Still no secondary school

[funtimes]

We still have no secondary school at all, despite naming 6 preferences and sitting 3 unsuccessful appeals. We are so distraught and our DC is beginning to pick up on our worries. We have one more appeal left and need it to work. can anyone offer any advice that could help us?(prh47bridge, tiggytape, or admission in particular?)

I had no idea that this was possible.

It’s not supposed to be possible. Even if the OP put down 6 unreasonable preferences the LA still have to offer a place somewhere. It just might not be a school the OP thinks is OK. Depending on how many children have no places, there’s a couple of ways they can do this.

They can’t possibly be surprised they don’t have enough places. This year’s Yr 7 places are probably the same cohort they didn’t have enough Reception places for.

Ah that makes sense. They are going to offer you a place at the school they have asked you to apply for. They are pressuring you to go onto the waiting list for that school because then when they publish their statistics there will be one fewer in the "forced into a school they didn't want" category and one more in the "successfully got a place in a school they were on the waiting list for" category. It's purely a statistics massaging exercise now.

Might be more of a ‘can’t be arsed to force a school to take children over PAN’ issue. Even if the OP were to go on that waiting list, I’m not sure it absolves them of the duty to find her a place now.

As said, your LA does have an obligation to find you a place, though it may not be in a school you want.

Were the appeals to selective schools?

The current year 6 was indeed a bulge year - from memory, my London Borough had to add 12 bulge classes, including one added in October of their year 1, to accommodate children who had not received any offer of a school place.

OP, good luck and keep pushing the council. Try speaking to your local councillors or MP, I'm not sure if it's worth mentioning the fair access protocol, perhaps one of the experts could advise.

Maybe the school being touted by the council is one that might be pressured into putting in a bulge class, and having 30 people on the waiting list for that specific school will help secure whatever agreement/funding etc might be needed.

I have some concern about the action of the LA in trying to get you to put your name on a waiting list for a school you do not want so that you might get a place offered in September. Sorry that sounds very like the LA trying to get you to commit to something, so that they can say you have been offered a place. Do not under any circumstances accept this suggestion.
I would go back to the LA in writing and say that you are on X schools waiting lists already and so far you have received no offer of a place, despite being an on-time applicant. As you are aware of pupils being offered places at schools from waiting lists, when you have not had the offer of a place, which is the legal duty of the LA, you now require them to instigate the Fair Access Protocol and allocate your child a school place within the next 7 days. If they do instigate FAP then it is probable that you will be allocated the school you do not want but at least it is a school. However many LAs are reluctant to allocate to school using the FAP at this time of year and if they decline to do this, you need to get that in writing before the next appeal.
At the next appeal you need to be saying we are trying our best, we accept that we live in an area where pupils outweigh the number of places but the LA has a legal duty to provide a place, which they have failed to do, they have now declined to allocate a school place by FAP and so we are appealing to you as a panel to allow a place at the school based on the fact that you do not have a school place, have not been allocated a school place and the LA are failing in their legal duty to allocate a place. That must contradict admission appeal guidance para 3.2B which says whether the admission arrangements were correctly and impartially applied in the case in question. They are not correctly applied if the LA are refusing to make any offer.
I am sure you have already sent in reasons for the appeal for the school in question. I would normally always recommend making sure that the panel is aware of all the reasons for admission prior to the hearing. However in this particular circumstance I would not submit anything in writing, because if you do you will more or less guarantee that the LA will make you an offer of a school immediately before the hearing and torpedo your potential to get a positive outcome from the appeal. Bring it up in part 1 and say that you need the panel to make a decision about whether the LA have done their job correctly in this case.

So what reasons did the appeal panels give for finding that prejudice to your child in having no school place did not outweigh prejudice to the individual schools?

If your appeals were for selective schools that may explain your lack of success. They are more complex than normal appeals. The fact you don't have an alternative school is not necessarily enough to win. However, I would expect you to win almost any appeal for a non-selective school.

As I said previously, your local authority must come up with an offer for you somewhere. Going on a waiting list of a school that is likely to have a place will help and will not stop you getting a place at a higher preference. But keep chasing your local authority.

Just to clarify - don't allow yourself to be pushed into going on the waiting list for a school you don't want. But if there is a school you would find acceptable where you are likely to get a place you should seriously consider getting onto that waiting list.

We did not get a place for our son in any of our choices either and no the council does not offer you a place however i did put my child on every wait list possible for all of the local schools and we were offered a place at one of them, the only one that still had any places and one that we would not have put down as a choice due to travel time.
We have appealed for our 1st choice school and are awaiting the outcome.
I would advise that you add your child to a wait list as you may end up in a situation of being offered any school available come September as your child will have to go to school somewhere.

Thank you, I really appreciate yours & others input. We are on all waiting lists we would be happy for DC to go to, we won’t let the LA Pressurise us. I’m glad you commented as I was beginning to think we should cave in.

But accepting a place in a non ideal school will not stop you being on waiting lists for others you prefer and will ensure you have a place for September.

But wouldn’t that only be an issue once the OP had received an offer and turned it down.

At the moment the onus is still on the LA to find a place and presumably that can be in any school within a reasonable distance regardless of whether the OP is on the waiting list or not.

What Rafals says!

The fact they haven't offered you place anywhere implies there isn't one...

I wonder if they want you on that waiting place because it's the easiest school to force a bulge class onto but no one wants to go there!