Will late christening stand against us in primary school application?

[chiquititayouandiknow]

DC is 20 months old and soon to be christened.

Was chatting to friend who is already thinking about primary schools (!?!). She said christening so late could count against us when applying for C of E primary schools (best one in our area is C of E).

The school is very competitive to get into, something like 5 applications for every place. I've not looked around and may not even like it but would like to have a decent shot at applying, if we do like it.

There doesn't seem to be anything on their admissions criteria to say that christening must take place in the first year... is this a thing?

DH attends church every week with DC (I'm not quite so consistent!).

Your pastor will be able to write a letter of recommendation if your dh genuinely attends regularly.

Christening is not usually a requirement for c if e schools because Christians take different stances on infant baptism.

I think it depends on the admissions policy. I sit on an admissions committee (faith school) and this year we had a Baptism certificate dated three days before the admission deadline. We called the Priest to verify it was all above board and child will be offered a place.

The nearby Catholic school policy says Baptism has to occur before the child is one. I don't know how strict they are about it.

Check the school admissions policy and the supplementary form is my advice.

Doesn't usually affect CoE. Baptism before 6months may often be a requirement for catholic schools

In the local to me c of e schools church attendance is key.

If it doesn't say in the admissions criteria, they can't use it. So no.

(And as others have said, C of E much less likely to include such a role compared to eg Catholics.)

It is very unlikely to be a C of E admissions criteria. You need to check the admissions policy. Some schools specify attendance at a particular church for a particular period of time. It might be years on the electoral roll. Or something else. We applied for a very popular school where they wanted to see evidence that the parents had been active members of key church committees. It was bonkers and there were many appeals so they went to a much simpler system. Many CofE schools don't have a faith criteria at all and it is distance from the front door and siblings that get you in.

In our CofE schools date of baptism or even if baptised at all has not mattered

Regular worship is a deciding factor though - they have 3 levels, I can't remember exactly but something like:

Church member and weekly attendance
Member and attend minimum every month
Non member but affiliated with a church group - youth, bible study etc.

Thank you for the speedy responses! I'm of different heritage/faith to DH so not familiar with C of E schools. And when DH attended his C of E school (a long time ago) he doesn't think there were any admissions requirements, ha! What a lot has changed

If you check with the school they will have a specific admissions statement

Clips of ours to show examples

If applying under the foundation or faith category you need supporting evidence from your faith leader about the families faith, commitment, attendance and involvement in the life of the church.

Being baptised by itself is meaningless in a C of E school by itself.There is a separate admissions criterion to rate supplementary evidence which varies slightly school to school. They are looking at the parent and child's commitment. Some rely on the faith leaders comments about their statement of faith. Some have heading boxes that may range from no evidence of faith to Deep evidence of faith.
Schools know that parents attend the year before to try to get a place and this forms part of the review.
The school admissions group will grade them, check the date it is in time, the school is named, it is the correct school, if it is in the parish and the distance and any other criterion. Then they are checked against the CAF application already sent to the Council. If it is an oversubscribed school you need more than a baptism for C of E. Catholic schools tend to rate Catholic baptism above other religions. C of E may rate all religions as the same and other faiths may be placed above you depending on the school.

You may find you are at the bottom of the faith eating relying on Just be baptised. It depends on if the other supplementary evidence is stronger or not. In my experience this would be a weak application to an oversubscribed school. But you never know.

As others have said this is typically a catholic thing. Our C of E school do require a baptism but it can happen at any age before entry to school.

The most important thing is regularity and length of attendance. But all schools are different. If you look on the council website it should tell you what criteria was admitted last year.