When will councils post their Y7 accepted distances? (London)

[MagPiedPiper]

My DD is Y5 so I am keenly watching this year's acceptances to see if we have any chance to get into our top choice schools next year. At what point is that information made public? I don't see anything on the council websites.

Edit: Sorry, I mean offer distances.

Ah you sound like you're quite far than. I'd stay on the waiting list, moves a lot once they start in Sept.

I don’t think it means that. As I understand it the school allocate 25% x 4 bands. I think it means that lower scoring very local girls are much less likely to get a place than higher scoring girls who live further away.

I think these are the same thing?

If 2,000 girls applied and were in that band but with only 100 places and then they sort by distance, it’s likely that the 100 will live very close.

Contrast to if only 100 Band A girls applied for the 100 spaces then the catchment could be a 100+ miles as every girl got a place.

There will by definition be more girls of average ability and so that banding will generally have the smallest ‘catchment’

That's how I understand it too. It's pretty fair.

Yeah, we're far :( I actually preferred CSG upon visiting, but we're about the same distance from there (almost 2 miles) so have absolutely zero chance!

You may be right! My maths is shocking. It doesn’t sound right but I’ll bow to both your greater wisdoms!

i suppose it doesn’t feel fair to two girls living next door near the school when one gets in and one doesn’t. And the one that doesn’t has dyslexia and didn’t finish the test paper.

Although I’m not sure band D is supposed to be average ability? Average ability of girls that sit the test would be the band B/c girls. But average ability of girls who sit the rest could be pushed up by the girls sitting it as a test or back up for private schools.

OP, your daughter may get a place eventually. I suppose you’ve got to think about at which point you’d move her if one was offered.

@Camdenish if they have the paperwork, they should get the access arrangements they're entitled to.

There are no access arrangements for the camden banding test.

I'm surprised a disgruntled parent hasn't threatened them with a lawyer. Either way I just checked, 30 places are awarded to each band. There must be a lot of very local girls in the lower bands applying which makes sense given the demographic.

I don't think it's that fair really. Problem is what happens is that you get a skewed demographic that apply. Most of the local people will do, but then others from further away will give it a go to. Inevitably lots of the further away applicants will be engaged parents who prioritise education. These parents are more likely to have children who do quite well at the test, either because they have been prepped (for the banding test or for other schools) or just due to the benefit of having engaged parents. This then pushes the marks up, so that the higher bands have loads of bright girls from a wide radius, many of whom don't even massively want the school. This leaves more of the 'average' local girls in lower bands.

When places are given, more of the lower bands will list the school first as their local option. Lots of those in Band A will have listed other schools first (their local popular school, selective/part selective schools) or will turn down for a private offer. So imagine there are 100 girls in band A, but only 50 really wanted the school and the others had it as back up versus 90 girls in band D who really wanted the school. They would end up going out much further in Band A. (Obviously numbers aren't real and I say this as someone with a daughter who has a decent chance of scoring in band A and so benefitting from the unfairness.)

In case it helps some schools have the opposite pattern such as Stoke Newington school, the higher banded children have a smaller distance offered.

But this is what I would expect would happen as a school like CSG tends to attract very clever girls so I'd assume the higher bands have lots of applicants therefore live closer. Guess the ones scoring higher must just take other places.
CSG doesn't have great support for lower ability girls anyway so not sure it's somewhere I'd be shoving elbows to get into. Parli has much better provision, way more space and the PAN isn't that much bigger.

Brent, Hammersmith and Kensington have 2024 catchment data on their website.

Catchments were definitely smaller this year. Our second choice the distance offered was 5 miles the past 3 years. This year its 2 miles!

Wandsworth has issued - we appear to have plenty of spare places - only the top schools are full. Yet Richmond is short of 126 places. It's madness. Same issue in Streatham - not enough places. Lambeth takes forever to upload their figures.

Can anyone link to the 2024 Greenwich figures please?

I think the current Y6 are the last of a population bulge. We saw the same for primary applications.
The other issue is that people who might previously have considered scrimping to send children private won't be doing so due to the expected VAT increases. In some areas of London this could put a lot more children into state system and keep offer distances low for preferred schools.

@LostMySocks yes. 2024 is the last intake of the bulge years. Brexit has meant there's none of the usual influx of children to offset it.