Secondary school waiting list

[Nikkipez]

Hi there, unfortunately my son didn’t get his first choice secondary school. We are going through the appeal process (meeting next week) but he was automatically put on the schools waiting list. I have phoned school admissions and he is 5th out of 129. So I know it could be a lot worse. But does anyone think he’ll have a chance of gettibg a place before September? I know there is going to be a lot of movement over the summer. Just wondering if anyone has been successful in getting a place this way?
Thanks

that sounds promising but its difficult for anyone to advise really - what is in the intake, could admissions advise as to wait list movement last year (although thats not a prediction). Also, and hate to be doom monger here - don't forget you could move down the wait list over the summer. But that does sound promising - good luck!

In London there is a high degree of mobility and 5th would give a very strong chance. Do people move in and out if your area?

In London there is a high degree of mobility and 5th would give a very strong chance. Do people move in and out if your area?

Have you asked the school what your chances are? Sounds promising to me.

In a similar boat here. 3rd on waiting list for a school with a PAN of 150. We are not in London and I'm presuming there is not a lot of movement.

Appeals haven't happened here yet, but no doubt they will stall any waiting list movement once people are successful. We have appealed but tbh our grounds are weak and I don't expect to be successful.

I guess time will tell! Best of luck to you!

There seems to have been some waiting list movement around here this week, for the first time in weeks and weeks! We had moved up two waiting lists when they were updated yesterday and today we have been offered a place at our preferred school!

Hope you get similar news soon OP!

Oh that’s fabulous news!! So happy for you. We had our appeal meeting yesterday. And we found out with missed the distance criteria by 5.5 inches!!! 😩 We couldn’t believe it and even the appeals officer laughed and shook his head. So close 🤦🏻‍♀️🤦🏻‍♀️ I’m hoping for movement from now until sept. Keep your fingers crossed for us 🤞🏼

how did you miss out on distance by 5 inches yet are 5th on the waiting list? That implies other missed out by smaller distances which seems incomprehensible.

Perhaps the other 4 rank ahead on other criteria lien siblings and came along after the first allocation? Not sure if the timings work that way. Ie OP ha seven pushed down the list

I have no idea. I rang admissions today today and we have now gone to 6th on the list 🙄 I just have no idea how it works.

The waiting list will be ranked by the admissions criteria, so you can move up and down depending on whether new children are added to the list.

It may be that, for example, there is a defined catchment area that you fall just outside and anyone living in it gets priority. Are you happy that you were placed in the right admissions category? This should have been explained in the appeal.

Apparently the school we applied for doesn’t have a catchment area. But then in our appeal meeting the representative from the school then continued to tell us the admission criteria 1 Looked after children 2 Medical social 3 Siblings 4 Distance and then said that 118 children were admitted on distance. The last allocated place was a child in our road so we were literally that close to getting in 😢

We were fifth on offer day. We didn't get a place. Everyone joining the list late who lived nearer went ahead of us. I found the lists hardly moved at all.

I really think it depends on the area and the school. My friend who is a head teacher told me today the list for her school moved 12 places yesterday!! Same council as our appeal school too. But like I say we had gone from 5th to 6th yesterday 🙃 It really is just a waiting game unfortunately.

The other potentially positive thing to bear in mind is that there might well be people ahead of you on the list who don't actually want to be on the list anymore.

We were on two lists and can check the lists online here. Out of curiosity I had a look the day after we accepted the place we wanted and we were still on the list for the other school. No one asked if we still wanted to stay on our second choice list when we accepted a place at our first choice. I contacted the LA to remove us thinking of anyone out there checking the lists for movement as obsessively as I was but it would have been easy to have forgotten about it altogether having got what we wanted. Normal people probably don't give such things much thought once they have the place they want.

Keeping my fingers crossed for you OP.

Round here (London) you only automatically stay on lists for schools higher up your order of preference than the one you've been allocated. You are removed from the lists of all schools further down your preferences unless you specifically request to be kept on them.

So DD still on waiting list for our 1st pref school - she went down about 20 places after offers day but before 2nd round allocations, has since gone back up nearly 50 places but still miles from top of the list!

It seems to vary hugely by area and as PP says by school. But yes, the way the lists move is by people declining offers when they get to the top