Secondary school appeal

[jhmj2968]

Hi, this is my first time posting a message here and I was wondering if there is anyone that would be able to help me with a certain area of an appeal that I am going through for my child. I will try to explain it as clearly as possible.
Ok here goes...

My JJ was not offered a place at our first preference school for entry into year 7, so I have lodged an appeal. I received the admission authority's statement a while ago and I have since sent my statement to the Clerk to the appeal panel. I have now received another statement from the admission authority and there is a discrepancy in the distances.

The first statement states that we live 1.4km away from the school and the last successful applicant lives 1.1km away. The second statement came with a letter saying 'During the processing of your appeal paperwork, the distance from your address to the school was incorrectly stated as 1.4km. The correct distance is 0.96km'. In the revised statement it now states that we live 0.96km away from the school and the last successful applicant lives 0.36km away from the school.

The distance of 1.4km is stated on the information form which the school uses as part of the admissions process so therefore a mistake could not have been made during the preparation of the appeal paperwork.

What I would like to know is can I challenge this? How do I challenge this? What do I need to do? I am so confused
Please, please help. Any advice would be much appreciated. Thank you

Do they measure using straight line distance or shortest walking route? If they used shortest walking route, have they told you what route they used? If not you should ask. Does the shorter measurement seem right to you? Or do you think even this is too long?

Take all the paperwork to the appeal with you. Send copies of the first statement to the clerk along with any other information you have indicating that they used a distance of 1.4km. Tell the clerk that you want this information circulated to the appeal panel. When the LA's representative has presented their case, ask them about this discrepancy. The line I would take would be to point out that they've given two different distances to your home. The original distance which appears to have been used in the admissions process was 50% longer than the distance they are currently stating. Which is correct? Which was used in the admission process? They originally said the last successful applicant lived 3 times as far away as they are currently claiming. Which is correct? Which was used in the admission process? How can the panel have any confidence that they have measured correctly and operated the admissions process correctly?

It will then be up to the appeal panel to sort it out. My immediate reaction is that changing the distances at this late stage smacks of someone trying to cover up a mistake, but then I've got a suspicious mind! It certainly doesn't give me any confidence that they have administered admissions correctly.

Oops!I knew I would miss something out! Thank you so much for your reply which has given me some great pointers as to where to start on this one.

The admissions authority uses straight line distance 'as the crow flies' I was told. I too am thinking something suspicious is going on...

You can check how the LA measures distance by looking at their admissions booklet. That should still be on their website somewhere. The admissions criteria should lay down how distance is measured.

Taking my suspicious head off, at the very least this does not give me confidence that they've administered the process correctly. It falls short of proving they've got it wrong, of course, but it raises questions about their competence.

Good luck.

Just one other thing. On the letter I received it says 'Distances were measured on a street map from the centre point of the school to the estimated point of an applicants address'. Not very accurate, eh?

Thanks again for you help on this matter.

Is the first set of distances in km and the second in miles (but erroneously written as km)?

All I know is if they screwed up over the distances on the original applications then you should win at appeal.

Ignore me. I have just done the conversion!

That's a very unusual way to measure distances. What type of school are we dealing with here? Most LAs use a GIS (Geographical Information System) to measure distances. Using a street map and measuring to "the estimated point of an applicants address" simply isn't good enough. If they use distance they must measure to your address, not where they think your address might be. And the statement gives no clue as to whether they were measuring straight line distance or shortest walking route. This statement is certainly something you should attack in the hearing. It again tells the panel that the authority wasn't doing its job properly.

It is possible that the longer distances reflect the shortest walking route (although I wouldn't guarantee that they've got that right if they were using a street map) and the shorter distances are the straight line distances. However we don't know that at the moment. And you need to look at the admission criteria to find out which measurement is correct.

Messing up on the distances isn't a guaranteed win at appeal. The panel has to assess whether or not your child would have been admitted if they'd measured the distances correctly. We may be in a situation where the panel has to work out how distances should have been measured and then tell the admission authority to go away and remeasure the distances for all applicants so that they can figure out whether or not your child should have been admitted. If that happens I'm afraid the appeal will be adjourned to give the authority time to do this.

If you feel able to identify the school and LA involved, I'll do some more digging.

Thanks guys.

A VA comprehensive school. They only measure in a straight line, not by the shortest walking distance or bus route.

I wrote to the admission authority for clarification on how they measure the distance and it was that that triggered them to send me another statement and the letter saying 'estimated point of an applicants address'.

I really don't understand how they can change the distance from one statement to the next.

Using a street map is going to be much less accurate than a GIS. And, as I've already said, if they use the distance from home to school in their criteria they've got to get that right. Guessing where the home is reduces it to a lottery.

It may be that they've actually managed to get the admissions right despite everything so there is no guarantee you will get in, but I would be disappointed if the panel didn't take a long hard look at this.

This is a shambles.

There is no way that 'Distances were measured on a street map from the centre point of the school to the estimated point of an applicants address' is an appropriate way of measuring the distances. You need to check very carefully what it says in the admission booklet of the LA, because that is usually considered to be the definitive version of what the admission arrangements are.

If it is straightline distance I suggest that you use www.freemaptools.com to check what you believe is the distance between the school and your house. That should confirm whether the figure of 1.4Km or 0.96Km is the more correct figure and mount your appeal accordingly.

The very fact that the school believes that the distance of the last successful applicant was 1.1km and now is 0.36 shows there is something terribly wrong here. I can give you one reason why they could be horribly wrong and an innocent mistake, the figures came off an appeal paper from last year and someone did not alter them to this year's figure.

The thing that makes me think that you might have a problem is that in both sets of figures you appear to live a considerable distance away from the distance to the last admission. As such the panel may accept that the admission authority have made a right horlicks of the process and letters to you but you are still far outside the admission area and therefore would not have got a place under any of the circumstances.

Hi all,

I will try to explain this in a bit more detail.

The school is based in a different borough to the one in which I live. For the children who live in the borough where the school is situated, they use a straight line calculation using a more accurate system identifying address points supplied by Ordnance Survey and doing the calculation that way.

The school admits a certain percentage of children from the area where I live because it used to be based here until it moved some years ago as they want to maintain the links it has in this area. The way they decide who will be admitted to the school from this area is that they measure the distance from where the old school stood (the middle) to the (estimated) applicants address.

My friend who lives further away from the old school site than I do, successfully got her child in to the school last year.

What a strange system! However, whatever the reason for them using this approach to measuring the fact remains that it is inappropriate. They should not be measuring on a street map using the estimated point of your address. If there are two candidates living a similar distance from the old school site, the wrong one could get in simply because they've guessed where their home address is incorrectly. I don't think the appeal panel will be very impressed by this. It doesn't mean you will win - they may decide that you wouldn't have got in even if the school had administered its admissions correctly. But it certainly raises serious concerns.

There is another important point here. The school as the admission authority cannot have two different methods of measuring distance, they must use the same system for all applicants.

If they are using a computerised system there is no reason why they cannot use the same system to measure from the site of the old school to the address of applicants, rather than the mickeymouse estimate they seem to be using.

To follow up on my last post the distance you need to check on freemaptools is from your house to the old school site and see what it says. My guess would be that it is the smaller of the two figures and that the original figures quoted are actually the distance to the new school site. Regretably the figures could still well indicate that you will not get a place as you were outside the last place distance.

I've checked on freemaptools and the distance has come up as 1.0km.

I will definitely raise my concerns at the appeal though.

How do I know if the last successful applicant was 1.1km or 0.36 as they are claiming? Would they be telling me the truth?

You have no way of checking which distance is correct for the last successful applicant. The school can't tell you who it is or where they live. However, in this situation I'm sure the panel will want reassurance that the distance is correct.

Have you checked the distance from your house to the current location of the school? If that comes up as 1.4km that would tend to confirm Admission's guess as to what has happened.

Another question that needs answering is how they allocate places for the two separate admission criteria.

I would presume that a set number of places are allocated on the old site criteria, but is this at a higher priority than the other criteria of straight line distance from home to new school site. What I would expect is that the fixed number are allocated to the old site and then everybody is then in the criteria for the new site based on distance.

But is this what happens?

Please tell me it is not based on only those in the borough can be on straight line distance to the new school site, because that is definitely illegal!

The admission authority do have to present a sensible case at the appeal hearing as to the real distances involved. The reason I ask the questions above is that I suspect that you have a more likely case for admission on distance to the new school than the old school site. So there is a question about how the initial allocations are made and then how any subsequent allocations are made as people decline places at the school.

The school was a grammar school which was in a building here in this borough. The school merged with another school and moved some 15 miles away. It is no a longer a grammar school, it's a comprehensive.

Because the school was founded some 300 years ago and based in the borough where I live, they take some children exclusively from this area.

For the children who apply from this borough, they admit children who live closest to the old school site.

-The school has usual admission criteria:
-Looked after children
-Siblings
-10% aptitude
-Exceptional need
-Faith
-Distance

After the above spaces have been filled they will admit a handful of pupils (usually no more than 5) from my area who live closet to the old school site as measured by straight line and you definitely have to meet the faith criterion.

Do you mean 15 miles or 1.5 miles?

I sincerely hope that children from the "old" borough can be admitted based on the usual criteria (i.e. Looked after, siblings, etc.) If not this is clearly wrong.

They should specify how many pupils will be admitted frome the "old" borough. At the very least they should specify how the figure will be calculated. They shouldn't wait until they've got all the applications in and then pick a random number. That's not acceptable.

In fact the way you've worded it suggests they admit up to the PAN based on their admission criteria then add a few children who live near the old school site. They are not allowed to do that. I wonder if that is why there is this stuff with street maps and estimated locations - they are breaking the rules so they don't get any support from their LA in determining the distances for these extra places.

If that is indeed what they are doing this should be highlighted to the appeal panel. If they are admitting beyond PAN every year, it might lead to the panel questioning what the admission number should be.

15 miles! Not as bad as it sounds.

I think they can be admitted on the other criteria.

If there are more successful applicants on the faith criterion, 70% of places will be allocated on proximity to the school. Then the remaining 30% will be allocated to three other catchment areas (2 areas near to where the school is now, decided on proximity to the current school site) and for my catchment area it's whoever lives closest to the old school site.

At least that rules out the possibility of the measurements being to the new school site!

These admission criteria still sound odd to me. I'm not saying they are wrong, just strange. I'd be very interested to see the exact wording.

This has all the hallmarks of a school that has complicated admission criteria, that the school interprets in a set way but the question is whether that actually accords with what is written down in the admission criteria.

The admission criteria for how the pupils are admitted from the old site has to be specific and written down. If not the school is just not doing it properly.

It does not get you a place unless you have been disadvantaged but the only way to determine that is to go to appeal and ask for some specific explanations of the criteria and this shambles over the distances.