Dadsnet - School admissions appeals

davros

We just had confirmation that my 9-year-old son didn't get into our first choice (outstanding) middle school next to our house, and instead is going to a much worse school a bus ride away. Obviously we're pretty bummed about this, and looking to appeal.

We moved to this area from about 15 miles away 3 years ago, and couldn't get him into a first school nearby, so we have been commuting him to his old school since them. He's been on the waiting list for our local first school (where his younger brother goes) since then, but no places came up.

It appears that he doesn't have a place because he isn't attending a feeder school, despite being smack bang in the middle of the catchment area. All feeder schools are oversubscribed. Feeder schools take precedence in admissions over distance.

The most annoying thing is that the first choice school feeds into an outstanding high school. The other feeds into a "needs improvement" high school.

Effectively, because he hasn't lived in this house since he was 3, his education will be worse to the age of 18, and there's nothing we can do short of stumping up 16k a year for private. His younger brother, on the other hand, will sail through each of these schools as he started in one of the feeders.

You may say I'm just bitter, but these are literally our closest schools by far, we're 4 minutes walk from each. We also moved to this house specifically because of this.

So, we are going to lodge an appeal, but it looks like that's a tough process - anyone on here been through something similar? Any advice?

Heartfeltdawn

davros said:

So, we are going to lodge an appeal, but it looks like that's a tough process - anyone on here been through something similar? Any advice?

Drop me a PM. For two years I was responsible for organising admission appeal hearings for a county council about a decade ago. Things haven't changed too much in that time. 

davros

Thank you! PM'd

nanoman

Just in case it doesn't pan out, my anecdote on this; My sister in law went through excactly this and her daughter ended up at a needs improvement school and is the most well balanced, down to earth person earning a small fortune. I'm sure a lot at the 1st choice school are doing well too but good kids will come good regardless.

SteveRobinson

The admissions criteria sound rubbish. Kids should go to the closest school to where they live.

Teyeplayer

SteveRobinson said:

The admissions criteria sound rubbish. Kids should go to the closest school to where they live.

Which then creates a bubble of overpriced housing around outstanding schools, only serving to lock the poorest students out of accessing that level of education. There’s a very good reason that model is no longer common practice.

boogieman

In our case my son didn’t get into our first choice of secondary school. We went through the whole appeal process and still got nowhere. I should mention we lived less than half a mile from the school gate but the place was massively oversubscribed, the catchment area seemed to be about 50 yards. He still got in eventually though as lots of parents hadn’t bothered to notify the school that their little darlings had been offered places at “better” schools (or they’d forked out for private education and were just hedging their bets). So don’t give up hope just yet. 

Redlester

Teyeplayer said:

SteveRobinson said:

The admissions criteria sound rubbish. Kids should go to the closest school to where they live.

Which then creates a bubble of overpriced housing around outstanding schools, only serving to lock the poorest students out of accessing that level of education. There’s a very good reason that model is no longer common practice.

Proximity is still a criteria in a lot of areas. 

I personally don’t buy that argument about people moving nearer to better schools. It can happen, but you don’t get the same level of criticism aimed at people who buy an education for their kids privately. 

The aim is to improve  all schools of course. 

Hey OP have you got yr son on waiting list for the preferred school anyway? 

davros

We will be accepting the place and putting him on waiting lists as there's always a chance a place will open up. I doubt there are others closer on the list.

Currently formulating arguments for an appeal!

WiresDreamDisasters

Kids should go to where ever the parents want them to go to.

I wanted our kid to go to a school a 15minute bus journey away. We're not in the area, so were denied and put in a closer school - which is not as good. I spoke to the head, and she kept going on about diversity and religion. I specifically asked them what their science and maths programs were like, and she gave me a load of old typical waffle - she couldn't muster any sincere pride.

The nipper is only 4, but these decisions affect their entire lives. Yes, someone who is very intelligent can overcome a shit school. A lot of kids don't get the inspiration and the active reinforcement that they really need to succeed.

crunchman

WiresDreamDisasters said:

Kids should go to where ever the parents want them to go to.

I wanted our kid to go to a school a 15minute bus journey away. We're not in the area, so were denied and put in a closer school - which is not as good. I spoke to the head, and she kept going on about diversity and religion. I specifically asked them what their science and maths programs were like, and she gave me a load of old typical waffle - she couldn't muster any sincere pride.

The nipper is only 4, but these decisions affect their entire lives. Yes, someone who is very intelligent can overcome a shit school. A lot of kids don't get the inspiration and the active reinforcement that they really need to succeed.

As a former teacher, I would say that at least 80% of how well a kid gets on is down to the parents and not the school.

Going back to the OP's concerns, I also wouldn't worry too much about Ofsted ratings.   My wife used to teach in an "outstanding" school.  The school was good, but it was carried by the deputy and some other senior teachers.  The head was lazy, and did nothing constructive. The deputy retired.  One of the other senior teachers died.  Another got a deputy job elsewhere.  The school went massively downhill.  However, because it had been rated "outstanding" it didn't get another Ofsted inspection for many years.  It still got good results in SATS because it had a middle class intake where the kids got a lot of support at home, but it wasn't a good school.

The other thing is that the secondary schools could look very different in 3 or 4 years time.  The "needs improvement" school could get a new head who turns it around, while the other one could see the head leave, and get a weak head who is good at dazzling governors at interviews (not uncommon), while not actually being good at the job.

WiresDreamDisasters

@crunchman ;

The voice of wisdom, cheers!

axisus

I was going to say similar things to @crunchman - but not as eloquently and not with any experience!

Our kids didn't go to the best school, but they went where their friends went and they were happy. It wasn't a great school but plenty of kids still got outstanding results. If kids are clever and work hard they will do well and if they don't they won't do so well. Generally if parents take an interest they do better - although we struggled to get our sons interested in school. Daughters did better.

Kilgore

crunchman said:

As a former teacher, I would say that at least 80% of how well a kid gets on is down to the parents and not the school.

This certainly wasn't our experience with my eldest son. His first year in the local secondary school was a disaster. He was depressed, demotivated and complained that the teaching was uninspiring and unchallenging.

After the first year we transferred him to school a few miles away with a much better reputation in which he has thrived.

He's breezing through his GCSEs( or rather the testing regime to replace them) and is taking Maths, Physics, Economics and Law at A level.

It's orobably true that bright kids can thrive anywhere, but I'm glad we didn't take the risk with the first school. 

Iamnobody

WiresDreamDisasters said:

Kids should go to where ever the parents want them to go to.

There’s a couple of issues with this - at the moment (as far as I know) in most areas parents do get to ‘choose’ in as much as they submit their preferences to the LA, but ultimately school places are then allocated in accordance with policy and catchment areas.

A system where parents get the final decision wouldn’t work as the majority of parents would (naturally) seek out the best rated schools - how would the applications be prioritised?

The other issue is travel - there are far too many kids travelling long distances by car, congestion on the roads and terrible school gate parking. If more kids went to local schools and travelled actively - walking, cycling, scooting etc it’d help solve a few issues in society.

WiresDreamDisasters

Iamnobody said:

WiresDreamDisasters said:

Kids should go to where ever the parents want them to go to.

There’s a couple of issues with this - at the moment (as far as I know) in most areas parents do get to ‘choose’ in as much as they submit their preferences to the LA, but ultimately school places are then allocated in accordance with policy and catchment areas.

A system where parents get the final decision wouldn’t work as the majority of parents would (naturally) seek out the best rated schools - how would the applications be prioritised?

The other issue is travel - there are far too many kids travelling long distances by car, congestion on the roads and terrible school gate parking. If more kids went to local schools and travelled actively - walking, cycling, scooting etc it’d help solve a few issues in society.

Those two points aren't exactly congruent. If school places are allocated according to policy and catchment areas, then presumably all kids are going to local-ish schools, and presumably the "need" for long distance travel is only because of lazy parents who refuse to walk 20minutes.

I'd walk the 40minutes with the nipper on my shoulders if I had to. A lot of parents wouldn't. They value their time more than their kids futures. I was put into a shit school as a kid because it was a 30 second walk from the house. All of the other schools - better ones - were at least a 10 minute drive. I didn't even get a choice.

If you want to talk about solving a few issues in society, I think there are bigger problems than road congestion. How about the rampant council estate nihilism that is ingrained throughout our society that leads to schools being shit in the first place?

If some schools weren't shit, and didn't focus on non-academic ideas to the detriment of education, then it wouldn't even be a problem. All schools should strive to be exceptional, but the simple reality is that they don't. They just chase figures and quotas.

Iamnobody

I don’t want to talk about solving issues in society but promoting local schools and sustainable travel to and from school would bring about some fringe benefits - environmental and health and well-being. Stats around kids and obesity aren’t great currently. 

There are many kids travelling too far for schools and apologies I didn’t mention it in my initial comments - too many unnecessary short journeys by car as well for the school run. Which is a separate problem.

The current system as it stands does mean (in my experience) that a lot of kids don’t go to their local school. 

I still wonder how giving parents the choice, as per your preference would be successfully administrated?

Axe_meister

Bright kids "can" thrive anywhere as long as they socially fit in.
My experience of schools is kids are fucking arseholes to anybody who does not fit the norm.
In my son's case Asperger's, white and middle class in a predominantly black deprived area.
He suffered chronic depression and anxiety.
Alas specialist schools are no better and have become dumping grounds for kids with behaviour problems.
My son will be getting his education as an adult (night classes, etc) as the school system has truly failed him.

davros

All good points, there's no way of knowing whether he'll be just fine in the other school. All I know is I'm doing whatever I can to get him into the outstanding rated school that's 400m from my front door!

...and I paid a premium for my house to be in the catchment! 

Danny1969

Axe_meister said:

Bright kids "can" thrive anywhere as long as they socially fit in.
My experience of schools is kids are fucking arseholes to anybody who does not fit the norm.
In my son's case Asperger's, white and middle class in a predominantly black deprived area.
He suffered chronic depression and anxiety.
Alas specialist schools are no better and have become dumping grounds for kids with behaviour problems.
My son will be getting his education as an adult (night classes, etc) as the school system has truly failed him.

My son went to mainstream schools too with Asperger's .... was a complete nightmare with him being bullied,  incompetent teachers who just didn't understand the syndrome and couldn't be arsed to research it. I spent a lot of time at meetings at the school and went round a lot of pupils houses to confront their parents. Was a constant battle for years. 

I think parents can get sucked in to thinking that a schools rating is a huge deal in getting the best possible education but there are so many other things in the schools pupils hierarchy system  that have more of an effect. 

WiresDreamDisasters

Iamnobody said:

I don’t want to talk about solving issues in society but promoting local schools and sustainable travel to and from school would bring about some fringe benefits - environmental and health and well-being. Stats around kids and obesity aren’t great currently. 

There are many kids travelling too far for schools and apologies I didn’t mention it in my initial comments - too many unnecessary short journeys by car as well for the school run. Which is a separate problem.

The current system as it stands does mean (in my experience) that a lot of kids don’t go to their local school. 

I still wonder how giving parents the choice, as per your preference would be successfully administrated?

No idea. I'm not a school administrator or anything like that, just some cunt on a guitar forum. But I'm annoyed that the school my daughter has been put into is one of these touchy-feely wank schools that cares more about buzzwords like diversity and inclusivity than it does about discovering and shaping little geniuses/psychos.