record card at local church for CoE school

[BlueberryPancake]

I know it's controversial, but I can't help it I want to know what people think about this.

We have a very good local CoE school, one form entry, and it is very very oversubscribed. You have to attend local parish churches to be accepted in the school, and live locally, and it is so oversubscribed that they have now introduced a 'loyalty card' type record that parents take with them every time they attend church with the child, and have it signed by a member of the clergy or a reader, or a sidesperson. Their explanation is that there are so many parents who want their children to go to the school that they can't keep track, and that they want the system to be as fair as possible for people who attend church regularly.

Also, in that school, there is a no priority for siblings situation. So if your older child/children are at the school there is no guarantee that the younger one will be accepted. It depends how many people apply and qualify, and how close you live to the school. The rule for no priority for sibblings has been introduced this year for the children starting September 2010.

Isn't this a bit much?

[muddleduck]

I think the sibling rule was prob brought in because people were going to church long enough to get one sibling admitted and then never going back.

The obvious silliness of all this just shows up the ridiculous nature of faith school admissions.

[Runoutofideas]

I personally don't agree with church attendance forming any part of admissions criteria. In an ideal world I would have the priorities as

1. Children who have that particular school named on a statement.
2. Siblings of existing children (providing the family home is not further away than when the initial child was admitted - thus avoiding the people who rent for 6 months to get in then move further away)
3. Distance as the crow flies.

Maybe though, seeing as my ideal world is not going to happen while faith schools can set their own admissions criteria, it could be seen as a good thing to have church attendance monitored. At least it is fair to everyone and you know that the rules are being correctly followed. Not having an allowance for siblings does seem like madness though - how is a family supposed to deal with the practicalities of multiple children in multiple schools all with similar start/finish times?

[prh47bridge]

I'm not sure what you are objecting to. The fact that they are checking that families who claim to attend church actually do so? Or the fact that they are one of the many schools that don't give priority to siblings?

[annh]

I have heard of the requirement in some churches to have a record of attendance when it comes to getting the supplementary form for admissions signed. It does sound awful to have to "prove" what a good little church-goer you are in this way but how else can they do it? If it's a busy parish it would be impossible to monitor attendance otherwise. On the other hand, if (as in our parish) the priest/minister doesn't want to do this and then signs all the forms given to him by members of the parish, you end up with people who have barely been to church since their child was christened getting a place at the expense of someone else who is a genuine believer. There have been several threads on here about that situation as well!

The situation re siblings does sound worrying and I wonder what the purpose is? Surely, if your first child is accepted and you continue to attend church your family is unlikely to become less "worthy" of a place? A faith secondary school close to us used to give priority to siblings as it was not very popular a number of years ago. About three years ago, they ended up in a situation where their results had improved and they found that they were full with siblings from miles away who had no faith affilitation to the church and people who genuinely wanted to go to the school couldn't get a place. Their admissions code now gives lesser priority to siblings than to children who are baptised and attend feeder schools which I think led to some problems in the first few years. However, they are now almost completely full with faith children from feeder schools and siblings who are coming in along the same route are pretty much guaranteed a place anyway because they have a PAN of 180 and never fill that number just with siblings/feeder schools. Given that your school is already very popular, I don't know what the purpose of introducing this rule is.

[MaryBS]

I feel sorry for the minister who has to ADminister this...

[Fink]

Agree with muddleduck about the sibling rule, have seen this so many times. It seems like the school could have done this in a slightly more nuanced way though so that all other things being equal, siblings would count, but I do think it's fair enough to consider other factors first. Distance to school seems a little mean if people are apllying with no CofE school nearer and definitely want CofE, but it is common practice in faith schools so this one isn't unusual.

The only thing I would really mind about is the order to attend a particular set of parishes. Fine if they want to check church attendance in a faith school, but either the area is quiet enough that the clergy would be able to remember all their regular parishoners, or if it's in a larger town with a more mobile population then there's a wider range of churches available and it strikes me as totally unreasonable to tell parents which ones are acceptable for school admission.

In a few years' time I would like DD to attend local RC primary, but the RC church we attend is in the town where I work, 20 miles away. There would be no end to my ire if told to join a local parish instead!

[BetsyBoop]

Fink - have you checked out the schools admissions criteria? (just to be sure) Some church schools do give preference to those who attend specified church x (others to living in the parish, but attend any church) there are almost as many "twists" in admissions criteria as there are faith schools

I think schools need to balance the needs of siblings to go to the same school with the needs of places for local children. It would be awful to miss out on a place for a sibling because the catchment has "shrunk" in that particular year & you miss out by a few metres, but I also don't think that a sibling living say 20miles away should have priority over a living-on-the-doorstep non-sibling child. In my ideal world schools would have a "geographical priority" area where any siblings within the area get priority but if you move outside the area you lose the sibling priority. As long as it's stated up front the parents know what risk they are taking if they rent to get a place and then-- move out of the "geographical priority" area.

(I am not intending this to be the same as "catchment" where these are used as you can sometimes move across the street & be in a different catchment, which would then be a bit mean to lose sibling priority in such circumstances)

[admission]

I would agree with BetsyBoop you need to give very careful consideration to what the school admissions criteria says. The LA book on primary admissions is the one that is taken in all admission appeals as being the one that is correct. So you need to compare that with what the school and /or the church are saying.

I have seen too many situations on appeal where the official version says one thing and the school / church version is something else. Only having checked all the sources and confirmed that they are the same would I be absolutely sure that the attendance card at church is being used officially and correctly as an admission criteria.

Incidently the change in admission criteria to remove sibling priority is pretty much flying in the face of what the admissions code now says about sibling priority so I would not be surorised if that does not get challenged at some point.

[hocuspontas]

I think the loyalty card is a good idea but siblings should still take priority within the loyalty card criteria. I.e. siblings with a 'reasonable number of stamps' should have priority over a non-sibling with a 'full card'.

[BlueberryPancake]

The card is used by the vicar to write the reference, which is then sent to the admission pannel. The admission pannel doesn't see the card. So it would never come to appeal with 'my child attended 60 times and this one attended 55 times'.

I don't like the principle of the card, I think it's a very regimented approach and not personal or reflect a sense of trust and community. But they have to have some form of record because so many families attend.

I think the no siblings rule is affecting families badly, I know 4 families who will have children in different schools from September. It's awful. Basically 4-5 years ago, the school was popular but not so oversubscribed, so children from further out would be accepted. Now, a family that hasn't move will have the younger child refused a place.

This measure is obviously to stop people who go to church for a while and stop coming once their first child is in. But it has a very sad effect that impacts families that go tu church and are christian, but live a little bit further out (not that much out, tbh, about 1.5 miles!)

[Fink]

BetsyBoop - it's not an issue up here in the under-populated north: all the RC schools have similar policies which prioritise baptised RC children, then baptised non-RC, but they make no distinction for whether families are practising or not so I can go to whatever church I want! I was only commenting on how I'd feel in the OP's situation, unless we move before DC reach school age, I'm in the clear.

[toccatanfudge]

urghh - I could never stick with attending a church that can't even remember who has been regularly over a long period and who hasn't...........and I'm a regular church goer!

[MumInBeds]

The catholic schools near here do this, they also get extra 'admission points' for church volunteer groups so if the mum plays the organ and the dad runs the toddler group they get a bonus towards school entry. I'm not really comfortable with it but we aren't catholic so it makes no difference to us.

[toccatanfudge]

oooooo MIB - I'm liking which way round you put the organ player and the toddler group runner there

I will apparently get extra points because of my level of involvement at the church when I apply for the church senior school in the next town in a few years time

I can honestly - hand on heart say that I didn't have a CLUE about that when I started playing at church 7 1/2yrs ago when DS1 was 2yrs old

[MumNWLondon]

I actually think the card is a good idea - make it fair, transparent and objective. Setting faith criteria which is not transparent or objective is unfair.

re: siblings is there no priority for them at all, or do you just mean they have to satisfy the faith test too... just means that you have to go to church the year before each child approaches school age....

[toccatanfudge]

actually the more I think about it the shiter I think it is - and it's an AWFUL reflection on the churches that potential school attendees are going to - that they can't even keep track of families??

[admission]

Blueberrypancake,
What does the admission criteria actually say because I bet it doesn't say that the vicar will write the references using the card as a basis. Is there a published minimum number of visits to church or what?

I can't see how they are going to differentiate the criteria other than they are regular worshiper (assuming it is defined) or they are not.

This has got schools adjudicator written all over it as being a potentially unacceptable school admission criteria from your posts but it would be sensible to see the admission criteria in full before commenting further.

[annh]

But the only person who can sign the form and who therefore has to know if families are regular attenders is the priest/minister so one person can't be expected to keep track of whether families are regular attenders or not? In our (Catholic) parish, we have one priest with four Sunday masses. He is sometimes ill (a legacy of years spent in far-flung corners of the world and picking up some tropical diseases along the way) and sometimes is on call at the local hospital so we have had a number of other priests saying mass. Should he, on his own, be trying to recollect whether he sees a particular family once a month or once a week? What about the people who arrive quietly and leave at the end without perhaps engaging in conversation with him or going for coffee in the hall? If they are relying on his recollection of their involvement, he might think they haven't been there at all!

[BetsyBoop]

Fink - I'm also in the "under-populated north" (but pressure on places this year means for the first time in memory none of the 4 primary schools in town have a spare place for Sept & it's only going to get worse with the upward trend in the birth rate... but that's a whole other thread...) but I can assure you that the RC primary school 20yds from my house does give a higher priority to those who worship at St X's (the local RC parish church) than it does to RC's worshipping at other churches, so it definitely isn't the same everywhere up north

We aren't RC, (so zero chance of getting in there anyway ) but one of the two CofE church schools also does this (luckily it's the church I attend as it's the school we wanted for DD...)The other gives priority to living in parish & worship at any anglican church.

[toccatanfudge]

there should be stewards on the door, welcomers, a whole host of people that should be able to tell the vicar/priest/minister who has or hasn't been as well.

It's not the sole reserve of the priest to make sure that people are welcomed or absence noticed

[zanzibarmum]

muddleduck - what this system shows is not the ridiculous state of the secular schools that so many people want to go to this CofE school.

I do think though that taking a register for attendance at church is wrong - not in terms of schools admission but in terms of the church.

[ShoshanaBlue]

Yes, we too are in the underpopulated north. We're RC though and we have to travel 5 miles to school - 3 parishes away due to 'a sudden increase in the Catholic population'....

There's only one CE high school in our area though and there's no loyalty card, but there is a questionnaire for that - and it does question the church attendance of both the child and parent and looks back at church attendance for 10 years!

[BetsyBoop]

zapostrophe - probably for child protection purposes - I'm the child protection co-ordinator for my church & it's in our CP policy that we keep an attendance register - as required by our diocese policy

[Fink]

Betsy - Ok, I'll go with the underpopulated far north then since we're the most northerly diocese south of Scotland and I know the admissions policies are similar across the diocese ! Like you, though, it's becoming less underpopulated by pre-schoolers, but as you say, that's another issue.