help regarding appeal?

[Loobylou8888]

hi everyone! just joined to this site and im wondering if anyone has or is going through the same issue as myself. My daughter has attended her nursery for 2years and i applied for her a place in the primary part of the school. Have recieved the letter this week with the most heartbreaking news.... she has not been accepted.

Granted this is a faith school and as of yet i have not had my daughter baptised as i have just had my son and i was planning on a joint batisim. I know that the school accept pupils that are not of any religion as my nephew goes to the same school and he is not baptised and a few other pupils i know are not either. My sister had this worry last year when she applied and she spoke to a teacher who said that it didnt just rely on that for entry.

I have already been on the phone to the local admission place and the person i spoke to said that she missed out on grounds of religion, when i mentioned all of the above he agreed and said that the last pupil that was granted a place was not baptised either but lived closer to the school than i do. now i know that majority of children in the nursery that would of applied for that place dont actually live on the same "estate" as such as what i do.
I literally live a 3 min straight line walk to the school.

The school they have offered my daughter a place is litrally round the corner to the school i wanted but after reading the latest ofsted report which was published yesterday i have serious doubts over accepting the place as report pretty much states that majority of children are below average. I know all mothers are biased when it comes to their children but my daughter is extreamly clever for her age even her nursery teachers comment that shes a bright little girl, and i feel that if i accept the place at the other school my daughter will not be given the best oppertunities to progress aswell as possible.

Since finding out both my daughter and myself have been devestated, she doesnt want to leave her friends after 2 years. Im completly at loss as what to do, would appealing help? The school is still on easter holidays and does not reopen untill monday so i feel like a sitting duck as i cant speak to anyone there untill then. Any help or advice would seriously be greatful as seeing my daughter upset has resulted in me running off to the bathroom for a cry every 5 min. Also if i requested would the school be able to prove to me that indeed the last entrant to the school lived closer. I know that even still she may not of been accepted but it would help if they could actually show me evidence for this.

Thanks in advance :)

I know im going to have to book a visit at the other school and see if that settles any of the doubts ive got. my DD's nursery was absolutlely flawless not a thing any parent could fault on, staff, the way the kids progress everything was amazing and having spoke to parents whos kids left to go to reception last year apparently that trend has followed on to the primary aswell, which is making my choice of not getting her baptised all that harder for me to take :'( because i feel like my choice has resulted in her possibly missing out on a slighly better education.

I can see by reading other posts that im not the only mam in the same situation regarding not getting 1st choice of school. :( Its such a shame that there isnt a way that all this dissapointment could be avoided eg making the schools that are constantly getting over the amount of applicants to mabey extend their shool or something to save any future disheartened parents and kids.

They're not going to extend schools whilst they have space in other local schools. There's no money and, to be honest, they wouldn't do it even if there were any.

I know, its just hard to take when your the parent of a kid who never got accepted. Never did i think i'd see the day that i was envious of a 4yr old for getting a place in a school!

They are actually spending some money on new /extended schools, Mr Gove has just announced another £600M of spending, which should be enough for some around an extra 250,000 school places.
The problem is that you have to extend schools where they have sufficient room and if they are rubbish schools, well they are still rubbish schools even when they have more spaces.

admission i have noticed that the senior school i used to go to merged in another local senior school recently, they built one giant super school to put them both in but not sure whether that fell under the issue of building it to help create more schools or whether long term... merging them both seemed the better option than keeping them separate.

• supposed to say create more school spaces :s

Re: the religious aspect - are you sure it's as simple as "just" getting your child baptised? I thought you had to have a letter from the priest confirming your regular attendance at Mass over a long period of time. Regular as in at least a couple of times a month.
Did you know you wanted to be a Catholic when your dd was born?

As I said earlier, you need to look to see whether "Catholic child" is defined anywhere in the admissions criteria. Simply having a child baptised may not be enough to fulfil the criteria, if they demand baptism before a certain age or regular attendance at mass.

hi iv'e got the same thing neither me or my partner are baptised nor are my children we really want them baptised as my son goes to reception next year and he goes to a catholic school which is brilliant i would love him to carry on there i spoke to a priest and he said there is a waiting list till next year is there any way i can get it done quicker

I would be surprised if it were not possible, we had ours baptised during the regular Mass, of which there are two morning ones to choose. Also babies are usually baptised early in life, so unless it too has become a case of booking in with your scan, I imagine there is some way of bringing it forward, but maybe not in your own baptism service, iyswim. However although it is possible to have a Catholic baptism if neither parent is Catholic, the priest needs to be confident that the child will be raised as Catholic, maybe he is saying that if you are regularly attending mass and maybe put yourselves forward too then he would be happier, which is why he has advocated waiting. He is interested in your child's spiritual life, and may be concerned that you just want him baptised for the school place.