Reception place in 2016

[Kiciaaaa]

Hi
I am new to mumsnet.
Ive got a problem, my son was born in may 2012 so he will qualify for the place at the primary school in September 2016. The problem ive got is that we are moving flats in march 2016 (not sure where yet) so should i apply for the school place where i am now(haringay) or wait till we move and apply for September 2017? I know that the dedline for 2016 aplication is january 2016 but by that time i will still not know where we going to move. Its so complicated i dnt know what to do. if he miss this he will need to start primary school without reception by 2017.

please help :D

Apply from where you are living in January 2016. If you move then you have to inform your new LA.

I would apply where you are now, anyway, so, if anything changes and you don't move, or, if you move close by, he will have a place.

Once you have moved, you won't have to wait for a year though - there is LOTS of movement after the closing date, and you contact the area you move to, explain the situation, and they let you know which schools have places. It might not be your first choice, but you can sit on the waiting list whilst he attends a different school.

But whats is going to happened when they offer my son place in Haringay and by this time i will not live there anymore? do you think i still will be able to find a primary school for him in that short space of time? we need to move by march 27.

Well, depending on how far you are moving - you might decide to bring him back in if you can't get a place at a school near your new home.
Or
Once you find a new place, then you let Haringay know that you won't be needing the place offered, and it frees it up for someone else who is waiting for a place in Haringay

As soon as you know where you are going to be living, it's worth investigating the local schools, so you have some knowledge when you start speaking to School Admissions in your new area

BackforGood Thank you very much. I will apply for the place in Haringay just in case we find something near. We are thinking of moving Dagenham so way too far :D Thanks again xx

You need to apply where you are presently.

If and when you move, you make a late application based on your new address.

If there is any, any way you can be in your new address before the January deadline, move heaven and earth to do it.

Thanks. that's the problem we are having. our tenancy finish at 18 of march so there is no way we can move earlier:( i am scared that by march 2016 he will be place in whatever school. Is there a chance that he can skip reception and go straight to year 1 in 2017? i just dnt want him to end up in a bad school.

If schools are full for reception then you will still have to go through waiting lists etc for year 1 so won't gain much that way.

Is there any way you can move earlier? After application closes is the worst time to move, you will of course be put on all sorts of waiting lists, but essentially you get what others didn't want unless somebody else moves away. 2017 entry into year 1 won't much help either, you are still relying on people moving away and in really good schools that simply doesn't happen as much as in bad schools.

If he goes straight into year one you are still missing the main application round. The school will be full of kids who have just done reception. So in terms of applications that is just as hard. Possibly harder as waiting lists often move a lot between allocation day and September.

Sorry, x post, I see you can't move earlier.

ooooooooooooooh thats all this is sooooooooooooooooo horrible i want him to go to a good school :( can he not stay at the nursery till he is 5 and then go to reception class. oh god this is so complicated :( i guess i will need to be put in a waiting list and pray that some good school will have places or drop outs..i though this supposed to be easy lol parenting :D

Well,as a May born it might be possible to start Reception in 2017. But I think doing that just because of a house move would be bad long term.

Start by looking at schools in your new area. You might find ones you like that are not over subscribed or have lots of movement on their waiting list.

yeah i do not really want to wait until 2017.....oh

There is huge pressure for school places at the moment and anyone moving mid year ,which is what you will be classed as because you will be applying after allocations have been made , doesn't have very much choice at all. If you really can't move sooner then you need to do a lot of research prior to your move to see what the school places situation in the place where you want to live and tailor your move to the places where there is a history of there being plentiful school places.
The local authorities are usually good at giving you data on historical numbers of children verses the number applying. Many local authorities actually publish this data on their websites. If it were me I would try and find a way of moving before January. Even if that means renting for a while in the area you want to settle.

Can you stay local to the area when moving flats?

Is there any way you can manage to have a rental agreement in your new area before the application date in January? Even if your tenancies overlapped for a few weeks?

Obviously there would be large costs associated with this but I would do this in order to get a reception place in the right area if I could afford it.