Confusion about how admission works and the equal preferences system

[Ellle]

I’m hoping that someone that works in admissions or is very knowledgeable about it can clarify how the system works.

Having read numerous posts in Mumsnet when I had to apply for a primary school for DS1, I was under the impression that the way it worked (putting three schools on your application) was:

1. For each school, the LA considers all applicants and sorts them according to the school’s admissions criteria, and whether you put the school as your first, second or third choice has no bearing on this initial sorting.

2. The LA then marks up the names at the top of each school’s list, up to the number of places it has to offer (i.e. the PAN; published admission number). At this point, your child could be within the PAN of two or even all three schools.

3. If a child is in the PAN of more than one school, the LA will allocate him a place at whichever of those schools has higher preference on his application.

4. I assume that any children to whom (3) applies will then be removed from their lower preference PAN, freeing up those spaces so that some children lower down the list can move up and get a place at that school.

5. Once all the names have been sorted ensuring that no child’s name is on more than one list, the LA sends out offers to the parents.

Is this how it works?

Now, my confusion is due to the fact that we called our LA a few days ago inquiring about the application process for a secondary school, and were told something different. What they said was:

1. If your first-choice school offers your child a place, then the LA doesn’t even look at your second and third choices.

2. However, if your first-choice application is unsuccessful, then they will look at your second choice. At this point, other people’s first-choice applications for that school will have already been considered, so your application is basically being looked at in a second round, when many places have already been filled.

3. If you are unsuccessful at your second choice, then your third choice is looked at – so you go into a third round, behind two other groups of people who have already been considered for that school and filled many of the places.

• What this means is that you could meet all the criteria (feeder primary, catchment area etc) for your second- or third-choice school, and yet lose out on the place to someone who meets none of the criteria – because their first-choice application was already accepted before your second or third choice was even considered.

• So if you put an “outside chance” school as your first choice hoping that you’ll be lucky enough to get in, and your “safe bet” school lower down as a backup, you might actually be shooting yourself in the foot and end up not getting an offer for any of your three choices.

• This would mean that they are working under a “first preference first” system. Do different LAs work in different ways? I thought admission authorities were now legally required to operate an ‘equal preference’ system.

Can someone clarify this?

Your understanding is correct. However, I suspect the LA isn't explaining themselves very well. I'd be very surprised if they operated in the way you describe. In essence, they are right that if you are successful in getting your first choice school, it doesn't matter what choice 2 & 3 is.

Other people’s first choices might not meet the admissions criteria. It’s not a given situation that they will. That’s identical to your situation. Only first choice AND meeting admission criteria are in on stage 1. However your first choice is being considered for another school at the same time. So an identical situation.

If too many get into a school, when all applications have been considered, distance is usually the tie breaker. So if you live nearer than others, you will still get a place.

Your understanding is correct. The LA's explanation is wrong. If they are actually working that way (which I doubt) they are breaking the law. I suspect the reality is that they do it correctly but the person who you spoke to doesn't understand the system.

By the way, if you would like me to check I will be happy to do so if you name the LA. PM me if you don't want to name them publicly.

Thank you everyone for your replies.

It is reassuring to see my understanding of how the admission system works was correct.

prh47bridge, thanks for your post. I have sent you a pm with the name of my LA.

I think your understanding is correct OP.
Could the confusion perhaps be because some of the secondary schools sort out the priority lists themselves i.e. act as their own admissions authority? If this is the case then the schools don't know whether the school is 1st, 2nd or 3rd preference and the LEA come in at stage 3. Stage 1 would be LEA passing on details of all applicants directly to the school.

I've responded to your PM. No thanks to Mumsnet who STILL haven't fixed a defect in their messaging system - if adding "Re: " to the message title makes it longer than the limit, instead of truncating the title (which would be the sensible thing to do), Mumsnet gives you a failure message (which is completely blank so very unhelpful) and doesn't send your message.

I got your PM, thanks for your help prh47bridge.

I will write to my LA so that they are aware someone gave us confusing information and incorrect advice about how the admission system works.

I totally agree with what you wrote regarding what to do with my third choice. I have thought about those two scenarios and the risk involved in leaving the requires improvement school out if it gets filled up with parents naming it as one of their preferences.

Knowing the allocations breakdown and whether this school has been undersubscribed or oversubscribed in the last couple years would help, but when I have asked about this information to help me decide between the other secondary schools I liked to be able to assess whether we had a good chance or not of being offered a place, they said they couldn't give me that information and that I would have to submit a FOI request that would take about 20 working days before they could provide a response.

I have done this, so hopefully I will have the information about a week before the deadline on October 31st. I have already submitted the application with the requires improvement school as third choice, but the application says I can go online to make changes to the preferences I have expressed until the closing date (31/10/19).

Just out of curiosity, at one of the Open days we attended a headteacher was urging parents to make sure they submitted their application as soon as possible so they wouldn't risk missing the deadline as it would then be considered a late submission, and not to worry because even after the 31st of October you could still change your mind and edit your preferences before school places were offered on March 1st.

I have never heard of this, and it doesn't make sense that anyone can be allowed to make changes after the deadline of October 31st as it would mess up with the allocation system. Was this also unfounded advice?

You can make changes after the deadline, but then it would be considered as a late application and would only be processed after all the on-time applications.