In year admissions and deferring places?

[Eesha]

Hi,

Can someone help as I'm getting myself confused! We were told by admissions that we were more likely to get an in year admission to our chosen school than an initial offer due to distance. My twins are also Sumner born and ideally I'd like to defer. However is it better to accept then start mid year at a school we would like or defer and again start mid year though I'm scared we will have less options if we did the latter in case we don't get a mid year place? Am I getting confused here?

Yes, you are!

You need to accept any offer even if you want to defer. If you don't accept the offer the place will be given to someone else and you won't have places for your children at all. If you accept the offer then defer they have to keep the places open for your children.

Your choices are:

• accept the offered school and start in September then transfer to your preferred school if places become available

• accept the offered school and defer entry until later in the year in the hope that places become available at your preferred school. If nothing comes up by Easter you should start your children at the offered school

Thank you!! So really the second option is me as ideally I'd like to get the right school which we would like. Would we then home school till then or go private otherwise wouldn't my children miss out on a big part of reception? We have twins which makes me wonder if two places are even likely to come up, can a school make room for the second twin if only one place becomes available?

If your children are in nursery they will be doing much the same as they would in Reception. Note that starting in the offered school (option 1) will not affect your chances of getting places at your preferred school so, if you are concerned, you could send your twins there. In my experience children at that age generally take changes of school in their stride.

Yes, a school can legally made room for the second twin if only one place becomes available. If there are 30 in the class the second twin would be an excepted pupil and would not count towards the infant class size limit. There is no guarantee that they would admit the second twin if only one place was available but you would have a very good chance at appeal if they didn't.