Primary School offered, not possible, how likely would an appeal be successful.

[LeeandEmma88]

Hello all,

We have read this forum many times but our situation has led to us feeling the need to create an account for advice.

This isn't the typical "We didn't get our preferred school, but it is a good school so can I appeal" post, so please bear with me whilst we explain.

My family has lived in the area of our preferred primary school now for 10 years, with us being located here for 5. The reason we moved to the area was solely for this primary school. We have had our Son's name on the school list since 2013 when he was approximately 10 months old, he is now 3 years and 8 months old and will be starting school this September 2016.

My wife and I work full time jobs and these jobs are unfortunately located out of the area, my wife working 1 hour from home and myself working 30 minutes away.
We also have a 9 month old baby who will be starting daycare in September of this year. This leads us to a bit of an issue, in regards to dropping off children.

It would not be possible for my wife to drop off our baby at daycare, our son at school and then travel to work. she has tried to go part time and drop morning hours but to drop off both and get to work is just too much, leaving her approx an hour late each day.
It is not possible for myself to drop hours as I am a manager at work and have several employees under my sole responsibility. I have to be at work when they are so to say.

This means we need assistance, which comes from my Mother. She is retired but does not drive, she lives on the same road as us meaning both the preferred school and our house are walking distance (she actually has to pass our house to get to the school).

Now we haven't been offered a place at either of our 2 local and preferred schools, which in normal circumstances I would just put it down to over-subscription and learn to live with it. But since January 2016 when the application process was closed my Father has taken ill in health meaning he requires full care which is provided by my Mother.

My wife's employer has agreed to shorten her hours on 2 days meaning she can drop off and collect (based on the thought we would have gotten our preferred school) leaving my Mother to drop off and collect the remaining 3 days of the school week. Now my mother doesn't drive as mentioned earlier so needs a school in walking distance (she cannot leave my Father for a length of time) this leaves two schools, both which were on our application. The 1st choice is 0.3 miles and takes 6 minutes to walk, the 2nd choice we had is 0.6 miles and takes 15 minutes to walk, now the offered choice which we didn't even know existed is 1.8 miles away and takes 45 minutes to walk (these times are one-way not round trips). The choice given would take 4 hours walking time per day to drop off and collect for my Mother, this is not even a possibility due to my Father's health.

We know the preferred school has 30 placements up for grabs and half of these have been filled with siblings, this leaves around 15 places to fill with other criteria. We live 0.3 miles away and can walk to the school within 6 minutes, not many people at all live closer than us, the reason we chose this address. Where do you lot think we would stand with an appeal taking all of the above into consideration?

We would be taking all my Father's medical history to any appeal, along with work contracts to show hours etc as we really feel we should have been offered a place at one of the 2 schools. We also have to take into account though, that the local council do not know of my Father's ill health as it has all happened 'after' the application process. We honestly thought luck would be well within our side as we live so close to the school (we can just about see it from our house) but this isn't the case obviously.

Any help or advice is appreciated.

Unfortunately there's not a lot you can do, as others have said, they will not take your childcare arrangements into consideration as grounds for appeal. You will either have to pay for wraparound care or taxis as previously mentioned and get on the waiting list in the meantime.

The previous criteria seem to be slightly misleading though.

For someone who isn't familiar with the system, it isn't at all clear that an SIF has to be filled in or that the baptism certificate needs to be provided at the time of application.

The newer set of criteria seem to be much more clear. I wonder whether this might have been an issue in the past.

All information might be online, but if you'd been given the information by the school about their admissions criteria and it matches what is on their website it would be reasonable to think that you already knew the admissions criteria and didn't need to look them up again.

Assuming that the open day the OP went to was less than a year ago and not one for a previous admission year.

To those who say "it's not the school's job to have accurate admission information on their website"... well, actually, in this case the giving out of poor information might be relevant, because the school is its own admissions authority as a VA school. The school admissions code and primary legislation underpinning it places responsibilities on admissions authorities AND on local authorities pursuant to their co-ordinating responsibilities. Admissions arrangements must be clear, among other things.

If you're going to appeal, I agree, alleged non-compliance with admissions law is your strongest suit. An ICS appeal panel are required to consider whether the admissions arrangements are lawful and, if not lawful, whether if they had been lawful the child would have been admitted.

I would get some independent advice from a CAB or similar if I were you. I think an appeal is a long shot but it's worth a try.

As this is a VA school it is required to have the correct information on its website for the whole offer year. Failure to do so does not mean that the school has acted unlawfully but it is in breach of the Admissions Code. The crucial question for the appeal panel is whether this breach has cost the OP's son a place. So, if the admission criteria on the school's website had been used (which they should have been as they are the published criteria even though they are not correct) would the OP's son have got a place?

True, Ragusa, but OP's ds does not qualify by either old or new criteria for the higher admission band, not enough church attendance and no baptism certificate handed in.

I agree with Rafa that the wording around clergy confirming attendance is ambiguous at best. The OP thought school would approach the vicar for confirmation. That was wrong but a possible interpretation of the rules.

I really feel sorry for the OP and his wife, they must be kicking themselves and regardless of the technical legalities they must be feeling very hard done by.

Yes PRH you've explained that better than me.

Go for an appeal OP - there isn't much to lose. But get some advice from a specialist organisation to support you. And make contingency plans for if the appeal fails of course.

I feel for OP, too. There are threads like this every year on MN and many primary schools do well because they manage to only attract the most engaged and well informed parents.

I'm sorry it hasn't worked out OP, but what strikes me is you said you still need your mum to help because of cost even though she is your dad's full time carer. Please don't add to her burden. Being a carer is stressful enough without having to factor in school runs. Don't put her in that horrible position of not wanting to let you down but also not wanting to leave her poorly husband because he's having a bad day. They're your children and you should pay for childcare or get different jobs or hours to fit in with family life (I had to do that).

I think that would be true, Pax if the old criteria were as clearly worded as the new criteria. The poor wording on the original version doesn't make it clear that the baptism certificate has to be handed in when you apply. Usually the wording is much clearer.

If the OP has proof of baptism and gets a letter from the parish priest confirming that they attended at least fortnightly for the 12 months up to 1st Sept (if they did), would that help at appeal? Alongside arguing that they information given by the school was incorrect and that they would have provided it at the time of applying had they known they needed to.

I sit on an appeals panel. Unless you have a very good case proving that the admissions criteria was not adhered to resulting in your son not being given a place then unfortunately you will not win your appeal.Infant class size is 30. This is a legal requirement and the only way the class size will go over this is if a child is admitted under the Fair Access Protocol or on appeal.
The distance from the school for a KS1 child is two miles as the crow flies. If the distance of the school allocated was over two miles(as the crow flies) then it is likely you would win the appeal.
Sometimes if there are exceptional circumstances an appeal will be allowed.

The distance from a school for a KS1 child ... Likely you would win the appeal.

What's your source for that, Saralice? 2 miles is the qualifying distance for free school transport at aged 8 and below, but the criteria for allowing an appeal are entirely separate from that. Each appeal is decided on its own merits but it most definitely isn't the practice in our LEA to allow appeals just because the allocated school is far enough away to qualify for free school transport.

Agree with PanelChair. Over 2 miles simply means the child qualifies for free transport. Anything up to 45 minutes travel each way is considered reasonable. If the allocated school was further away than that an appeal may be successful. Any appeal panel that admits pupils in ICS cases on the basis that the allocated school is over 2 miles away is being very generous to parents, to say the least.

OP, in your shoes I would be finding out, today, about flexible working. Your wife has managed to make changes to her working day, you need to do the same.

Your mother can use a taxi to do the pick up each day. If you both work full time you have obviously been paying childcare for your older child, a daily taxi for a couple of miles will be cheaper than that.

I live in a village with one, oversubscribed, primary school. Last year something like 7 children in the village (including DS1) didn't get in. In the part of the village I live in, it's more than 2 miles to any other primary school under the safe walking route criteria the council use. Same for some of the other children who didn't get in.

Most of the parents appealed. None of the appeals were successful because of infant class size legislation. The distance to the other schools offered was not more important than the class size legislation and not a valid ground for appeal - as pp say, if nearer schools are oversubscribed, the council can allocate a child a school over 2 miles away as long as they offer free transport.

OP I do think you really need to look at childcare options too. You will have loads of school holidays, 5 inset days etc to finish plus invites into schools for events. It's a real commitment to ask your mum to every day and lots of the holidays too surely? It's tough, but all FT working parents are in similar positions

I have sat on a couple of KS1 appeals which were upheld because the schools allocated were over two miles away.There were no other schools within a two mile radius which had places.I live in a large town with around eighty primary schools so it is rarely a school offered is over two miles away.
As most of the schools, primary and secondary, in our area are full I can see that
the problem is only going to get worse.
What happens then?
The free transport option has never arisen but it is definitely something I will make enquiries about. Does the council have to provide a taxi or is it free bus fares?
With the appeals which were upheld the children would have had to catch two buses and then still have quite a walk. It was taking them an hour and half to reach their allocated school. They were only four years old.

If you didn't hand the baptism certificate in to the school with their own form you won't be in the correct category. Speak to the school but I'm fairly sure they will say that it should have been submitted at time of application. If you show it now though you might move to the top of the list.

Sorry, should have said Waiting list there.