First child got into first choice primary school but is out of catchment so no guarantee 2 younger siblings will get a place.

[TerriM86]

Hi,

We have just had our sons primary school offers come through this morning and somehow we have managed to get into my first choice school which is out of catchment and normally oversubscribed, they turned 22 people away last year and the furthest allocated place was 0.6 miles away and we live just over a mile away. I should be happy as it’s a great school but I have a 2 year old also and a baby on the way so I’m starting to think we should have gone for our 2 schools in our area one which is rated as good and has a new head teacher that is getting a lot of praise and the other is ok ( my step son also goes there) I’m just not sure I can handle the stress of worrying about getting my other children in and is it just not sensible?

We have spoken to the schools admissions who said we can accept first offer but apply for the other 2 schools and wait and see if there is any space.

Does anyone have any experience of not getting siblings into the same school?

I can only imagine it must have been a low birth year? As I applied for favourite school just assuming I wouldn’t get in.

Sorry for waffling I’m just got myself into a bit of a state over this.

Thanks for reading. Xx

You need to read the admissions policy of the school to see if subsequent siblings automatically get a place.

My school does kids in care first or adopted children, then siblings followed by catchment area.

Yes it happens people sending kids to different schools becasuse they can,t get in. If the other school is mre convenient could reapply, but it may be that it too is full.

What is the school's admission policy on siblings and if there is a defined catchment area?

Does the school not have a siblings policy? I thought most schools had siblings accepted as one of the earliest groups - so usually children in care/looked after/previously looked after, then siblings.

If siblings are NOT accepted, then yes, you should consider an alternative. But really, why did you put this school as your first choice if you weren't sure you'd get it? This is the kind of debate I'd expect to hear from someone who got their second/third/fourth choice.

Sorry, meant, why put this as your first choice if you were't sure you'd TAKE it. I can understand putting in a hail mary first choice school but don't understand a first choice school that you then wouldn't accept anyway.

Could be any number of reasons for distance being bigger in a particular year including low number of siblings for that year (that happened to us when DS was applying for schools), the school taking additional children for some reason, other schools taking additional children and therefore impacting the catchment zones etc.

Agree that you need to read the admission policy - thought that can change before your younger ones are going to school. Ours has recently changed to prioritise children in catchment over siblings out of catchment.

Yes the school prioritise catchment over siblings, siblings are about 5th on the list just before out of catchment no siblings.

I can only say that I had a moment of wanting to do the best for my first child and I felt that was by far the best school.

Obviously sensibly I should have just gone for the schools in my catchment and I made an emotional choice over a sensible one

Well if they usually offer places out of catchment the fact your other children will benefit from the out of catchment sibling priority means they should get in.

I’d only be worried if some years they don’t offer any distance (non sibling) places out of catchment but that doesn’t sound like it’s the case so your younger children should have a reasonably good chance of being admitted unless I’m missing a detail.