appeal advice if possible

[bjrl98]

hi im new on here we have our daughters appeal next week for reception in september .i have twin boys in the school which my daughter attends nursery but she didnt get place at our chosen school i didnt put any other school down as 2nd or 3rd choice silly i no . anyway iv refused the school she has been given as i took my 3 boys out of the school in 2009 for behaviour and fighting in the school which was shocking teachers had no control over pupils.
anyway im just wanting advice on what expect my twins get additional support in school and i have a letter to support their additional needs also i cant be in 2 places at once
thanks for any advice in advance

forgot to say im not in the catchment zone thats reason why i wasnt given place and we are on waiting list

yes theres 2 x 30 per class i do understand that my reasons wont help but the 2 schools are a mile apart aswell i have thought about changing schools altogether but its getting 2 places in the same year was hard enough to begin with to get them together
thanks for your reply

As tiggytape says, your chances don't sound good. Infant class size appeals are very hard to win (read all the many threads about them).

Being out of catchment has put you in one of the lower admission categories and it doesn't sound as if any mistake has been made. Draw the panel's attention to your twins' additional needs but unless the letter you have indicates that only the school you're appealing for can meet their needs it's not going to carry much weight. Even if the panel accept that this is the only suitable school, it's more likely that your application will be referred back to the medical-social panel and (perhaps) you'll be moved into that category on the waiting list (which presumably is higher than the category for out of catchment siblings).

You would be very unwise to put all your eggs in this appeal basket. You need a Plan B, such as another school for the twins which is nearer than the allocated one, or a school that can offer places to all your children, or home education until such time as your preferred school has places. If you go for this option, you obviously need to factor in how long it might be before the preferred school has two places to offer you.

And you know this already, but for the sake of other people who might be reading this thread I have to say that only putting one school on the application form - especially when you are in a low priority category for admission - is a very risky strategy. As you have sadly discovered, it often backfires. So too does refusing the place at the allocated school, as the LEA has no further obligation to offer alternative places and it could leave a child with no school to attend. Any new offer from the LEA could be at an even less popular school, even further away.

And sorry, I misread your first post. I can see that your twins are already in the school and it's your daughter for whom you're appealing.

i have spoken to the twins of going to a new school and they are not jumping for joy which is understandable no-one iv spoken to have mentioned nothing about the twins until today when i spoke to school secretary

You do need to establish exactly what the admission criteria is. There is almost for sure some priority for siblings even if it is divided into those in catchment and those out of catchment. As such you might have expected with some priority and 60 in the year group that you would have got a place. The only reasonable explanations are a very large year group with lots of in-catchment siblings or a mistake that they have not given any priority for siblings.
You should check with the admission office under what criteria you were placed and under what criteria the last allocated place was offered. IF your appeal is next week you should have received the schools case not to admit and all this info should be in there. Is it?

I agree with Admission.

I was assuming from the first posts that this was one of those schools that places out of catchment siblings in a lower category than children in catchment, along the lines of

looked-after children
social/medical need
siblings in catchment
other children in catchment
siblings out of catchment
others out of catchment

Since OP said that nobody had mentioned the twins, I'm now wondering whether OP did not state on the application that there were siblings already in the school or the school/LEA overlooked that fact. If there has been an error by the school/LEA and places have been given to pupils who would have been in a lower admissions category than OP's child, she has a very strong case for appeal.

PanelChair without wishing to hijack too much from OP's questions, I'm interested that you should say it is risky to put only one choice of school on the form.
My DS2 will start school in Sept 2013 and though we have DS1 in the school of our choice (our village school, nearest one to us) we are technically just out of catchment (though this is being challenged, a very long story, see my other threads). Our district councillor who acted as advocate for our neighbours' appeal recently (they also didn't get a place at this school through being out of catchment) advised us for next year to put only this school down on our list of choices, to make it clear this was our only preference.
In a way it is more or less all the same which other school he might go to if he doesn't get into our village school, there is only one that I'd rather he didn't go to.

Fluffyanimal - Then, I have to say, your district councillor is a twit not well informed about how school admissions work. It is exasperating to hear of people giving out such bad advice that could lead people into real difficulties.

A lot of people believe that if you name only one school, it will show the LEA that that is the school you really, really want your child to attend and they will give you a place accordingly. This is the myth for which your district councillor seems to have fallen.

The reality is that the LEA (or the school if it is its own admission authority) ranks all the applications according to their oversubscription criteria. They work their way down the oversubscription categories until they have filled all their places. There is no additional priority for those who only name one school or for putting a school as first preference. With popular schools, they may not get far (if at all) beyond the in-catchment siblings category, but that depends on the size of the intake, whether there?s a bulge class a couple of years ahead adding to the number of siblings etc etc.

By the sound of it, unless you win the argument about changing the catchment area, your child will be in quite a low priority group for admission to your preferred school. If, as an out-of-catchment sibling, he does not get a place, the LEA will allocate a place at the nearest school which has a vacancy. That may or may not be a school that you would be happy with. There?s a fair chance, though, that the school you?d rather he didn?t go to is one that many parents would rather their child did not go to and so will be the one with vacancies.

So, the fewer schools you name on the application form, the fewer opportunities (it seems to me) you have to influence where your child goes to school. You can still show your preferences by putting your older child?s school first, but as you are far from certain of getting in, you need to decide whether to gamble on where you might be allocated a place if you don?t or to state some preferences for other schools that you would be willing to accept.

Tiggytape is swifter on the keyboard than me!

Very poor advice from your district councillor who clearly doesn't understand how admissions work.

If you only name one school and don't get a place at that school you will be offered a place at the nearest school with places available. That will be an unpopular school and it could be a long way from home. Naming second and third preferences will not affect your chances of getting your first preference at all. But if you don't get into your first preference you may get into your second or third choice. Obviously, if you don't get into any of them you will be back to being offered the nearest school with places available.

Any admission expert will tell you that you should always use all of your choices and make sure that at least one of your choices is a school where you are very likely to get a place. Anyone who doesn't tell you that is not an expert on admissions!

It is better to end up at the unpopular school that you consider just about acceptable and so named as your last choice than to end up being offered a school you consider completely unacceptable.

Everyone is faster than me today!

Thank you to all of you wise peeps, thank goodness I discussed this now! Sorry for taking the focus away from OP, but hopefully it will be of use to more than just me.