End of sibling priority in Wansdworth?

[MsHerodotus]

Interesting - I like the idea of the 800m rule, tho' here in East Sheen it would have to be a 500m rule, as the catchments are so tiny...

here

I would have thought the proposed 800 metre rule is to catch people who move very close to a school, get one child in on distance then move a long distance away knowing that all the siblings are now covered. It basically says you are allowed to move and keep sibling preference providing you do not move more than 800 metres away from the school.

Other LAs do this and I wish ours would. Maybe stop people moving more than 0.5 - 1 mile away. Loads of people rent flats or small houses, get one in child and then disappear off to cheaper areas.

We're close to Wandsworth although not in it, thankfully. If priority was given to those living within 800m of a school, we would never have been offered a school place at all, for any of our 3 children. We are 970m from our closest schools (3 of them, equidistant) and in a London borough with a massive shortage of school places.

Interesting. But why 800m? It seems a bit arbitrary. Why not 700m or 900m?

I'd find it more logical if they said within 2km (which I think is the distance from which you get free travel for infants, as it's officially considered too far to walk).

Good. The sooner the sibling policy is scrapped the better, afaic. I hope all London authorities see sense and go for it.

Fantastic idea but perhaps it should be siblings for whom it's their nearest school as opposed to an arbitrary distance.

Perhaps all those who think this is a good idea should go and respond to the consultation in the hope that other EA follow their example

Googley great idea re 2km. That would allow genuine local moves but not people moving to cheaper areas etc after renting next door

It isn't a problem for secondary age children to be at different schools Madrigals.

Madrigals part of the issue near us is that families have 2 or 3 children under 4 and buy, rent or hang onto 2 bed flats and houses until after April 16th then a flood of estate agent boards (sale and to let) fly up on the streets round school. They then move miles away. House prices are inflated in the tiny catchment etc. It's an openly discussed strategy. One could argue that if you knew you were going to move to a different area / for three extra bedrooms then you should move then apply for a school from a house that you actually want to live in long term.

Scrapping the sibling policy is all fine and large but think about it... how would you like to have to deal with 2 or even 3 different school runs with all kids needing to be inside their school gates by 9am? Families do this and it's very, very difficult. In secondary school it's a different matter because by then, kids can get themselves to and from school independently. I think the sibling policy for primary should remain firmly in place.

Oh, yes, different if we're talking about primary. Are we?

The article implies primary. 800m seems tiny but then it's London?

In London, 800m is a big catchment. 100m is the smallest I know of around here...

Yes - would be about right near us at 0.497 miles. I know other LAs where catchment area children (by map not distance) have priority over out of catchment siblings. This does mean that if people choose to move out of the boundary they end up with two schools - but catchment areas are a decent size so most are at a school within 0.75 miles

It would be interesting to know if all of Wandsworth is covered by an 800m 'catchment' area around all the infant schools or if there are gaps that open up that mean there are some houses that will never be close enough to a school for a sibling to go to it, even if the parents have always lived there, if that makes sense. Or if there are many areas where schools are closer together than 800m and so there are overlapping areas where you could go...

I think they need to be fair and ensure that there are no cold spots in the borough that aren't covered by any of the 800m zone. I think they also need to have something to cover what happens when children are sent to a school that isn't their nearest school even though their parents wanted them to go to it - and end up going to a school much further away (seems to happen quite a lot judging by the threads on MN). If these dc have siblings that can't get into their nearest school then they ought to be able to get into the school that their eldest siblings were sent to without any choice - the parents shouldn't have to suffer with two different low choice or no choice schools in different parts of the borough - it's a double insult after not getting your closest school(s)!

Around here it's quite common to have siblings in catchment area having higher priority than no siblings, but siblings out of catchment area have lower priority than no siblings in the catchment area, which works reasonably well. I think that this is sort of trying to do that - but maybe due to very small catchment areas they are getting their knickers in a twist trying to word it easily. Or maybe they want kudos for something that other people see as quite a normal thing!

Zipzap - our borough (not in London) does have that policy:

Occasionally a parent with more than one child can express a preference for their designated area school(s), but the local authority is unable to meet this preference. The local authority will then allocate a place at a lower ranked preferred school or the closest available school with places. In this case, the parent may then prefer to send younger sibling(s) to the same school as the older child attends. In such instances, the allocated school may be regarded as if it were the designated area school for subsequent siblings and would be treated as meeting criterion C (sibling resident inside the designated area). Parents must notify the school admissions team at the time of application that they consider this exception applies. Where there is an application for the actual designated area school(s), designated area status would still be applied.

I bet this is aimed at Between The Commons, where the cut off for a non-sibling is about 290m, but of siblings admitted over 20 of live over 1.5km away.

The admissions footprint for the two schools in question hasn't been 1.5km for at least 15 years, probably longer.

London is another world 3 miles is normal for rural primaries.
DDs nearest secondary is 5 miles and plenty if DCs come further.
My nearest senior school was 12 miles!

Some schools have different days/or and half term days off. It's complicated enough when there is one child in primary and one in secondary without making it worse by having different secondary schools.

Perhaps if the standards were raised in the schools where houses are cheaper this situation could be alleviated.

Some schools have different days/or and half term days off. It's complicated enough when there is one child in primary and one in secondary without making it worse by having different secondary schools.

Perhaps if the standards were raised in the schools where houses are cheaper this situation could be alleviated.