Primary School Appeal Help

[poshphil]

Hi, our daughter didn't get her first choice allocation at the school where her sister is. It's a reception intake so I wasn't going to appeal due to ICS but the person at the council I spoke to seemed to be encouraging me to appeal.

The school we applied for isn't our catchment school, and that takes precedent over siblings where we live. We are currently 3rd on the waiting list for a class intake of 30 so it's quite possible we'll make it in eventually. (2 people didn't take up their allocated place in the current year's reception intake)

The only extenuating circumstances we have are that we moved into the area about 6 months ago and our catchment school for our elder daughter was full, hence why she is attending the other school. I suspect this makes no difference when it comes to applications, particularly for a reception intake, but I thought I would ask the question for any advice.

Thanks

Alternatively could you move your dd to the same school your dc2 has been allocated?

This could have been a consideration, but the allocated school is an infant school, so our elder daughter would only be able to move there for a year before having to move back to (most likely) her current school!

Our elder daughters school increases their class size to 33 from Year 3 so it's possible our younger daughter would be able to transfer at that point anyway (although not guaranteed obviously).

As I think you already know, if this is an ICS appeal your chances of winning are slim - essentially, you're looking for an error which has deprived your child of a place or a decision that's so unreasonable as to be irrational. By all means appeal, as you never know what might come to light.

I’m sure I’ve read on here that some LAs treat siblings in this situation as in catchment. Have you checked whether that is the case for your LA?

That is the thought I had, but only after we didn't get the place, so it would have been an error on our part in the application as we didn't list that in the other reasons for applying for that school section. However I suppose it might bump us up the waiting list now if it is a consideration.

Unfortunately the fact that the elder sibling only started at the school 6 months ago because they could not get into catchment school will not have been given any consideration in the admission criteria order unless the admission criteria specifically mentions this - it would be quite unusual.
By the same token an appeal based on the two sibling being in different schools will also fail.
I am afraid you best chance is to get a place off the waiting list in all probability.

There was a ruling by the Ombudsman recently regarding a school in Nottinghamshire that a child was disadvantaged by the fact their sibling was 'displaced' and had not been offered a place in their catchment school. This resulted in the child being treated less favourably during the admissions process as they were classed as 'out of catchment with a sibling at the school', which was oversubscription criteria 4. In that area of high density, the child had little chance of getting into the school and the family were disadvantaged by having to have children at 2 schools. The LA had to pay the family £500 for the disadvantage and the LA has had to amend it's criteria for this school to allow equal treatment of siblings in catchment and displaced siblings out of catchment for which no offer at the catchment school has been given.

It's been a well publicised case to LAs and I wonder if that is why you have been encouraged to appeal.

Thank you all for the responses. I have been corresponding with the admissions team here. Everything in terms of distances to school etc. seem OK so nothing to appeal around there.

They don't currently have any criteria around displaced siblings, however I would imagine this is the area we would look to target in regards to the appeal we will now be starting - in essence other local authorities do consider this to have an impact so it is unfair they do not. I don't expect to win as this is the only angle we have and it's probably quite weak. Looking at the case mentioned above it looks like criteria for admissions were changed between when the elder and younger siblings applied, to the detriment of the elder sibling.

We are on the waiting list for our elder daughter's school, and having now had a chance to speak to the other school after school holidays, because they are a small school they are flexible around drop off and pickups so although not ideal, it isn't too difficult for us. It is only an infant school so hopefully she will feed in to our elder daughter's school come Year 3 at the latest, we will probably keep her on the list for a transfer to ensure we get a place rather than risk having an issue at Year 3.

Yes, I'm afraid this is weak. You are basically saying you don't like the admission criteria and think they should have been different. The appeal panel can only look at the criteria if they breach the Admissions Code. It doesn't sound like they do.

Following on from this, we now have a date for appeal, but are not sure whether to just withdraw it.

The only thing further that has been suggested to us, by our elder daughter's school, is that the admissions code states “the home local authority must ensure, so far as is reasonably practicable, that the child is offered a place at whichever of these schools is their highest preference”.

We have since discovered there is a child at our preferred school who had the school our daughter has been allocated as their preferred school. It would seem logical to me that a reasonable thing to have done would be to swap these two round when awarding places, as that would then be 2 further children awarded a school place of their highest preference, however I accept that what constitutes "reasonably practicable" probably has a legal definition that this falls outside.

The authority is presenting this as a class size limit argument, so part of us just thinks we might as well just withdraw and get on the waiting list. If we do continue I'll need to submit that extra information shortly. Any thoughts much appreciated.

It would seem logical to me that a reasonable thing to have done would be to swap these two round when awarding places, as that would then be 2 further children awarded a school place of their highest preference

I'm afraid it doesn't work like that. The fact that they are required to use equal preference in deciding admissions prevents them from doing this. The child at your preferred school came higher up the admission criteria than you, but you came higher up the admission criteria for the school you've got than they did. Having said that, if there is any reason to believe that my last sentence is not true (i.e. that you should have been higher up the admission criteria for the school you want) there is something to explore here.

You should be on the waiting list already. Your appeal should not have any effect on that. Personally I would go ahead with the appeal. You have nothing to lose and it is possible something will emerge on the day that allow you to win. But go to the hearing knowing that it is a long shot and that it probably won't go anywhere.

Thank you.

Having started to write something to submit as further evidence and reading what the School Admissions Code actually says I think the person at eldest daughter's school missed the important bit around reasonably practical, which is "Where a place is available for a child at more than one school". This is not the case under the admissions criteria in our situation. Suspect it is probably not worth submitting that as it doesn't add anything.

I suspect we will still attend, but are not expecting anything out of it.

If you decide not to attend, please let the clerk know before the day. Not sure if it's the same everywhere, but in my LA if someone doesn't cancel beforehand we still have to sit and wait for you in case you change your mind. I've had days where only one appeal turns up all day!

As above though, there's no strength in your new information so I wouldn't waste your time in preparing a new submission.

Well it's our appeal day tomorrow. We are still going to attend, but we are realistic about our (pretty much non-existent) chances.

We could have been in a much more difficult (or expensive) situation though - as the school she has been awarded is very small we can drop off with the teacher from around 8.30 which gives us sufficient time to get to elder daughter's school. They also run after school clubs 3 times a week that I believe are free which helps the other end of the day as well. That should hopefully mean we only need to use a paid after school club once or twice a week at most. We will keep on her the waiting list as it is an infant school and we don't want to be in the situation of not getting in at Year 3 (the school will take 3 more pupils per class in KS2, despite it taking them over their Net Capacity).

Throughout the process I have increasingly felt that where catchment takes precedence over siblings that there should be accommodation for those whose elder child didn't get in to their catchment school. I understand why Local Authorities put catchment ahead of siblings generally, but it leaves quite a difficult situation when it comes to applying for the younger sibling in these displaced situations (as we've found). That's more an issue to follow up after (pretty sure our MP has a child in eldest daughter's school!) to help others in this situation though.

Had the outcome of the appeal today, and as expected were unsuccessful. The panel were "very sympathetic" to our situation but the decision was one a reasonable authority would make. Thanks all for the help.

We will stay on the waiting list and if she hasn't moved by the end of Y2 hopefully she'll get in with the application for Y3.

I am still going to press for a displaced sibling criteria for the future. There's a lot of house building around us, but no single development is big enough to warrant a new school, so I can see this becoming more of an issue for others in a few years time.

Sorry it didnt work out for you, I hope you feel you did the best you could.