OOC moving Latymer School

[Berry12345]

It may be a bit early to worry, but my DC sat for the Latymer School 11+ exam today. I'm well aware that we live out of catchment (OOC). I understand that some people who receive good scores may move before the registration deadline in early January 2024. However, I was wondering if it's possible for us to rent a "second house" for the time being?

I noticed someone posted this information in the past regarding what you need if you're moving.

• A signed tenancy agreement, or
• Evidence of exchanging contracts for a property purchase
• Proof that you have vacated your previous property
• Paid council tax bill
• Paid utility bills showing usage
• Primary school record(s) showing your new address

Do we really need ALL of the above? We can rent a place, pay council tax and bills, etc., but we'd like our DC to graduate from their current school and not vacate our current place just yet, especially considering it might be tough to find a decent place within just two months.

I'd appreciate hearing from someone who has actually moved from OOC to IC and their experience with this process.

Yes, you really need all of those. Especially proof that you have permanently and irrevocably left a previous address (if it's within school run distance - if you're moving from Inverness they'd be far less sceptical).

There rules are in place precisely to prevent short term renting for school admissions purposes, because they want to prioritise the DC who genuinely live locally.

You'd have to sell your house for this to work and even if you do, doing it for solely this reason is illegal.

Are you for real? What about the kids who live in catchment. How about you give the money you’d spend each month renting your “second house” to a local state funded secondary school and find an option that doesn’t involve fraud.

Thank you for your response!

I understand now that it's not as straightforward as I initially thought. While we'd be willing to eventually move locally if my child secures a place, it seems like a significant sacrifice for us at the moment.

When I look at the Latymer's result data, it appears that every year, approximately half of the top 700 students are from out of catchment. I'm curious to know how many of these OOC students actually make the move to in-catchment.

@, you may be better placed to ask on the elevenplusexams.co.uk forum section - the school is under Hertfordshire(other and north london). There is a thread for 2023 allocations.

There's a Freedom of Information request regarding the 2022 intake on the Whatdotheyknow website, which shows that for that year, 16 families indicated that they were moving into catchment by the cut-off date.

They won't move into the catchment, most of the OOC are just exam tourist who wants a free mock. The actually OOC students admitted in the end is a very small number.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-5749099/Pushy-parents-free-exams-trick-children-grammar.html

Looking at the admissions info, they offer to around 100 places over admission number (I.e to around position 300, with 192 places), so around 1/3, either don't apply or don't move having sat the papers.

It does not work like that, the school take out all the OOC from the ranking around end of December. So the 300 offer places are all in catchment place.

Ah ok, so it is 100 in area that don't put it as a top choice/ apply, even after out of area taken out.

@Takeachance18 correct, the catchment area is large and overlapping with DAO/QE/HBS, share the same pool of top ranking exam kids. And also some kids will prefer local good comprehensive instead.

Well said!

This is correct. There's a lot of movement in the rankings in January when the OOC children are removed - DD1 went up about 200 places from 520 to 320.

Then there is further movement from March onwards. Lots of people on the list won't have put Latymer first or will decide to go to independent schools instead. In DD1's year, they offered out to around 230 in the first round, but did eventually go higher.

@Berry12345 very few OOC bother moving. Like you say it's a sacrifice - a lot of the catchment area is relatively pricey - and you need to consider whether one school is worth it. Would also consider any siblings. There's no sibling preference at Latymer so if you're moving do make sure you have a decent local back-up school in case any further children don't make the grade.