Help please re house move/school appeal

[schoolsearch19]

I am planning to move house next year (summer holiday if possible) from London to a county just outside London. My children will be beginning of years 6, 3 and nursery. I am timing the move so we will be in the right county to apply for secondary (for number 1) and primary (for number 3).

Although Plan A would be to sell our house and buy a house we like near the schools we want the children to go to, we may need to rent initially if we haven't found a house we want to move to. If we can't sell our house (which I consider highly unlikely) we would rent our house out. We would NOT live in our old house and rent another one 'for the address' – this would be a genuine move, it is just a case of how on earth to do it.

Plan A for child 1 would be commuting to London for a year. Not sure how viable that is but probably preferable to any other alternative.

Child 3 (nursery year) I hope will be manageable with a private daycare nursery until they start reception.

Any of the primary schools we choose for Child 3 seem (going on the current vacancy lists) very unlikely to have a vacancy for Child 2. I want to do everything I can to end up with Child 2 and Child 3 in the same primary school, with as little disruption to Child 2 as possible.

I would really like to know how I go about getting Child 2 into a school. I presume I can apply to the council as soon as I am renting/have bought in the county. I will probably be offered a school a long way away that I don't want. At that point I would refuse the school, go on waiting lists for all the ones I do want and child 2 would need to commute to London (which is not a viable long term solution). At that point I would have no link to the school in question. I presume I can then appeal, at which point I would first need to try to prove that going above a PAN would not be detrimental to anyone else (don't have the exact wording to hand so that is how I interpret it) and then need to prove why the school would be best for them.

How do I go about getting information to launch an appeal. Is it available to anyone at anytime, or am I only entitled to it if I launch an appeal? This may seem mad but there will be around 6 primary schools we would be happy to live near, so if we are more likely to win an appeal at one than another that might be worth knowing. And how likely is it that I win an appeal, based solely on nearest school? Is there anything else that would be relevant?

Assuming I lost an appeal and kept child 2 commuting, and then child 3 got a reception place at the school (which I would find out in the April), can I appeal again on a basis of material change in circumstances (sibling who will be at the school?) If not (because I think you can only appeal once in a year) does it mean once a school year (ie can I appeal again the following September), or is it 12 months on from a previous appeal? Would I be better off waiting until Child 3 has got a place and then appealing? And in that case does it become more likely that I win a place on appeal?

And how does all this work if having been renting, we then decide to buy (which we would probably only do when all the schools were sorted, but this may be before Child 3 starts reception and Child 1 starts secondary school). I would quite happily tell the council everything before applying, I want to do everything above board, but we may end up being further away (or hopefully nearer) the schools in question. On the assumption that we would at all times actually be living in any address we have given, would there be any problem?

Very grateful for advice please!

Why don't you just move somewhere where you're happy with the selection of schools? It sounds like you're fixating on one school and, frankly, misplacing your energy and effort a bit.

No that is not the case at all! I will be moving somewhere where I am happy with the local schools, and that will be great for number 1 and number 3. Unfortunately, number 2 also needs a school, and I am pretty sure they will all be full (because no 2 will need an in-year place, rather than a place at a 'normal' admission point). I do not want to end up with number 2 at a school miles away that will mean it is unbelievably difficult to get two (primary aged) children to two different schools, and also (based on current research) the only ones that have space are (unsurprisingly) not very good.

Is this a rich area? If so, quite a few kids might move into prep schools in year 3.

Do you know for sure that there is unlikely to be a space for Child 2 at any of the schools? Children often leave primary school at Yr 3/4 to move into prep school, for example, so there may well be a space in one of the higher grades even if there isn't one in reception.

Suggest you start by having a conversation with the admissions people in the area you want to move to about the situation, then you can think whether you would be happy to have DCs in two different but local schools, or what your realistic options might be to get them into the same school

your issue is if there is a school with space for dc2 that is within the funding for school transport.
we relocated recently. chose house for secondary school.literally every single school was at capacity for year 5
this worked in our favour because to allocate our daughter the nearest school with places meant that the lea would have to pay for transport. so they allocated her a space under the fair access protocol. they can do this once they are beyond infant class age.

When I worked in a school we published the appeals process on our website each year alongside the admission policy.

The local authority may give you some information about current availability for the year group in question, including waiting lists. Ours keeps a vague list to hand as it's an area with high levels of movers and it helps if parents know before applying which schools are full.

Waiting lists here are discarded each September, so if you applied in-year then you should reapply once dc3 gets in.

The above note regarding how far away the nearest place is should be asked with the LA also, the distance for qualifying for free transport is 2 or 3 miles depending on age so do check how far away the nearest school with available places would be.

i would also add that the lea were really helpful. i worried myself demented over her moving schools. i assumed i would have to appeal etc etc. but in actual fact, notwithstanding the 10 week school holiday she has had, its been fine.

If there are several schools that you'd consider, then you'd be likely to be offered one of them. You might also check the policy thoroughly- in one of the areas I worked, out-of-school children would be given priority. That meant that those commuting to their old school waited for longer/got stuck.

Agree that you need to check the criteria for each school carefully. In our area, the LEA would only consider our new (rental) address as our permanent address if we had (at least) a 12 month tenancy and could demonstrate that we'd disposed of previous (out of catchment) house. Also, some schools don't have sibling priority which could be an issue if you're assuming Child 2 goes to the top of the waiting list when Child 3 gets a place.

i would also be cautious about your renting scenario. when i asked our lea about this i was told that rented address would not be considered if the distance was commutable. from what you have said it is. is eldest in year 5 now?
we moved during this summer holiday. our timetable went
sold house on 3rd May (same day it went on market). early june chain complete. early august exchanged and put in school application straight to lea cos its the holidays. Sept 21st school place allocated. they had 15 school days to find a place. school in theory have 10 days after that to admit.
so even if you are the most switched on parent you could be hanging around for a month at least, especially if you are moving over the holidays.

Okay I live somewhere where every school pretty much is full. But that doesn't mean that children moving into the area do not get places.
a) people move, so places come up and are then filled very fast.
b) after year 2 class sizes can be over 30, so schools can squeeze and extra child in.
c) if necessary the fair access protocol can be invoked by the LA and they make a space.

Now what I would suggest is just move to where you want to live (ideally with a good secondary which you will be in area for). I would do this at June/July time. Then apply for schools, and appeal your top choices. You will end up with some kind of school. Ideally I would move DC1 too, as that commute would be tiring and less than ideal for a whole year.

Thank you very much everyone that is really helpful. It is possible there may be children moving into prep schools so I will keep my fingers crossed. I think I probably need to speak to the LA at some point and hope they are helpful.

Call the schools in the area you are moving to before you move. They'll soon tell you whether they have spaces and how often spaces open up. You'll then have an idea of what to expect before you move. Also talk to the admissions people at the LA. My school is now an academy but we still work v closely with the LA for admissions and they really do go out of their way to help parents.

Where the school is its own admissions authority (i.e. academies and VA schools) their appeal procedures should be on their website. For community schools speak to the LA about appeals.

With regards to your likelihood of winning an appeal, this will depend entirely on the appeal panel who hear your case. I've sat in on appeals where I was certain we wouldn't be told to admit a child, only to find myself ordering a new desk and chair later that afternoon, and vice versa! One thing I will say is that you usually have more chance at an appeal if there is a sibling link. So if one child already attends (so your Year 6 child) the appeal panel will be more likely to force the school to admit your second child.

hmmm, having been through the appeal process recently and fortunately winning it, I wouldn't wish the process on anyone....sorry. It was stressful, time consuming and involved a lot of waiting. Yes, I think you would stand a decent chance at appeal where you have a sibling link and can get some good evidence to show that the school has previously gone over its PAN and has coped or has big classrooms etc. It takes a lot of effort to get the information....I spent literally hours talking to parents at the school (thankfully DD got in so I had a reason to be there lurking!), getting information, asking the school for information etc, it was a full time job whilst working a part-time job and DS was at home with no school place!! Very good people on here will tell you about the appeals process but the feedback I got was that it is very panel dependent and very hard to judge the outcome in advance. Knowing that I don't think it is wise to rely on winning and have a back up plan of other schools you would be prepared to accept.

Which county is it as that might help. If you can move sooner ?May yr5/2 you might be better placed to pick up some state to 8 places. Most state schools suffer from some attrition at the end of yr2. If you are planning to sit entrance exams then it helps if you are in situ before the beginning of yr6.

Surrey has some junior schools with year 3 entry. You'd need to be in situ by January to apply through the normal process though. Surely your eldest would be an In Year applicant too.