Faith School Appeal

[NorthernDad2022]

Hi all,

I’m hopefully looking for some advice/guidance. We have been refused a place for my youngest daughter at a church school in Leeds (which her older sister attends) on the grounds of too low a score on the admissions criteria. The main reason for this is that the Supplementary Information Form evidencing church attendance was returned by our vicar with ‘no evidence of attendance’ marked on the form.

The background to this is that the current vicar is relatively new to the church (joined shortly before the pandemic struck) and so doesn’t know the family particularly well. The family have been attending church for around 9 years but suspended attendance during the Covid lockdown due to safety concerns, recommencing attendance in August 2021.

We have now obtained a letter from the Vicar at least acknowledging attendance since August 2021 and also a supporting letter from another member of the clergy in a personal capacity evidencing our long-standing relationship with the church, along with some patchy Sunday School attendance records.

The grounds for the appeal are:

1.      The school did not have a complete picture of the family’s attendance at Church which may have influenced the ranking of our daughter’s application. The Supplementary Information Form is quite specific in that it refers to church attendance in the two years prior to application (i.e. the time of the Covid lockdown) but the argument is that the key issue is that the family have a long-standing and consistent (apart from lockdown) relationship with the church 
   

2.      The faith focus of the school is very important to our daughter and the family, given our long-standing relationship with the church – the argument being that refusal would be of significant detriment to her (the school we have been offered is non-faith) 
   

3.      Her older sister has a health condition (mental health related) which my youngest daughter is playing a key role in supporting with. The argument here being that her inability to help and support her older sibling (travelling to and from school together, spending breaks/lunch etc together and having some commonality in education) would be of significant detriment to her 
   

I would welcome any comments or advice. Some of my queries are:

Is point (1) a procedural matter rather than the detriment to her vs the school argument? Do we have to make this clear on the appeal form?

Is there likely to be flex around interpretation of the Supplementary Information Form or is it strictly to the letter?

Do I need evidence of the school’s past flexibility in terms of student numbers to show that they have flexed before?

Many thanks for your help

Did the school change their admissions arrangements due to COVID? There was a mechanism for changing the requirements.

The supplementary forms have to be very clear in their criteria so that an objective judgement can be made. I don't think the long-standing relationship would be an argument for saying they should have accepted (IE. Claiming an error was made) but it can be used to form a prejudice argument.

My question around your daughter's mental health condition is how has she been able to cope until this point without her sister being there, if it's so important that they are together. Also, is it helpful to your younger daughter to expect her to spend lunch time with her sister when she needs to make friends in her own year group?

Yes, getting details of previous flex would be helpful.

My first thought was the same as the previous poster about point 3, your older daughter is already there so it's not necessary for your younger one to be around all the time. It would also not be good for your younger daughter to be required in that way, it's definitely not a claim that would go in your favour.

Do you know what evidence other families provided for the two-year church attendance rule?

I would imagine that the most helpful thing would be a letter from the vicar acknowledging that in view of the pandemic, he should have checked with those in the parish for longer, and that had he done so, he would have ticked a different box.

Our church is small, and so it was relatively easy to keep everyone involved - most of our kids contributed to one of the recorded services by doing a reading or similar. I don't know what larger churches did to maintain engagement - and to monitor that in areas where application to church schools is an issue.

Thanks. The admissions criteria are that the requirement was only for attendance when the church was open for public worship (or alternative premises provided). Zoom services were held, which we did not attend (being uncomfortable with the medium). The church was open for a couple of 3-4 month blocks but we were not comfortable attending at the time.

At issue is whether the family has been regular worshipers (at least twice a month) or 'at the heart of the church' for at least 2 years prior to application. Strictly to the letter I guess we are not but in spirit we definitely are - I'm hoping this is what we can demonstrate.

Noted on the mental health issue - there seems to be consensus on this with other posters.

Is this for reception?
If so then Infant Class size regulations will make it very difficult for any appeal to succeed

Apologies, I see that this is in Secondary education which would give you a better chance.

I guess the problem may have been that the vicar was unaware why you were not attending. We had some people not attending for covid reasons (and some still now) - but maintaining contact in various ways, but with others it wasn't clear whether they hadn't come back out of health concerns or because they had lost interest.

Unfortunately it's not uncommon for families to attend for a bit, and then stop - perhaps because Sunday morning sport has become more important to them, or because they've got the place at the church school for their eldest. There's also probably an assumption that it is only older and more obviously vulnerable people who will be staying away from services for covid reasons (although for quite a while the families in our congregation were staying away because they felt they were more likely to have caught covid through school, and wanted to protect older members of the congregation for whom this was their one outing in the week).

The fact you didn’t partake in zoom service and then commence attendance when they initially reopened will of gone against you. I know you say it’s important to you but they will take the view it isn’t that important given you chose not to attend.

The points about your older daughter will not make a difference as she isn’t your other daughters carer and your other daughter attends without her already. They may actually hold that against you instead as they will be keen to avoid her stepping into a young carer role and ensure she has her own independence and the opportunity to develop on her own without her older sibling being dependent on her.

Ultimately, if 200 children who applied attended church more than you during lockdown then of course they deserve the place over your daughter as they have displayed a bigger commitment to the faith.

Surely 3) is weak because your elder dd has managed on her own until now and expecting dd2 to support her sibling in break-times could be deemed not in her best interest.

Other families attending by Zoom would have had their presence recorded. Registers for Sunday School were in place and my daughter has attended some sessions but often preferred to be in the main service with mum. It's a tricky one where we were relying on the church taking a 'reasonable' view. It's a shame but Covid and the change over of clergy have complicated matters - we just hope that a common sense reasonable view can be taken but we don't know if the appeals panel are willing to entertain that.

It sounds like the Admissions Authority haven't made a mistake, in the sense that the SIF was filled in correctly, and administered correctly; you didn't attend, either physically or remotely, for the period required, so the form was filled in correctly. I understand your reasons, but I think an appeals panel might question why you didn't engage with the Zoom services, given how important attendance was normally to your family, and to school admissions. There is no scope for the Priest to make a value judgement here - either you attended, or you didn't.

So your appeal will be on the grounds of prejudice; that the prejudice to your child of not attending will be greater than the prejudice to the school of taking another child.

I think your arguments, as they stand, are fairly weak, but then the school's may be too. It could be said that if you are already a faith family, that side of your lives could easily be supported outside of school, and your daughters have already been separated for a year at least in different schools. It would be good to have them together, but that's not a strong argument. You need to identify other elements that the school offers that will be of benefit to your daughter - clubs? subjects? specialisms?

However, the school's case may also not be strong - you need to identify whether they have gone over PAN in other years, which would demonstrate that they can cope with more children. The school should give you all the relevant information for your appeal.

Her older sister has a health condition (mental health related) which my youngest daughter is playing a key role in supporting with. The argument here being that her inability to help and support her older sibling (travelling to and from school together, spending breaks/lunch etc together and having some commonality in education) would be of significant detriment to her @NorthernDad2022
Is your younger daughter happy with this? To not be allowed to become an individual in her own right at school? To make friends and attend clubs and activities? What happens at evenings, weekends and holidays? Is she allowed to do these then?@NorthernDad2022

If religion is important to you, not engaging by zoom was probably a misstep.

From the other side, if it mattered, you would have connected.

The church have been reasonable.. you didn’t attend when you had the chance and didn’t attend the zoom sessions either.

At issue is whether the family has been regular worshipers (at least twice a month) or 'at the heart of the church' for at least 2 years prior to application.

Is that the actual wording? If so, is there any scope for arguing that you have been regular worshippers for at least 2 years, prior to application - just not the specific 2 years most recently prior to the application?! No idea if this would be any kind of argument, and not an admissions expert, but just curious - it seems like the sort of slightly woolly wording that might be exploitable (whether that's moral or not is another story!).

@AeroMocha no that wouldn’t wash. Many families decide to attend church for a year during Y5- Y6 and it’s not hard to figure out why. The ones who actually want to be there will be.

Presumably you knew "attendance" was important evidence for the Supplementary form, having already had a child apply successfully. Others managed it during lockdown, even with the change of clergy and format.

"At issue is whether the family has been regular worshipers (at least twice a month) or 'at the heart of the church' for at least 2 years prior to application."

Unfortunately there have to be objective criteria and if the criteria was attendance, you don't meet it.

Focus on why the school is important for your DD2. I wouldn't try to suggest that she's vital for your DD1, tbh, because the panel will see a thousand holes in that argument.

[quote RussianSpy101]@AeroMocha no that wouldn’t wash. Many families decide to attend church for a year during Y5- Y6 and it’s not hard to figure out why. The ones who actually want to be there will be.[/quote]
yes ,I totally see why just during year 5-6 wouldn't wash, and the reasons that families do this.

I was thinking more that if someone could evidence attendance from years nursery up to Year 4 or whatever, that's well over 2 years, just not the specific two years in question. In some ways that seems like a family more interested in the faith side of things (setting aside the question of why they didn't/couldn't attend during covid) - so I thought there might be a loophole if the criteria didn't specify exact which two years it had to be!!

Of coruse, evidence many years of previous attendance wouldn't have been easy either, if there was a new priest in place who didn't know the family.

@Lougle

"At issue is whether the family has been regular worshipers (at least twice a month) or 'at the heart of the church' for at least 2 years prior to application."

Unfortunately there have to be objective criteria and if the criteria was attendance, you don't meet it.

Focus on why the school is important for your DD2. I wouldn't try to suggest that she's vital for your DD1, tbh, because the panel will see a thousand holes in that argument.

The focus on why the school is important to DD2 will be the Christian ethos being at the heart of the school. This thread runs through the school's approach, not just religious education.

General question: do the activities, clubs etc that are important to DD2 have to be unique to that school i.e. not provided by the school we've been offered? Do we have to evidence the importance of such a topic? Desirable but may be tricky. I will have a think

@AeroMocha We can evidence a history of 7 years attendance pre-pandemic and 6 months post pandemic. It's whether this will 'wash' with the panel or not. Regardless, this is our only shot aside from focusing on why the school is important to our daughter. Any ideas on this would be welcome. The Christian ethos is the biggest thing that this school is unique in providing. It does provide a range of other activities/subjects but difficult to distinguish these from the offering of the school that we have been offered a place at - though we could argue that our desired school particularly excels in the areas that are important to our daughter.

But would the importance of the Christian ethos not be self evident from the SIF? Are you not laying yourself open to questions about why that criteria was not met of it were so important to her? It could be interpreted that having got one child in you took it for granted the second would follow and the faith itself became less of a priority

Where is she on waiting list?

"General question: do the activities, clubs etc that are important to DD2 have to be unique to that school i.e. not provided by the school we've been offered? Do we have to evidence the importance of such a topic? Desirable but may be tricky. I will have a think"

I suppose it depends why you think the club is important. If both schools have the same club, then you can't say she's better off at school B because school A doesn't have the club. However, if school A has a music club run by an unqualified but enthusiastic member of staff and school B has a music club run by a peripatetic music teacher, you could argue that she'd be better at school B.

You can't say that school B has such and such club and then just ignore the point that school A has the same club. You'd have to find a reason why the club at school B is better or more suited to your DD than the same club at school A.

You don't have to have any evidence for why a club would be good for your child. However, bear in mind that where a school has more appeals for places than it can reasonably accommodate, then the panel will weigh up the strength of each appellant's argument to decide which children, if any, get a place. So a child who has strong evidence (e.g. child has been learning Mandarin since age 5 and school B has a Mandarin club but school A doesn't) will be more likely to get a place than a child with weak evidence (e.g. both schools offer a dance club but we like school B better).