Primary school admissions - 14 miles apart

[Ruralparents]

Hi all

I thought I’d join to mine your collective wisdom!

We live in rural Cambridgeshire, 6 miles from our nearest school in one direction and 8 miles from the next nearest in another.

Back in the depths of lockdown we had to a choose a school for our eldest to start at in Sept 2021. My wife teaches at the school 8 miles away and so we chose it because it would be handier. We didn’t know if our eldest would get in there but she did. And it turns out that her catchment school, 6 miles away, was oversubscribed.

Now, in 2023 our daughters school is over subscribed and our youngest has been placed at the catchment school. These two school are 14 miles apart! We lost our appeal and have now got the prospect of trying to manage a 28 mile school run, twice a day.

Cambridgeshire council don’t care, they are hiding behind their protocols and passing the buck.

We asked if our eldest could move schools to be with our youngest and they’ve refused because her year group at the catchment school is oversubscribed.

Out of catchment siblings get the same priority as in catchment siblings in Suffolk and Norfolk, but not Cambridgeshire. And when you live 6 and 8 miles from the two schools it’s fairly obvious you’re going to be at the bottom of the admissions list when either school is over subscribed.

Has anyone had any joy appealing on the grounds of unreasonable journey times etc? I just don’t think anyone should be made to do over 10000 miles a year on the school run. School transport hasn’t been offered but even if we can get it, someone still has to be available to put a 4 year old in a taxi and to collect them etc, it doesn’t help the logistics.

There is an ombudsman, but I think they have just rigged the whole system in order to do as they please and screw those who live out in the sticks.

It doesn’t directly, and of course admissions criteria can’t take account of it.

But when we were choosing the school for our eldest in winter 2020/2021, covid restrictions were still in place, memory fails but I think they ran up until Christmas 2021 in some form. My wife was alternating between teaching from home or going into school to teach the key worker children.

If we had chose our catchment school at that point, she would have also left her job in order to handle the school run. I doubt she would have quickly found new employment, or would her school have been able to quickly replace her, with restrictions as they were in winter/spring 2021.

Im not claiming formal admissions criteria should allow for this obviously, but we were both classified as key workers at the time, so needed to travel into work, and it informed our school choice, especially as we didn’t know how long restrictions would be in place for.

I'm sorry OP, I'm not entirely sure what you want the LA to do in this situation. In order to give you what you want they would have to displace a child from your 'preferred' school that has a more legitimate claim to be there.

Why should a catchment area child give up their place in their catchment school for a non catchment child who lives further away? Why should their parents have to contend with longer school runs, siblings potentially being in different schools and their DC potentially being separated from their friends just because you feel you should get special treatment?

Why do you think you are entitled to push the consequences of your choices onto someone else?

You CHOSE to live 8 and 6 miles from the nearest schools with small children and you CHOSE to put you DD into the bin catchment school knowing that this scenario was likely to occur. You have to deal with the consequences of your choices and not try to palm them off onto another family because you feel as though you are somehow special.

Almost every working parent struggles to fit school runs in around their working day but somehow they manage without inconveniencing others. They use childcare, breakfast clubs, after schools clubs etc.

You keep going on about a 56 mile trip but the truth is, your wife is already doing 32 of those miles on her days off anyway plus, you are entitled to free transport to and from your catchment school so nobody has to do the extra 24 miles if they don't want to. If you choose not to avail yourself of the free transport or the breakfast/after schools clubs on offer then that's entirely your problem. Why should others suffer to make your life easier? Your choices, your consequences.

If after 500 odd posts and plenty of replies from me, that’s still your reading of the situation then there’s little I can do to change it.

I see no other way of reading it. You're acting like the LA are just being difficult when they are in fact just following the law. Legally they cannot exceed infant class sizes and so, to give you what you want they would have to rescind the place of another child who legitimately has a greater claim to the place. Why should a catchment child give up their place for a non catchment child who lives further away? I honestly can't understand why you would think that was fair.

So realistically - what do you expect the LA to do?

@FaithHowells As I thought, Wiltshire has comprehensively looked at school provision. There is a very recent draft document on their website listing every single new development and plans for schools. There are clearly some issues which are difficult to resolve regarding falling school rolls and considerable shifts in population due to the military. Few areas are having 2000 houses though and I’ve probably pinpointed the area you are in. However there are plans to ensure Dc get a school place. Like the op, there is no easy quick fix to school places to suit everyone.

As in any community with rural and town schools, there is a balance to be found in how many tiny schools can be kept open and funded with small numbers, and how you commission new schools or expand existing ones. The schools with capacity often end up being in the wrong place. In new large estates, land is normally set aside for a new school and, if you read the document, lots of research goes into what’s needed and where. Of course everyone wants convenience immediately. It’s very complex but plans are there for new schools. Plans might also be there for school closures and that will result in lots of arguments too. As the op here has found, you cannot please all of the people all of the time.

I expect them to have their criteria written in such a way that this can’t happen, and for there to be mechanisms to resolve it. As other LAs do. I thought I’d made that clear?

I think what the OP wants really, as there is some areas, a Social Need criterion. It covers things like a police officers child being placed in a school away from their work area.
A teacher having to resign as they can't physically get their child to school and get to a school elsewhere could be seen as a good reason. Others may disagree obviously.

I don't think people pointing out yet again about the catchment issue is helpful... he has neither a time machine or a crystal ball.

The LA did have their policy written in a way that it can’t happen for those paying attention and making safe choices - through the catchment system.

However, what the LA can’t do (in a world of limited resources) is have a policy that ensures nobody ever suffers any detriment for making risky choices.

You made - unknowingly, perhaps, through lack of research as to how policies are implemented - a risky choice. Is it the LA’s responsibility to stop you from making that risky choice (best way to do that would be to take away the choice of an out if catchment school) or reverse its effects (at the expense of others)?

PuttingDownRoots - the problem us that ‘difficulty with school logistics’ is an almost universal parental experience, and so would not and should not start playing a part in school admissions.

Also, the more complex a school’s admissions criteria, the less transparent and less predictable it becomes. With a simple catchment or distance based criterion, with or without siblings, and data from previous years, it is fairly predictable whether a place in a school is likely or unlikely, and this helps parents to plan. Where you are having to take into account many different criteria - different employment groups, residing within the parish of x, siblings but not if you have moved house etc etc - it all becomes much less transparent.

(Children who need to be placed FOR THEIR SAFETY away from their parents’ work or away from abusive partners or due to witness protection etc are different and should rightly receive priority)

Surely if you wife works at one of the schools she would do that drop off/pick up and it only means arranging drop off/pick up for 1 child 8 miles away?

Stormy, yes, and if the OP applied for it, school transport should provide that as they are attending the catchment school.

@Stormyweathr Exactly. Transport would have been provided for both to catchment school. The fact that catchment school was avoided is the issue. Plus I agree totally with @cantkeepawayforever . We cannot have too many special categories. Many schools do not have school staff, let alone anyone else! Where would it stop? The whole of the NHS? It’s fairly transparent at the moment but if parents choose without considering the consequences, it is down to them to make arrangements.

I don't know what schools your DC are attending but the oversubscription criteria on the First Steps document in this link seems pretty unambiguous

https://www.cambridgeshire.gov.uk/residents/children-and-families/schools-learning/apply-for-a-school-place/primary-reception-junior-or-middle-school

School transport isn’t the issue, if available it still requires both of us to do the school ‘run’ 3 days a week, because I would need to be there to place our youngest in the taxi, and meet him from it.

So after that it’s childminders, from first thing in the morning until late at night, for a 4 year old. In order that my wife and eldest child can get to their school, with its wrap around care, whilst my wife does her job.

As explained earlier, we don’t want to hold youngest back another year, for one thing, we might just find ourselves in the same situation a year later.

Same thing happens everywhere. In many areas they have to downgrade out of area siblings, or families rent in the area for a year to get their first child in and then move away.

So after that it’s childminders, from first thing in the morning until late at night, for a 4 year old

Two days a week, presumably, as your wife works part time?

Do you not think that other children go to childminders before and after school when both parents work, often more than two days a week?

Yes, obviously I am very very well acquainted with that document now, this does not mean I think it’s been written fairly.

To summarise as briefly as I can.

In winter/early spring 2020/2021, we made the decision to send our eldest out of catchment. I’ve been trying to rack my brains as to how we ended up doing something which has caused so much hassle. Both the school we chose and the catchment school have good ofsted reports and both have a good reputation.

My wife was splitting her time between teaching from home and teaching key worker children in school. I was out each day on the farm. I’m not claiming key worker privilege here, being able to go to work each day and leave the house was a blessing. But, it did add to our decision to choose the school we did for our eldest. It would have been very difficult for my wife to move jobs at the time, and likewise difficult for her school to appoint a replacement, her headteacher at the time was in full agreement with our decision.

So we put our eldest in her then undersubscribed school which meant jobs didn’t have to be changed, their school life continued unruffled we could manage the school run and so on. Our youngests pre-school was near enough to the eldests school to manage it all.

Subsequent checking of the school allocations shows that our youngest would generally have got in.

Fast forward two years and the eldests undersubscribed school is now hugely oversubscribed to to a lot of house building, the council refused its request for two form entry and therefore many have been refused entry.

To compound it, the eldests year 2 class at the catchment school is also oversubscribed, and so even if we wanted to move her to be with her younger brother, we cannot.

So we now have a 6 and a 4 year old in schools 14 miles apart with all the difficulties that brings. We may yet take the offer of an over the border school, which is live for a few days, but this brings alternative problems.

The council, and councillors in their responses have made it quite clear that they think our choices were a self serving attempt to game the system, that the criteria are right, we got what we deserved and half of Mumsnet agrees with them, with the added proviso that we should quit moaning and get on with it.

The other half of Mumsnet thinks we’ve been hard done by.

How late at night are we talking, 10/11pm?

They don’t go to childminders early enough, that their elder sibling can go to their wraparound care 14 miles away, and if they do then I’d assume that is their parents choice.

7.30am drop off, 6pm pickup. A 4 year old shouldn’t be put in that position by the LEA.

So not "late at night" at all then, hyperbole really doesn't help your cause.

Two days a week. Plenty of kids go to nursery, 8-6, five days a week, from the age of 1.

That's a very manageable solution.

The various ways of resolving the situation have now been discussed ad infinitum. The chief means of contesting the decision - an appeal - has been tried and failed. That leaves adding each child to the waiting list for the sibling’s school; appealing again in the next academic year; various combinations of school transport, childminder and wraparound care; or finding another school which can accommodate both children.

I appreciate that none of this is ideal and not what you want but these are all things you can do (or not do) now. I understand that you would prefer the LEA to rewrite the admissions criteria for your preferred school, but this would not be retrospective and, besides, as much discussed here, the LEA may be reluctant to do anything that gives more priority and more places to out of catchment children. Likewise, the LEA can’t squeeze your child in as the 31st child in the class because the law prohibits it.

One other thing that crossed my mind is to lobby the LEA to add a bulge class to your preferred school. LEAs can do this relatively quickly, but only where there’s clear evidence of unmet need for places around that school. They would also want to take into account any knock-on effects on the viability of other local schools. What did your councillor say when you spoke to them?

Single parents who don’t work at a school do a school run five days a week I am confused as to what the issue is now

firstly you said it was a 50 mile round trip but now saying it’s not and that two of you have do the school run 3 days a week I am confused

I suppose what I am saying is you are fortunate that there is two of you and they you both drive and that your wife is not actually going out of her way everyday to do a school run