Secondary school appeal

[Annio82]

My child has been offered a place at her third choice school for September. I’m very unhappy with this but felt I had to put it as a choice to avoid an even worse school.

Our first choice school, is not perfect but in many ways I feel it would be an excellent fit for my child. They have a really strong dance program - it’s part of the curriculum for all students in years 7-9, they have extracurricular dance clubs, dance teams and do a dance show every year. They also offer GCSE dance. My child dances 5 classes a week and (I know this sounds biased) is very talented. She also enters competitions in different styles, has undertaken exams and gotten excellent marks and is planned to be performing at a dance convention in the near future. She wants to have the option of studying GCSE dance as well as being able to pursue her passion further and talks about being a professional dancer when she’s older. It’s not the only school in the area to have GCSE dance on offer, but nowhere else has the dance teams and yearly dance show, nor does anywhere else include it in their ks3 curriculum in the same way.

Now being completely honest, my main reasons for wanting to appeal are more to do with the school we have been offered which only offers minimal sports or academic extracurricular clubs, and has dismal exam results despite years of additional funding and a change in leadership, but I realise these are not reasons for appeal because ofsted considers even schools that are rated requires improvement to provide and acceptable standard of education.

my question is, is the dance thing and going to a school which actually caters to her strengths a good enough grounds for appeal? How can I present this information in the best light to improve our chances?

You have to show that the detriment to your child not getting a place at the preferred school, is greater than the detriment to the school of taking a child over numbers.

You can use the argument that your child is a talented dancer, attends dance classes, wishes to pursue dance as a career when she’s older and wants to do formal dance qualifications. The emphasis on dance and the opportunities in the school will be of benefit to her and may give her the opportunity to take more exams and further improve her performance.

Word it in such a way that she will benefit from those opportunities and say nothing negative about the school that’s been offered.

TBH, it will depend on the strength of the schools' case. It's a reasonable argument, but the counter argument could be that she is already doing lots of dance outside of school so the school provision is less important, and there is no guarantee that when she comes to pick GCSEs that Dance will still be offered. So it will come down I suspect to how strong the school's case is that they cannot take any more pupils, which you won't see until you appeal.

This is the exact predicament that I’m in with my son. He was offered 3rd choice, the school is undersubscribed and has an inadequate ofsted rating. The school he put as 1st is rated outstanding, is a sports and arts college with excellent curriculum offered aswell as extracurricular activities. He dances at advanced competition level, is part of three teams and is being put forward for the dance World Cup qualifiers this yr.
He wants to be a choreographer and work in the performing arts industry. The school is the same as OP and offers everything that he needs to support his education. He had very low self esteem before dancing and still struggles with anxiety, the only time I see him express himself is on stage. He is exceeding expectations in all subjects and throws himself into his learning but he does get overwhelmed. The school we wanted has an excellent pastoral faculty whereas the one he’s been placed into doesn’t. He struggles with new surroundings but found the school he wanted very easy to navigate and the one he’s been placed was difficult even for me. He’s clever but needs challenging in class, he has additional work folders which he can readily access at the moment. This is because he was showing signs of agitation and frustration when he had completed work in lessons aNd had nothing else to keep him occupied. He’s struggled with peers in the past resulting in him refusing to go to school but bottling things up. I found out he was trying to be a peace keeper amongst friendship groups and this took its toll on him. He has also suffered from panic attacks which started after lockdown. I’m struggling with writing the appeal as I don’t want to sound like I’m ranting and being negative towards the school he’s been placed in x