Admissions advice please-can schools tell what order i put them on my list?

[Totallyfloaty35]

A school that i viewed today said that everyone who put it down as 1st choice last year got a place,with the rest of the places going to those who had it as second choice....
but how do they know what order you choose?

The school was wrong.

Paragraph 3.19 of the School Admissions Code states "Each admission authority must maintain a waiting list... making clear that children will be ranked in the same order as the published oversubscription criteria." There is also a definition at the end of the code saying that a waiting list is "a list of children... on which children are ranked in priority order against the school's published oversubscription criteria." The "oversubscription criteria" are what we usually refer to as the admission criteria.

There are some limited circumstances in which children can jump the queue, e.g. when a school closes. But using different rules for calculating distance as you describe is definitely aganist the rules.

As it is a faith school I expect it was acting as its own admissions authority so it was the school that got it wrong. If someone points out the problem to the LA they may well tell the school to mend their ways.

Thanks for clarifying that for me, and actually for all the advice you give relating to admissions. I found these forums to be a great resource during the period where I was preparing my appeal, even though I never specifically posted for help.

PRH is correct in saying it is the school that is at fault here. It does happen on waiting lists for schools that are their own admission criteria and unless the right questions are asked at an appeal it will not be obvious. There have also been occaisonal instances where the set criteria are not actally adhered to. This is usually where the school is relying on the priest etc for info and they do their own thing rather than what is published.
If you are appealing for a school that is their own admission authority it is always worth asking the question can you confirm that the admission criteria used to agree the rank order was that in the admission booklet of the LA. If they answer "of course" without looking at it I like to have a second question that is specific to the criteria just to have a second check that all is OK. Something like "so the priest has confirmed all the appealants attendance using the agreed form"

Many years on.... :)

I saw a faith school online today. The head mentioned that in Sept 2020 90% of year 7 places went to those who had put the school down as their 1st preference. Is that just a coincidence that iyt happended that way? I'm really concerned as I have 6 schools to list and the 3 that I want the most I may be a little too far away from to be favoured. The concern is that if I do not put my 4th choice (which is a school we would likely get in to) higher up, if the top 3refuse I wont even get a place at the 4thas it wasnt higher up. Stastics published on sites such as locrating worry me - you see that most offers (in the hundreds) go to those who listed it as first choice and a small number usually well below 50 of their offers are made to 2nd choice and 3rd choice offers were in single digits! any advice for getting it right?

Put the schools in genuine order of preference.

Admissions authorities MUST work within the Equal Preference System. Which means each admissions authority will simply look at the complete list of ALL people who apply for a school, and rank them by admissions criteria, then submit this list to the central admissions administrators (LEA) for your area. The LEA then work out if any child appears on more than one list; if so, they are offered the school highest on their application, and removed from the other lists.

Where a school comes on your list has no impact on whether you are offered a place UNLESS there are 2 or more schools who can offer you a place. Then you get offered the one that is higher on your list.

Always put a "banker" on the list, at the bottom - the school you are likely to get into, but ideally don't want, but would take over anything else not on the list. This means you minimise your chances of getting nothing on your list and being offered something a long way away.

I agree, and think schools quote the figures in a misleading way. It's good that lots of parents liked the school enough to put it first, but they didn't get it BECAUSE they put it first. So it could be seen as a measure of popularity (although even that is not certain as many people will just put the nearest school) but you should still rank in genuine order. Even if you put it last choice, you will still get preference over someone who put it first but comes in lower down the admission criteria e.g. lives further away.

I think the reason there are only a few getting in who put it 2nd or 3rd is due to lots just putting the school automatically and hopefully lots getting their first choice generally in the area, so lots of children get the schools they want.

When looking at schools the HT for my DDs primary school explained how she'd do it. We get 3 preferences.

She says for number 1 put your favourite school, the school you'd absolutely love your child to go to or if you have an older child already there put their school down.

Number 2 is your dead cert school the school that on all of the available data your child would have got into. If this is the same school as No1 put another school down that you'd be guarenteed to get into.

Number 3 any other school in the area that you can get your child to even if you need to use wraparound at the school if you have another child elsewhere.

In our area most parents get their number 1 school, the rest get at least 1 of their other schools on the list. They've only had once in the last 10 years where parents have not got any of the schools they stated on the form. The year my DD started 99.1% of children got into their No1 choice, and the remaining 0.9% got either school 2 or 3 on their list.

In the admission process, all schools are not supposed to receive any information about what preference any parent put down on their application form. I am not saying that it never happens because I know of a couple of instances when it has happened by mistake.
But in general the school does not know whether as a parent you put down the school as first preference or lowest preference. What information the school does have is the total number of preferences for the school and how many of each preference there were. The headteacher may therefore be able to make some assumptions from this data but they cannot say definitively that 90% of the pupils receiving a place put it down as first preference.
This gaming by headteachers of giving what is false information has been going on for many years and it is about time that it is stopped by somebody being bought to task for it.

@admission

In the admission process, all schools are not supposed to receive any information about what preference any parent put down on their application form. I am not saying that it never happens because I know of a couple of instances when it has happened by mistake. But in general the school does not know whether as a parent you put down the school as first preference or lowest preference. What information the school does have is the total number of preferences for the school and how many of each preference there were. The headteacher may therefore be able to make some assumptions from this data but they cannot say definitively that 90% of the pupils receiving a place put it down as first preference. This gaming by headteachers of giving what is false information has been going on for many years and it is about time that it is stopped by somebody being bought to task for it.

Thank you, that is helpful ans does make it clearer for me.

Now the hard part.....putting them in order :)

I'm also confused about this - I've got a preferred school but it's very hard to get into, so I'm worried that putting this as my first choice instead of one we're more likely to get into will then mean we don't get the second choice school because they will see it as not our preferred choice. Does that make sense?

Also why does it say on the admissions form on the website to put your preferred school first if it doesn't matter?

All preferences are regarded as equal initially. Only when you meet the criteria for more than one school does the preference come into play, and you will be allocated your higher (or highest) preference. I just wish heads would not try to give advice; most of them do not understand the system.

The system means that you should put your schools in the order of your preference because all your preferences are initially treated as being equal and the schools should not know in what preference order you have put down the schools.
For every school the order of priority is dictated by the admission criteria for that specific school but will eventually come down to how far from the school do you live. So for each school there is an admission criteria order, based solely on the admission criteria and nothing to do with how you have put the schools down in terms of preference.
The LA are ultimately responsible for the allocation of places and they will have the admission criteria order for each school. What then happens is that they start by looking at the school list that you put down as top preference and check where your application is on the list. If the school has 30 available places and you are 25th on the list then you get offered a place and it will be the only offer made to you. If you are 35th on the list then you will not be offered a place and the LA will then go through the same consideration for the school you put down as second priority and then third priority etc. If the LA cannot offer you a place at any of your preference schools then they will offer you a place at the nearest school which has places. As this could be anywhere that is why the advice is always to put down as your last preference the school that you believe is closest to your home and that you are most likely to be within the first 30 places on their admission criteria order list, no matter how much you do not really want a place at the school. A local poor school is always preferable to an equally or maybe even worse school some distance from your home.

OK, I'm slightly going to defend schools here. I don't doubt that some break the rules in the advice they give, but sometimes I suspect it's actually that parents misunderstand what they've been told. I work in an oversubscribed primary. Every single year, we get disappointed parents phoning up after offer day who would quite easily have got a place on distance, but who decided to put another less popular school first because they considered us a long shot and thought that it would be 'safest' to put another school first - so that's what they get. I am constantly telling parents to order their list in their true order of preference, and that does sometimes include explicitly telling them to name us first if we are their first choice, or to put another school first if that is their first choice. I would never tell them they have to name us first to have a chance of a place (even though that's almost literally true, as the other local schools are mostly undersubscribed), but it's possible that they misinterpret what I say. I really do take my responsibility to give advice very seriously, and I make sure I do understand the system so that I can advise parents accurately.

I completely agree with you, it is sometime down to parents. The school where I am chair of governors we have a nursery which is part of the school. Experience over the last 3 years says that no matter how many times you tell the parents in the nursery, there are always 2 or 3 who forget to put an application in or just assume that they will automatically get a place. As we hand out letters individually to parents, telling them what to do and then tell them when they only have a week to go to apply on time, to make sure they have applied. We even have filled the forms in with the parents using the school's computers when we have concerns but eventually you just have to accept there are some parents that simply will always get it wrong

It is the children that I feel for when they have made friends at nursery and due to their parents' incompetence do not get the place which they deserve.

Hi all (mums);... but I am a Dad (LoL), urgently seeking advice for my baby-girl primary-school application.

Sorry, if I'm hijacking this thread, but I'm doing the Primary school application for my daughter now.

So, scanning this thread;... is it still officially still 'equal-preference, NOT first-preference' system in UK primary school system here in UK? As of 2021?

And even if it's 'official',... unofficially, what is actually happening? ;-) .... Urgent advice and worried Dad...

Yes, the equal preference system is still the law in England.

Yes, the equal preference system is still one of the chief features of the system in England. Check the oversubscription criteria for the schools you’re interested - and include at least one you can bank on - and put them down in your genuine order of preference.

@zanzibarmum

DiscoDaisy you are spot on - schools don't know for current applicants their preference order but they will know in aggregate how places were allocated by preference ranking for previous years. So schools who say put them first if you want a place may be being helpful to applicants. What do they say about a little knowledge?

No, they are not being helpful. It could well be the case that those who put them second choice didn't end up there because they got a place at their first choice.

Suppose an area has three schools
A - unpopular, very few people's first choice
B, C - good schools, which most people put 1st/2nd in some order

A will only get those who put them first choice or fail to get into either B or C.
Some people may get their second choice out of B and C, because of the admissions criteria.
If there are enough places for all who want them in B/C between them, then A will only get those who put them first preference, whilst B and C will have a mix of 1st/2nd.

Schools giving out this advice are at best not understanding the system, and at worst trying to scare people into putting them first, because that will give them more pupils.

I work in admissions in a large state secondary and see the preferences, it doesn’t matter though as the LA operate an equal preference system that is executed electronically. I used to be an LA admissions officer and the stress that some parents put themselves under re choosing a school causes a lot of heartache. It doesn’t make any difference to us what preference you put us and we explain this to parents every year, we really don’t care about the number! Put the schools you really want in the order you want them and I always suggest a banker school that you don’t really want, but would accept then you can appeal the others if you don’t get in. I’m my experience, schools that say you’re guaranteed to get in if you put them first are not usually oversubscribed and want to make themselves seem more popular than they are. Choose the school you want for your child but be realistic re distances etc.

I wish people would stop making this system seem so complicated. There isn't a trick to it. You view several schools decide which one you like best, that one goes first, the one you like second best goes second and so on it really is that simple. The only bit to remember is to make sure at least 1 of the schools on your list is a certainty unless you are happy for them to allocate just any school which has space and may be far away.

I rank admissions applications for several primary schools and can confirm we don't know what preference an application has been given. We know how many of each preference we have received and sometimes parents state what preference they have listed it as. However they are all processed equally, ranked against the oversubscription criteria and then by distance. Sometimes we process a child's application for 4 schools - they may be in catchment for one, out of catchment for 2 others and out of catchment with a sibling at the school, for example, so we would process them individually for each school. Unless the parents state the preference you can only guess how they have listed them. However, any admissions officer who takes pride in their job wants the satisfaction of knowing they have processed it all correctly. We go through several checks to make sure we have ranked every application correctly.

@TheNextMrsDepp

I can think of one reason to choose carefully. In our area there were a few people last year who, when the admissions were announced, didn't get into ANY of their three choices.

Lots of panicked phone calls to the local C of E "fall-back" school that everyone had expected to get into (hence not bothered to put first on the list)! At the eleventh hour the school agreed to open an extra class but it would only help those who had put it as their FIRST choice.

So if there is a risk that none of your choices will come off, then you might want to give some thought as to who you put first, because you may find it hard to win an appeal for one that you didn't. I've a feeling you can only go onto the waiting list of your first choice too.

Sorry, I think this is school gate gossip,

If you don’t get into any schools then you can go on the waiting list/ appeal to all the schools on your list, and they won’t know what place they were in on your list because they don’t get to see your original application. Noone does.

I also think that if a school has had to open an extra class then the children they accept will have been allocated to the school using the original admission criteria as laid out in agreement with the LA.. Many popular schools are oversubscribed, they don’t all immediately open new classrooms! It is only in exceptional circumstances that bulge classes are formed.

Sorry, just realised this thread is older than the dinosaurs. ZOMBIE

The order of your preferences only matters if you will meet the criteria to get in to the school. If you don't have a hope of meeting the criteria (say you only meet the distance criteria, you're 15 miles away and for the last 10 years the furthest child admitted was 2.5 miles) then whether that school is 1 or 6 on your form, it's irrelevant - you won't get it.

If you put a school that you're guaranteed a place at (e.g. it's undersubscribed and you live on the doorstep) but don't actually want, in slot 1, you will get that school, and the school you really wanted that you put 2nd will be rejected.

So the way to do it is to put what you want (but perhaps it's a slim chance of getting) first. Then all your other choices, in order of preference, but make sure you include a school you know you would get a place at and could accept.

You will never miss out on a good school place by putting your choices in genuine preference order, as long as you include a school that you have a strong chance of getting. When people come unstuck, is that they choose 6 'aspirational' (i.e. virtually impossible) schools and don't include their local school. Then they do the sad face newspaper article, saying 'my child has to travel 11 miles to school'.

The key points have already been made in the thread but I did just want to add that schools do get some information from the local authority regarding preference.

It's not on an individual level nor does it make a difference to anything but, for example, our school was informed by the authority that we were over-subscribed last year and that all of our wider available places (after siblings) went to applicants who had listed us as first preference. Our nearest school were also told that a number of their intake had listed them initially as second or later preference (no names or identifiers though).