Waiting for a primary school place

[Paulac77]

We moved house and requested a in year transfer just before the holidays. My daughter is going in to year 2.
We didn’t get offered a place at the village school as there was no space so I placed her on the continued interest list, she was first on this.
The school we got is not working for me with work .. it’s taking far too long to drop and pick her up.

Our village school started back today.
I guess what I’m wondering is, is there ever much movement after school go back?
Admissions have said they are awaiting confirmation from the school regarding places.
But surely pupils don’t just not turn up, do they??

I doubt they don't turn up but there is movement, people move for all sorts of reasons, although IME less likely in a village school compared to somewhere in a city where the population is more transient anyway.

It really does depend where you are. Here, nobody left dd's class until y2 and in DS's class, one boy left the Easter of reception year. This is in a village school. In the nearest town, there's more movent and I'd imagine even more so in cities. Fortunately when we moved, DS was given a place using fair access protocol meaning they could have 31 in the class.

Hmm .. We’re in quite a big village which has a lot of new builds going on plus a RAF base up the road. So praying hard for some movement’

We are also hoping for a place from waiting list.

Does anyone know how long after term starts you tend to hear? Do schools tend to tell the LEA on the first day back? How long does the LEA spend allocating the place - same day? Same week? Longer?

The best people to ask are the school imo - ask them how much movement there was in previous years, for example. It can vary enormously.

Someone I know was offered a place a week after school started. I don't know the circumstances under which the other child didn't offer the place though.

Hi there, I work in primary admissions. Yes, sometimes people do just not turn up after the summer - we've had two this term. Throughout the year, admissions can be wildly unpredictable - no spaces at all come up in one year group, ten come up in another. And sometimes at v short notice (eg parents telling you that today is their child's last day, when they've known about it for weeks). If the school's just gone back today, they'll still be in crazy mode - I'd leave it a few days, then give them a call to check in.

Oh, and it's not always instant that the school will tell the LA - sometimes it's a straightforward move but there's just a few days' delay through busy-ness, but if the child leaving has disappeared off the radar, there might need to be an investigation process before they can be taken off roll, which can take weeks.

Thanks mayofan!

Our school always has a couple of no shows, who move to private school but don't tell the state school for a few days to make sure they have it as a back up.

If there's an RAF base up the road then you may well get quite a lot of movement as they get moved to another station and their families move with them. The downside is that (I think!), forces families come above non-forces families on Admissions criteria so, even if you live closer to the school than an incoming forces family, they may take priority over you.