Fancy putting the Rightmove School Checker to the test? £300 to be won for feedback NOW CLOSED

[AnnMumsnet]

The team at Rightmove have asked us to find MNers in Great Britain to put their School Checker to the test and we know you all love a bit of property porn so we thought you’d all jump at this one - we’re specifically looking for parents (or parents to be) who have pre-school children who are starting to think about primary school for the first time - or those who are pregnant for the first time (and for whom school choice is on their radar). It doesn’t matter if you’re looking to move in the near future or not.

The team at Rightmove say “Find the right home near the right school with Rightmove’s School Checker. School Checker gives you access to admissions criteria and academic inspection reports for primary and secondary schools across Great Britain. Now on every property, School Checker lets you discover previous admissions areas and Ofsted ratings to easily compare local schools. Visit rightmove.co.uk/schools to learn more.

Once you’ve found the right home, simply click on the ‘School Checker’ tab to find the right school. Available on both desktop,mobile site and apps.”

Check out their video here

If you’d like to take part in this (will be over the next month or so) - please add your details here.

If selected, we will email you but you’d need to visit Rightmove, choose a property and then look at the School Checker tab. Testers will be able to have a play with it. We’d then want you to add your feedback and thoughts on a thread on MN.

All selected testers who share feedback will be entered into a prize draw where one MNer will win a £300 voucher for the store of their choice.

Thanks
MNHQ

Standard Insight T&Cs apply

I don't really approve of this at all - it pushes house prices up artificially and supports the monied 'haves' to ride roughshod over the 'have-nots' to sharp elbow their DCs into the best state schools.

Teddy

How? It's already perfectly possible to do this exercise using google maps and local authority information. This is just making it a bit easier.

IMO the biggest problem with Rightmove pushing prices up artificially with this tool is the inaccuracy of it.

Not accurate at all. It really does depend on the school adding correct information. Our local ones just don't do it.

Had a quick look at an over-subscribed school in my area and it appears accurate.

What it can't show you easily is how that admission area fluctuates according to the cohort size in any given year.

This makes me very
IMHO it's whipping up the property market and the hysteria associated with school places. The TV ad is even worse.

Having just been through choosing secondary schools in London I can categorically tell you that no 'school checker' will tell you if your child will get into a school, and there is no such thing as a catchment. It depends entirely on a whole load of unpredictable variables and indeed your own child's preferences/needs/ ability to pass a test whether you have your choice of school!

If School Checker can do what it took me several weeks of research, second guessing and school visits to work out then I'm impressed.

Can school checker tell me whether my new local scondary school has lots of siblings this year - is the next school along having a bulge class this year? Did something happen in the up-and-coming neighbourhood this year to put off the aspiring middle classes? Did the next borough along change their admissions criteria to make admissions change enough to have a knock on effect? Does my particular child need a small school to cope /large school for greater pool of friends?All of these things affect choices significantly and none can be algorithmyically predicted.

Catgot

All good points.

I mentioned some inaccuracies around my local primary school upthread, but you've reminded me that there's currently some new housing developments planned that are nearer to local primary than the house for sale on my road is. That's the sort of thing that would throw the school checker data out, even if the school checker was using the correct distances (walking distance) for my area.

But school checker doesn't pretend to show those things!

It tells you the distance (not 100% accurate), whether a school is oversubscribed and whether the distance is within the furthest admitted distance from the previous year. Of course you need further research - it's just one tool.

Hmm. I've looked at my village and it lists several schools as being inside admission area when they're not. Because of where the catchment areas are the nearest schools aren't actually the catchment schools. I'd be wary buying a house for a specific school based on the information on the school finder. You're better off looking on the local council website as it shows the catchment areas.

I've just checked a local school I know - the catchment is totally wrong because the school has a 'nodal point' that admissions are measured from - The checker is measuring the correct distance 'catchment' - but from the temporary site for the school (as it is built elsewhere) rather than the true nodal point on the final site of the school. Almost nobody actually in the circle it shows wouldn't have a hope of getting in.

Looked again, goodness only knows why, maybe wondered if they would have realized the Scottish schools boo-boo. In fact it is quite misleading for Scottish schools, which do have reliable catchment areas year to year and the whole system is different. If I was Rightmove I'd be well advised to remove the schoolchecker altogether from properties in Scotland. ESPC.com have it right for Scotland, they just tell you what the school is for that address, the RC and the non-denom.

it is very helpful and convenient to have the check while doing search on rightmove. Not sure whether it incorporates most recent year school catchment data.

We moved 6 month I used school checker a lot as school which is close enough and is good was very important for us.Information on school checker is more or less accurate and great as you can see straight away is this house suitable for your family or not because after looking at price and pictures you open school checker and see schools close enough or not.but will this chool be suitable for your child and will you get space school checker can't tell you.That's why if you really like house,area and nearest schools then go for a visit,ask questions and then decide will this house with this school is what you are looking for. Ofsted rating of course is good and is helpful but unfortunately don't tell everything.It took us 3 month and we saw more than 35 houses and I played with school checker a lot! All in all it's very helpful tool!

Rightmove isn't much use for NE Scotland anyway - ASPC has 2487 properties for sale in Aberdeen, Rightmove has 197 - local solicitors don't use Rightmove, it's generally big national or online agencies or builders with new homes.

I've just checked some new homes being built near me - they are listed as being within one state primary school catchment, but Rightmove can't allow for the new development being initially zoned to that existing primary until a new primary school is built as part of the development master plan.

Wow - I've just found out my neighbours house is up for sale - he kept that quiet!

Interesting the school checker says we're in catchment for two schools, but in fact it's only one. As pp have said, depends on the number of siblings too.
I've always contacted the education authority to find out about catchments etc, the info on right move is ok as a starting point but I'd want to do further digging before I based any decisions on it.

Rightmove for a house that I was interested in doesn't list the catchment secondary in the first ten schools it shows. Rural admission criteria for a village on a town boundary can really throw the school checker out.

LilQueenie, schools don't add this information, I assume it is taken from public information such as the Ofsted report.
Over subscription is inaccurate for my school, it says it wasn't, I know it was.
Interesting that in the academy system an inadequate school which becomes an academy 'loses' its inadequate status, this doesn't necessarily mean the issues have been addressed, however well done Rightmove for giving the last inadequate judgement on that school and not being fooled into the 'new' school fallacy.

I've looked at DC1 primary school. The rightmove checker doesn't have information on admission at all. Also our catchment secondary also only has information from 2015. And I know both have admission statistics on our county website for 2016.

Tomlinscote (GU15) Secondary School's catchment area looks wrong 2016. I've friends near there who got in from well outside the catchment given last year.

This one:
www.rightmove.co.uk/property-for-sale/property-57921691.html
Doesn't have the school checker on.

The schools near us look correct, but there aren't as many as the above place, so those were more interesting to look at.

For my county Surrey it is pretty useless for secondary schools. Surrey has some very rural bits, so the criteria is "nearest school" that is the closest school to the home address. That means for my DCs school although my house is 2 miles away I am below children who live 4-5 miles away but for whom this is the closest school. So just drawing circles showing the last distance admitted does not really show your likelihood of getting into a specific school from a specific house.

Secondary schools locally don't seem to be listed. Primary schools are listed and seem accurate from what I can see. However, surely the schools listed are subject to changes year on year and OFSTED report to OFSTED report.

If buying a house it would not be my first concern.

It's obviously only a guide. Before you actually buy a house, go to the council and check catchment!

See below for a note from Rightmove
"Thank you for all your feedback so far, it’s great see so many of you already using School Checker.

Rightmove’s School Checker uses data provided by FindASchool by 192.com to show successful admission areas from the previous academic year; these previous admission areas can be used to help indicate whether residents living at a certain property would have received a place at that school that year. These areas are calculated using data obtained from local authorities and individual schools regarding the furthest home to school distance of a successful applicant in previous years, and details of predefined catchment areas where applicable. This information should be used as a guide only as catchment areas can change year to year with each school having its own specifications.

Academic report information, such as Ofsted reports and ratings, are updated regularly to ensure we provide you with the most accurate, detailed information possible.

Thank you to all those who have requested to be part of the conversation and we look forward to hearing more of your thoughts once the feedback thread is live. Good luck with the prize draw!"

How regularly are the Ofsted ratings updated... one of them is wrong. My DD's school has just been rated inadequate but is still showing as its previous rating on there. Obviously when moving house it's sometimes necessary to make a quick decision - I would have assumed that the ratings were automatically updated but it seems they are not, & are therefore unreliable.

I can confirm details of the school if MNHQ requires this.

Not read upthread, but very few schools have 'catchments' nowadays - many select on distance from the school. Whether your house is near enough for a child to get a place at the school will depend greatly on the number of children who apply, and where they live. The distance away from our local school which would assure your child a place has varied wildly, with houses where people were 'guaranteed' a place in some years being those which were way too far away from the school in other years. Bulges in sibling applications made an enormous difference to who could get in or not, and it fluctuated wildly from one year to the next.