PAN for Harrow School

[adhw]

Hi
If the Pan is reduced for a school for a specific year...does the reduced pan apply for just that year or for all future years too?

also, should the LA always offer only the number of seats agreed as PAN OR could they offer more if there are more applications and the school previously used to have 120 as the PAN...and can accommodate 120 children?

Thank you

for That year and future years.

It depends on whether the school is its own admission authority in terms of what the LA can or can’t do to influence the school. But ultimately the school will limit admissions to the PAN unless they have space and fee they can cope. I suspect that if they are reducing their PAN, that will not be the case.

A reduction in PAN always requires consultation, even for academies. A reduction would normally be intended to be ongoing, though a school can increase its PAN without consultation.

A school should always offer to PAN (unless it is a grammar and not enough children qualify). It can choose to over offer but does not have to. There may be a good reason they needed to reduce it.

Of course the LA can't offer to more then the school says they can accommodate. What are they going to do with the others? Stand them in the car park on rotation?

Just because they could accommodate 120 in the past does not mean they can now. Many things can change

Hi

So to give some more context - the school had a PAN of 120.

In 2021 July, the local authority had asked if the PAN can be reduced for September 2021 considering they had less than 90 applications. The case documentation says the below which indicates the reduction is for September 2021.

Summary
15. Numbers of applications have taken an unexpected and significant drop for
admission in 2021 and therefore I approve the variation which will provide realistic stability for organisational and financial planning for the school.
Determination
16. In accordance with section 88E of the School Standards and Framework Act 1998, Iapprove the proposed variation to the admission arrangements determined by the London
Borough of Harrow for Cannon Lane Primary School, Pinner for September 2021.
17. I determine that the published admission number for September 2021 will be 90.
18. By virtue of section 88K(2) the adjudicator’s decision is binding on the admission
authority. The School Admissions Code requires the admission authority to revise its
admission arrangements within two months of the date of the determination.

The above makes me think the reduction in PAN is only for September 2021. However if the argument is the reduction is for all years....I would have expected the LA to have offered only 90 the following year. However this is not the case. For the same school, the LA offered 120 places on offer day - this is the case for 2022 and 2023. The school website says it takes 120 children.
How can this be the case? If the PAN is 90 - I would have expected the LA to have offered only 90 on offer day....am I missing something?

Thank you

A school can offer over PAN if they want to. This year they have offered 90, which remains their official PAN.

It looks like they feel they have the capacity for say 24 classes, which is 3 in most years but another one every 3 years or so.

The full adjudication
https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/60facc298fa8f5043b11e445/VAR2158CannonnLanePrimaryySchoolHarroww23Julyy2021.pdf

Makes it clear that it was based on future projections and to give the school stability to plan, and they would consider increasing again in future. So it was intended to set a new PAN.

http://www.cannonlaneprimary.org/

This is the right school?

The LA school admission arrangements documents for 2023, 2024 and 2025 entry all say that PAN is 90.

@adhw schoolis correct, though that the school website says...

Cannon Lane is a large all-through primary school with an annual intake of 120 children. As part of an ambitious expansion programme, the school has benefitted from significant financial investment that has provided us with new, state of the art facilities for our children to enjoy.

Offering an extra class' worth of places in the years following the 'variation' year could indicate that there were more places required than expected in those years, but over time, numbers are going down, so the

LA wants to leave arrangements as PAN 90 plus a bulge class if required, rather than officially increasing PAN again? Would the actual numbers required at several local schools potentially lead, technically, to odd over a multiple of 30 intakes and instead, this one school is being used to mop these up, as it is obviously designed as a 28 class base institution?

Thestatement on the website does makes it sould as if 120 is a permanent state of affairs, though.