Reception Class Appeal - Need help!

[SonalK]

I have lodged an appeal for reception class for my lil daughter on the basis of facilities provided by the school.

Situation is: I did not get 1st NOR 2nd preference....directly 3rd (Still better of than those who havent even got any stated preferred option.). I have been rejected first two preferences based on oversubscription.

We are both full time working parents and at the moment its extremely difficult alter our office times extensively to strike a balance between work and school runs. Our preferred 1st choice of school provides breakfast and after school club which is perfect and helps working parents like us where we can drop our child early and pickup after work. The school that we have got (3rd choice) though it is nearest to our home it doesnt provide an after school club which puts us under immense pressure to find a childminder etc... I have also been ringing a lot of childminders and all of them are not able to accomodate. I am really in a fix.

What I dont understand is why do the council asks us to state preference when they want to do what they think is right based on unreasonable laws!! Council has no idea what the personal circumstances of a family are and why have they chosen a particular school as 1st or 2nd preference...why do they ask us to provide additional comments while applying for a school place....just so they can ignore and do THEY think is right?

Instead of encouraging parents to strike a balance between school and work and helping them out...are they expecting us to leave our jobs and stay home and look after kids and NOT have a quality life. It's sad to see this happen in a country like this!

Anyway, I have appealed with the slightest hope that things will work my way, I wanted some help from any one out there so I can prepare for the hearing and anything that can make my case stronger?

Thanks.

Unfortunately childcare is not taken into account for school allocation nor is it grounds for appeal. I know it's not what you want to hear but that's just how it is.

Preference is a joke. You get what you're given here too. Have you asked where on the waiting lists you are for your first two choices? There may be movement yet.

Yes...7th(first preference) in the and 5th(second preference) as of last week.

They ask you to state preferences because those do have a part to play in the process. However, you are only entitled to state a preference, not choose a school. If a school is oversubscribed they must use the school's oversubscription criteria (which must be fair and objective) to decide who gets offered a place. They cannot give you priority just because you have named the school as your first preference. That is illegal. A very high proportion of parents get their first preference. However, there are some areas where you are unlikely to get your first preference unless it is your nearest school.

As Hermionestranger says, childcare difficulties are not a factor they are allowed to take into account when allocating places, nor will they win your appeal.

If this is an infant class size appeal you should only win if you can show that a mistake has been made and you should have been offered a place - for example, they have placed your child in the wrong admissions category or they have measured the home to school distance incorrectly. If you have no evidence of a mistake you are unlikely to win.

If this is not an infant class size case you have a better chance. You need to concentrate on showing why this is the correct school for your daughter. Look for anything the preferred school has that is missing from the allocated school and would be of particular benefit to your daughter. If, for example, your daughter is musically talented and the preferred school has more musical activities (a band, for example) that would be worth bringing up. Note that it must be of benefit to her, not to you, so the after school provision is unlikely to count.

Thanks for all the information...much appreciated.

The two schools in debate here is the one I have been offered which is 0.31 miles and the one which was my first preference is 0.36 miles...they are both 0.3miles from home (schoolsfinder.direct.gov.uk/)...then why wasnt I offered the my first preference?...0.05 difference?

Cross posted with Tiggytape but agree with everything she says.

I tend to say "a mistake has been made" to sum up the three grounds on which you can win an ICS appeal. In detail these are:

• the admission arrangements do not comply with the relevant law or the compulsory provisions of the Admissions Code and your daughter would have been admitted if they had complied

• the admission authority has not administered the admission arrangements correctly and impartially, and your daughter should have been admitted if the arrangements had been administered correctly

• the decision to refuse admission was unreasonable. Note that the bar for deciding that a decision is unreasonable is very high. It must be "so outrageous in its defiance of logic or accepted moral standards that no sensible person who had applied his mind to the question to be decided could have arrived at it."

On distance, the first thing to say is that the LA will have used a more accurate measurement system than the one on schoolsfinder. That only measures from the centre of your postcode (which may be some distance from your house) to the centre of the school's postcode.

But the reason you weren't offered your first choice is that all the places were taken by children who were in higher admission categories or lived closer to the school than you. The distance for the last child offered a place varies from school to school. The fact that the distance from your home to the two schools is similar is irrelevant. If your first preference is a popular school you may have missed out even if you lived closer to it than you do to the allocated school.

Gosh...I am a bit shattered atm...little hope is NO hope atm. :)

Are you saying that councils just leave it to the parents fate to sort out the mess that they have created for them.

Why is is the Council' fault?

I mean the laws that they need to abide to...not really 'councils'.

School places allocation is a whole debate on its own. There has to a way to allocate school places that is the fairest to as many people as possible. Available child care local to the school isn't one of the criteria.

We get this a lot at my school because we have a very good breakfast/afterschool/holiday club and we are oversubscribed.

Schools are supposed to be able point you in the direction of extended services care, but that could just be a list of childminders.

It is hard for working parents and you will hear 'school isn't child care' a lot over the next few years.

I have been ringing most of the childminders in my area...and havent got anyone yet.

I completely understand your point but I fail to understand how are full time working parents able to cope with this pressure.

I have 6 local schools. The distances from my house (as measured by the LEA) are :

1. 0.2 miles
2. 0.4 miles
3. 0.4 miles
4. 0.8 miles
5. 1.3 miles
6. 1.9 miles.

Which school are my DC's at? The one that is much further away by safest walking route than the 1.9 miles away that is measured by straight line distance and us actually 2.7 miles away when you are walking but measuring straight line distance gets my LEA out of paying transport costs.

It's crap, and I either spend £48 a week on bus fares, or walk 54 miles a week, making my DC's from the age of 4yo walk 27 miles a week.

It's a preference, not a choice, they can't give you a place in a school that is already full with siblings and those who live closer than you. It's awful, but you are unlikely to win an appeal on transport or childcare issues.

Could you talk to the after school club at your first preference school and see if they either a) Do pick-ups from the other school, or b) If they accept DC's from other local schools, as then you would only have to find a childminder willing to pick up from your allocated school and drop off at the school WITH an after-school club?

Btw, when DS2 was allocated a school, it WASN'T the same school as DD and DS1, despite the sibling link as there were 71 siblings that year!! I won an appeal, as did the other 11 people with siblings that lived too far away from the school, and the school opened up a bulge class (they built a new classroom over the summer holidays, the DC's had an 8 week holiday that year), and filled it full to have an intake of 90 that year.

Before we found out about the bulge class, though, the LEA said it was down to us to ensure that ALL our DC's got to school on time, even if they had to be in st the same time at schools in totally opposite directions. They told us that it was not their problem how we managed that, and if any of the DC's were persistently late, the EWO would be informed! They told us to pay for a childminder etc to drop the DC's off at school. I couldn't do that - I was on NMW working nights, and the childminder's fees were more than 2 day's wages. I was only working 4 hours a day!

They will not give two figgy hoots HOW you manage your childcare, as long as you DO!

Also, there could be non-working parents living close to the school who have probably have got their lil ones in my first preference stated school...whereas there are working parents like us who are in need of that school due to after school and breakfast club facilities.

WHts DC??

They def do not accept children from other schools...I have already asked.

Have you asked at the school you have been allocated what other parents at the school do about before/after school care? I'm sure you won't be the only working parent there.

I have already asked the school and the answer I get is...there isnt enuf number of parents demanding for the need of after school club and hence the school cannot afford...but on the other hand is childcare very affordable for parents?

I am not saying working parents should get priority over non-working ones...all I am saying is the system is still not fair!

So how would you make the system any fairer?
You will always be bias towards your own needs so what you may see as fair somebody else would see as unfair.
The only real answer is for all schools to be outstanding, all schools to offer wrap around care and all schools be able to take increased numbers should the demand be higher some years. The simple reality is non of those things is possible for many different reasons so the government and councils have to work the fairest system they can with the way things are. I don't think they do a bad job of it, I think the only times that parents may be right in saying the system is unfair and disadvantages a group of people is when you start getting into the murky world of faith schools. My personal opinion is that faith schools should run like our faith school does, as it is a village school and the only option (next nearest school over 2 miles away with no safe walking route) faith only comes into it after children in care, catchment siblings, catchment and out of catchment siblings however even then you could say well I want my child to be educated according to my faith but I can't get into my nearest faith school because children who are not of my faith but live closer take all the places and what is the point of a faith school if it is filled with children of no faith or a different faith just because of where they live. Then you get into the debate on the whole should their be faith schools but the point of my post is you could apply the same arguments to working parents and non working parents in regards to schools that offer the wrap around care. All you ever do is argue yourself round in circles.
At the end of the day all you can do is your best within the system you are in. Talk to your allocated school, ask them to but a notice up or something in the news letter asking about wrap around care, current parents will be able to help you find something. I know I didn't think there were any childminders in the village before my children were school age, there was no one who took babies but I found out through the grape vine at school that in fact there are two, it's just they only take school aged children for wrap around care.
I wouldn't go into the appeal with the argument you have laid out here as you are likely to put peoples backs up, you have mine, it feels like you are saying that as a non working parent I have less right to a place at my local school then others who may both work, why do you think my child matters so much less then yours?

We are in a very similar position.

DS got a place at our catchment school (our 3rd choice), which has a free breakfast club, but no after school club. None of the CM who pick up from his school have spaces, some very kind ones have tried to re-rig their other kids, but to no avail (you can't be in 2 places at once and you can't leave a 4yo standing at the school gates!!).

Luckliy I only work 22.5hrs a week, so I am applying to work 5 short days instead of the 3 full days I currently work. However if this is not allowed I will have to leave my job, after 21 years, and lose all my long service, kibosh my pension, etc.
However there is no one else to do it, so thats it. I think all chlidren should be intitleed to after school care (not free) to help parents stay in work

Or at least have it compulsory for schools to run a after school and breakfast clubs to help working parents...so at least they dont have to go against the system. They will opt to stay on the waiting list and wait until a place become available in the preferred school due to xyz reasons if they want to.

But what if a school doesn't have enough uptake on the wrap around care to meet the cost? If iti s compulsory then where is the money for that shortfall going to come from? School budgets have already been slashed, running wrap around care at a loss would then be taking money away from the actual education of all the children at the school, can you imagine 'No, you have to share a book because Tom's parents work and need childcare so we have to provide it meaning there is no money for you to have a textbook each', there would quite rightly be outrage!

agreed but if I think from an individual point of view...sorry I might be selfish here. I also cannot afford childcare costs as compared to after school/breakfast club costs...inflation is affecting us at the same time and everything is getting more and more expensive. Cost of living has gone up. what am I supposed to do to strike a balance between work and school....!!

I know I am arguing very heavily for the current system but don't get me wrong, I have every sympathy, I really do, it is hard enough to work as a parent as it is without this kind of added pressures.
I am lucky in that I work free lance and I can work while I have my children with me (would rather I didn't but the fact is I can) and I have no need to use paid for childcare. I however don't know how the hell I would manage if I was in the situation of two children at different schools or a school too far to walk but didn't qualify for transport/lived in an area where only bus travel is free for the child so the parent still has to pay their fairs as I do not have the cash available to be paying for childcare to make sure both children get to school on time or to pay for four bus trips a day, I simply don't have it, we live on a tighter then tight budget. So I empathise greatly with people left in this situation when over subscription means they are unable to get any school place local to them, in places like this with these so called 'black holes' then yes, absolutely the councils need to do something about it, they need to expand schools or build new ones.
What I do object to, and the reason I joined this thread arguing on the side of the government and councils is a sense of entitlement that comes from some groups of parents (and I am not necessarily putting anyone on this thread in that category, I know nothing about you or your families to label you in this way), the idea that the fact they work trumps all else, that parents who don't work have less rights and are not important. The one I hate most is the 'I pay al this money in my taxes' argument, as a parent who works only very few hours I feel they are saying they are better then me, their children more deserving of an education then mine. I know that in most cases that is not what they mean and I can take things too much to heart because I the way I feel about my own situation (I will never be able to work a full time job again due to disability, I can't drive as I am now partially sighted. My disability is an invisible one and I don't spend time at the school gate discussing the state of my health so unless you are a friend you wouldn't know the problems I have) however if they were able to take a step back and really look at what they were saying, analize their arguments without the amount of emotion they have invested in the issue they would be able to see why their arguments are flawed and why their arguments can be so hurtful to others.
I am lucky as all this is academic to me, I live in a rural location, we have an outstanding village school, we live in the village so way inside the catchment, I have two children and both have places at the school. The school has some after school provision and their are options within the village should I ever need it. I am one of the very lucky ones, people from outside our catchment fight for places at our school but it doesn't effect me however I would be very hurt if I heard one of the people who couldn't get a place at our school insinuate that their child should get a place ahead of mine because I don't need the wrap around care, I don't work full time difficult hours and therefore I should have the time and means to get my children to another school. If you step away and think about it that is what some of you are implying, not through malice (I hope!) but because things haven't gone your way and now you are in a difficult position. So I feel for you, I understand how it must me very difficult, give you a great deal of uncertainty and make the school transfer harder then it should be for both you and your children but I do beg you to take a step back and listen to what you are saying, yes, it may not feel fair but when you look at the big picture there really is no fairer way of doing things.

But if every school was obliged to provide wrap around care, what would that mean? Enough spaces for 10%, 50%, 100% of pupils? Unless it was 100% you could just as easily miss out as it happened that the majority of year 1 and year 2 had child care needs.

Also after school club and and after school childminder cost approx the same in my school!