Nursery admissions - sibling policy?

[winterrabbit]

Does anyone know if schools are allowed to have a sibling policy for nursery admissions? I understood that nursery intake was outside the usual admissions policy for reception and that siblings were not given priority. Have found out that DS does not have a nursery place at our closest school (we are 0.3 miles) as they have too many siblings. Didn't factor this into my planning as I assumed he would get a place based on distance given how close we are. Have applied to the nursery of another primary school who say they won't let us know if he has a place until July (!) and am worried the same thing will happen and he'll be without a nursery place. Was really counting on this for financial and social reasons so quite upsetting. Does the council/LA have to find you a place where you can take up the 15 free hours?

Generally nurseries are separate in admissions in that they don't give priority to starting Reception, but I think they tend to have similar admissions policies to the main school. So I think it's quite common to have siblings as a criteria. It makes sense for the school to prioritise the same children for nursery and Reception if they are oversubscribed for both. I appreciate that is frustrating for you though.

The LA don't (unfortunately) have to find you a place for 15 hours. Are there other options you can look at e.g. independent nurseries or childminders? I know this can be trickier financially though, as sometimes they have other costs. That's frustrating the other school can't tell you until July, as you would think they would know if they have spaces left.

Our school has a siblings policy for coming into nursery (if siblings are not in yr 6 at time of application). Having a nursery place doesn't automatically get you a Reception place though. The admissions criteria are applied separately.

Well If they have a maximum capacity and more sibling applications than places I can't see what they can do about it? Nursery isn't compulsory so the LA isn't obliged to find you a space

You’re correct, the process is separate from reception admissions and in our LA the criteria are quite different, for LA maintained nursery classes (priority for looked after children and children who had two year old funding, then catchment, then distance, nothing about siblings, unlike for reception). But that’s just one LA and only their maintained nursery classes. Our local preschool for example sets its own criteria and siblings are in there. It’s unfortunate it’s resulted in you not getting a place but it doesn’t seem an unreasonable policy. Or are you saying you think the school has not applied the published criteria correctly and the published criteria don’t cover siblings?

LA don’t have to find you a place, but they might be able to give you a list of alternative options you could try? Have you looked for any local preschools for example?

No, I don't think they applied it unfairly, I just hadn't heard of it before and assumed he would get a place especially as my two older DC went there and my eldest got a place no trouble although 10 years ago now. Limited alternatives available. Spoke to one private nursery and it costs considerably more as the funding only covers half their fees. Paying for a nanny at the moment which is crippling and was assuming we'd get 15 free hours from September but now it's not looking likely.

What about a childminder, they can accept the 15/30 hours funding too so you will still be able to save some money?

Private nurseries still accept the 30 hours funding? Ours offers term time only hours (9am-3pm, term time) & full cover nursery.. can you look into that? Being in a school nursery doesn’t have any effect of primary admissions, you don’t get any kinda preference because they attend the school nursery. So you’ve nothing to lose finding a private nursery that does term time.

I’d be honest, I’d be a bit worried if their pre-school is that full of siblings as they’ll get priority in reception as well. Catchment siblings is up there at the top of priority in most areas! 😬

Our school nursery has a sibling priority policy and our eldest didn't get in despite us living next door to the school. Apparently though in that year about a dozen siblings didn't get in. They get very over-subscribed.

I assume that they're applying the same admissions criteria as the school, therefore (unless nursery has smaller class sizes) you're unlikely to get a reception place at that school. It might be worth looking into which school you'd be likely to get a place at and seeing if you can get a place at their nursery/feeder preschool.

I just looked at the application process for my DDs primary school Nursery class and it has older siblings currently in years R-5 as a priority if oversubscribed.

@Teatoweltable I would imagine for most schools the nursery intake is significantly smaller than reception. At our school it is 30 for nursery and 90 for reception.

[quote Bear2014]@Teatoweltable I would imagine for most schools the nursery intake is significantly smaller than reception. At our school it is 30 for nursery and 90 for reception.[/quote]
Our primary is the same, 15 in Nursery but can go up to 25-30 depending on spread of days for other children. PAN for Reception is 60 or 75 depending on how the rest of the school is looking.

Same here. They take 120 for reception and I think 30 or 40 for nursery.

Interestingly our school nursery class has more on roll than the PAN for reception. But they’re mainly 15 h so part time and some are there for five terms so it’s not reflective of the chance of getting into reception class.

Ohh I guess I’m thinking of the predominantly one form entry schools around me. Their nurseries have around 20-25 kids and then obviously PAN of 30.. I guess bigger schools are v different!

" I would imagine for most schools the nursery intake is significantly smaller than reception. At our school it is 30 for nursery class and 90 for reception." Our nursery is 52 place and reception has a PAN of 30. The nursery class my children attended had a intake of 78 and a reception intake of 60. This is really common in my area.

Our school gives siblings nursery priority as they will ultimately enter reception so transition is smooth. There are 1/4 less nursery places than reception but they want to expand due to demand.

Actually that's FT places. They offer limited PT as most want full