Late Grammar School offer: over the moon but stressed/flummoxed

[PermaShattered]

What a 3 days we've had - any insightful comments welcome. In short:

1. Our daughter was offered 3rd choice (her 11+ score was about 30 down on passmark);
2. 3rd school is outstanding but we appealed to 2nd choice school as was our preference;
3. Last Friday took calls from our local Ed admissions authority saying why appealed when have offer from grammar school?
4. Said we hadn't. She made further calls to other relevant admissions authority and came back and told us we definitely have an offer and it would be in post next day (Saturday just gone);
5. It duly arrived, and we posted our acceptance same day (they should have got it today) - verbal acceptance of place given by phone on Friday;
6. On Friday the Authority also withdrew both our place at 3rd choice school and our appeal to 2nd choice school;
7. Today i take a call from a friend whose daughter got substantially higher score than my DD - and she is 188 on waiting list;
8. I call our admissions auth to check they received our acceptance (they said still in posttray but will be dealt with this afternoon);
9. I query whether there could possibly an error and i'm told categorically 'no'. And if there was, we have a written offer, accepted it and they can't take it off our daughter;

10. Finally, my other DS is that grammar school.

I'm perplexed. What could be a possible explanation?

Re the matter of saying that OP's DD is L5 and up to Grammar standard:
We found when we tried to appeal that saying "DS is bright, please let him in" cuts no ice. They stuck to the line that their Admissions Rule said that entry was based on the admissions tests, end of. Evidence of other tests was not of much interest to them.
Stick to the professional advice on majoring on the 'you made a mistake' angle, not the 'my DC is worthy' angle.

Good luck.

IDK, I agree! I was just saying that such evidence could be used if the school try to say that the OPs DD couldn't cut it academically.

YY

Morning all, thanks for comments/support. STILL no response to formal request to resolve before appeal - nor phone calls returned/followup email answered. Disappoint really. Perhaps everyone's still on hols

Specific responses to qus/comments: donnie you're right re the experts: without them I couldn't deal with it without their expertise. flakjacket she is already L5a in everything bar maths - for maths she's L5b but predicted 5a in SATs tests. And she's studying GCSE level music theory - not an easy task. So for the sceptics gotanygrapes! I have no doubt she's capable (and we'll point out that she was v nervous on the day of the 11+, and she also had timing issues). CATs - they don't do at our school....

flog as already point out since your comment, her place at 3rd choice was withdrawn. Also - her appeal to her 2nd choice school was withdrawn. To be frank, the main detriment to her is she spent a week excited and thrilled to be going to the school; trying on her sister's uniform; planning the fundraising projects incoming Yr7 pupils do over the summer holidays - she'd even chosen the charity she was going to benefit (I could go on with her planning but i won't bore you). Then all this was snatched away.

I found out yesterday that it is not a group appeal which hopefully is a good thing (it's been pointed out that it could mean there's only very few). nigel your last comment made me smile :)

IDK - I obviously wasn't on your appeal panel

Hang in there. At least with it being an individual panel you don't have to face having to put on brave face with other parents.

Remember, right is on your side.

Perma - You and your DD are obviously very keen on this school so I was surprised to read in your earlier post about how you didn't do much to prepare your DD for the 11+.

Frankly, I don't understand why you are getting all the virtual huggies from your fellows MNetters. I mean, if me and/or my DC was this keen to go to this school you can be sure that I would have done a lot more to prepare my DC. Your DD is still in with a chance but only because of some silly admin mistake.

Since I am not one of the parents who spent months prepping their DCs and didn't get a place, good luck with your appeal.

Perma - You and your DD are obviously very keen on this school so I was surprised to read in your earlier post about how you didn't do much to prepare your DD for the 11+.

Frankly, I don't understand why you are getting all the virtual huggies from your fellows MNetters. I mean, if me and/or my DC was this keen to go to this school you can be sure that I would have done a lot more to prepare my DC. Your DD is still in with a chance but only because of some silly admin mistake.

Since I am not one of the parents who spent months prepping their DCs and didn't get a place, good luck with your appeal.

hubba silly admin mistake - read the thread properly before making such sweeping comments.

As for preparation - you have misunderstood. We actually did a lot of preparation (I'm only responding to help others facing the 11+ not simply to retaliate as frankly i don't have the time): we spent months doing practice papers. At least 2 a week. With maths she had a week with my mum who is a retired maths teacher to help her with some of the problems that came up that are not covered in yr 6.

What we didn't do is hire a private tutor. If that's what you take to mean we didn't prepare my DD then so be it.

On page 1 you said that you did one or two papers a week over 6 weeks. That is hardly you spending 'months' doing 'at least 2 a week'. Perhaps you should read the thread properly.

I hope that your DD gets her place confirmed but please spare me the 'boo hoo, oh woe is me'. I did 6 month plus with mine. They both passed but even if they had failed I knew that I did my best for them.

You have a nice support group going so my presence is only going to spoil that so I'll bow out at this point and leave you to it.

Habba
This is not a silly admin mistake, its a very serious one. All the admissions authority have to do is allocate places to children who meet the admissions criteria. To wrongly allocate a place, then to repeatedly assure the parent that a mistake hasn't been made then a week later go "OOPS!" and try to withdraw the place shows a serious failure of the system and the OP's daughter has a right not to be disadvantaged by their cock up.

Just read the whole thread and want to say good luck :)

HabbaDabba you add so much to this discussion. When you are finished criticising Perma's parenting, perhaps you will read the thread again and see that this appeal is not about Perma's DD being worthy or otherwise of a place. It is a simple matter of law and justice.

IDK I missed your post for some reason. It's ironic as we never even considered appealing on the basis of non qualification. Even DD's begging us to appeal - we said 'we can't'. We explained that the selection criteria is as it is - it's a case of how well you do on the day - and that's that. (of course, some cases to have extenuating circumstances such as sickness on the day. etc etc.)

Anyway, I digress: because subsequent events completely changed the picture (even all these weeks later it's all still so surreal and incredible) we are appealing on the basis of maladministration - but we do have supporting evidence of her academic ability to strengthen our case. I know we have a strong case, but wanted to cover the 'ability' issue in case it was an issue for any panel member.....

habba it was around 6 weeks spread over a 3 months or so as we had summer hols in between - not that i'm answerable to you.

If it's an issue for any panel member, Perma, they need retraining

Surely the length of time it took plus the fact that they withdrew both her 3rd choice offer and her appeal for 2nd choice school clearly how's their mistake has been detrimental to her both practically and emotionally. That has got to be reasons enough to allow your appeal.

I wonder if your friend phoned up after talking to you and that's what prompted their investigation and realisation of their mistake.

To paraphrase Al Pacino in 'Carlito's Way', I try to walk away from this thread but they keep pulling me back.

6 weeks solid or 6 weeks spread over several months is still very light prep work for something that is very important to you and your DD.

gotanygrapes according to the school's foundation, my friend (when raising that someone she knew had been offered a place) was told 'perhaps they should ring us....' - my contact at the foundation (who have been so helpful through all this) took the view that if someone thought they had been offered a place they should call because no offers had been sent out - they thought the friend must be mistaken. (does that make sense?!)

lougle quite. I do tend to worry about little things - eg, we lose the appeal because the panel members been retraining.......!

Habba, can't you see that it was more important to the OP that her DD attended the grammar school if she was able to get there on her own merit rather than being tutored furiously?
The OP had accepted her DD didn't get a place. She had explained to he daughter that the cut off is the cut off etc. However, the lea then phoned saying she did indeed have a grammar place, the OP told her DD the good news and the DD got used to the idea. They also removed the poor girl from the waiting list/appeal for her 2nd choice. This was clearly to her detriment. That coupled by the time it took to correct the mistake means the OP should win her appeal.
Oh and the OPs DD just happens to be achieving L5s anyway so will cope just fine with the rigour of grammar school.

It's not a silly admin mistake, it's a very serious one
It's still a mistake.
In the natural order of things, op's dd's score fell below the required level so she wasn't allocated a place; she's now attempting to force her in by benefiting from this mistake.

I think it's understandable that even though her academic ability isn't the basis of your appeal that it could in theory be a stumbling block for the panel to send a child who is not academically able to grammar school simply because the lea messed up. The fact that your DD is academically able should remove that worry (from the panel) and allow them to focus on the law and adherence to policy in the way they would for a non selective school.

It was more important to the op that her dd attended the grammar school if she was able to get there on her own merit
She didn't.