Any successful (or unsuccessful) stories of appeal.

[worriedmother7787]

So my DS is having to leave his school and goto a local state school we applied for 3 good school but have been offered the awful school 2nd closest from us (in special measures) The school we have applied for is just out of catchment and oversubcribed a large school (!897 pupils!!) DS has Severe Dyslexia and dyspraxia (statementing process has deffintly began) and is a wonderful boy and is my main carer, (because of this he can often be upset) we have got stamens from ofsted reports to support wonderful pastoral care at school. We have supporting letters from GP, hospitals consultants and ed. sycoligist. So i know I have to appeal and am going to and I wanted to hear some success (or unsuccessful) stories of appeal and what grounds you went on.

You've already posted several threads about this and had some very good advice, particularly from prh47bridge which is specific to your situation and far more useful than any general stuff others can post about their own appeals.

Id still like to know to have some idea!!! I am just worried for my son

Hi we just won our appeal.

Dd is severely bullied from year 2 -5. Spat at, sisscors thrown at her, restrained by her hair. The school didn't do anything and dd was so traumatiaed we home schooled her until we found an appropriate school. At her new primary she worked with her teacher (who is also the Senco) and our gp. She has improved massively. She is still anxious and suffers terribly on groups where she does not know anyone.

Basically she didn't get into our school of choice that we picked with the Senco as theist appropriate. She didn't get in. The appeal board agreed with our evidence that the school we wanted was the only one that could accommodate her. We are the first people to win an appeal at that school for 4 years.

I'll be honest, it was awful. The woman at the council essentially told me and dh we shod have told dd to get over her anxiety and go to the school allocated. She made a lot of assumptions about us, that proved to be true.

But it was worth it. You need to prove that school is THE only school that can accommodate your child.

I am happy to answer any questions you have.

Sorry the assumptions she made proved to be untrue.

You need lots of evidence to back you up

Thanks Teabagbeforemilk! (you're so helpful) I do have questions which you may have be able to answer. My DS is also bullied school try to do things but are quite bad at it. He is a private school know, with 50% funding from council but we can't pay the other 50%. But he wants to move because he is picked on for being the "Poor kid, whose mum can't afford anything and is also a stupid disabled person in a chair who can't do anything.!!" (I think the school are bad at discipline because the kids in question are loaded and give donations to school! (but thats just my opinion)) He has had head slammed in locker. He has slightly lose joints so was kicked in knee until knee dislocated (I tried my best to go in over this, school denied everything even though friends where backing him up!) :| He has had lunch taken of him juice poured on books and name calling. Bullying is such an issue everywhere and i am so glad that you're DD is happy! My question is i know for a fact the pastoral care at allocated school is awful and my first choice school has been praised for pastoral care and also the dealing with bullying! But what is the best way of proving it how did you prove it.

Have you visited either of these schools?

Yes both

Hello I have read your posts, and have to say that sounds absolutely awful, hope you get your son out of their ASAP and find somewhere where he will be able to develop and shine.

I won my secondary school appeal in Birmingham where wining an appeal is considered near enough impossible! So my advice to you is, gather all the bullying incidence reports, emails to the school everything on paper that will provide evidence that this is a common, traumatising occurrence that happens in school.

Secondly, him being your carer is a very important factor and his needs and requirement of pastoral care is vital to cope with his responsibilities at home.

The trick is state your child's needs and match them to what this school can offer to help.

State only the facts about current school offered I.e ofstead report on lack of pastoral care etc. Don't be nasty about the school offered what ever you do.

I think you have a really strong case, what you need to do is prove to the panel that the disadvantage to your child not being admitted into the school far out weighs the disadvantage that would cause the school if they admit your child.

Also, in stage 1, I would try and weaken the school's case as much as possible. I.e have they gone over Pan? If so, find out if the school have achieved good results this will show that they can cope with another child being admitted. If they claim all sorts of havoc will be causes in corridor ask if they have reported any health and safety incidents...chances are probably not!

I wrote a comprehensive statement for my appeal. I found that this helped as the panel knew a lot about us and our situation, if yours is an in year appeal I would advise writing a detailed appeal statement. Most experts advise to write the main points in bullet points..in my experience I'm glad I write a comprehensive statement as I didn't need to stress on so much detail.

Every main point you make, back it up with evidence and match it to what the school offers that the other school can not offer.

I wish you all the best, I'm more than happy to answer any more questions.

And I'm glad you posted, however many threads! The experts are brilliant especially tiggytape and prh47bridge! But no doubt, peoples experience posted on here of their appeals helped me tremendously. It's always nice to know that your not the only person in the world going through this terrible process and so many people offered me a lot of support and encouragement through their posts which made the experience a lot less stressful than what it could of been.

I won my appeal because my daughter suffered racist bullying as she is of mixed ethnicity. I was able to produce a recent incident report (which actually involved her sister) but able to demonstrate this unfortunately occurs and has caused my DD lack of confidence and her just being unable to express her emotions. I was able to demonstrate the school is the only school that can offer my daughter a curriculum that us designed to boast confidence, resilience and to become a well rounded, happy individual. The allocated school had a very little diversity in terms of race/ethnicity which is something my DD desperately needed to feel included, again I was able to demonstrate that the school welcomes diversity and actively seeks to embrace therefore was a much better environment for my DD.

Also my DD loves sports, she's in a football team, she's the schools sports ambassador etc. was able to show this school meets my daughters sporting needs (WHICH IS WHAT GIVES HER CONFIDENCE) and can hopefully work towards building her confidence in other areas as well.
She was offered a girls school which is what she didn't want. I explained that her love for football, which means she plays with boys as well therefore a mixed gender, mixed diversity and cultures is best suited for my DD as she has seen the benefits of a mixed gender environment in primary school.

Hope this helps.

Hi, I am happy to chat to you whether you have posted 10 threads or 1.

This has been one of the worst things we have done. Even though we won I keep thinking about it and getting angry. Especially about the woman the represented the council. Angry that we had to go through it. Accepting that we had to. Relieved we won, upset for people who didn't (one was a neighbour) . I kept going through things leading up to, googling the same things over and over looking for new different information. I understand the multiple threads when you are scared for your child.

I have replied to your dm.

Thank you all for you're replies it is such a stressful time at the moment and my big problem id DS school is on holiday now (because its private) and any letters i want from staff will be difficult to get.