When to arrange a school place?

[singsong]

At what age do you need to start thinking about putting your child?s name down for a school? How do you go about getting the best chance of getting the school that is your first choice?

How old is your child ? Usually for state schools applications are made during the year preceding them being due to start in the September. (So now-ish for Sept 2005 starters)There were a couple of threads recently and the consensus seemed to be that "putting names down" really made little difference in the State sector as the LEA sets the timetable and all that usually happens is that you are then registered to receive the application pack and school prospectus at the appropriate time. However if the school you are particularly interested in is out of direct LEA control (VA?)then it can set its own priority criteria for selection if they are oversubscribed and it might be worth becoming aware of this now so that you can ensure you meet as many of these as possible (ie. living in certain areas, attendance at certain churches etc) In the private sector you can register as early as possible as they often operate waiting lists.

hth

state school you need to live in the catechment area. people i know have rented houses for a short time to ensure thet will get in, just to use a postal address.

My ds is only a baby, topic actually came up when talking with my SIL who has a 3yo and we were talking about the choice of schools in our area.

DS name was down for the most popular school in the area from 6 months old

HOWEVER, by the time he was ready for pre-school (around 3) we checked out all the local schools and decided on one much closer so filled out an application and he's been there since April

God I'm glad I don't have to go through that tearing your hair out, what's right stage again (until secondary school)

cazzybabs , but not all LEA 's and state schools use catchment areas any more. For example, a C of E school might give priority to practising members of a particular church or churches, siblings of those already at the school, SEN etc ahead of where your child lives. Even those which do use catchments can vary them according to demand or use walking distance from school to house within a catchment, so it is by no means necessarily cut and dried.

I've been told to put baby's name down when he/she is born for the local primary. I've not rung up about it but a lady I know is a teacher there and suggested I should as it's such a good one and only 5 minutes walk from my house.

It can't hurt to ring the school or local authority to find out for sure. Bet you can never be too early.

Hi Delgirl - as far as I understand it makes no difference if you 'put their name down' for state schools. As someone else mentioned the LEA has a timetable for applications roughly about 1 year before start date.

Singsong - you could try and get hold of a copy of all the primary schools in your area admissions criteria for the next intake (Sept 2005) - that would at least give you an idea of what cateory you would fit into ie. Faith, Catchment, Siblings already at School etc etc. Try either the individual schools or ring the LEA - in my experience they are usually more helpful than the dreaded School Secretary (no offence if any MN are!!)

Where we live (Richmond upon Thames LEA)you can put names down as early as you want, but there is still a set timetable for sending out formal application forms and as long as applications are in by the deadline (in our case, January 17th 2005 for the 2003-6 school year), it doesn't matter how early you registered with the school - there's no priority given. Your local LEA probably has its admissions criteria online; ours does. And where we live there are no fixed catchment areas, it's just how many people nearer to the school (or with siblings already there) apply in a given year. Mmmm, that was clear as mud, wasn't it?

Where I am (Trafford LEA) it works like this:

Each school has a catchment area
The criteria for admissions is set by the school and is usually something like:

1)children in the catchment area with siblings at the school
2)children in the catchment area without siblings
3)children outside the catchment area with siblings
4)children outside the catchment.

Where they reach the point of not enough places, this is how the allocate and say they got to step 2) and didn't have enough places for all those kids, they'd do it by distance from the front door of the school to the front door of the child's house drawing a straight line on an OS map (you can see I've done my research )

In terms of applications:

To apply to a school for which you are in the catchment area - you apply directly to the school by the start of the Easter holidays before your child would start in Sept.

To apply for a school for which you are not in the catchment area - you apply to the LEA by January of the year your child starts school.

When you put their name down is irrelevant - admissions work on the criteria above and not on a 'first come first served' basis.

DS1 starts our local school in Sept 2005 and I've not put his application in yet as we aren't moving into our new house till January so will wait till then.

BUT, I think you need to ring your own LEA to find out as it looks like it's slightly different in different LEAs. It is certainly different in this LEA among the schools as the catholic primaries have slightly different admissions criteria to the normal state schools.

Gobbledigoose, Do they really draw a straight line on an OS map? Here apparently they measure the route by public roads, including maintained footpaths and bridges! But we are pretty urban and you might not be...

We are very urban but, yes, that's what they do! Like you say, ridiculous because there is a brook that runs through the catchment so people nearer the school by the straight line method are actually much further away than I am when considering driving there as you have to drive about an extra 3 or 4 miles (so they couldn't really walk) whereas I'm about 1.5 miles away.

Ridiculous!

Well, we put ds' name down for our local primary school (we are in the catchment anyway) when he was 4 months old and they told us that we were a bit late. Apparently, a lot of people put down BUMP on the application. It is a very good, popular school though. I've no idea if it helps to put the name down but if you have, at least you can use it as an argument later on if need be...

Around here you apply directly to the school. We phoned ds1's school in December 2003 when he was 3.5yrs. In Feb 2004 we were sent an invitation to an Open Day/Evening for March. At the Open Day we were given appointments to see the Head and to fill in the school's forms in June 2004. Ds1 started at the school in September 2004.

We had a lot of contact with the school before ds1 was formally registered. He has SN so we had meetings from about February onwards to discuss how best to deal with his transition to school and any possible problems he might have.

singsong, now is the time to be considering the state of your local schools, because if they are dire it gives you plenty of time to move to a better area before you have to apply for a place.
we tried to move area from our terrible schools 2 years before admissions & it still wasnt early enough (catalogue of disasters) now my dd is in year one at an average school (still in the not so great area) & we plan to give it another go because my children deserve an education & theres no way they are going to any of the local comps.