Secondary School Third Choice Allocated - can we appeal?

[kdandml]

Hello, I hope someone can help.

We recently learned our daughter has been allocated her third choice school. This school is close to us but has a bad name, which is why we put it as third choice rather than first or second.

All her current school friends are going to her first choice, and our child is distraught. We had reasons for choosing the first choice as we did and we feel there is a grounds to appeal on those bases, however I am not sure that the distance rule has been applied correctly in any case.

Her friends do all live closer to <FIRST CHOICE> than us, but it seems that crucially, they don't live too close to <THIRD CHOICE>. We emailed the admissions team at the council to say we weren't happy with the offer and below is an extract from the reply, with the schools redacted. It appears that we have been penalised for living too close to a bad school, which is bizarre, Is this right?

Thanks in advance.

Extract from the reply:
<FIRST CHOICE SCHOOL> was oversubscribed and we had to apply the oversubscription criteria in order to allocate places. The last person offered a place at this school lived 2.56 miles in the nearest school criterion and you live 1.55 miles from the school in the distance criterion. <THIRD CHOICE SCHOOL> is your closest school, therefore your application was refused on distance. <SECOND CHOICE SCHOOL> was also over subscribed and the last person offered lived 1.82 miles in the distance criterion. You live 3.41 miles from this school and this application was also refused on distance.

Yes but the nearest school was our third choice. If you see the website of the school we applied to, it doesnt say what the LA document says. It says simple distance. I really do appreciate all the help from everyone!!!

No, it’s not. You’re not being penalised, it would have been the same regardless of whether you had listed School 3 as a preference or not.

If School 3 was the popular school that you wanted, you’d have been a higher priority than those living closer to School 1. In that system, everyone has a school where they get a higher priority.

Putting the third choice school down won't have ruled out the first one tho @falalalalalalalallama - the OP didn't get the place at the first one because more people listed it for whom it was their closest school.

It's not the OP's closest school - so her application would be considered after those for whom it is (who listed it) - and places were filled from that list (or from that list and from others who live closer than the OP).

There is a school near me which operates a catchment, and some people within the catchment live further away than some outside it but they get places ahead of the people outside catchment. It's fair in this case as the catchment children live a long way from their next nearest school, whereas the nearer people have other schools in the city or another town.

No. Every school is considered as if it is your first choice.

Choice 1: You were closer to the school than some other applicants, but it wasn't your closest school and it was filled by students who either had it as their closest school, or who lived closer to you but had another school that was closer to them.

Second choice school: You lived further away from the school then the last child admitted.

Third choice school: It was your closest school and you were admitted above any children who applied but had a closer school. You were close enough to get a place.

What are the oversubscription criteria?

In my LA, one of the oversubscription criteria is children who’ve applied to their nearest school. Children who’ve applied to a school that’s not their nearest are a lower priority.

So for instance we live about 4.5 miles away from our nearest secondary school - School A. But School B is about 2 miles away from School A. So my DC will get priority at School A over some children who live just 1 mile away from School A because those children have School B as their closest school.

Hi, maybe im misunderstanding so forgive me but i think youre misunderstnading...we live closest to school 3, then school 1. Kids have been accepted to school 1 who live further away than we do from both of those schools. Hope that helps explain! :)

I think this is whats happened. Please see below though - this is the admissions policy for 23/24, uploaded to the school wesbite in august 2023:

The Governing Body, as the Admission Authority, have adopted the following oversubscription criteria:

When there are more requests for places than those available, the following criteria will be used to
allocate places strictly in order of priority:

1. Looked after children and all previously looked after children....
2. Medical Reasons...
3. Sibling Links...
4. Children of Permanent Staff...
5. Applicants nearest to <SCHOOL>

Children who have applied for a place at <SCHOOL> as measured by the distance from their home address, to the main entrance, measured by the shortest walking route

1. Tie-breaker....

I don’t think I have misunderstood. I understand that you live closer to school 1 than they do, but school 3 is your closest school. So if School 1 has a ‘closest school’ category, you won’t have qualified for that. They may live further from School 1 than you, but if other schools are further still from them and 1 is their closest school, if the criteria @Lougle shared are correct, then they will have been a higher priority.

Let’s say you live 1 mile from School 3, and 1.5 miles from School 1. They live 5 miles from School 1, but 5.5 miles from School 3 (with no other schools nearer to them). Therefore, your nearest school is 1, theirs is 3, even though you live closer.

Do those kids still have school 1 as their closest school though? Even if they live further away than you do?

So therefore it is beneficial to seek to live in a village where the nearest school is a good school then? Wow. And to think people move to areas to be CLOSE to schools. Gamechanger.

yes, definitely

I get what youre saying. This is straight off the policies information on the school website:
The Governing Body, as the Admission Authority, have adopted the following oversubscription criteria:
When there are more requests for places than those available, the following criteria will be used to
allocate places strictly in order of priority:
5.Applicants nearest to <SCHOOL>
Children who have applied for a place at <SCHOOL> as measured by the distance from their home address, to the main entrance, measured by the shortest walking route

@kdandml could you PM me the name of the actual school? Nearly all the schools in your LA use the 'nearest school to applicant' criteria but there is one that appears not to. If you PM me the name of the school, I'll be able to see what's happened.

The reply you had from the council fits with the criteria that @Lougle posted.

If the criteria you have shared are the ones on the school website and genuinely make no reference to closest school, then that needs querying.

Ultimately criteria around nearest school are trying to avoid admissions black spots, where you get areas that aren’t close enough to any school to qualify, and end up with no school at all, whilst others have the choice of multiple schools. It also encourages children attending their local schools, which many people (me included) consider a positive.

You're probably looking at the 2025-26 Determined Admissions Arrangements now, as they have to be up on the website no later than 15 March of the previous academic year - they don't apply to admissions this September.

Either way, take a copy of the relevant pages on the website now, in case you need them later.

I agree attending a local school is a positive but when one is better than another and there's a 3-4 minute walking difference, I tend to think most people will think as I do and be willing to go that extra 0.5 miles.

“I think this is whats happened. Please see below though - this is the admissions policy for 23/24, uploaded to the school wesbite in august 2023:”

Possibly a typo but material if arrangements are in a state of change - don’t you need the policy for 24/25 as your kid will start in sept 24?

Hi, good point but i dont think so. I worked off the 23-24 policy which was uploaded August 2023, during the period we were visiting schools and only 3 months prior to the deadline.

I think there is an omission in the policy for the school you have applied for. The policy continues:

1. Tie-breaker

Where the school is oversubscribed within any of the above categories the following tie-breakers will be applied: (a) *For those children who have applied for a place at the nearest school to their home address (category 4)*, priority will be given to those living closest to the nearest school [Emphasis mine] measured by the shortest walking route. (b) For other children (category 5), priority will be given to those children who live nearest to the school applied for. Otherwise, if only one final place can be offered and two applicants live equidistant from the school, the LA's system of random allocation will apply.

If you look at the policy, however, category 4 is 'Children of permanent staff'. It was clearly intended to be 'Children who have applied for a place at the nearest school to their home address'.

The main admissions page on The LA site specifically states that this particular school does not fall into their overarching admissions criteria.

I think you need to go back to them and point out the error, stating that you relied on the fact that it said 'nearest to school' not 'applied for their nearest school'.

You're all brilliant. Truth is I dont entirely understand what youre saying here Lougle but if we could perhaps speak either on a pm or on a call in the enxt couple of days it could help enormously. Thanks to everyone, really.

I do intend to appeal on the basis of what is good for our child, however I did read all this first and thats why i was so baffled by the email. It is misleading and clearly, erroneous.

What I'm saying is that the school thought they had included a criteria "children who have applied to their nearest school" as category 4. However, Category 4 says "children of permanent staff", not "children who have applied to their nearest school".

It is possible that at the last change round, they decided to add a priority to children of staff, but have also accidentally deleted the criteria for children who have applied to their nearest school. If it is a genuine mistake, the LA may not be aware, so applied the intended policy.

You would contact them and say that according to the published criteria, you should have been given the place. They will see that there is an error in the policy.

No, you definitely need the 2024-25 admissions policy, not the 2023-24 or the 2025-26.

Both should be on the website for the rest of this academic year, 2023 only being removed in August 2024 as it's no longer applicable.

Hmm...good point. My posts relate to the 2023/24 policy. The 2024/25 policy isn't on the school's website.

@kdandml you'll need to contact the school and ask for it.

However, it would surely be unreasonable to expect me to know that the policy they updated on their website in August 2023 wasnt the correct one? We only just arrived in 2024.