Criteria for choosing state school?

[pizzanoodle]

Hi everyone!
We're interested to know what criteria should parents use to make choices for primary school? Any thoughts appreciated!
Thank you!

Visit and get a gut feeling - do you share the school's values?
Ease of getting to and from school
Provision of wrap-around care if required
Progress, attainment and behaviour of pupils
Ofsted (whole report not just one-word grading)
Will DC already know other children there?

The value-added measure in the Offsted report.

I agree with the list provided by @BlueChampagne and also with the order of priorities in their list.

I agree with PP's list. I would also add local reputation as something to look out for- quite often it can tell you a lot.

Around school gate, you will see parents & kids behaviours. Read everything in ofsted report. Talk to parents. Visit school. Ask the questions you care about.

First things first - do you actually have a fair chance of getting into more than one school? Parents express preferences on the form and if you live close enough (or meet any other higher criteria like siblings or religious attendance) you will get a place. But lots of people only actually have one “banker” that they will definitely get into.

This ^.

But... you should still aim to use up all the preferences allowed on your LA's form (must be a minimum of 3, some allow 5 or 6), even if it's a case of

1. The only one we really want / The only one we're +/- guaranteed to get
2. The next least worst / less likely
3. The next one down from (2)
4. The next one down from (3)

etc

If none of your preferences can be met, your LA will allocate the nearest of its schools to your home address with a place remaining at the end of the on time allocation process. Definitely don't only name one school. You may strike lucky, and that's the school you might have put as e.g. preference 2 or 3 anyway, had you bothered to list any more. Or you might get the school that nobody else wants, either, when you might actually have got what you might have listed as preference 2 or 3, had you actually listed them.

Look carefully at the oversubscription criteria for each school, for the correct year of entry, to see under which criterion your DC would be ranked. Ask the LA / school (if a faith school / academy) for info re the criterion under which last offers have been made, if it's not easily available on the relevant website(s), but remember that each year brings a different cohort / possibly different pattern of application etc.