So we have a response
Mail Received
Dear Mr xxx,
Thank you for your recent emails.
Any place which becomes available is offered to an applicant from the waiting list. The waiting list is ranked in accordance with the authority’s oversubscription criteria. The reason for withdrawing xxx's (my child's) offer of the place at xxx Primary School was that another applicant on a higher priority than xxx (my child) on the waiting list should have been offered the place. xxx (my child) is ranked as a category 3 applicant. The applicant who should have been offered a place was wrongly categorised as a category 4 applicant rather than a category 2 applicant. The authority’s oversubscription criteria is as follows:
Oversubscription criteria
Quite often, there are not enough places at a school to satisfy every parent who wants to send their child there. This is what is meant when a school is oversubscribed. When schools are oversubscribed the admissions authority has to adopt criteria for deciding which children are to be offered the available places.
All children whose Education, Health and Care (EHC) Plan names a school, must be admitted to that school.
Xxx (council/LEA) is the Admission Authority for all community and voluntary controlled schools in xxx (borough).
Where the number of applications for a community or voluntary controlled school exceeds the number of places available at the relevant school, the following over-subscription criteria will apply:
Criteria 1. Looked after children and children who were previously looked after.
A looked after child is a child who is in the care of a local authority in England, or is being provided with accommodation by a local authority in England in the exercise of their social services functions.
Previously Looked After Children are children who were looked after but ceased to be so because they were adopted (or became subject to a child arrangements order or special guardianship order)* This includes children who have been in state care outside of England and ceased to be in state care as a result of being adopted. A child is regarded as having been in state care in a place outside of England if they were accommodated by a public authority, a religious organisation or any other provider of care whose sole purpose is to benefit society.
*Section 14A of the Children Act 1989 defines a ‘special guardianship order’ as an order appointing one or more individuals to be a child’s special guardian (or special guardians).
Criteria 2. Children who live in the catchment area of the requested school, who will have a sibling attending the requested primary, infant or partner junior school at the time of the applicant's proposed admission (This includes half/step/adopted/foster brothers or sisters, and any other children, who are living at the same address as part of the same family unit).
Criteria 3. Children who live in the catchment area of the requested school.
Criteria 4. Children, who live outside the catchment area of the requested school, with a sibling attending the requested primary, infant or partner junior school at the time of the applicant's proposed admission (This includes half/step/adopted/foster brothers or sisters, and any other children, who are living at the same address as part of the same family unit).
Criteria 5. Children who live nearest to the requested school, calculated in a direct straight line from the child's permanent place of residence to the school.
The distance from the home address will be calculated from the seed point of the property, which is defined by co-ordinates held in xxx’s Local Land and Property Gazetteer (BSxxxx), and are available for each individual property on request from Trafford’s School Admission Team.
For applicants resident outside xxx, the seed point data will be provided by the Home Authority. Royal Mail Postal Address Information may be used in some instances. The co-ordinates used for each school are held in Trafford’s School Admissions and Transfer system and are listed in the Directory of Primary Schools.
In the case of a child living in a block of flats, co-ordinates will be obtained in the same way.
If there are more applicants than can be accommodated at a school in criteria 1 to 5, places will be offered to those children in each criterion, whose place of residence is nearest to the school, as defined in criterion 5.
Where two or more applications cannot be otherwise separated, the final place will be determined through a random draw, conducted and scrutinised by persons independent from the School, and from the Children's Services Directorate.
You refer to clause 2.14 of the School Admissions Code which states:
"A school must not withdraw a place once a child has started at the school, except where that place was fraudulently obtained. In deciding whether to withdraw the place, the length of time that the child has been at the school must be taken into account. For example, it might be considered appropriate to withdraw the place if the child has been at the school for less than one term."
The place was not withdrawn by the Head and governing body of xxx Primary School. Instead, the offer of the place was withdrawn by xxx Local Authority in accordance with clause 2.13 of the School Admissions Code because we are the admission authority of xxx Primary School.
I apologise for the error which took place but I can assure you that the previous email was sent to you as soon as the caseworker had brought the matter to my attention and I advised her to withdraw off's (my child) offer of the place.
In relation to school admission matters, the official complaint process is an appeal to the independent appeals panel. Information on the appeals process and how to lodge an appeal is available on the xxx Council website: Primary school admission appeals
In the meantime, I have advised the caseworker to allocate xxx (my child) a place ar xxx Primary School.
Regards
xxxx
School Admissions Service Manager