Querying child’s rejected place

[MamaMD99]

Hello!
My child has just been rejected from our first choice school however having read into it we are unsure how they have justified accepting others and not us.
we have chosen within catchment and aside from a small village church school it is our closest school.
I know of two other people in our area who have applied to the school, one accepted and one rejected.
we live 2.3 miles from the school, the person accepted lives 2.8 miles from the school, has no siblings/ additional learning needs or anything other than being in catchment that could support the application.
having read up on how they choose, it states clearly that the last applicant was chosen based on the shortest safest walking distance from the school. The applicant mentioned above either has to walk along a 60mph road that has no footpath (therefore not safe) or walk an extra half an hour (a route that takes them past where we live) to get to the school, meaning we live a shorter safer walking distance from said school.
so, my question is, can I raise this in our appeal? Or can I outwardly question their decision??

as you can tell we are devastated because the school is beautiful and my LO has been part of it since joining their charity run nursery on site at the age of 2.

TIA xx

Contact the admissions department at the council first and ask them what distance they have used for your address, and what distance the last awarded place was.

You can certainly try appealing based on a theory that the criteria wasn't applied correctly. In reality, it probably was, as odd as it sounds.

The distance/catchment criteria often causes confusion as it's assumed those who live closer, as the crow flies, would beat someone further away to a place (this is indeed how it works in many areas). Some do still use defined catchment areas though, which are often oddly shaped and can include areas further out from the school in one direction and not so far out in another. It's definitely worth enquiring about, but it sounds like something like that may have happened here.

Thank you for your advice :)
we are in the catchment for the school as per our local council website and the distance is based on ‘shortest safest walking distance’

We were given this in response to our application

The thing is that you don’t really know if the child who was offered a place at 2.8 miles doesn’t have a higher ranking than your DC. Not everyone is open about their DC being eligible as a looked after child, or having an EHCP etc. My DC is on a waiting list for an assessment but no one knows because it’s my child’s private personal info that he doesn’t want shared at the moment.

Best bet is to get on the waiting list as there is likely to be some movement between now and September.

You need to ask them what distance they have for you - do they have it as 2.3?

I think this is why most schools use straight line distance as their tie breaker. You can't really argue much about that, but shortest safe walking distance is often debatable.
I am no expert, but I would think your prospects might hinge on whether you can demonstrate a route from your house that is less than 2.8miles. I would be asking for details of what route they have used for you. I don't know exactly how you'd find that out but I presume that if you appeal they'd have to tell you - I believe the LA have to answer any reasonable questions you have relevant to your appeal.

Ask for the "safe walking route" distance from your address to the school, and also check what their definition of "safe walking route" is.

We had this with one of the schools near us. It turned out the council had a weird rule that the safe walking route couldn't go over land owned by the City of London Corporation, but for some reason it was fine to walk on an unlit path next to a busy A road 🤷‍♀️

Distance is normally calculated as the crow files - could this be the issue with regards to their versus yours perhaps theirs is closer under this calculation? There is websites that calculate the distance as the crow flies so you could check.

Yes, ask them what distance they have for you and how they calculated it and what category they put you in.

The council software has deemed the main road as being a safe walking route. I see your point that realistically very few (if any!) would walk a child to school along a road like this. However this hinges on the definition of 'safe'. It is a legal and possible route to walk, and I don't see that the council could exclude it. If they did, others could appeal based on it being a suitable route. The term tends to exclude things like cutting across private land.

Yes. Ask what distance they have for you. If you really are 2.3 miles, and the last accepted is 2.8, you presumably have grounds to appeal, on the basis that the criteria was not correctly applied.

You cannot know who the last applicant admitted was, so you don't know if the 2.8 mile route involves walking along a 60mph road. Also, you say it is a 60mph road. Most single-track roads are 60mph but no-one would go at anything like that speed along them. It is not necessarily the case that a 60mph road with no footpath is unsafe. But this is why I am not a fan of "shortest safe walking route" criteria. Straight line is difficult to get wrong, but when looking at walking routes the council can miss out safe footpaths or include routes that are not safe.

You say you live 2.3 miles from the school. If that is the straight line distance, it is irrelevant. You need to know what the council regards as the shortest safe walking route for you and the distance that gives. If you can show that there is a shorter safe route than the one they have measured and the distance on that route is less than 2.8 miles, you have a case. However, if they have got the correct shortest route from your house to the school, it will be much harder to win.

If they produce a map for the appeal showing the route for the last child admitted, you will be able to see if it is safe. However, convincing the panel that it is unsafe will not necessarily result in a place for your child. The council would have to re-measure the distances for everyone excluding the unsafe part of the route. They may find that you still wouldn't have got a place.

If the 60 mph road is deemed safe, are you still closer? Or is your argument that the road isn’t safe, therefore you are closer?

There are some additional reasons why someone might get a place before you - for example my friend’s child is adopted and she got priority over other children.

If ex LAC then they would be in a higher up category and not be the child mentioned in the screenshot from the OP as the 'last admitted'.

You’ve got nothing to lose by challenging the decision.

Is your walk 2.3 miles? Because if so you likely have grounds to appeal. Are you in the waiting list in case spaces become available?It sounds like the walk of the nearer applicant is 2.8 miles so you need a closer walk than that.

Do you live 2.3 miles away as the crow flies, or is this your measured walking distance?

No harm in asking again

A lot of children live on 60mph roads with no footpaths and walk down them everyday on the way to school. I don’t see why that would be excluded as a safe walking (although it obviously isn’t ideal)

The rule (as stated in the council’s response) seems to be shortest ‘safe’ walking route - not ‘safest’. Otherwise it would cause all kinds of issues with parents arguing over what routes are safest. But if you think the shortest safe walking route from your address to the school is less than 2.8 miles, then I think you have grounds for appeal.

ask them what distance they have down for you.Maybe they didn't record you as 2.3

@MamaMD99 definitely call admissions about this, and email them after any phone call, with your child's name and date of birth as the subject/title of the email, confirming what was discussed so it's all recorded in writing.

You just have to keep calling and emailing until it gets fixed unfortunately. I say this as someone whose DD's place was misallocated by the local authority (we live on the boundary between two different local authority, so I pre empted thar a mistake was more likely and called a few weeks before offers day). I got it sorted a week ahead of national offer day, but if I hadn't chased them up and kept everything recorded in writing, my DD would have been incorrectly allocated to a less preferred school. If they've made a mistake with your application, then even if it's after offer day, it's on them to fix it.

I know someone years ago who won an appeal on “shortest safe walking route” as there was a cut through onto a footpath at the end of the cul-de-sac where they lived and the LA measured them walking all the way down the road and then back on themselves up the footpath in a sort of hairpin. The cut through wasn’t on the LA map but it did exist and was a proper paved path on public land rather than an informal track through a copse or something. You need to know the route they have measured and see if it’s the actual route.

Nobody here can answer these questions except the admissions office but plenty of people including children walk safely along National Speed Limit roads every day.