General Appeal questions

[JM231]

Afternoon,

Sorry as i know there are a lot of appeal chats happening but I had a few questions regarding appealing in general that I didnit see being covered in other chats - if anyone could help, it would be much appreciated!

1. I know you cant add additional evidence after the letter but do you have to play all your cards/arguments in the letter? My concern is that it will allow the school to see and prepare responses a long time in advance?

2. i understand we see the Admission authority's case 7 days before the hearing but when do they see ours? as we have to send our appeal to the school in April doesn't that allow then an unfair advantage to plan the responses?

3. When arguing on grounds of subjects/clubs that the school offer that are not offered elsewhere - would A-Level choices be applicable for a year 7 appeal or only GCSE options?

4. There is a lot of info regarding the strength of the LA's case in other threads - but surely 99% of the time their argument is simply " we are full". Maybe its my ignorance but what else would they bring to the table?

All time and help is much appreciated.

Hey

a couple more if anyone knows please?

at what point do the panel get the appeal bundle?
when do we find out who is on the panel?

I’m interested in this too!

We would normally get the bundle a couple of weeks in advance, then later evidence is sent seperately if within the correct timescales. I'm sitting this week and I got this bundle 2 weeks ago with one piece of followup.

You should get the bundle about the same time, and it should have the names of the panelists. Quite possibly just surnames, ours does.

Perfect thanks - if there is follow up attachments should we flag they are on their way in the initial pack?

secondly - what’s the opinion on examples?
for instance if you are saying child x struggles in a particular enviromment - is it worth giving an example such as “in June last year this happened and this was the outcome” or is that something to save for the face to face?

finally, is an appeal letter ever too long? On the assumption that everything is relevant and not repeating itself should you just put it all down?

Perfect thanks - if there is follow up attachments should we flag they are on their way in the initial pack?

You can, but it doesn't really matter, as long as they arrive by the deadline. After that then the panel don't have to admit them.

secondly - what’s the opinion on examples?
for instance if you are saying child x struggles in a particular enviromment - is it worth giving an example such as “in June last year this happened and this was the outcome” or is that something to save for the face to face?

If it's strictly relevant and you have evidence, ideally, yes. If it's just a general observation that "if this happens, this could happen..." it's not very helpful. One relevant example may be useful, more would be labouring the point in most cases.

finally, is an appeal letter ever too long? On the assumption that everything is relevant and not repeating itself should you just put it all down?

Well - if you find yourself writing pages and pages, then honestly it's unlikely to all be relevant and suggests you could summarise. As a guide, most appeals get a slot of an hour, which includes the schools' case and all the questioning. Some do take longer but that's normally because something comes up that requires more indepth questioning or further examination. I would say it's rare that a case genuinely needs more than 3 sides of A4 (excluding documents of evidence).

On the final question, remember that the panel have to read every single appeal case in full. They won't thank you if they have to plough through War and Peace.

Thanks @PatriciaHolm & @prh47bridge
in terms of the first question we have been given 1st may to provide the letter and all attachments and the appeal is at end of June. No reference to another deadline - can we still send it other supporting documents after that?

if an attachment is a report which is 10 pages - should we send the whole report or just the relevant page?

if we are referring to points in the ofsted should we send it in or assume they can fact check if needed?

There would normally be a deadline around 1 week before the appeal for final documents. I would check with the clerk if they haven't said explicitly. My documents pack sent out 2 weeks in advance has a date 8 days before the appeal as the deadline.

If the report is a whole report with context, I'd copy the whole thing but clearly highlight the relevant paragraph.

Don't assume the panel will check anything, or ask for anything more. They are not allowed to. However, Ofsted is very unlikely to be relevant.

Interesting point. Mine is only one page with 2 bullet points each clearly explaining ( maybe 3/4 sentences my on each point) my basis for appealing. Have l kept it too brief? I am a less is more type person, is this going to work against me? Am worried now after reading in here that people are writing pages and pages. We'll all be different as some cases are more complex. I have attached around 4 pieces of evidence to support my appeal.

Most of the appeals I see (as a presenting officer) are less than half a page. But then, none of them have succeeded so far.

Panels want you to set out your case clearly but concisely. Cover all the points but don’t use 1000 words if you can say everything you need in 100. To expand on prh47bridge’s comment, most panels would prefer a haiku to War and Peace.

The strength of a case isn't judged by how long it is. A couple of concise bullet points that highlight the strongest parts of your case are better than 10 pages of waffle.

@prh47bridge & @PanelChair thank you. That is reassuring.

I know it will vary dramatically by school but anyone got any experience in terms of how many secondary school appeals are normally heard at each school?

As a slightly extreme primary example, I believe that we used to have c. 50 appeals over the course of a year - a number which had actually decreased from historical levels. Higher than average, I think, due to people moving into catchment for neighbouring secondary.

My daughter’s 240 entry secondary had 19 appeals last year of which 2 were successful and 7 appeals the year before of which none were successful. Not surprisingly, the distance from the school of the furthest away to get in on distance was smaller last year when the numbers were higher.

The LA has quoted 4 consecutive dates as provisional dates for our appeal which I thought initially was a range they would select a date from but now think they plan to hear the appeals over all 4 days. On another thread a poster said that their 150 form entry secondary had 12 appeals which were being heard over 3 days.

It varies hugely. Nationally, the number of secondary school appeals is around 4% of the number of pupils admitted. However, a heavily oversubscribed popular school will see many more appeals than a similar sized school that is less popular, and an undersubscribed school won't have any appeals at all.

im trying to demonstrate that the allocated school often something different to the appealed school. The appealed school clearly states this in a policy that I intend to send as an attached, highlight the areas, and reference the points.

However, should I send the allocated schools policy too? I dont want people to question it but also not sure i should copy in a 20 page document to prove its not included?

Any help is much appreciated

No, please don’t send in 20-page documents. The system runs largely on trust, so if you say “preferred school has a policy which says … but allocated school doesn’t”, the panel will accept this, but they (and the school) may want to question you about why this is so relevant to your child.

A further problem here is that the appeal is about what your child needs and how the preferred school can meet those needs (and the allocated school can’t). Of course, it depends on what sort of policy you have in mind, but it’s difficult to see how a child could need a particular policy, in the way that they might need (say) a subject on the curriculum or an extra-curriculum activity.

For the appeal school you could just include a snip of the relevant bits rather than the whole policy. There's no point in including the policy of the allocated school because it won't prove the absence of whatever it is in the the school - only the absence of it in the policy.

does anyone know if the same appeal members will always do the same school each year?

The same panel should hear all appeals for each school (but there are caveats if someone is ill or the appeals are late etc) - but year on year it may not be the same panel.

fully appreciate it any round it needs to be the same panel. but interested to see if its the same panel every year for a particular school? if not, how often does it change etc.
My thinking is that if a school has successfully argued their case for a few years then if its the same panel each time surely they will go into a new round already having an opinion of a schools case? its only human nature

I don’t recall whether it’s in the appeals code - you might want to check - but the thinking in our LEA is that it shouldn’t be exactly the same panel year on year and, anyway, it’s unlikely to happen because there are lots of schools and a large pool of panel members, so quite unlikely that this year’s panel for any school will be the same as last year’s.

I’ve heard rumours (but it’s no more reliable than that) that academy schools which manage their own appeals and don’t buy in the LEA’s services often draw from a much smaller pool. Our priest used to sit on one academy’s panel every year but I don’t know whether the rest of the panel changed ir stayed the same.

No, it isn't in the Appeals Code, but it shouldn't be the same panel every year. Apart from anything else, the Appeals Code requires the panel to be independent. If the school uses the same panel every year, it raises questions as to whether they are truly independent.