Moving and school allocations

marywb

I hope someone can help. My husband has had a short notice draft which means we will be moving to a new area in a few months. The problem is my youngest is in Year 6 at primary school and should be moving onto secondary school next September. We have done the application procedure for where we are now but of course due to the new draft my son can now not go to any of these schools.

The usual application procedure is to apply by 31st Oct and then you are notified of the allocated school on 1st March - now with the move it means that we will not know where we are going to be living until January and so have no idea about local schools etc.

My main concern and reason for this post is that my son will be at the bottom of the allocation list for secondary schools in Birmingham and could end up being put in a terrible school miles from where we will be living. Someone has told me that local authorities have to give special consideration to children from armed services families who have to change school and I wonder if anyone knows if this is the case and can point me to the relevant regulation.

Many thanks in anticipation of advice.

Marywb

EmmEve

I've heard this too but no idea how true it is. The Children's Education Advisory Service (CEAS) should be able to offer some advice.

http://www.mod.uk/defenceinternet/defencefor/servicecommunity/education/childrenseducationadvisoryservice.htm

RAF_Nurse!

Hello.

I am based in Birmingham at the RCDM.

TBH, we had a total nightmare Re/ houses, schools, etc. Many (all families) of us seem to! Sorry!

You will get no priority as a Service family , trust me. It's like they even resent you asking. The 'legislation' makes no difference....they will simply point out that legally they cannot give you a place that simply does not exist (they will not over-fill a class just for you).... They do not have to legally.

You can appeal, but this takes time that you probably don't have and is not certain, etc. Instead you will be allocated a place by them at a school as near as possible, but be warned - they are not concerned about OFSTED reports, etc. That said, as a child moving from Primary to Secondary he will get some priority.

For the RCDM they (HCR - the MOD's agent) like to house you in or around the Harborne / Edgbaston area. ALL the local primary's that are not failing (as per OFSTED) seem to be full and massively over-subscribed (as is the whole of Brum....I heard on the radio earlier this year that for the coming school year the area was 280+ places short!)...we were told by the headteacher of Harborne primary school that 31 children would need to leave the year group before they could offer us a place!

And as for housing....don't forget you can only accept a house no more than 2 days before the date on your assignment order (AO)....which is helpful when trying to find schools. Not to mention the fact that the HCR/MOD scheme does not allow for a deposit to be paid to the lettings agent/landlord! How many landlord's would be happy to take a tenant without a deposit?!!!!

CEAS are good, but be prepared to print off stuff to show schools / LEA to prove to them that they HAVE to abide by certain things!

Good luck! Enjoy your posting! Where is your Husband gonna be working? If you want advice on area's, etc let me know...i've been here since last summer.

marywb

Dear EmmEve and RAF Nurse

Thank you for your replies, I'll just have to keep my fingers crossed re schools and hope for the best.

marywb

mumps

Have you considered 11plus? Birmingham has five (I think) King Edwards and Handsworth Boys. Also grammars in Sutton Coldfield, sorry can't remember the names. The exams used to be in November but there was a second lot in January for children who had missed earlier exams for some reason. I don't know if you agree with grammars or if your child is likely to get through but it would mean a place at a good school if they passed. Good luck.

13Kent

I know of someone that was about to move, and in order to get a place in the desired school for Sept took a 2 week holiday in the July before they actually moved and enrolled the child in the current year of the school they would be going to in Sept for that two weeks, then in September the child was allocated a place alongside the other children in that year automatically. They had been told there were no places left in the following year, but there were in the current year group (not sure how it worked but it did!)

Whether it would help to have your child enrolled in a feeder primary school at the end of year 6 as in this case I don't know.

footychick

We are about to move to an area which all the secondary schools are very good and over subscribed. We got offered a school out of catchment, which I was not happy about. I rand CEAS, they were really good and told me the process I needed to go through to go to appeal and they said they would attend with me.

Eventually our 1st choice school contacted me and said that they had decided to offer my DS a place as they felt that I had a good case and that I would win at appeal (they are an academy and have their own appeals process). I would deffiantely give CEAS a call, leave a message and they will get back to you.

Good luck