Urgent Help - Year 9 school places for six children required asap

[2010louises]

I'm posting on behalf of a friend who would prefer to remain anonymous, could any one help or offer her advice please ?
"Do any parents whose children are in Year 9 know of any local schools whose classes have room for 1 child (or up to 6 kids) ? My son is being forced to change schools at short notice , he is one of six kids in his year who are in the same situation, all the parents are now scrambling for a school that has spaces available. I have contacted my Local Authority (Bromley) and been told despite classes being full , not to worry as by law the local authority have to find him / them a place, so in the meantime we have to join the waiting lists "

Just he away..
If you apply now, they will be expected to take up their spaces within a couple of weeks. They won't keep them until January.

On the plus side... it means you can put them on waiting lists for schools you like now, and only accept a "bad" place if it becomes necessary.

Funny that you would have enough money to send your kids to private school but not be financially prudent enough to have the savings to cover the VAT for a term or two while looking for an alternative.

I’d contact the MP and ask for help. Many areas don’t have spaces in certain school years. In all honesty, I don’t know what they’re going to do. There simply aren’t enough school places.

Apologies, I'm not sure PAN applies to year 9. If that's correct, it's positive though, as it means LEAs may be able to direct schools to take children in January as they do when they create a "bulge" class.

There is an expert poster on here called something like @prubridges - if anyone knows him/her please mention this thread to them?

@prh47bridge is the person you’re after

Bromley is huge, are they towards Beckenham, West Wickham, Bickley? If Bickley side, then they may be close enough to the Bexley schools too.

Directing snide remarks at the OP is hardly helpful is it?

If for example your car insurance went up 20% with very little warning you might struggle to pay it or are you prudent and put 20% aside just in case. Like it or not there are some people who really struggle to put their children through private school and this rise is too much for them.

OP this governments policy takes absolutely no account of the outcome on children like these 6 boys - or maybe it does and they intend to be vindictive because that's the way it comes across - leave your friends, your school, even your GCSE courses and take your chances with a completely different environment - because we don't like your parents choices so we're going to punish you.

(no skin in the game by the way state schools here and I am not saying state school is a punishment but that being forced to leave a place where you're happy and thriving is)

What are the parents doing? Why haven’t they contacted schools directly? What do you expect MN to do other than stir up dramatics yet again over the 20% VAT? The discussions been done.

The dc are in full time education until the last day of the Christmas holiday, when the de registering process starts at the private school, so there isn't any urgency for the council at the moment.

Their parents need to complete the in year transfer forms through Bromley council. Be aware they will need to transfer once a place has been secured not January though. (Think you have 2 weeks to take up a place). It's not unusual to move in term time and sooner the better as far as education continuity goes.

Whether there's 6 spaces in one school will depend entirely on availability, but they do need to find a place.

There’s no need to be rude. Some of those children might be on bursaries, where they pay a small amount of fees. Their parents might not have a huge amount of savings. Even those not on bursaries, many private school parents don’t have thousands of pounds sloshing around, especially on top of the cost of living crisis. Perhaps they are being prudent and trying not to spend all of their savings. I’m afraid the government will have to find these children state school places, as all children are legally entitled to.

There used to be an expectation that the PAN set in Y7 would follow the year through the school. The latest Admissions Code changes that. It now only applies to Y7. However, most schools and appeal panels still work on the old basis as it provides a clear capacity for each year.

@2010louises You say, "state education follows a totally different exam board curriculum". There is no separate curriculum for state schools. The question is whether local state schools use the same exam board as the one used by the independent school. If they do, the curriculum will be the same.

The LA must find a place for these pupils somewhere, even if all local schools are full. They can't invoke the Fair Access Protocol yet as the six boys are not currently in education, but they can do so once they have been out of education for four weeks. However, you shouldn't have to wait that long. When parents apply for a place for their child, the LA should offer something.

Haha, call and (s)he appears! Brilliant!

Helpful 🙄

Yes, one of the most helpful people on MN - has helped me in the past. Thank you @prh47bridge

It may be that there are places at an undersubscribed school which may be a distance away.

You used to be able to go onto a waiting list for the school that you want, but have to accept the place offered initially. Friends' DS started at quite a rough school first but was able to change to a different school after a year or so.

Rather than send them to some random school why not enrol them is a homeschool like Kings Interhigh? The fees are a fraction of a private school in the South East and as there is a few of them they could do it together and at least would have the social connections.

It doesn’t really matter which two year GCSE syllabus is being followed for each subject in the private school, as these children are in Year 9. (If they were halfway through Year 11, it would make a real difference!)

As previous posters have said, going on the waiting lists for the relevant/preferred schools now would be better than waiting until January. Even starting a week or two before Xmas would be better, imo, if possible, rather than waiting until January. Start before Xmas, have the holidays, and they’d feel like old hands by January.

It sounds like the hope is that all 6 can move to the same school, (apologies if I’ve misunderstood). This might be a tough ask, but I would be surprised if there weren’t places at several schools by January able to take one or two. (Bromley is a huge borough with loads of schools.) Do these parents want an all boys school, though? If so, that would restrict their options considerably.

you may find there's places available, as the other posters have said, you'd need to contact Bromley secondary schools admissions for an in year application.

Bullers School for Boys
Ravensbourne (co-ed)
Ravenswood (boys)
Darrick Wood (co-ed)
Beckenham Harris (co-ed)
Langley Sch for Boys

All decent options, it just depends on where you live and if there's spaces.

I'd advise against Bishops Justis ... it'll probably have spaces but has a bad rep locally.

good luck, hope you find spaces for your ds and his friends.

there will be spaces in Bromley schools. Declining birth rate. At my daughter's sch (all girls) there are 2 spaces in her form.

Forest Hill boys is on the up.

in the meantime how about the six share the costs of tutoring? It would be about 7 pounds each per hour so 200 a week for 35 hours or so

Depending on where they live Sue Gray’s son might be their mp - Liam Conlon.

I'm quite surprised that all 6 didn't plan for this & move at summer. I hope they get sorted soon

https://www.bromley.gov.uk/schools-colleges/apply-move-schools
(For schools in the London Borough of Bromley. For schools in other boroughs or in Kent, they need to check the websites of those LAs to find out what the procedure is; e.g. not that they would be applying for a place there, but applications for in year places at any Essex secondary school are handled by the individual school, not the LA ).

Yes, the parents should ring round to schools (and /or email Bromley admissions team) and ask about laces, but what will matter is not whether there is a place when they ring, but whether there is a place available at the point that a formal application is made, so they need to be getting on with that, especially if they would intend to submit an appeal for any specific school(s) if they were not successful there.

Have all these boys been in independent schools all through, or did their parents look at state secondary schools in year 5 / 6from which they would at least have some idea of what the various schools in the area were like?

You've posted this on other platforms too and have been advised to send the Bromley in-year admissions info to your friend (the link was provided via FB messenger) as well as being told to contact any of the Harris schools direct to ask about Y9 places. Hopefully that's been useful to your friend.