Secondary Appeal Advice

[Hecter01]

Hello, can I ask for your advice and wisdom, please.
I am really struggling at the moment on whether to go forward with yet another secondary school appeal for year 9. This would be our third appeal for this school, obviously the previous two were declined and a ombudsman appeal also declined.
My child wants us to appeal as he is so unhappy at his current school, but my husband thinks it is a waste of time and has said a strong no. I am willing to override him if I thought we stood a chance.
Background as follows.....
We are in the catchment for said school but as the year had large cohort we were denied. Went forward with appeal, as did 48 others. The school was at PAN ,but had agreed to take extra for this year group. After appeal process they were just under extra admission, after allowing several in with FAP and ECHP and SEN. 6 places still available to reach extra admission. Which I know they don't have to reach.
Our first appeal, we focused on how our child was affected by not going to this school and that his was the only child from his primary school not to go. Also the school he was going to go to was 8miles out and was difficult with my health to get him to bus stop. We had supporting letters from Dr's and friends and family.

Second appeal for year 8, we understood a bit more on what the panel wanted to hear, how the school in question would benefit our child and override the prejudice to the school and resources.
We did speak about this with a mixture of personal reasons on how he was still unhappy and grades were declining, due to him not wanting to be at this school.
We spoke of if the school was full and not allowing any more children in because of the prejudice to resources etc. Why had they then let several more children in.
This time, I understand even more, I have information on class room capacity. Can argue more on the prejudice affecting my child outweighs the prejudice to school . How the school offers activities in and out of the school that the his current school does not have.
Have all the information on safety within the school. Including accident reports, which are zero.Have information on classroom sizes and TA that are needed.
My point being after reading numerous threads on here and understanding now that you have to prove and argue the prejudice point stronger.
Should I, for the sake of my son's happiness and education, as he will only get one shot at a good education with results, put ourselves through this nightmare again.
Any advice I would welcome.

What makes him unhappy at his current school? How would that be materially different at the school you are appealing - primary friends will have moved on and made new friendships at school.
How do you think he will be if this appeal fails and you say well this is it we have to make the best job of what we have got? So much of life is making the best of a less than perfect situation. Only this week I have faced the same challenge with my DD and we discussed that it was okay to be upset on the day that it happened, but then she has to make the best of the situation as there was no changing the situation.

Besides appealing you've got 3 options:

1. Find a way to make his current school work. You need to find out what the cause of his unhappiness is first. Lack of friends? Content too easy/hard? Teachers? Disruptions/Interruptions in class? And then figure out how you can help mitigate that.
2. You deregister him and homeschool.
3. Look to a private school if you can afford to do so.

Failing that there are going to have to be HUGE reasons why your son NEEDS that place, that don't apply to the other 37 children.

Each individual appellant’s case is judged initially against the school's case not to admit any pupil above the current number in the year group, with no reference at all to any other appellant’s case.

Unless all the other 37 are also appealing at the same time and the panel decided that it would be reasonable to require the school to take some extra, but not all 38, and they decide, that each of the 38 would have their appeal upheld, were they the only appellant, there would never be a point at which the strength of the argument of each of the 38 would be compared with the others.

The independent appeal panel won't be considering the case of any of the other 37 at all if they haven't submitted an appeal in the first place.

The panel are not permitted to take an appellant’s position on a waiting list into consideration when assessing the strength of their case. And whereas the waiting list must be ranked according to the school's oversubscription criteria, the IAP is able to consider reasons outside of those criteria, therefore the person at position 100 may succeed, but the one at position 2 fail to have an appeal upheld.

Failing that there are going to have to be HUGE reasons why your son NEEDS that place, that don't apply to the other 37 children

Hadn't spotted this. Agree with @MarchingFrogs. All OP needs to show is that the disadvantage to her child from not being admitted outweighs any problems the school will face from having to cope with an additional pupil. The other 37 children on the waiting list don't enter into it at all unless they are also appealing.