And so it begins - what are my right re: getting LEA to re-measure distance to nearest school?

[MatBackFeck]

We are in Surrey LEA. It clearly states on website that distances are measured in miles for purposes of judging nearest school (as the crow flies) - one of the selection criteria. Online system terefore shows you your nearest school (school A) in miles, but also has it in metres.

We are equidistant from 2 schools both of which come up as 0.8 miles away. However, school A (crap one we don't want and can't walk to as no pavements) comes up as our nearest as it is 2 metres!! closer. School B (our first choice, walkable) therefore soes not give us the point for "childs nearest school". The admissions team have told me they use the meters distance in case where 2 schools are the sam ein miles.

I want to appeal this. Does anyone know anything about this or done similar? Obvioulsy, if they measured from, say, the corner of our property rather than the middle or wherever it is done (from land registry maps??) we could easily get it to come out the other way round and lose the 2 meters. Does anyone know what is possible?

Thanks

I personally think that measuring "as the crow flies" is laughable and lazy of the LEA (easy to measure on a map). Can the children fly ? Will they be taking a crow taxi to school ?

Other LEAs use walking routes as the distance from the school. Can you not appeal because they are using an inappropriate measuring method that accurately measures no-ones true journey to school distance ?

I agree - they changed it for last year apparently. It is stupid. As you say, you can't just stand at the end of your property and throw your children in a straight line towards the nearest school - which actually happens to be behind a massive ridge with a lethal country path through it with no pavements wheras the other one is up the top of our road and on the next road. It was by far our nearest when we moved here and rpads and paths were used.

I intend to explore very avenue, just wondering if anyone else has any experience of things I might use to get it changed.

Can't help with your individual situation but I do know they need to have very clear and detailed written guidelines on this. In our street people in the upstairs flat in one house did not get their children into the school even though the downstairs flat did - measurements were from the nearest edge of the front door. You need to get the written statement that includes these kinds of details.

thanks, will ask them for it. They dont use catchement areas here - just nearest distance so wonder if it is as detailed. I will ask!

I would defintley query how they have calculated the metres. I don't believe that they have gone to each property to measure it.

I don't think that you can formaly appeal though until you have gone through the application process and been turned down. That said nothing worng with querying how they have reached the measurements in advance.

I'm sure for primary government guideline or policy (not sure which ) also says about the route being a pavement and well lit?

Our borough (I sat on the appeals panel last year) uses a computer package - presumably based on the same sort of system as sat navs - to measure distance from home to school. We are about to change from 'most suitable walkable route' to 'as the crow flies'.

I think you will find that your LEA uses something similar and will take the view that (a) its measurements are reliable and (b) it has to use the same measuring system for all applications, as anything else would potentially be unfair; if it used any different system for you it might have to redo the measurements for other applicants too.

Good luck!