Primary admissions 2018

[Allosaurusroar]

Is there an anxiously awaiting primary school places thread yet?
One week to go and it’s all I can think about. We are on Easter holidays from pre school and it’s going so so slow waiting.
Does anyone know what time we find out?

London is pretty consistent - some time after 5pm.

Our LA will all be different. Essex for example is midnight but herts is around 3pm.

so what happens if none of the schools we've chosen (which are both in our catchment area) are given to us? Then what (I'm not from the UK)

You would be allocated a school which still had a vacancy at the end of the admissions process based on preferences. Occasionally that means waiting longer if there are more applicants than spaces overall for example, but if so it may lead to an additional ("bulge") class being added to an existing school. Did you list at least one of which you are certain to qualify, even if not first or second choice?

Anyone know what time it’s usually released for Cheshire?

In Cheshire West we've previously been able to log on just after midnight, but the email telling you so comes rather later. The email only tells you that there's something to log on to see.

Another one waiting for Monday... Our first choice is our village school. We should be fine - we are 400m away and we go to our parish church almost every week, so our reverend signed the SIF for us (it's a church school).

It was oversubscribed last year (it gets consistent outstanding on inspections and is a really lovely little school). I think there were 90 applications for 30 places, and at least some who put it down as their first choice didn't get in. However, there are rumours flying around that the school only received 28 applications this year so is under-subscribed. I can't imagine that is true - I think I could probably come up with 28 people who I know have applied for their children!

Ooo we are Cheshire west too so hopefully only just over 3 days to wait.

In a lot of L.A. areas you can log on just after midnight if you've applied online but may not get the notification email until later in the day due to volume of traffic. However, if you log on at midnight or just after, the website may be processing slowly due to traffic.

Cheshire West here too! Says 12.30am on the website

I think 12.30am refers to the secondary places, and it doesn't say about primary yet. But it would be surprising if they did things differently for the 4+ entry.

I may yet see some of you at the school gate if indeed you aren't my two over the road neighbours!.

I think it’s the same for primary if you click on a little further. One page says 12.30pm then am on the next one.

Hi neighbour!

Here it is

That'll teach me to believe what DH says when he's looking at the page

Fingers crossed for all those waiting.

Yes they know nothing. I didn’t see what options you’ve gone for Mrs Hathaway, what’s your prediction?

Sibling in catchment so we did our decision making before he was even conceived!

The school is oversubscribed, but we know it's a low sibling year so unless DH cocked up the application DC3 is a dead cert.

It must be a nice feeling to know siblings are all covered! One school fairly locally had 26/30 places go to siblings last year apparently, crazy!

Almost always they will offer your child a place at some school. You ACCEPT this place (even if you don't want it) unless you have a private school place lined up or are happy to home educate. Then, if you don't like what you've been offered, you put your child on waiting lists for any schools you do want and think about appealing for the ones you weren't given.

One year in our school was 24/30 siblings, and the six "new" children were two sets of twins plus two singletons. Adding only four new families to the school was a big blow to the PTA, I can tell you especially as lots of the Y6 leavers had been youngest siblings or only children...

@InTheRoseGarden

In my dd school someone started in y1 having been on waiting list since reception applications!

We have people on our waiting lists who are in Yr3 and have waited since Reception in one school. In others it isn't unusual to have Yr1s on a waiting list. They have to reapply each September to get back on it.

Hope everyone gets the places they want. I have a few friends applying this year and we think it will be a big year. Some are not sure whether they will get into our local school in catchment without siblings because they are near the edge of the catchment and the tiebreaker is straight line distance. However, here they get in before those out of catchment but with siblings at the school. There could be a lot of problems.

Oh I was hoping it was going to be a small year. I’ve heard a few people say it’s a low birth rate year but I don’t know for sure.

Our evidence shows it is a lower birth rate where we are using the raw data we get and the applications. In villages it shows more because we there are new housing developments there is pressure anyway. Next year is supposed to be a high birth rate year.

It might be a small year nationally, just big locally. We have had new developments built nearby, a small one in catchment and a larger one just outside. Based on the local toddler group and preschool, the next few years will be big. DC1's year was freakishly small, I think. Luckily, DC2 now has a sibling at the school as well as being in catchment so we should be ok when the time comes.

We got our letter today and got into our first choice wasn't expecting to find out till Monday but glad we know now