To only apply to schools out of catchment?

[drpepperwhatstheworstthatcouldhappen]

The school in our catchment area is a requires improvement school and I'd rather not send my son there. We had a look round and I just really hated it. Am I being crazy only putting down out of catchment schools? One 0.8 miles away, one 1, one 2.5. Our catchment school is always under subscribed so he's likely to get a place even if we don't get any of our 3 choices. It's just such a huge decision to make and I can't imagine sending him to a school I'm not happy with. Moving house not an option sadly.

Often a school.thst requires improvement gets a lot of support and can really turn things around.

I can't find any info on my local council website that says anything about the furthest away admission. I've searched so many times! Is this a requirement?

You aren't more likely to get one of the three you want if you don't put down a 4th.

That’s what you think at the moment ….
you could be allocated one “ just as bad “ but miles away … and once the council offer you a place they’ve done their job.

schools in special measures can be pretty much guaranteed to be “ on the up “ as investment and “
super heads “ etc are used. You can’t say that if a school “ ofsted outstanding “ who’s not been inspected for some years ….

ultimately it’s up to you of course but unless you want to home school ,go private , or move don’t put yourself in a position if having a worse / no school allocated. you cannot “ game the system “ by thinking you’ll be given what you want if you don’t meet the criteria published - it doesn’t work like that

If there isn't another school anywhere within a 10 mile radius that wouldn't be preferable to the nearby school then you are fine, feel free to use all 3 choices on schools you have little chance at. Sometimes you are lucky. Sometimes after the initial allocations of places in Spring there are movements on the waiting list and place become available even up to 2 weeks into the September term, so if your child can cope with a little uncertainty then you might get lucky.

It's not massively unusual for the family of a child who is offered a place at a decent school to not actually tell the school that the child won't be going there - maybe because they are also applying to private schools or because they are miving out of the area. The school don't find out until the child doesn't turn up on 3rd September, then there's 2 weeks of bureaucracy while they establish that the place can be re-offered, then they contact whoever is top of the waiting list. It's not at all unusual for a few of the people at the top of the waiting list to decide that it would be too disruptive to move schools having already started at another school, so the place can go to someone who was 5th place or lower on the list, so being unsuccessful initially isn't the final result. Good luck.

The standard advice is to put your catchment school on your form, even as the last choice, otherwise you run the risk of not getting a place at any of your chosen schools and being offered a school several miles away.

In theory, if your catchment school isn’t one of your choices but is undersubscribed, and you don’t get any of your chosen schools, the admissions authority will allocate a place at the newest school with spaces, which for you is likely to be the catchment school. How confident are you that it will stay undersubscribed?

Would you have historically have got a place at your preferred school/s (look at past year allocations data), are there any recent housing developments which could increase demand with them being closer?

I’m thinking if doing similar but I WILL be putting the ‘catchment’ school as the third choice. Im interested to know though, if I put my desired school at first place and obviously we don’t get in, would my child automatically go on the waiting list for the school? Even if we accept school choice three?

Waiting list policy will vary, some LA add automatically, others you have to request.

Thank you 💐

Catchment area isn't normally a thing. Most schools have a set of criteria which tend to give priority to children in care, children with EHCPs, siblings and then those living closest. You need to research the more distant schools to see what is the furthest distance any child has been admitted in recent years and whether you come within that distance, otherwise applying may turn out to be a waste of time.

You need to get two pieces of information. Firstly the admissions criteria and priority list. This will show you how a particular school makes their decision and where you are likely to be on the priority. Secondly, the number of applications and the number of places. For some schools you can find out how many under each criteria or the furthest distance they admitted a child. In there are some paid websites that will gather lots of this information for you, you can get a subscription for a month then cancel it.

We had two schools in catchment, one of which was nice the other one I wanted to avoid.

My first choice was the nice catchment school , the second one was a fairly and lately but very nice school, and the third was a local village school that is always massively unsubscribed. I knew that if we didn't get one or two we would definitely get 3, and therefore wouldn't be put in the catchment school we wanted to avoid.

As it was she got in our first choice, unsubscribed school number 3 wrote to us asking whether we would reconsider and choose them instead.

So I wouldn't put the catchment school as your number 3 if you really don't want your child to go there, but I'd look for a school that is massively unsubscribed, instead.

I don’t know whether it’s a legal requirement to publish furthest distance offered and whether schools are over/ under subscribed, but most LEAs do it- if you can’t find it maybe ask the LEA or a couple of the schools themselves?

I never applied for catchment schools for my kids. Always managed to get first choice but the secondary one I think we were one of the last in, as people down the street didn't get in. It is a risk but if you really don't want that school, it's worth it.

I just can't find this information anywhere, re the furthest away admission! V frustrating

So I've just had a response from the first choice stating they don't have a catchment area so locrating is a load of nonsense then!

I think this is the thing.

I take it, it's for primary entry.

Given the next few years entry had a particularly low birth rate, its potentially worth the gamble as if the school you don't want is likely to be the default anyway.

I know that in the last year none of our local outstanding rated schools which have traditionally been heavily oversubscribed have had a full intake which I don't believe has happened before.

I didn’t put my catchment school down as it had a bad reputation. My first preference (and actually closer than catchment school) admitted to PAN the year before, 2nd 5 under and 3rd 10 under. Catchment school admitted 2/3rd of PAN. It depends on what the demand is for school places where you live. You can often look up what schools were over subscribed and not on the local authority website.

Our council publish in on the single pdf with info on how to apply to schools. It gives all the entry priorities for every school and what the intake was for the last year and how far away the last entry was.

This is normal now

most schools do t have a “ catchment area “ ie an area within which you are promised a place.

what they do is start with the nearest kid and take them radially outwards till numbers are full (after sibling , looked after , special needs and other priorities ). So one year if there are a lot of births you may need to be 200m from school , a year with less babies could be 400m, or new estate for families near school - instantly 100m radius and they are full.

I put three out of catchment as none suitable within. Ended up searching London wide for a school and going to appeal when I found one. Got school confirmed end of July for September start. My daughter has an hour plus journey each way but school can at least meet her needs (SEN). Hopefully if primary you will have a better time

Catchment isn't always the priority factor in the council's decision making. Its continuity in my area so out of catchment kids that live further away but already in the pyramid take priority over those closer who may have just moved into the area.

I'd double check the priority factors on the LA/school website as it may make a difference.

Without knowing what the system is where you live, it is very hard to advise. Can you find out how many places your local school has and how may were admitted. That would let you know how under-subscribed it is, so you would know if you are taking a gamble or not. If it had a lot of spare capacity, I would take a punt on the 3 choices that I'd prefer.

This depends on your local council. My local council has catchment areas detailed on the website, but there are criteria within the catchment areas (looked after children, siblings in catchment, other children in catchment, siblings outside catchment, other children outside catchment).

It can be a bit strange - I’m just outside the catchment for one school, but distance-wise I’m closer to the school than houses at the other end of the catchment area! Yet I would be a lower priority application under the rules.

Sorry but this absolutely depends on your local authority. We definitely have catchment areas as an admission criterion.