Place withdrawn due to map error

[ChunkyButFunky87]

I'm so annoyed.

My daughter got offered our first choice primary on 16th April. Based on the fact it was catchment (we moved 3 years ago to be in this catchment ready) good reputation and only 0.3 miles from us so can walk etc,

Today they've withdrawn saying there's been an error with the catchment map and someone has complained leading them to relook. I know that at least 3 others on the road have also been withdrawn.

The map has been on the council and school website since we moved - we checked at the time. If was also there when school applications opened last year, I checked again - were on it.

We got the letter yesterday and now they've still left it there on a link saying "look here" but have now added an amended map further down.

I've since found out they apparently changed the catchment over a year ago but left this incorrect information showing. I'm so cross. They have had every chance to correct it but now have messed up our plans.

I've appealed but don't hold out much hope, I just don't feel we should be penalised for their blatant error

@GeorgiaGirl52 - In the UK, the LA must provide free transport for infants if the allocated school is more than 2 miles from home by the shortest safe walking route. As the rules stand, the OP's daughter is not entitled to free transport.

There is school transport in the UK.. for Primary over 2 miles, secondary over three miles where there is no nearer option. Less than 2 miles is considered a normal walk (which completely ignored it being a 4 mile round trip for a parent admittedly)

Did you put any other schools on your application? The council's error has potentially meant you have missed out on your chance to get those places too.

Can you have a look in your internet history to see if you have evidence of the previous internet pages. If it comes to it the more evidence you can show that you were working from published information the better. Also take screen shots of the current website with amendments just in case they do a total overhaul when you don't all just roll over and accept the places have been withdrawn. They probably send the letters out in the hope that at least one person will just go along with it and accept the alternative school. It's only been noticed because people have complained at not getting in so first they will get people to quietly disappear before they have to deal with the tough decisions of what they do with too many children.

@GeorgiaGirl52

The OP doesn’t live in the US. Here in the UK we tend to walk more, also we don’t have children with ‘handicaps’ as that is a very outdated term. I personally think it’s ridiculous that a child cannot walk 1/2 a mile to school. Whatever happened to parents actually parenting?

If you do end up at the new school your DD should be ok walking even if she needs to take a break mid way, she'll get used to it.
We're 0.8 miles from DD's infant school, she's always walked but at first needed a quick pit stop on the way home & a snack. We live up a big hill as well, she's now 9 & it's 1.2 miles from junior school & she's always walked albeit with some moaning

And those incredulous at driving a mile, I know of at least 3 families near our house who always drive to school regardless of work/timings etc, sometimes it is just laziness.

Good luck with your appeal though

@Soontobe60 thanks for that delightful comment but what on Earth gives you the right to think I don't parent!?

Politely remove yourself from my thread if rude is all you can offer.

My daughter will go to school regardless of this situation, the overall point here is she was offered the nearest school, shown within catchment and due to a council error that's been withdrawn. No need for catty comments

@ChunkyButFunky87 - Read my post if you haven't already done so. I have helped a lot of people with admission appeals over the years. In my view you have a very good case.

@GeorgiaGirl52 your examples of travelling 15 miles and a child having additional needs are valid but I don't think that's the case here?

Anyway, ultimately it's up to the OP how she makes the journey to school. And I can understand her frustration at this situation - I would feel equally annoyed!

@ChunkyButFunky87 if you hadn't been allocated your first school choice because the council used the "correct" catchment map in the allocation software, do you think you'd have got second choice? Would that be more convenient than where you have been allocated?

I think you've got 2 possible appeals:

1. they cant take the place away at this point, due to their own, sequential, mistakes (incorrect info on catchment, then using that incorrect info to initially allocate places)
2. (maybe) their mistake has cost you your second/third choice school because they are now full, and if you had been allocated a school in the first round, you would have recieved an offer for a higher preference school

If you need to see a previous page on a website (ie one that has since been removed or edited) go to web.archive.org and look for the site and a previous date; or you could always submit an FOI request for what was previously available.

Mind blown that I would have almost gp a bus to primary in the US, just shy of half a mile, for an 8 minute walk or 3 minute cycle. Surely the parents should be walking the kids so crossing a trainline or big road (my school was next to a dual carriageway) is supervised?

Anyway, if you need the old version of the webpage for evidence to wave the Wayback Machine or even Google's Cache might have it.

[quote ChunkyButFunky87]@Soontobe60 thanks for that delightful comment but what on Earth gives you the right to think I don't parent!?

Politely remove yourself from my thread if rude is all you can offer.

My daughter will go to school regardless of this situation, the overall point here is she was offered the nearest school, shown within catchment and due to a council error that's been withdrawn. No need for catty comments[/quote]
My comment wasn’t to you, it was to @GeorgiaGirl52.

Also, ‘catty’?

FWIW, I personally think that in your situation the LA are totally out of order withdrawing your child’s place in these circumstances and you should have it reinstated.

@prh47bridge i can't see to log in on the webpage to go to inbox. Don't think you can see it just on the mobile app. Can you inbox me so I can try and reply that way please,

Thanks

@Soontobe60 well I'm glad we can agree on something and if not aimed at me directly I apologise.

I do still feel it was catty to call anyone out on parenting. They've come on here to respond to my thread, not be addressed in such a way

[quote ChunkyButFunky87]@Soontobe60 well I'm glad we can agree on something and if not aimed at me directly I apologise.

I do still feel it was catty to call anyone out on parenting. They've come on here to respond to my thread, not be addressed in such a way [/quote]
My comment about parenting was directed towards a system whereby the state will fund transport if a child lives 1/2 a mile from school instead of the parent taking responsibility for their children, and I absolutely stand by that. I don’t even know if the person I was responding to has children themselves!
Do you believe that it’s the parents responsibility to get their child to school if it’s so close by, or do you think the LA, that’s already cash strapped, should fund it?

@ChunkyButFunky87 - The mobile app doesn't currently support PMS, either sending or receiving. If you want to PM me from a mobile phone you will need to use the web browser on your phone and switch to desktop view.

Can't really add anything to what PRH has already said, other than you really need to pursue this as this is a major clanger by the LA / school. They should not be allowed to just act as though nothing has happened and it has not affected anybody.
What staggers me is if they knew they had made a mistake then surely their first reaction should have been, OK we have made a mistake. What can we do for the parents who have been disadvantaged and not got a place, rather than immediately start to compound the problem by removing places from perfectly innocent parents who had no idea that a mistake had been made.

I can’t add much to what prh47bridge and admission have said.

This is superficially an error in that the LEA published the wrong map but, having published it, it’s become part of the admission arrangements which they have to administer. So the place hasn’t been offered in error because it’s been offered in accordance with the published admission arrangements and, besides, it’s far too late to remove places now.

The earlier comment about catchments in London changing every year comes (I think) from the habit in London of using ‘catchment’ as a convenient but misleading shorthand for ‘the farthest distance at which a place was awarded last year, which may or may not be a good guide to the distance at which places may be awarded this year’. Most people understand that this is not a catchment in the proper sense, but some don’t and there’s often disappointment where (say) people move close to a popular school and find that it hasn’t been quite close enough.

@prh47bridge @PanelChair @admission

I know you've said you deem it too late, but do you know if there's anything in writing? The only thing I can find says an error should be notified within 3 weeks . . Which it was, offered 16th April, notified 5th May.

I'd love to find something which might help - Leicestershire County Council

You may struggle to find it these days but the precedent was set by a case that went to judicial review and an LGO case. The reference for the LGO case is 99C01876 but it is no longer on the LGO's website. Appeal panels should be familiar with it but that can't be guaranteed. If you manage to PM me, I will be happy to help you put your case together on this point. However, in my view that is the secondary point. Your strongest argument is that the place was correctly awarded according to the published admission arrangements and that they cannot take it away by retrospectively changing those arrangements weeks after offers have been made.

Agree with PRH and panelchair that this situation seems straight forward, the LA published a map which was an intrinsic part of the admission arrangements and therefore should allocate places on the basis of that set of admission criteria. The only time that this could realistically be changed was if the mistake was recognised and publicised sometime between September 2020 and the cut off date in January 2021. But the fact that you were allocated a place and then subsequently had it removed due to map error would strongly suggest that the only time the LA found out about the mistake was after the initial allocations were made on 16th April 2021.

@prh47bridge I'm not ignoring your offer, Mumsnet has decided it doesn't recognise my email on the desktop site my app logs in automatically but that won't accept it, keeps saying not recognised so I'm waiting for admin to email me back lol

I’d have thought that if someone else had pointed out the map was incorrect the appropriate course of action would be to make sure they publish the correct map for next year, not penalise people who have applied correctly based on incorrect information they have published.

@RafaIsTheKingOfClay

I’d have thought that if someone else had pointed out the map was incorrect the appropriate course of action would be to make sure they publish the correct map for next year, not penalise people who have applied correctly based on incorrect information they have published.

You would be correct. They could, maybe, look to help those who had missed out on places they should have got if the correct map had been published. But they definitely should not, under any circumstances, be withdrawing places that were offered correctly on the basis of the published map.