Catchment area confusion

[Loveyou3000]

How many schools are people usually in catchment for? I've just had a look as DD starts next September, and it looks like there's only 2 in our catchment area, neither of which I particularly want to send her to. Is this right? To be honest I can't make head or tails of the council website to check that I'm looking at the right thing!

It really depends on your local authority. Admissions policies vary.

For reference, for our current and past houses, we would have a99.9% of places at 2 schools.

A lot of schools (most?) no longer have a defined catchment area. There will be a list of criteria instead (typically looked after children, siblings, distance), so it's then more relevant to look at the distance of the last place offered for the last few years, to assess your chances of a place. But some do have catchments - look at their admissions policies to check.

Many/most schools don’t have catchment areas. They don’t where I live. They have different selection criteria, as PP said.

We have defined catchment areas in our local authority. You are usual in the catchment for one community primary (non faith) then faith ones are on top (often defined by parish boundaries).

If you are in catchment for two then that sounds about right...the idea you have much of a choice is a myth!

Where a friend lived, the children were given the closest school to their home. The only way to go to a further away school was if the closest was full up.

Each school has their own admission criteria so that may or may not include a catchment zone. However being in a catchment zone does not preclude you from expressing a preference for schools which do not have a catchment zone covering your location.
The reality is that the admission criteria is much more controlled by whether the school gives priority to siblings and then on distance from school to home. Even that has it has its quirks because it can be as straight line distance or it can be via the nearest available walking route.
Bottom line is you need to do more research as to local schools and the potential for whether you are likely to get the offer of a place at each school. The LA publish a new directory every September with the latest admission criteria and information on what admission criteria were applied for admission in this September. You also need to visit all the schools and get a gut feeling for them. Whilst you can listen to the local gossip about schools, do not rely on gossip in choosing which schools to express a preference for - parents can have very different views on the same school.

Only one school in our catchment area.

Our LEA only uses catchment areas for high schools, primary schools admissions are done roughly by proximity to the school, plus the usual siblings/lac/sen.

I guess it depends on your local authority. Where I live there aren't catchment areas

If you don’t like either of the catchment schools, be very careful about applying to a school where you simply won’t get in. Always check stats around admissions for out of catchment schools. You might then compromise your chance of getting one of the catchment schools.

As others have said, it’s more likely to be about the admissions criteria. Look at the local authority website to see the furthest distance offered in your preferred schools and that will give you a rough idea though it changes from year to year depending on who applies. As PP said, be careful about which schools you apply to. You should only apply to schools you have a realistic chance of getting into or you could end up with none of them in which case the LA would just place you in a school.

Where I live in London most people have a realistic "choice" of one school, unless they are Catholic .

Catchment areas are not used by the majority of schools, look at the last distance admitted if that information is available OP.

Seriously ring up schools & ask

No catchment area around here (south London), varies every year dependent on birth rate for that year and who applies. some years the furthest away is half a mile, other years further.

Only in Scotland does every address have a catchment school, and guaranteed entry to that school.

In areas where there are catchments, you usually have one school per catchment. It is very rare to have two or more.

Outside Scotland, you are not guaranteed a place at your catchment school, you also have to live close enough.

As previous posters have said, you really need to look at greatest distance offered, by category. You might find that you live within the recent admissions footprint of nearby non-catchment schools, as well as having a catchment one

Defined catchment areas here. One school only for most people. A handful of roads have 2 options for historical reasons. You need to talk to your LEA.

As Bubbles buddy says, think long and hard about going out of catchment if you have to reapply for junior school places, or if you have younger children. People round here got stung getting into infants from out of catchment but then not getting a place in juniors. There were few other places to go because most of the neighbouring schools were "through" primaries, and didn't have a Y3 intake.

In our area NW England we have 1 local non religious primary that we are in catchment for. Other schools may sometimes take from beyond their catchment so may get in.
Only other schools that catchment overlaps with are religious primary schools if fit criteria.
We are told to put down local catchment school at least somewhere in options as otherwise might get a worse school at other side of authority

In our area our local schools don't have a catchment area and parents often get upset about the whole 'choice' thing. You definitely don't get to choose a school, instead you list your preferences and this preference is then added to the mix of the different admissions criteria. My friend decided to put the schools she wanted on the list without considering what schools she was realistically going to get. This meant she got none of her 'choices' and instead got a school that was not particularly popular. It turned out OK but if she had been realistic her preferences could have been taken into consideration.

There are two types of things people refer to when they use 'catchment':

1. A priority admissions area, which won't be a circle with the school at the centre. Where if you live in that area, then you get priority admission over people who live outside that area, even if they live nearer. This is what we have where I live in Hants. usually these catchment areas don't overlap so you aren't in the priority admissions area for more than one school.

2. Colloquially, the 'catchment area' can also be used to mean 'normally people who live here get into the school based on distance'. This is what people mean when they things like 'the catchment area shrinks each year'.

What you need to do, is to look up the admissions info for schools near you, and see which you have a chance of getting into. (e.g this page for Hants).Then visit them. Then order them in your true order of preference, but with at least 1 school that you will almost definitely get into on the list somewhere. Better a dire school on your doorstep than a dire school 10 miles and 2 buses away.

We have 1 primary school in catchment (Sheffield)

If a Local Authority uses catchment areas, they will publish a map of them. They follow roads and often parish boundaries. Lots of rural areas use them. You can often put your post code into a “school finder” on a LA web site to find out which is the catchment school. These areas are very precisely defined!