primary school appeal

[melkr]

we actually got our application in late due to not knowing that we had to put an application form in for our youngest to go to primary, my other children are 19 and 15 and someone came around the house then.
We live in the catchment area, our childminder is in the area and runs all her other children to the school, all her friends are going there, they say it is at full capacity, my eldest is disabled and we work full time and there would no safe walking route to another school from where we live plus they almost 2 miles away.
We are appealing the decision, and are also discussing the prospect of keeping her out until a place is available if unsuccessful, can she nursery provision if we do, what do you think the chances are of turning the decision, we have put her name on the waiting list, I feel for all those in the same position as us it is stressful

Your chances at appeal depend on whether it is an infant class size case. If the school has 30 children in each infant class (i.e. Reception, Y1 and Y2) it will be an infant class size case. In that case you will only get in if you can show that the authority has made a mistake (unlikely for a late application like this) or has acted unreasonably (again, unlikely). There is always a chance that an appeal panel will give you a place anyway but don't get your hopes up.

On the other hand, if it isn't an infant class size appeal you stand a better chance. You can talk about the lack of a safe walking route to your allocated school but it would help if you can find other reasons why your catchment school is the right one for your child - after school clubs which would be beneficial to her or special facilities which she needs, for example.

Do you know yet where you are on the waiting list? Waiting lists are made in line with the admissions criteria, so if you are within walking distance of the school I'm guessing you won't be too far down the list.

At any appeal, be prepared for the panel to ask you why you applied late. Our LEA puts posters on bus stops and does leaflet drops at nurseries, so it's quite hard not to be aware of the closing date for applications.

None of the reasons you give are sufficient to win a class size appeal - it would seem likely that the reason you didn't get a place is that you applied late, which is your fault. I would second the suggestion re the waiting list - I would imagine you would be quite near the top anyway?

The school has 28 in one class and 29 in the other, cannot understand why it is different between the two, we have enquired with the pre-school so that if need be she can stay there, and we have also asked for help and advice from our local counciller as she knows our family and everything we do on a daily basis, her name is on the waiting list.

What is the admission number? If it is 60, there will be 30 in each class in September and your appeal will be a class size appeal. On the other hand if it is 57 I think most appeal panels would admit 3 more children unless the classrooms are particularly small. Whether your child would be one of the three is another matter. The appeal panel is not bound by the admission criteria. They will decide based on the strength of the arguments presented.

We have now found out that they admitted total of 63 children last year after appeals, which will hopefully help, there are 4 other families in the same prediciment, in the local area who also say they did not receive information, it seems the processes were changed this year with our LA and have broken down in some way and so counciller is helping and said will come to appeal with us. Fingers crossed.

Melkr,
Would you be prepared to say which LA we are talking about here?

The fact that 63 were admitted last year, says that at least 3 pupils were admitted because mistakes were made by the admission authority and they were admitted as excepted pupils under the infant class size regulations. The two classes should not have had more than 60 (30 in each class). If the school still has more than 60 in the 2 classes in September they will have to do something about that and the only way is to reduce down to 30 in the class or employ a second school teacher in one of the classes and have 33 in one class and 30 in the other. Not a good position financially for the school to be in.

Whilst this might be encouraging to you that there were mistakes made last year, it will not in theory become a reason to admit to 63 again this year. The appeal panel could admit to 60, but not above that unless it is proved that the admission authority (the LA) have again made mistakes.

You need to establish what the numbers are in the current reception year, are they over the magic 60? If they are a really pertinent question to ask at the appeal is what the school intends to do in september to meet the ICS regs. If there is an extra teacher, could they actually have an extra class?

Whilst i would not want to tell you how to handle the appeal, you need to be able to prove that the LA did not carry out a sufficiently robust campaign to alert you as a parent to the fact that you had to apply last term for a place at the school. Why did you for instance not get the info through the nursery provision or the child-minder, both of which should have been aware of the need to apply? The fact that you now know of 4 other families in a similar position is a help in suggesting that there is something wrong but also a negative in that there will be four families saying the same thing and having the same case at appeal. I have in previous years seen a case where the parent contacted 25 local nurseries and asked them whether they had seen or handed out info from the LA on primary admissions. The figures were somewhat damning to the LA's case, so this may be a way forward in proving that the LA did not do a good job. A case that simply says we expected someone to tell us will not carry any weight with the appeal panel.

Also the local councillor supporting you, will not carry any specific weight with the panel, as they will also have in effect to support the other families in a similar position, to abide by the rules that apply to councillors supporting appeals.

Admission - the OP said in an earlier post (Mon 12-Apr-10 19:07:04) that there is currently 28 in one reception class and 29 in the other, so they are back within infant class size regs before Sept. I suppose the good news from this is that they have gone from 63 to 57 in 9 months, so it looks like there is typically some movement in the local area, and the OP stands a good chance of getting a place via the waiting list?

Hello...I am new to mumsnet, so thank you to anyone that's reading.

I am up at 1.41am as i cannot sleep. I was informed this morning my child did not get into her chosen primary school. I feel very, very upset and anxious. my child has been offered a school that is a good 25 minute walk from where i live. I do not drive. My 1st choice school was rejected, however it is the closest school to her and she has good friends in the area and a great child minder near by. I work and i feel everything has been turned upside down. I will loose a great child minder whom she's fond of, and the opportunity to go to a good school. Having to walk to another school will have a physical effect on me as i suffer from plantar fascitis (a foot condition) which is pretty painfull when walking more than 10 minutes, i also have sciatica quite often, which is also quite debilitating. I want to appeal, i have been rejected on grounds that there were 223 applicants and most places went either to kids with siblings or those that were 0.271 miles away and I am 0.279 miles away. There are 60 spaces which have been allocated (yet to know if parents have accepted. I feel so desperate and want to appeal. Can anyone help / advice?? Also has anyone appealed via John Chard or can advice? Thank you so much....

As there are 60 places, this will be an infant class size appeal (no KS1 class can have more than 30 pupils by law)

Where a child has been refused admission to a
school on infant class size grounds,you will only win an appeal if you can show one of the following:

• the child would have been offered a place

if the admission arrangements had been properly implemented and complied the School Admissions Code

• the decision to refuse admission was "unreasonable" or "peverse" in the legal sense.

Did you supply any information about family circumstances/your disabilities with the initial application? I ask as the appeal panel normally consider if the decision was "reasonable" based on the information available to the admissions authority at the time, not in light of "new" information you submit at appeal.

Sorry it's probably not what you wanted to hear, but infant class size appeals are very very difficult to win.

As BetsyBoop says this will be an infant class size appeal which will be difficult to win.

The bar for a decision being unreasonable is very high - the LA has to have acted irrationally.

I think there are three things to say here. If you are only 0.008 miles from geting a place there is a reasonable chance that you will get offered a place as others reject their place.

Secondly 0.008 of a mile is actually 14 yards (42 feet) so you need to establish how exactly the distance is measured. The distances can be measured down to very very tight tolerances, literally inches, if the distance is measured as direct line measurement from the datum point on the school to the datum point on your dwelling. However if it is nearest road distance or nearest walking route and if it is too the nearest school gate or school door, you need to question whether the distance measure is completely correct. Obviously from the admission authorities view it is, but is there a different route that is acceptable to the LA that they did not measure? A bit of research could be of use to you here.

The third point is that if you in your original submission did comment about your walking issues then the admission authority should have considered whether to put you in exceptional needs category, assuming there is such a category. The admission authority needs to inform you why they did not consider you to be in that category. Obviously if you did not say anything then the admission authority cannot have a crystal ball and will not have taken that into consideration. However there is nothing to stop you submitting appropriate evidence and that needs to be medical evidence to show that there is good reason why the school allocated is not appropriate. It is not a compelling case but in terms of infant class reg cases it is the best that you can mount with a questioning of the distance measurement.

Any of the experts such as John Chard are potentially going to charge you a lot of money. Having seen them in action on a good few occaisons I can honestly say that a parent who is well prepared and able to get a sensible line of argument across to the panel can do as good a job as the "experts". It is obviously about spotting that line of attack that is the crucial issue and even the "experts" can not win a case if there is no salient issue that convinces an appeal panel. This is especialy true in an infant class size case, which yours would be Incidently I chaired a panel two years ago where a parent ran rings around a so-called expert in convincing the panel about an issue over the admission criteria. The panel upheld the appeal and the "expert" has been calling it a major victory ever since on their website, much to my annoyance. If they only knew the truth!

wow had the appeal today, gruelling is how i describe it, we were the only one to appeal our daughter is the only child left to be placed, they argued that the measurements of the school necessitates 57 between the classrooms, although LA had put in her case about infant class sizes by law no more than 30, it was all about our childs education and social interaction as she is already in pre-school with these friends and will miss out on the bonding in school if not allowed to go, one child is all we asking for, closing statement did say in the interest of the child so hopefully this was a positive, its been a few hours since and keep going over it all, not going to be able to rest until receive reply in next 2 days hopefully.
good luck all with your appeals if not already done

Nothing you can do now so fingers crossed. I think you've got a decent chance given the slightly odd admission number and the fact that you were the only appeal. However, it all depends on the panel.

Melkr,
Sorry I might be misunderstanding what you are saying here but the school and LA may be misrepresenting the situation.
Is the PAN for the school 60 or 57?
How many did the LA admit to the school this year for september start?
Is there still 63 in what will be year 1 in september?
Did the schools case state that it was an infant class size regs case and that the qualifying measure needed to be taken was an extra teacher?

hi all
lost our appeal, just a quick question can an observer in an appeal who is learning the role of an panel member lean across during the appeal and whisper to one of the members, we do not know what was said by him,but feel it could have had a contributing factor towards our appeal, surely he was there to just observe as was said by the head of the panel

In theory the observer should not have talked to a member of the panel but they could simply have been asking for clarification of something that had been said. It would not constitute a reason to go to LGO on unless there was clear evidence that they took an active part in the decision making.

Is the PAN 57? If so, I'm not clear why the LA mentioned infant class sizes if the PAN is 57. If the LA misrepresented the situation that would be a reason to go to the LGO.

Hi,just lost our appeal for preferred Infant school, at time we went to appeal there were '2'appeals in total, we were told at the appeal meeting that a place had become available at the school and it had been given to the other appeal as they were at the top of the waiting list. In another breath they said that the appeals procedure doesn't take into account the waiting list.I thought that seemed unfair and told them so, any advice welcome ???

see answer on your other thread