Infant appeals procedure is a waste of time

[Kismet2010]

First of 2 school appeals yesterday in front of 2 60+ women and a Vicar. Emotional wreck due to the weeks of anxiety and sleepless nights, but had written loads down which hubby read out, but they did say what lovely name my daughter had!!. Each point they shook their heads at and the Council rep said as we were only out by 0.05 on distance 'she will keep her fingers crossed'. We were told to ring today at 10 for their decision. Tried ringing numerous times, but were told they are all busy with appeals and 'did we know there was an election on and they were very busy'. It is so unfair that they can put a family through this.

I have read all the posts about infant school appeals and knew from them that we had a poor chance, BUT the appeals are a farce and my advice to all parents wanting to get their four year old into a decent school is to MOVE NEXT DOOR TO THE SCHOOL YOU WANT ....... its the only way.

What a lovely name your daughter had is just condescending and uncalled for. They should not have been shaking their heads as they should not be displaying their emotions.

If they told you to ring at 10.00 then the admission authority are not being fair if they do not give you the answers you want. That is unforgivable.

I can only say that I hope your second appeal date is better organised than this appears to be.

Agree completely with Admission. This is appallingly bad.

I agree with the others. The head shaking and not being available to answer the phone when promised are not good.

But the remark about your child's name might, just might, have been meant as a kind remark to put you at your ease. Perhaps the panel could see how anxious you were and were trying to make some connection. And why is the age of the panel members - or their occupation - worth mentioning?

I hope you've managed to find out by now and it was a positive result.

Not good not being available when they said they would be and the head shaking was not on.

I agree though that the "nice name" comment could have just been intended to break the ice and help you feel at ease, as the panel could probably see how nervous your were.

Found out at lunchtime today and it was a NO, detailed letter on its way.

The only reason I mention the age of the panel was to suggest that things were a bit different in their day, but no offence intended, just an emotional comment and they were all experts in educational appeals, apart from Vicar who was the lay member.

Appeal on Monday is even harder to fight (2 miles out on distance criteria), thought knowing how things went would make me stronger, but it has put me right off. No chance of winning, but have to go so I know I tried.

Then the prospect of looking again into possible new school places, 8 months down the line!!

Second appeal over and done with. A better experience as the panel were more approachable and not so condescending. They upheld stage 1, so stage 2 was on infant class size and we spoke, but obvious it is going to be a no. I really do think it is a waste of time appealing in an infant case, I have had sleepless nights for four weeks, just to be in the same boat I was then and now needing to find a new school for my four year old. All that has happened is I have less time to look!!

As someone who has won an ICS appeal I have to say that it isn't always a waste of time but I agree that chances of success are low. Hope you are able to find a decent school for your four year old.

It was a No for both appeals. We have contacted all the schools with places and are off to visit them over the next couple of weeks. Problem is that the wraparound services attached are full for September, so on yet another waiting list. Visits to new schools start the week after half term and she will be the only one without a class to visit. Off to docs tomorrow as not eating or sleeping..... I have lost the will!!

i couldn't agree more - we did 2 and they were truly farcical. One was chaired by a woman in her eighties who had to keep stopping and asking her colleagues to summarise as she kepy losing the thread of the argument. She also needed to stop for regular breaks because she was tired. It is part of their strategy.

Fabhead,
If that truely happened then you have my sympathy because it should not happen like that. In fact I would go further and say if this recent that you should appeal to the LGO as clearly one of the panel members was not fit for such duty. If the panel member could not understand the arguements put forward then they could not make a reasoned and sensible decision.

Listening to this thread is terrifying me! Kismet, I sympathise with you so much about the huge emotional trauma. I'm still awaiting the date for my upcoming ICS appeal and haven't eaten or slept properly now since receiving refusal of place letter at end of March! Feel ill, constantly bickering with dh and not concentrating on anything other than my upcoming appeal. Am so worried. I have received some invaluable advice here so far from prh and admissions and am very grateful for that. Still going along the route of the LA measuring to the main gate of the school instead of the infant gate which is the only one they can use. Wondered if anyone could advise how to word this to greatest effect? also, can i bring up the fact that, at a recent meeting with an admissions person, they told me I should have filled in the special circumstances form at the back of the booklet, in relation to my location at the bottom of a country lane with only one access route in and out. She said this may have supported my application, but in the next breath, when I tried to show her a local map, she declined to look at my map, saying that she knew the area very well and didn't need to look at it. Therefore, why didn't admissions help in the first place, if they knew of my location and its access difficulties? Is this another avenue I can pursue or is it my own fault for not drawing attention to it in the first place as she says? i wondered if anyone could tell me what my chances of success are in your experience? I am absolutely terrified!

To be honest I'm not convinced the stuff about living up a lane with only one access route would have helped. That doesn't normally count as a special circumstance but, without knowing which LA we are talking about here, I don't know what your LA regard as a special circumstance. Given the behaviour of your LA so far I half suspect she was trying to make you feel guilty. However, it might be worth mentioning the conversation.

Your chances of success revolve around whether or not you can convince the appeal panel that the LA was wrong to measure to a gate that infants aren't allowed to use. It is very difficult to tell how they will react so I can't really say whether or not you have a good chance, although I think you've got a strong case. However, as I've said before, if the appeal panel find against you I would take this case to the LGO so that they can rule as to whether or not the LA's approach to measuring distances is correct. So don't regard the appeal panel as your final shot. It isn't.

Regarding how to word it, I would say something like, "The LA has measured distances to the main gate of the school. However, infants are prohibited from using the main gate. Indeed, the school positions a teacher at the main gate every day to direct infants to use the special infants gate. I would suggest that it is not reasonable to measure distances to a school gate that cannot be used by children in the normal year of entry. Indeed, given that the infants gate is the only gate that can be used by children in Reception, Year 1 and Year 2, I would suggest that this is the main gate for children in those years and that distances should be measured from that gate. If distances had been measured from the infants gate it would have reduced the distance for my child by (I can't remember how much - put in the correct figure) and would, I believe, have resulted in my child being admitted."

You need to put this into your own words then add any other factors you want to mention.

Try to relax. I know that's easier said than done. I know how nervous I was before my first appeal.

I am not at all sure that you need to have filled in the special circumstances form. There is no special circumstance, you live down a country lane with only one access route and this is not special. I suspect the admission person is simply trying to blind you with things that you should have done to try and make you give up.

This appeal is very simple the LA measure to the main gate which the school refuse to let the infants through. They use another gate, which is therefore the main gate for the year group that the admission refer to. The distance to the alternate gate is less than to the main gate and there is a belief that this has disadvantaged you.

Your theoretical chance of success is 50/50 that the panel will agree with you that measuring to a gate the infants can't use is illogical. I suspect that the panel will ask for legal advice on this and the outcome may depend on whether this has come up before or not. If it has come up before then the decision must have been that it must be what is in the admission criteria, that is the main gate, or they would have altered the admission criteria by now.

Whether the 50% that is positive then leads to a decision that you would have been offered a place with the new distance is impossible to know without having access to the data. So it is really difficult to guess what the outcome may be.

You have to be positive. You have a good case that measuring to the alternate gate is considerably closer, the rest is the bit that you can do little about.

djjc, I hope your argument on distance wins, as you really have to fight that the Admission Code was not followed correctly, as other arguments do not carry any weight. Not to sound negative, or to make it look like no one can win at appeal, but we argued (myself and four other parents) at stage 1 that school has taken over a classroom as a staffroom and rents out another classroom to a private wrap around company and these could be used as classrooms, to accommodate the waiting list of 24+ children who did not get a place at the school. The LEA and the Headteacher argued that this could be done, but they would not be able to appoint a teacher. We argued that more children, more funding, we were then told the financial year had already commenced, so this would only be available the next financial year. We argued that the top and bottom of it is that there are other undersubscribed schools in the area and until all schools were full, NO consideration would be given to increasing any of the school places, the LEA agreed. Every argument met with a brick wall.

But Kismet, while I sympathise with your position, their arguments re: funding are valid. There may be a classroom that they could use, but the costs of employing teachers and TAs to cover would be more than the paltry increase in funding for extra children which, as they've pointed out, would not be forthcoming until the following April after the staff were employed in September.
And no LEA will willingly sanction giving additional funds to expand a full schoolwhen there are empty places elsewhere, just because you don't happen to like the other schools.
Harsh, I know, but true.

I am not saying I don't agree with what they say, I am simply trying to show how hard it is to win stage 1 of an infant class size appeal and without a valid argument in stage 1 you are simply letting the panal know your problems in stage 2. I spent many a night researching literature on all sorts of child development issues, attending the library to research previous appeals etc., etc. The only argument is that of maladministration of the Admission Code set by that school. Don't bother arguing childcare, travelling distance between all the schools, cost of travel or childcare, emotional effect on your dd, it does not make any difference, it only stresses you out!!!

dear prh, admissions and panelmember, i would greatly appreciate your invaluable advice on a matter which has been brought to my attention today if you have the time.
my ics appeal is scheduled in just over a weeks time. as you are probably aware by now (sorry if you're getting bored with me) i am appealing on the grounds of the council measuring to the main school gate instead of to the infant gate, which, according to school newsletters dating back over the past 3 years, is the only one which the infant children are allowed to use. aside from this, i have just learned today that one of the parents whose child has been allocated a place actually handed in their application form a day late after the official deadline, to be told by the school secretary 'not to worry about it'. the school secretary then handed in this application to the council together with all the other on time application forms, which is contrary to the published criteria in respect of late applications. This child was subsequently awarded a place, which i feel should have been given to my son, as he would have been the next child in, being the next closest child under the distance criteria. i am devastated about this and don't know how to approach the situation as the headmistress has been so supportive. do i contact her or go to admissions with this information? or wait until my appeal to bring it up? do i need proof of this, as they may deny it, although the parent in question has been discussing the matter with others, saying she was quite surprised to get a place in view of the situation, particularly when she heard that we hadn't been successful! i feel gutted!

If you bring this up, then it will become a situation where you will be seen as being a tell-tale and it obviously puts the school in a dificult situation.

However there are rules and one of those rules is clearly that only on-time applications should be considered in the first round of admission allocations. I am somewhat surprised that the system being used is that it is forms handed into the school because it is so clearly open to abuse. However you cannot simply go to the appeal and say this because you have no evidence to back this up. The panel can only go on evidence submitted.

My view would be that on Monday you go into the school and ask to see the head. Explain how much you have appreciated the help that she has given her and that you have no wish to embarass the school but...

Give the head the opportunity to put this right before the appeal hearing. If they are honourable then the head will sort it out with the LA and they will admit you as an excepted pupil before the hearing.

They may say go the hearing and tell them this has happened. That may be a tacit admission of guilt which they will own upto but it may be done on the basis that you can't prove it. If I was the head or LA then I would not want to go to appeal as the obvious question that will come up is how many other applications were treated in the same way and the flood gates may be opened. If they admit before the appeal, then the panel will simply be told that a mistake had been identified and has been recitifed. There will be no embarassment to the school, other than the school secretary, so this would be my suggestion.

Thanks admission, obviously i don't want to come across as a tell-tale and realise this needs handling carefully. i was given the info on fri and my first reaction was to charge straight in to the school but i decided against it and thought it better to digest the information first and seek a bit of advice thankfully. i just feel my son has been so cheated i feel i can't just ignore it. the situation is already upsetting enough. will take your advice about going to see the head, am just very nervous in case they all deny it and there's nothing i can do. if this happens, would your advice be to not even mention it to the LA or at appeal?

If it is mentioned at appeal by you having had it denied by the school, I do not believe that you will have any information to back this up. The panel will simply not be able to consider it without any evidence and will just tell you to contact the LA if you can subsequently prove it.
So reluctantly I think you should not mention it at the appeal hearing because you wil simply be diluting your case.

I have one on Wed and know we will fail - I havw written a very brilliant and detailed leter as has nursery but there is no way we will get a place - 40 other parents are also appealing! Why do they do it? it's Infant size too..

Just a quick note to let you know that I went down the route of filing a complaint with LGO and they have just sent me a note of their decision and despite two points they agree with, to do with the schools brouchure being misleading and the appeal panel being wrong in saying that they did not have to consider childcare/the complete picture, their are no grounds to take matters further. At least I have tried everything to get my dd into the schools most convenient for us.

Last day tomorrow at school I want her to go to, tears all round and then spend the summer hols convincing dd that the school we have to send her to is the best, before working out the logistics of taking three kids to three different schools in September.

I am completely drained by the whole thing!! Thanks for many posts.

kismet2010 my appeal is 4th of august after read ur post i am really worried can i just contact u on your mobile number to gain some information about the appeal procedure if u dont mind

Dear Rohana I am no expert on appeals and everyone is different. Admissions and prh47bridge have answered a lot of my queries and always appear on any posts regarding appeals procedure. I am sure they will be able to help more. But if you still get no joy I will see what I can do. Which area are you appealing in? My appeal was in a rather small council borough.

i agree with u infant size appeal is waste of time they just play with the parents feeling and emotions