Which term should we move in to get an in-year place?

[Ruu]

Hi there

We are moving from London to a market town outside.

We have a bit of flexibility with regards to when we move after we complete as we are renting and we want a week or so to do some decorating. We plan to keep our son in his current school right up to when we physically move.

Should we request a (year 1) place at the end of this current term or a place at the beginning of the (summer) term? Would doing the latter mean we might have a greater chance in getting a school that is closer to us or will it make no difference as to what date we put on it?

Looking atY R1 places currently available this term there are places but not in the three nearest schools (we are not fussy about the schools, more about how close they are).

Thanks!

It will make no difference as you need a place to come up. Apply now

Things do work differently in different areas.

I applied for in-year places before we moved and as soon as the house offer was accepted. Took several weeks of negotiations to get offered places. They were held for a term while the house purchase went through.

The terms grace was I think at the schools discretion. I talked to the existing school (didn't want them to lose that place ) and the new school. It worked for us.

The LA involved will need to see documentation about the rental of the house before they will accept the address in most cases. So as soon as you have this documentation I would put in an admission application for the nearest school or the one that is your preference.
As your child is in year 1, two things are relevant. Firstly if there is an available place. If so wonderful you should get the offer of a place. However the probability is that the school will be full in year 1 and you will be told there is no place available. There is a very good chance that any admission appeal for a school place will be an infant class size regulations admission appeal, in which case the chances of winning at appeal or very low in deed.
The LA will have to offer you a school place within reasonable distance so you will get a school place but it may take a little time. If you are happy with a couple of other schools from a transport point of view then I would suggest after the initial rejection for your preferred school that you apply in succession to the other two schools to keep the pressure on the LA to find a school place. You do have to accept though that the school place you are offered may well be far distance away.

I'd apply as soon as you can with a view to starting at the beginning of the summer term. It takes a while for them to process applications, and if there isn't a place at a school you're happy with you can normally go on waiting lists - you never know, someone else might move at Easter. Are you renting now and then buying in the new place, or vice versa? Where we moved to, you could apply once contracts were exchanged or you had some official rental paperwork with a move date on.

When we did something similar we had in mind that if nothing came up that we were happy with we'd home ed for a term and see if anyone moved in the summer holidays. We did know there was a backstop though - a school we liked and had several spaces, but was further away than we wanted to deal with ideally.

Now call me cynical but how does it work if you move, know that the nearest schools are full so simply apply and accept the next nearest school?

If more than 3 miles, the LA won't help with transport. Because you chose it.

So move, apply to the three nearest. Once rejected (still full) take what's offered and enquire about transport.

And go on wait lists obviously.

How far out of London are going? Borders or 30 miles out ?

Year 1 is chocca where I am. Far Borders. Couldn't move schools if you wanted to because there simply are no places.
The same for Year 4. But not the case for Y3 and Y2. That's just here though.

Dungandbother - if the school accepted is the nearest one with space, then yes the OP would qualify for help with transport. It's only if she has already turned down spaces nearer that it wouldn't apply.

Thank you all for all your input.
It's Hertfordshire. Yes we are renting now and then buying.
I would consider home ed but I have a very lively two year old as well and he won't get his nursery free 15 hours until September.
Yes I think we're going to send in our app as soon as we exchange and go from there.
We can put on four schools I think and then we'll just accept the nearest that has a place and then stay on the waiting lists for the others.
We might get him into our catchment school on the back of my youngest I suppose who will be starting reception in 2017 as it will move us up the list because of the sibling rule.
What I don't really want is them being at separate schools for years. We could also do the reverse I suppose and try and get my youngest into my eldest's school!

My tale of in year transfer goes like this.

DD has place to start reception Sept 2015 in town A.
We will be moving house to town B, 180 miles away in Nov 2015.

Sept 2015 I start contacting the schools local to the house in town B. After 4 phone calls I am in floods of tears as each and every school said, "well we're full so there is no point you coming to have a look around".

I call the authority who advise me that they will find her somewhere but it might be "upto a 40 minute drive away" and request I fill in the transfer from based on the schools' websites. So I do that. We get offered 3rd choice, which is a ten minute drive away.

Move house on a Thursday mid November, visit the new school Friday (small but absolutely lovely) and she starts on the Monday. 2.5 months later you'd never know she hadn't been there since September, the school has been fantastic and I am so pleased. I visited my first choice to look at pre-school for younger DD and was horrified. So so glad we didn't get a place there. It's like the starts just aligned and all worked out perfectly.

The take home message of my story is that somehow I do believe things will workout. DOn't necessarily believe the schools about whether they have places. You don;t know if at the same time someone there is putting in a leaving form. You also don;t know if the school would prefer to stay at 25 per class, even though they have capacity for 27 but would rather you didn't know that. I don't think the timing of the house move will make any difference related to a school place (move when is most convenient for your family).

We are going to be in this same position at some point in the next 1-2 years. OP, sorry to hijack but can I ask a quick question? Is there a 'better' year to apply for? Do classes get bigger at some point? DD is currently Y1.

Mozzarella - At our primary the 'best' time to apply would be for the start of Y3, as quite a few go to independent schools then.

Thanks. I thought there was a point where class size was allowed to go larger than, say 30.

The infant class size limit of 30 only applies to Years R to 2. A school may be more willing to take on more in Year 3 onwards, or you may be more successful in an appeal at that point.