primary school appeal help,any advice please, thank you

[lailamom]

I am appealing to get my daughter into my first choice primary school, I have alot of reasons, but I have an enquiry.
The school I am appealing for, normally have 30 children in reception but this year they offered 31places, because they had twins, but I know from the school that they now have 30 because someone didnt want the place.
I know that for twins its exceptional, but I am thinking to use it in my appeal as well, that they already accepted 31 children this year and I believe my child should have a chance because of reasonable reasons, now that they have only 30. ???

I don't want her to settle somewhere and then move her but at same time I am not happy she is still nursery I don't want to delay her even more, also I exPected To have my appeal before the holiday cuz I wasn't late but till now I didn't recieve an appeal date yet :((

To be h

Ok and which r u?

To be honest I feel so down now it seems I have no chance of success in my appeal :( all the stress and hard work I put into this :( I am not happy I can tell u , am I now wasting my daughters time for nothing ?? ..

On deadline which was 15 June and yeah I talked to admission and they. Contacted school and they told me they might arrange it for me but usually they don't do cuz it's a church school

I come under distance

Lougle - If that is what Hampshire's admissions criteria stated they were breaking the Admissions Code (and hence breaking the law). But the new Admissions Code has legalised this practise.

lailamom - The law does not allow your daughter to be treated as an excepted child just because you have good reasons for wanting this school. To win an appeal you have to show that a mistake has been made. I am sorry but that is the way the law stands on infant class sizes.

I think category x is all those children who don't worship at any church at all but there should also be something about a tie breaker. Is it distance? If so, is it straight line distance, shortest walking route or something else? Does the distance they have got for you look right?

The questions tiggytape asks are important. If your daughter was placed in the wrong category or was higher in the admission criteria than other children who got places you have the basis for a successful appeal.

missions to reception class 2012/13
Number of places available: 30 (31 places offered exceptionally to accommodate twins)
Applications received
(by 15th January closing date): 129
Analysis of offers made on
initial offer day (18th April 2012)
Children whose parents worship at St. Gabriel?s: 3
Children whose parents worship at least monthly in Anglican churches: 3
Children whose parents worship at other Christian Churches: 7
Children who are baptised Anglican: 1 Other baptised children: 1
Children with siblings at the school at the time of admission: 9
Children whose parents live in the parishes of
St. Gabriel?s, St. Saviour?s and St. James the Less: 7

I mean to be honest with u, the school sent a letter in first letter in with details about how many children they took and under what criteria, but there it was clear they didn't follow the admission criteria, but then the next day the sent a letter in that it was a mistake and corrected it as shown above, I mean it's Weired. Regarding distance there is a shorter walking route than the one shown on the map. Again Thank you thank u very much all of you helpfull people I am so pleased and really I am surprised how much information I am given :)) glad I joined , I can't thank u enough it's incredible

So, I take it you live in the parish of St Gabriel's/Saviour's/James's?
Is the shorter walking route paved and lit?

A mistake in a letter (which is quickly corrected) is not grounds for an appeal.

Am I right in thinking that you are not a churchgoer? Do you live in the specified parishes for that category, and have you been correctly placed in it?

yeah exactly, and yeah there is a shorter route but I dont know which route the measured .. I might still have a chance but I have to find out on Monday, I will write the manager in admission regarding this, I will ask him for this information, is he the right person to ask? what if he refuse to give me information?

No I will not use admission criteria letter as a ground for an appeal, I just mentioned it here :)

yeah I live in the parish of St Gabriel's/Saviour's/James's

I thought perhaps I'd dreamt it, but I've just found the 2011/12 brochure online.

2011 Admissions Brochure, page 9:

If the last pupil to be offered a place within the school's published admission number (PAN) is a multiple birth or same-cohort sibling, any further same-cohort sibling will be admitted, if the parents so wish, even though this may raise the intake above the school's PAN. The PAN will remain unchanged so that no other pupil will be admitted until a place becomes available within the PAN.

I'm not surprised to hear that it's irregular though, because Southampton children always hit the news when parents were forced to separate their twins, I suppose because with Hampshire surrounding them it made them seem 'unreasonable'.

Lailamom, you need to find out the distance of the last offered place, because even if you know there is a shorter route to school, if that route (presuming it is deemed a 'legitimate' route by the LA) is longer than the last distance offered, then you won't be able to use that as grounds to appeal.

I thought that all LAs were now using "as the crow flies" measurements precisely to avoid people disputing walking routes used. Or is it different for church schools?

Each admission authority can choose how it measures distance, but it must be clear and applied in the same way to all applicants.

lailamom: have you found out the longest difference offered in your category? How have they measured it? What distance do they say is yours? What do you make it (by both routes, and the same measuring method)?

Lougle - Just to be clear, I wasn't saying you were wrong. I know one or two LAs that adopted this practise even though it was clearly illegal.

clam - There are still many LAs using shortest walking route or similar. There has been a drift towards straight line measurement for the reason you state, but in some areas straight line produces anomalies. For example, if you live near a river the school on the other side of the river may be only 200 yards away but the shortest walking route may be 3 or 4 miles. That kind of problem can lead to an LA deciding to go with shortest walking route.

Lailamom - If this school measures by shortest walking route and there is a shorter route than the one they have used you may have a case. It depends on three things:

• Does your route meet the requirements of their admission criteria? For example, they may say that any footpaths must be lit at night, in which case any route that uses an unlit footpath doesn't count. They should make clear what routes are acceptable in their admission criteria.

• Is your route shorter than the distance for the last child admitted? If your route doesn't bring you within that distance it shouldn't lead to you winning your appeal.

• Are any other children affected? If, for example, your route is shorter because it uses a footpath which the school hasn't included and which could shorten the route for a number of children the distances will have to be remeasured for everyone affected to figure out whether or not you should have been offered a place.

Don't give up hope. You may get a sympathetic appeal panel who will admit your child even if the rules say they shouldn't.

Chase the school for your appeal date. Point out to them that, since you submitted your appeal before the deadline, they are required to arrange the appeal within 40 school days of the deadline for submitting appeals. The 40 days isn't quite up yet but they have to give you at least 10 school days notice of the hearing. It is therefore clear that they will miss the 40 days deadline unless they intend to break the requirement for 10 days notice. You can't win your appeal just because they were late but it is evidence that their administration of admissions isn't all it should be.

Thanks for ur reply :) its good to get all these informations, another inquiry I have is that my daughter has been offered a place in primary school but I deferred her place and kept her at nursery, I believe if I let her go to school my arguments at appeal will not have same effect if I already let her start, it proves somehow that she is fine at her school, whereas if I leave her at nursery it shows that I am serious and passionate about getting her into preferred school or what ????