Appeal advice

[ThreeKidsNoSanity]

Hi all.

My youngest did not get our first choice of school (we are out of catchment) but did get the second which is the closest school and where both of his older siblings are. For lots of reasons it is not the right place for him. He has a diagnosis of ASD and an EHCP application is in, school 1 will be named on the EHCP. His primary school receive funding for him and he has had one-to-one LSA support in the classroom for the last couple of years. The SENCo is very confident that we will get the EHCP but we likely won't hear the outcome until May/June.

He is 15th on the waiting list, and I am going to appeal. This school has fantastic SEND support, and is a very caring, inclusive school plus is half the size of the school he has been offered a place at. I work there so am totally convinced that he would be far better there than anywhere else. They also offer a couple of extracurricular clubs that match his interests (which are limited).

I'm in the process of trying to fill in the appeals form. Do I need to attach any additional evidence or is explaining the above sufficient at this stage? I'm also wondering if I should contact School 2 and ask what support he would be offered. I know you're not supposed to appeal against a school so is this worth doing?

Any and all advice is most welcome!

TIA :-)

As I’ve just said on another thread, when you submit the appeal you should outline your argument in favour of your child having a place at the preferred school. Attach what evidence you can, but if more is in the pipeline, say that you’ll send it when available. Try to ensure that everything is submitted before the appeal hearing because, if you present new evidence on the day, the panel may adjourn to consider it and that’s potentially unhelpful to you.

You are, as you say, appealing for the school you want, not against the one you’ve been allocated. But, when you’re telling the panel about how your child would benefit from attending your preferred school, the panel may ask whether they couldn’t get those same things from the allocated school. So it helps if you can say that you’ve checked and they wouldn’t, if that’s the case.

@PanelChair how long do appeals meetings take.?The individual ones where each parent presents their case.

It depends how the LEA chooses to set them up.

Some LEAs have all the parents in together to hear the school’s case and then individual sessions to hear each child’s case. Mine doesn’t. Each appeal is self-contained. Each is timetabled to last an hour.

I agree with PanelChair. There is a difference between criticising the school you don't want, and highlighting the differences between the offerings at both schools. E.g. "School B is rubbish for languages" is not ok. "School A offers a choice of languages in year 7 and DS is particularly keen to learn German, having had taster lessons in primary school. School B doesn't offer German, but school A does." Is factual and constructive.

So you can wise to find out as much as you can about both schools, so you can compare the offerings and contrast them. Just make sure that you are always phrasing it as "Preferred school offers/would benefit/is strong in....." rather than "Offered school is weak in/would be bad/isn't suitable...." Unless it is something objective and demonstrable, such as having stairs and hills when your child is a wheelchair user, for example. Even then it would be better to say "Preferred school is single level/has lifts/is wheelchair adapted".