Advice on launching an in year appeal

[loveisagirlnameddaisy]

DS starts Reception in September; DD is in Y1 at a different school. We want to move DD to the same school as DS. This school is full in Y1 (17 children, 2 over the 15 limit). However, the classroom she would be in (made up of Y1 and Y2s) has a total of 22 children, so I don't believe would be subject to ICS rule. Is this correct?

I've had the appeal paperwork through and would appreciate some tips on what to say. Our reasons for moving DD are obviously practical, although I know this isn't taken into account. DD's school was not our first choice when we originally applied. We did an in year application during YR but other schools were full.

We have never felt particularly settled as a family at the school she's at and its taken a while for her to make friends. The school DS is going to was a preferred school for DD, but we were unsuccessful in getting her a place there. We know families there and feel that as a community school, it is very inclusive, supportive and welcoming. We have not always felt this way at DD's school although there is no hard evidence to prove/disprove this.

Our reasons for wanting to move feel very 'soft'. We want to keep the children together but I'm aware that I could have achieved this by applying for DS to go to DD's existing school.

Can anyone offer me some pointers? Thank you.

Whether or not it would be an ICS case depends on how the classes are arranged. If there are other classes with Y1 or Y2 pupils it probably won't be an ICS case. However, if this class contains all Y1 and Y2 pupils then I'm afraid it will be an ICS case under what is known as future class size prejudice. If it is an ICS case I'm afraid you will have very little chance of winning.

If it is not an ICS case you need to look at what this school offers your daughter that is not offered by her current school and find things that are particularly relevant to her. You might be able to make something out of the ethos of the school (being more inclusive, supportive and welcoming) if you can show some evidence of this being true beyond a belief that this is how community schools are (some are, some aren't) and show that your daughter has a particular need for such a school. To strengthen your case you need to find other things. For example, if the school offers more sporting activities than your daughter's current school and your daughter is particularly interested in sport that would be worth mentioning.

Thanks for the reply and comments. The school splits Y1 across two classrooms, one is YR/Y1 and the other is Y1/Y2. The latter has 22 children in it and is unlikely to have many more than this next year because there are never 15 Y1s in it (due to the split). Can you explain a little more about the future size prejudice?

It is possibly better to try and explain as a theory as you do not know exactly what the numbers are in the school from your posts. However from what you have posted I suspect it is not infant class size but would need more detail to be sure.
If the admission number of the school is 15, then in theory the school is full with 15 in each of reception, year 1 and year 2. That is 45 pupils in total, so each class would probably have 22 or 23 in it. Neither of these classes would be classed as meeting the criteria for infant class size regulations as they are not up to 30 pupils in the class, which is the maximum there can be with one qualified school teacher. Further pupils could therefore be added to any of the year groups until a class got to that 30 level.
If however you considered a school with an admission number of 20, then you could again have 2 classes but this time they would have 30 in each class. This would then be an infant class size regs situation as adding another pupil to either class would take it over the 30 maximum. However the school may not be full and has say only 17 in reception year, with 20 in each other year group. That would mean that the reception / year 1 class had 27 in it with the year 1 / year 2 having 30. In future prejudice there is an assumption that pupils could come forward to fill the 3 spare places in reception year, so that there is a theoretical 30 in the class. What cannot happen is that the school takes an extra pupil in year 1 over the 20 to fill one of the 3 spare reception places. That would give a theoretical 31 in the class and hence breach the infant class sign regs. Also in 12 months time the same situation may happen that there is more than the theoretical 30 maximum. This belief that in theory the infant class size regs could be breached now and in the future is referred to a future prejudice.

I agree this doesn't sound like infant class size so future prejudice would not apply. So you need to build the best case you can as to why this is the right school for your daughter.

Thanks admission

Y1, which we're applying for has 17 which is 2 over the PAN. The school also has previously extended a class from 15 to 18 to admit siblings. Do you think the panel would take these 'precedents' into account?

The fact they have 17 Y1s at the moment doesn't help you. However, if they have had 18 in the past that is worth bringing up as it suggests the school can cope with another pupil.