Offered place due to sibling priority but then sibling leaves?

[AtiaoftheJulii]

Anyone know what would happen in that situation?

The wording of the LA admissions policy says "where the child for whom the school place is sought is living in the same family unit at the same address as that sibling and who will be at the school when the child will enter the school".

But if I apply for a y7 place now with a sibling in y11, currently planning to go into y12 (this is ok, I checked that, as I know some schools don't count 6th form sibs), and then the sibling ends up going to a different 6th form - which wouldn't be known or definite until AFTER March 2014 - could the younger one have their place taken away?

Going by past numbers, younger sib is pretty much guaranteed a place with an older sib there, but probably won't get one as an unconnected applicant as we are out of DA.

Older sib has a preference atm for staying, but we are looking at other 6th form options, and I can't say to her she has to stay where she is for the sake of the younger one!

I would assume that eldest wouldn't change choice until after results are out in Aug? Her " plan" is year 12 at the same school?

In which case I can't see they can withdraw the place a couple of weeks before term starts....

I had a similar situation and the LA weren't able to give me any proper guidance, other than to say that they "didn't think" that would be a sibling link but they weren't sure, apply anyway and see what happens.

Thankfully we were able to move DD2 up the priority list and it wasn't an issue in the end, but the LA were spectacularly unhelpful.

LAs approach this in different ways - some give the younger child the benefit of the doubt on the basis that it's a relatively unusual situation anyway, and it's unfair to place that kind of pressure on the older child if, as in your case, they want to keep their options open. Others use it as a reason NOT to give priority to applicants with a sibling about to enter Y12 or 13. They take the view that since 6th form places are usually dependent on GCSE grades, these places are not guaranteed. This was the situation we found ourselves in a few years ago when our younger DD was refused a place at an oversubscribed school purely because the sibling link with older sister in Y11 at the time of appliction was not recognized. Older DD had every intention of staying on into the 6th form, and the school had over 90% staying-rate anyway. The appeal panel fortunately took our side and we won, though not sure what would have happened though if DD had been planning to move.

The current thinking is that where the school allows year 11 going into year 12 to be considered as siblings that the wording usually says something like "where the sibling is expected to go into year 12".
It is a grey area but if you make it very obvious to the school that you are considering alternatives for the elder sibling then I would expect them not to allow the sibling priority.
However the sibling priority comes from being an on-time application (by 30th October 2013) and still having a sibling in school on the date of the place being offered (1st March 2014). If at that later point the intention of the elder sibling is to stay on for year 12, then under the current regs I would not have thought that the school can then remove the place retrospectively.
However schools are a law unto themselves and where there is a significantly over-subscribed school they may take a different attitude to this. I would in those circumstances definitely go to admission appeal.

I think round here it says 6th form don't count. It only counts if they will be in years 7-11 when the sibling starts.

The old Admissions Code used to cover this situation explicitly. It said that if a child got sibling priority they could not lose the place just because their sibling left the school before they started. The new Code does not contain that statement. That isn't the only change. The old Code said you could only get sibling priority if the sibling was expected to still be at the school when the child started. The new Code allows schools to give priority to siblings of ex-pupils.

I agree with Admission that I don't think the school can remove the place in the circumstances you describe. If they do you should definitely appeal.

I think round here it says 6th form don't count. It only counts if they will be in years 7-11 when the sibling starts.

Yes, that's why I said I checked. The actual wording is "Parents may indicate a sibling in Year 11 at the school provided it is the intention of the family that the child is due to continue their studies in the sixth form at the school."

That's interesting about the code change.

I'm sure I've read here about how after a certain length of time they can't take a place away because it wouldn't be fair?

If dd2 was definitely moving, I wouldn't try to game the system, but she honestly hasn't decided and might well not decide for months.

On the basis that the applications for Y7 have to be in before the applications for Y12, and the prospective 6th-form entrant to that or any other school theoretically wouldn't know for certain whether they have a place until GCSE results arrive in August (I've known students plan to move but end up staying put, or plan to stay but change their mind at the last minute), perhaps it's safer to assume the sibling will still be there and put in the application on that basis. It's unlikely the place would be withdrawn, and if it were, you'd probably have a good case at appeal.

Yeah, we'll proceed on that basis, and I'm not even suggesting to either child that it might be an issue.

prh, that's really interesting about ex-pupils. Presumably that only permits the school to do that if they want to, rather than creating any obligation? We have a bad sibling gap and a younger child that will be scrabbling to find a primary place owing to shrinking catchments. Do you reckon we'd have any chance of appeal based on the ex-pupil issue?

As I thought! Just a feeble hope.

Oh, there's a wild combination of bulges and free schools going on and hopefully we'll avoid being sent three miles across London in the wrong direction like our neighbours were. I think every school within a two mile radius could get an awful Ofsted though and it would make no difference - we are now short of an entire primary school's worth of places!