Infant class size appeal - help!!!

[grizzlyhair]

Please can anyone help. We have just moved into a new area and want our DD1 (4 in July) to start the local school in Sep. However the school (round the corner) is full for reception, although not full in Y1 and 2 and never been full before. Want to appeal but keep hearing it will only work if we can prove an error has been made. What does this mean? What kind of error? Has infant class appeals ever won before where there has been no error / similar circumstances?

The "error" people talk about is only really applicable to the main admissions round, and means that the admissions authority made a mistake in the way they applied the over-subscription criteria.

You are in a slightly different position as you are coming in after the main admissions round & the class is already full, so in effect no "error" can be made as they have no space to admit you.

You can still apply (which will be turned down) & go on the waiting list (which is also held in the same order as the admissions criteria, so if you are very close to the school you may be near the top.

You can appeal as well, but the likelihood of success depends on the local position with school places. If say the nearest school with places was 5 miles away (I'll make it extreme to explain the point) then you would be a lot more likely to win than if there was another school half a mile away with places free.

There is also something called the "Fair Access Protocol" - which you should be able to find on the Las website - which deals with cases like yours when you move to an area outside the normal admissions round. If no local schools at all have places then this will explain the process your LA use to find (ie "make") a place free.

I hope this helps?

PS - I should have said, just in case you don't know, "infant class size" appeal means 30 in a class for YR, Y1 & Y2.

Just to clarify, if there will be 30 in each class in Reception this will be an infant class size appeal. The rules are that an ICS appeal can only succeed if the LA has made a mistake or has behaved unreasonably in refusing your child a place.

As BetsyBoop says, since you are applying outside the normal admissions round and the school is full up, it is unlikely that you can argue that a mistake has been made.

If it is not an ICS appeal the points made by MintHumbug are correct in that you need to show why your child's education will suffer if she isn't admitted to this school. However, if it is an ICS appeal you are unlikely to win. It is still worth trying as you may get a sympathetic panel who will ignore the rules and admit your daughter, but be realistic about your chances.

Thanks for your advice. It will be an infant class size appeal as the class is full. We have arranged a place at a school 2 miles away with places but this will be a problem journey. My question is are there any other grounds at all that we could appeal on, eg the smaller Y1 and 2 classes, hence the school not being technically full. There isn't really anything else I can think of, apart from the social benefits of being able to make frieds locally (DD is very shy and finds making friends difficult) This whole appeal business is becoming a complete nightmare and makes me wonder if there is any point at all...

Check with the LA, but if the journey to school is more than 2 miles away you should qualify for free transport from the LA as this was the nearst school they could offer. If just one child involved then this is typically a taxi door-to-door - don't know if that helps the logistics?

Later years not being full doesn't really help as the appeals panel won't force the school to do mixed age classes if they don't already do them. However what it does show is that there is some movement out of the local area, so you might get a place fairly quickly from the waiting list.

Do check out the Fair Access Protocol I mentioned, just in case there is anything in there that could help your case about how far is "too far" for it to be classed a local school & therefore the LA should "make" a place for you at a local school over & above the 30 limit.

I'm sure you've got this right but just in case, if they aren't mixing Reception with other years it will be an ICS appeal if the admission number is 30, 60, 90 or 120. If the admission number is not a multiple of 30 it will not be an ICS appeal and you will have a much better chance of success.

As BetsyBoop says, the smaller Y1 and Y2 classes don't help. The panel has to work with whatever class arrangement the school is using. They also have to consider that Y1 and Y2 may fill up and/or the Reception may be full for the next two years, either of which will leave teh school with a problem.

It is always worth trying an appeal - you may get lucky. However, if it is an ICS appeal I'm afraid it is unlikely you will succeed.

Just to clarify admissions number other than multiples of 30 can sometimes be ICS appeals too, as they don't just look at YR, but the class set-up in all KS1 years, so you do need to check.

The appeals panel also must consider whether admission of an additional child to reception would cause future infant class size prejudice as well as looking at the reception year.

eg one of my local schools has PAN of 75. They do 3 YR classes of 25, but then 5 classes of 30 between Y1 & Y2 (one being a mixed Y1/Y2 class) so any appeals there would be ICS.

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