To think it's just bad form to not inform a secondary school that your child won't be showing up on the first day

[gazzalw]

One of DS's long-term primary school friends has just started a very good comprehensive in another borough which takes 99% of its children from
local , catchment area feeder schools. DS's friend did a week of fun activities at the end of the summer hols and made a good friend, only to have him leave on Day 2 of the Autumn Term to take up a place at one of the local(ish) superselective grammar schools.

Presumably this was the usual case of someone having held onto a place for their child, something better came up and they didn't inform the grammar school concerned.

It is just such poor show really, isn't it? So many desperate children chewing their nails all over the summer hols just waiting for a place, psyching themselves up to got to a school which is maybe not their first option and then being offfered a place just as they've started to settle and more importantly once their parents have shelled out a fortune on uniform ;-(.

Think schools should fine parents who do this - of course there might be some exceptional circumstances which require last minute change of plans, but it seems from previous threads on here, that this is a fairly regular occurrence.

It's just not cricket is it?

It happens loads, children don't turn up, you cant get hold of parents for a few weeks. Sometimes they are on holiday and turn up in week 3, sometimes they never appear.

very rude though.

Not good though for the DCs affected by it.....;-(

I agree, it happens all the time. It's a PITA for schools and other parents who are looking for places.

I cancelled a place at a local school a few years ago after a very short notice house move meant DD would not start there.

I emailed both the school and LEA as soon as we knew (around 18th August), so a place could be offered to one of the many kids we knew were on the waiting list.

According to a close friend - the same thing happend as you describe. They boy (who we knew) was offered the place on the first day of the new term. His mum received the phonecall an hour into his 1st day at his last choice school. He did move (the next day) and was placed in the class/tutor group my DD was scheduled to have been in.

Maybe there was another kid who actually had my DDs place but I do wonder why it took them this long to offer my DDs place (2 weeks) if it was infact hers.

When DC4 went to secondary the system was that if you put grammar as first choice then didn't pass the Kent Test you wouldn't get your nearest High school. So we were told by the HT of the grammar, and the LEA to put the High school as 1st choice.

Ds passed the 11+ and we then had to go back to the LEA and request our "2nd choice". We hadn't accepted the High school place, plus we told the LEA we weren't going to take it.

On day one of the new term the High school rang to ask where DS was. I was mortified at the thought that someone else had missed out on a place, but it wasn't our fault. I had told everyone I was supposed to tell.

In our LEA if you apply for a state school place, then subsequently tell them you are goinmg private they still keep your state school place open until the start of term.

Well that's totally ridiculous....isn't it.....

Yes, it makes sense that more often than not it would be the LEA dragging its feet....