Something weird is going on here

[pennysays]

DC is #1 on the waiting list for our nearest school, let's call it Amazing Academy. We have been told we are #1 every month or so for the last 4 months.

We started at our second choice primary - Lovely Local - three weeks ago. Since then a child from DC's Lovely Local class has left. His mum says he has been offered and accepted a place at Amazing Academy.

Our admissions officer at the LA says no one has been offered a place at Amazing Academy and that there is no one "of that name" on her records.

WHAT IS HAPPENING?! Is other Mum lying? Is admissions officer lying? I feel like I'm losing the plot.

What should I do?

I was in a similar position, I wrote to the school asking them some very specific questions under the freedom of information act. Things like, can you tell me how many students are currently on roll in that particular year group, how many children they started the year with, what was the maximum number they had ever have, how many leavers and admissions had their been in the last 12 months. What number we were on the waiting list, if we were not number one, under what criteria were the children above us. If they had been admissions in the time we had been on the waiting list under what criteria did they go above us. They never answered these questions, just called me to arrange a meeting with them to arrange a start date for my child!
In my case, we had been number one of the list for around a year, I knew a child had left the class yet they insisted there were no spaces, they then told me several times someone else had taken the place. My nephew was in the same class and insisted they had no new children.
If you find from the above information you have been treated unfairly you can appeal on that basis but only if admissions rules haven’t been followed.

In one of my dc's years they had no child leave until year spring term year 2, and the child who got offered the place had only moved to the area a fortnight previously. So the child who had been first of the waiting list for over 2 years didn't get offered it.

@MargaretThursday

In one of my dc's years they had no child leave until year spring term year 2, and the child who got offered the place had only moved to the area a fortnight previously. So the child who had been first of the waiting list for over 2 years didn't get offered it.

That's how it works though- the list is ordered by the admissions criteria, regardless of how long someone has spent on the list. It's tough on someone who has been at the top for years but it was correct according to the rules.

@OrangeTortoise

Warmduscher - yes, this criteria is common around here, for teaching staff only.

It's nit fair is it. I know someone who is a fundraiser for a highly sought after local comp. the kind of place people move house for. She lives nowhere near catchment & her kids are there. It's not even like parents drop kids off at that age!

Could the child be having a managed move due to behaviour?

Don't bother with a FOI request. If the data of "admissions between x and Y dates, giving criteria for admission" is such a small number that it potentially makes a child identifiable i.e. one student admitted, they're able to refuse to provide the information.

@FawnFrenchieMum

I was in a similar position, I wrote to the school asking them some very specific questions under the freedom of information act. Things like, can you tell me how many students are currently on roll in that particular year group, how many children they started the year with, what was the maximum number they had ever have, how many leavers and admissions had their been in the last 12 months. What number we were on the waiting list, if we were not number one, under what criteria were the children above us. If they had been admissions in the time we had been on the waiting list under what criteria did they go above us. They never answered these questions, just called me to arrange a meeting with them to arrange a start date for my child! In my case, we had been number one of the list for around a year, I knew a child had left the class yet they insisted there were no spaces, they then told me several times someone else had taken the place. My nephew was in the same class and insisted they had no new children. If you find from the above information you have been treated unfairly you can appeal on that basis but only if admissions rules haven’t been followed.

It could be that they had previously admitted a child over the PAN, either because of an appeal, fair access, twin given last allocated place, LAC admission, bringing the class size to 31.

If a child had left then the class size would have been 30. Therefore the class is full even though a child has left and no one else has been admitted.

It won't change the detail of what's going on but I'd put the information in writing and email it to the LA admissions team and to Amazing Academy.

Dear Admissions people,
I understand from the parent of Stanley Yelnats (reception class at Lovely Local Primary) that he has been offered a place at Amazing Academy and will be taking it up.

I was under the impression that my child, Marley Barley, was first on the waiting list for Amazing Academy and therefore, should a place have come available, it should have been offered to him.

Please would you confirm as a matter of some urgency that Amazing Academy’s admissions policy has been correctly applied when offering the vacancy. In the event that you discover an error has been made, please let me know when I can expect Marley to be offered a place.

Years ago now, DD1 missed out on a place at our first choice primary (where I taught). It turned out to have been the knock-on effect of fraudulent behaviour by a parent at a school two streets away. I found this out because the parent of a child DD1 had been with in the school nursery told me she'd been offered a place at their first choice and had accepted it. I immediately emailed the LA, told them that child named XX at Favourite Primary had accepted a place at Posh Primary and asked what the impact was on DD1's position on the waiting list. She was top but the LA messed up and over-offered the vacancy by offering it to fraudulent parent, DD1 and tried to reserve it for a child with an EHCP. It was a right mess, and got messier when the LA tried to withdraw our offer. As DD1's was the only legitimate one (child with EHCP could be admitted as an excepted pupil), hers stood but not without a battle!