We didn’t get any of our choices - appeals & what next

[Switchy111]

I’m devastated that we didn’t get any of our 3 choices.
we have been allocated a school, we never discussed or even considered as it is required improvement and 7 miles in opposite direction to where we work/ nearest town. I tried to put a positive spin on it but my son just cried and said he didn’t even know where it was.

His first choice school, offers aptitude places, which he passed the test for (we got a letter after test to say he was in top 15%, you don’t get exact score). Based on this I was quietly confident he might get through.

I would have been equally pleased with school 1, 2 or 3 - but to have missed all 3 is gutting. All 3 are outstanding and oversubscribed.

ive added him to the waiting list for all 3 schools and now starting appeals.

School 1 & 2 are effectively sister schools. So children take a single cat4 test for entry to both, the school then band the children into 5 groupings and take an equal number from this band (to prove they are taking a mix of abilities).

school 3 has faith criteria.

the basis of my appeal for school 1 is;
— the day before his cat4 test, he was ill - 16 hours before the test I had to take him to the gp and they diagnosed tonsillitis and gave antibiotics (I now have doctors notes to confirm this) therefore he testing ability was compromised and he is likely to have been incorrectly banded
-he has an aptitude for drama, which they have recognised, this school is a performing arts school gives him the chances to develop his aptitude, which other school cannot offer
-his dad, my husband, is acting as a carer for his father who lives 300m from the school (inside catchment). This means our son frequently needs to stay at his grandparents, and only this school would allow this with minimal impact on his schooling (my husband is registered with his gp as a carer, and is on the electoral role of address within catchment)

Appeal for school 2; (sister school of school 1, but single sex)

• same as above, in terms of cat4 test/ illness: antibiotics/ doctors notes to be provided

appeal for school 3:

• the independent application to the school was not competed correctly, i genuinely believed I had completed everything but hadn’t submitted the full application
• because of this the supporting evidence for faith criteria wasn’t considered
• i am now providing baptismal certificate, holy communion certificate and letter for priest to demonstrate with are practising catholics (school is actually CofE, but any faith is considered)
• we are a long term religious family, and need our son to be in an environment that fosters this

apologies this is very long, but just wanted peoples feedback or experiences.
can I boost appeals or add anything?
for example would a letter from his teacher or head teacher help, if added to supporting evidence.
is it worth mentioning in the appeal that we didn’t receive any of our choices and have been allocated an unsuitable school.

im so devastated for our son and for me/ our family. My husband has worked as a state school teacher for over 20 years, in good and outstanding school, so it’s a kick in the teeth that we can’t access the prvovision he has worked so hard to provide to other people’s children.

I know appeals are a longshot but feel like we have some strong points- rather than just saying we want him to go there.

if we are unsuccessful, we will need to remortgage the house for private school fees which would be awful…but i really don’t want him at a required improvement school.

there is no other school with spaces within 20 miles of us. It’s ridiculous.

Play silly games.... Get silly prizes.

It was a risky strategy as others have said and being honest, I don’t think your grounds for appeal are very strong.
Where I live, there is a lot of shift with secondary places when the independent school places come out. Best advice is to get on the wait list for anything you’d be happy with particularly any schools that might be regarded a ‘back up’ for anyone applying to independent schools.

Why are you only now willing to provide supplementary information like his illness and faith? Should that not have formed part of your original application in October? The illness information would need some substantiating evidence that his normal level of working was compromised and his result not reflective of his aptitude, will his primary head support this? Even the top performing 15% may not all get automatic places each time, depending on number of applicants to places and and any tie-breaking criteria applied.

And your dh becoming a carer will not have any influence. Your ds can travel independently.

Fortunately for the OP, because one appeals for a specific school, individually, then one can big up the 'need to be educated in an environment where everyone follows a religion, even if it's not the same one that we follow' for the faith school, whilst at another appeal hearing stress how much one's DC needs to be in a school whete some pupils got in on the strength of an entrance test, etc. In some places, the independent appeal panel will have a copy of the appellant's CAF in front of them (which really helps in assessing whether an error may have been made in processing the application), in others, not. If the OP finds a copy of their CAF turns up in their appeal paperwork for any or all of the schools appealed for, my advice would be to emphasise the aspects of the school that are 'very important', not what they 'must have', if it's obvious that e.g. faith isn't really the most important thing if two higher preferences have no faith criteria.

Re the number of preferences one can list on one's CAF, the minimum which an LA must allow to comply with the Admissions Code is three. Just because my LA allows five, or every London borough six, doesn't mean that the OP lives in an LA which allows more than three.

Plus, like another pp, I am also confused re the test - if it's just a banding test, then the oversubscription criteria within a band cannot include score order. So if the 'top 15%' means 'in top band', then there have to be other criteria for allocating within that band - LAC / PLAC must come first, then e.g. sibling, distance.

I used to sit on appeals panels.

"we have been allocated a school, we never discussed or even considered as it is required improvement and 7 miles in opposite direction to where we work/ nearest town."

Go and visit. RI schools get massive injections of support and money. You don't know why they are RI. It could be something irrelevant to what's important to you (e.g. my DDs' lovely old primary school got RI because they had a high turnover of staff due to teachers seeking promotion and so they didn't have a stable SLT - the teaching was still good, it was no different to the day before the judgement, it was fine).

You say that they take an even mix of bands, then say "They take the top 5%" which is it? If he's only in the top 15% then the top 5% is a stretch, unless they don't further break it down.

What aptitude for drama has he shown, and how has it been recognised? Has he attended a drama club, been in plays, local amateur dramatics group? You need something solid rather than 'he likes drama'. Have you investigated what drama opportunities the other school has?

"his dad, my husband, is acting as a carer for his father who lives 300m from the school (inside catchment). This means our son frequently needs to stay at his grandparents, and only this school would allow this with minimal impact on his schooling (my husband is registered with his gp as a carer, and is on the electoral role of address within catchment)"

For this to fly you'd have to say why you can't be home for him, why he can't be home alone in the morning if you need to, say, go to work. How often your DH stays at his father's house, and why your DS couldn't travel from that house/why your DH couldn't take him to school.

The faith element is sketchy. You didn't apply correctly, so no error was made. If it was really important to you, you would have applied correctly. It won't matter for appeals purposes, because each appeal is independent, but if it is so important to you, it should have been school 1, no? This strikes me as grasping at straws. But the panel won't know that.

Your big mistake is not putting your nearest school on your list. Because of that, the LA isn't obliged to offer transport to your allocated school. Some LAs will offer transport for the distance that is beyond that which the nearest school would be.

This really is a pickle. Without seeing the particulars of your case and the school's case, it's impossible to tell, but I'd say that on the face of it your grounds aren't very convincing.

Yes, I called the admission secretary on Monday at 9am! she has said the waiting lists are for those who applied and weren’t offered, up to 27th march, then we can process a new application and join waiting list.

I did put my nearest school on my list - it was number 1!

re; aptitude for drama, he took a drama aptitude test for our first choice school, and was successful - they emailed and said his aptitude score was in the top 15%. Many friends of ours got emails and didn’t get selected.

Obviously you can't change it now the the final choice really needs to be somewhere which is realistic to get a place in. Otherwise its like applying to Cambridge and putting Oxford as your back up.

State school bounce around in reviews all the time. Local the school that required improvement 5 years ago is now outstanding, and visa versa.

Just bite the bullet and go private, or move into the catchment for one of better ones.

Oh, and make absolutely no mention of the allocated school being unsuitable or not good enough. All schools are deemed suitable if they are open to pupils. No pupil is too good for any school. You have to use the things you don't like about the offered school and find the opposite in your preferred school. But again, that's only going to be relevant if the things you like can be evidenced as being helpful for your child specifically. For example, it's not enough to say "school A has excellent pastoral support". It has to be "school A has excellent pastoral support and my child has needed pastoral support over and above that offered to offer children at primary school." "School A has a football club and my child plays football regularly/was on the primary school football team." "School A has a music stream and my child plays music to grade 3". "School A has several small lunch halls rather than one big hall and my child is noise sensitive and doesn't cope with large groups".

But if they take top 5% then top 15% isn't enough.

But you put your nearest selective school. Why didn't you put a non-selective?

Sorry if I’ve not been clear

the top 15% relates to aptitude criteria

the cat4 test is for banding of ability

all applicants take the cat4 test and then the school band them into 5 groups

the take a number from each band - for example last year they took 44 from each band

my argument is he may has feel into a different band, had he not been unwell (doctors note reads he had high temperature, unable to swallow, inflamed tonsillis and that antibiotics were prescribed for 10 days)

some bands would have more children in then others - so an average score makes it more competitive, than a very high or very low score

his dad, my husband, is acting as a carer for his father who lives 300m from the school (inside catchment)... (my husband is registered with his gp as a carer, and is on the electoral role of address within catchment

Does school 1 have a formal catchment area? The combined implication of this part of your OP is that while your husband's father lives within catchment, your child doesn't.

It's very confusing but is this a school with drama aptitude places, and in addition 5 different bandings, and a fixed catchment area which you are outside? And how do they allocate places within the different categories?

Only 3 choices here, but they will move to 4 from October 2026

I'd get him on all the waiting lists, make sure they have key missing info and hang on. First week of term there will be some shuffle with kids who are hanging on or dithering about private school choices. If you're near the top of the waiting list he might get in then. I'd also have a look at the place you've been allocated - what is it doing with it's requires status? Get a good idea of what it's like & try to be positive about it in front of your son.

You should be able to ask the furthest distance that each band took a pupil from. That will give you an idea if the band above had a much wider effective catchment. If say, the distance in your band was 1.5 miles and the distance in that band was 1.75 miles, and you live 1.6 miles away, you might have a point. However, did you submit this evidence at the time? Did you raise the issue of his illness?

Even if that is an argument, you'd have to demonstrate that his banding is out of kilter with his in class performance and that he generally works at a much higher level than on test day.

I'm also getting confused about the father. Are you saying that you live separately from your husband? Where is your DS's registered address? Is that within catchment? I'm unsure if you're saying your DH lives in a different catchment, or whether you're just stressing that the grandparent's house is still within catchment?

OK, well hopefully if No 1 is your closest school he will get a waiting list place, and should be on both waiting lists: the ‘aptitude’ places plus the remaining places

I didn't understand that either - is your DH on the electoral roll at his parents' house rather than his own?

Why would you do this unless he has actually moved in? Which address have you used for the school application?

So you applied to your nearest school which is non-faith, uses fair banding and allocates a proportion of places on aptitude. Given the importance of your RC faith, did you apply to an RC school, or is there not one within travelling distance? How far is the offered school from your home address and how does that compare with the schools to which you applied?

What is the relevance of your dad being on the electoral roll at grandparents address, your son doesn't live there?

Your argument re banding seems a bit flawed but I'm not sure I can articulate why. Do they distribute applicants evenly across the bands and then allocate an even amount of places per band? If it isn't an even distribution, then you are trying to argue that he should have been placed in a higher band if he wasn't unwell - what if that band had a higher amount of children than the one he was placed in? He'd have even less chance of success as he'd be in a bigger pool

Re banding, I think the OP is saying that her son was top 15%. If he'd been top 5% he'd be given a place automatically.

The only plausible argument is that if her DS should have placed in the higher band on a normal day, and that band had a skewed distribution of applicants, so that the furthest distance was further away than that of the lower band that her DS was placed in, then on a typical well day, he would have got in.

For example, 5 bands taking 44 children each could have furthest distances of 3 miles, 0.75 miles, 2.5 miles, 1.25 miles and 1.75 miles.

No amount of non-hospital acute illness in a child who was still deemed well enough to sit the exam would give a 10% uplift to their mark.

However, I think @Switchy111 is saying that they don't get told that exact percentage, so it's possible that he's in the 'top 15%' and actually scored top 6%, which could be relevant.