Help! Submitting appeal form

[MrBloomEatsVeggies]

Hi, I'm submitting my appeal form today online, and I only have 3000 characters, I've written way more than that! Would it be better to put a brief outline of each point and then say at the bottom that I will be expanding upon my points at appeal?

I've researched and written so much!

Yes - give enough information to convey all the main points and say that you will add further detail in your presentation on the day. If you introduce lots of fresh arguments/material on the day, the panel may decide to adjourn so that they and the LEA can consider it and you probably don't want to add that delay into the process.

Alternatively, print out and fill in the Appeal form from the LEA website and add a note in the "Reasons for Appeal" section saying "Please see attached information" - then attach your full statement to the form.

That's what we have done.

Thanks ComeInto and pinwick...which would be a better method of submission? I worry that a letter will be lost.

You can send as "recorded signed for" - first class and means you get a signature to say its been delivered or "special delivery" which you can track online.

We had much more to say than the online form would allow for, hence the decision to post!

pinwick, did you add much more to your presentation on appeal day, than was on your form, or did you put your entire case on it? Thanks for your help

We have put the majority of our case on the form.

We haven't had our appeal yet - once we get the LEA's statement, we will most likely add something relating to that on the day. However, we felt it was important to put everything relevant down so that the panel had that information prior to the appeal.

Are you saying that the admission authority are limiting what you can say to 3000 characters?
If so that is maladministration because they are not giving you the opportunity to say everything that you want to say. Having said that 3000 characters should really be enough.

Well, I'm not entirely sure. When I submitted my admission form online it was the same, 3000 characters. However on the admission form it did say that you could send an attachment if you wanted to send additional information.

It could well be that the online appeal form said the same, but I missed it. I'll go back and check.

You say that 3000 characters should be enough. Does that mean that the appeals panel prefer you to be succinct?

Can't check it, the page displays an error message. I feel like the Gods are against me.

Succinct is good. You obviously don't want to be so succinct that you miss important points from your case, but it makes the panel's life easier if your case is clear and to the point, so that they can understand the basis of your appeal and the issues involved.

Thanks prh47...there is one thing about the appeals process that I'm finding annoying. Is is incumbent on the parents to find out what the criteria for the school is? On the admission form, nowhere did it state the criteria for our 1st choice school. In fact, I had to ring and ask the LEA. They told us that the criteria for our first school was the standard criteria, i.e. Children in care, normal area, siblings, something I can't remember, and out of catchment/other.
We fall into the last bracket.

However, at my request I have today received 'How to apply for a place at Primary School' - a guide for parents 2011-12.

In it, it states that voluntary controlled schools (our 1st choice) criteria is children in care, normal area, siblings, faith, others. It stipulated that if you can provide proof that you have attended regularly, you must submit this.
Well, This past year I have not attended regularly due to childcare issues, so i couldn't provide that evidence. DS1 goes to Sunday school there. I'm annoyed that had I attended regularly I would have lost an important opportunity to 'up' my criteria placing.

Also, whilst I'm on that subject, I find the regular attendance 'proof' absolutely ridiculous (as evidenced by the recent thread on here). I am a Christian, my son is being raised a Christian, I try to live my life according to Christian values. I was confirmed in 2007, and have attended the same church, albeit irregularly since before my boys were born. Not attending church regularly does not make me any less of a Christian. I do not have to be inside a church building to worship. God is with me wherever I am, and I can talk to Him whenever I feel like it.

The LEA's method of 'proving' the validity of parents Christian values is so flawed it's almost laughable. I am a Christian, yet parents who have no beliefs but attended church once a month get a place. Something needs to be done about this. I think the faith criteria needs to be removed from voluntary controlled schools because it's patently not fair.

Rant over!!!

MrBloom - I wouldn't say it's incumbent on parents to check the admissions criteria for schools but it's an obvious and sensible step, so surely everyone does at the time they are applying? It is incumbent on LEAs to publish this information too - is yours a rarity amongst LEAs which doesn't publish an annual booklet with all the information about admissions criteria, number of places awarded last year in each category, distance at which last place awarded etc? The LEA has (by the sound of it) sent you the booklet for 20011/2, was there really no comparable booklet for 2010/11?

And, I have to say, your rant about church attendance and faith criteria is misplaced. All admissions criteria have to be based around something that can be measured and assessed: is the child in care? does the child have a sibling at the school? how far does the child live from the school? do the parents regularly attend church? are they involved in parish life, etc? That way, the school/LEA can make an objective decision about whether the child fulfils the admissions criteria and appeal panels can double-check that the decision has been made correctly. There is no way that a system could be devised that would assess what parents believe or how sincerely they subscribe to Christian values. You may feel that you are as good a Christian as the people who attend regularly (and I'm quite happy to believe it) but you cannot seriously expect a school or an appeal panel to run some sort of 'who's a better Christian' competition to decide who gets the places. It would be intrusive, subjective and completely unworkable. Of course there are drawbacks in basing the faith category around church attendance - and yes, some people play the system and you yourself suggest that you would have done if you'd known of it - but it's the least bad system anyone can devise.

If you want to argue for the abolition of the faith category, I suggest that you raise this in the first place with your diocese. You might also want to look up the recent remarks of the Bishop of Oxford, who suggested that C of E schools should reserve fewer of their places under the faith category. The C of E school nearest to me has one third of its places set aside as community places to which the church attendance criteria do not apply, but actually fills about half its places without reference to church attendance.

I'm afraid I agree with PanelMember. The criteria for 2011/12 are available on the council's website. I presume the 2010/11 criteria were similarly available. There is a note on page 12 regarding the proof required if you want priority on faith grounds. Voluntary Aided schools which set their own admission criteria would require similar proof in line with the policy set by the diocese. I'm afraid the church thinks you need to attend church regularly if you want priority as a Christian.

Although I have been completely naive throughout this process, and I did check the criteria with the LEA, who didn't mention faith as a criteria. I accepted what they told me. I was not given, or directed to a booklet with the information that you mention, and didn't know that such a document existed.

'you cannot seriously expect a school or an appeal panel to run some sort of 'who's a better Christian' competition to decide who gets the places'

But that's sort of what it comes down to isn't it, when you think about it. Parent A attends church regularly, Parent B doesn't, however is still a Christian. Parent A gets the place.

I appreciate that it's difficult to devise a fair system. I know of the Bishop's comments, and I think he talks a lot of sense.

Ah, OK, I somehow missed that then . Onwards and upwards though...

Please excuse me but I'm about to hi jack a minute.
When applying for a proper faith school is it the parents attendence at church or the childs that's taken into consideration.
The reason I ask (apart from curiousity) is that myself and my partner don't attend church but our 3 young children do on a regular basis.
Would that be enough to get them into a faith school or is it based on the parents?

Parent A attends church regularly, Parent B doesn't, however is still a Christian. Parent A gets the place.

But that's exactly the point that you are missing. Obviously I haven't seen the criteria for your preferred school but I dare say they follow the usual form of words, something like "Children whose parents or carers
are faithful and regular worshippers at [the church]". It doesn't say that they have to be Christians (although that is obviously implied) but ties admission to something measurable, ie church attendance. What you seem to be advocating is some some of spirituality test or assessment, under which someone who seldom goes to church could somehow convince the school that they were just as much a Christian as someone who attended regularly. There is no conceivable way of doing that in a way that is measurable, systematic or fair - the school cannot look into people's souls - and the school would be in an invidious position. Besides, it is part of Christian doctrine that Christians should attend church, to meet in fellowship with other Christians, so no church school is likely to be won over to the idea that one can be a devout Christian and yet rarely go to church.

Discodaisy - It all depends on what the criteria for that school say. In the faith schools that I know of, the relevant criterion is expressed in terms of the child attending with the parents. The child being taken to Sunday school by granny while mum and dad have a lie-in does not usually count. So, in my experience, your children would not get a faith place in a faith school (although they might still get a community place) but other schools may do things differently.

Thank you Panelmember. Like I say it was just out of curiousity. My children attend church every sunday morning but I don't go in with them. I sit in a seperate room within the church and wait for them.
The school 2 of them attend is a non selective CofE junior school so religion doesn't come into the admissions criteria.
Thank you once again!

@Panelmember

Sounds mad and I know its no grounds for appeal, but there does seem something really odd about the idea that 'Child A's parents are agnostics who believe he/she needs exposure to a Christian upbringing to allow him'her to choose, so arrange for him/her to attend Church / Child B's parents are believers who don't wish to expose their children to overt faith teaching yet', therefore faith school prioritises Child B.

Can't you argue this is anomolous because all other criteria are about children and their needs, and this one is based on parents?

I would also beg you to raise the issue formally with the school, even if it doesn't affect the appeal. I work at a VA school and our governing body is seriously upset by the fact that this year's intake includes sizable numbers of children from outside the local parish community who have attended church (I'm not speaking to their sincerity, although some are) in ways which have limited the parish catchment area to the street on which the school is. This does not strike them as what a Christian parish school should do. Neither, clearly, does it strike individuals such as Oxford as what was intended.

So pressure you bring may well lead to a redrawing of criteria, which would help others and maybe you if you go on a waiting list. But nobody is going to examine parents' faith in unobjective ways, I'm afraid.

Adela - I see what you're getting at, but (and sorry for the repetition as I've said this twice already) the point is that the faith-based criterion is always worded on more or less these lines because it is objective and measurable. Yes, it is true that it doesn't cater for the 'spiritually-aware person who would like their child to receive a Christian education' category or for the 'someone who holds themselves to be a Christian but doesn't go to church' category but, even if something could be devised that did cater for these groups, it would fall foul of various parts of the admissions code. What the earlier poster seemed to be arguing for was some sort of assessment of how Christian or spiritual a person was. That immediately falls foul of the requirement that criteria should be fair, because it depends on a subjective judgment and is so open to bias; it could probably only be done by interviewing the parents, so falls foul of that part of the admissions code too.

I doubt that any diocese is hugely sympathetic to the arguments of people who say that they are Christians and so deserve a place at the school on that basis, and yet don't go to church. For obvious reasons, churches regard attending church as a very important measure of someone's Christian commitment. Where I think there may be more scope for change - and the Bishop of Oxford's remarks may give more impetus to this - is in the number of places at each school which are 'community places' to which the church attendance criteria don't apply.

Adela - How many of your school's places are community places? Increasing that number may offer some protection to local children who are currently failing to get places and that's a decision within the governors' powers.

Adela - One last point I should have mentioned. In your scenario, Child A would only get a place in any of the faith schools around here if the parents took her to church - arranging for her to go to church (with granny/au pair./whoever) wouldn't be enough.