the number of babies carefully. If the school roll goes down too much, staff numbers are cut, according the the council spreadsheet. When there is a baby boom (of sorts), the village breathes a sigh of relief and puts the mothballs away for a few more years.

I agree. Hard to get my head round it tbh. Is it because of overcrowding? Also the 11+ ...nothing like that here. If kids have significant earning or behavioural needs they go to a school for this or a separate unit in the school otherwise all kids go to their local school/ local religious denomaotion school if preferred. Also there is a Gallic state school in Glasgow.

population-wise just looked

scotland has about 5 million people
greater london had 9 million in 2015

London is very roughly a circle about 15 miles in radius

so it's just a very very different kettle of fish

I think that a lot of the nightmares with the admissions system are from london based people although know some other cities can be an issue

question might be why are the london voices so loud and their experience becomes english experience

answer is of course because london is so massive, 1 in 6 of the population of england live here

I do think that the situation is made worse by a lot of the factors mentioned for sure but fundamentally it is just a different ball game due to numbers / density etc

and yes to the level of watching over birth rates. We plan many years in advance and staffing alters accordingly. I work in a very diverse secondary school with increasing immigration and while it is hard from a language basis, the council have to be responsive and adjust where necessary

YANBU. I've never heard of a child not getting their chosen place and I'm baffled at why it is so difficult in England and maybe someone can explain why?

I know its a different curriculum but maybe here in Scotland we are less concerned with league tables than England are? Not that requesting a place in a better school has ever been a problem I''ve heard of up here.

I think sardine sums it up perfectly. Sheer population

Pleased to see my fellow NE-ers are as stumped by the scjool place hysteria as I have been.

Immigration can be an issue... but, you’d need a large amount that also have school age children year on year for it to really stuff up the system.

Yeah, we've had that.