School appeals - help offered

lallysmum

Re the faith school bit - I'm catholic, my son is baptised catholic, we attend Mass every week, I helped run the children's liturgy for a couple of years, helped run the children's choir before it was dropped, my daughter went to the primary school (she's 15 now so left 4 years ago) and my son *still* didn't get in.

This year, they had a massive number of catholic children with siblings already in the school so no other criterias got looked at.

Ds is going to a non catholic primary school, a very good one and will do all the religious bits outside of school.

Maybe your wife could teach your child spanish as she is already a teacher...

peachyprice

chrismal wrote: »

First off I have never seen such poor advice in my life Flea72. I'll ignore your advice. And your quote "work is a lifestyle choice" work is a moral right and obligation. I can only assume you are unemployed from that absurd comment.

Just because advice is not what you want to hear it doesn't make it poor.

The school will care not a jot about your working day and how that fits in around the school day. Your working hours are your choice.

The school will care not a jot that the other school is further, do not fall into the trap of comparing any aspect of your chosen school with the given school.

Your childs language needs do not come into the equation, the school is a centre of excellence for Spanish becuase it teaches Spanish as a second language well, not because it is a Spanish speaking school that provides a Spanish speaking environment for Spanish speaking children.

The only thing that you can appeal in is failure to follow their own admissions criteria.

flea72

chrismal wrote: »

First off I have never seen such poor advice in my life Flea72. I'll ignore your advice. And your quote "work is a lifestyle choice" work is a moral right and obligation. I can only assume you are unemployed from that absurd comment.

work is a lifestyle choice, because you can choose not to work.

you and your OH have both chosen to work f/t and you are using your childcare needs, as a reason for your child to attend a set school. the argument from the LA would be that, one or both of you doesnt have to work, and would therefore be available to do the school runs. or that seeing as you work, you should be able to pay for wrap-around childcare (like many 000s of others do)

if you read back through this thread, you will see that i have given accurate advice on many an occasion. my employment situation has no bearing on my understanding of the appeals process. but if you are so interested, i have chosen to work

F

clearingout

and of those of us who don't work, it isn't necessarily by choice!

go_cat

chrismal wrote: »

First off I have never seen such poor advice in my life Flea72. I'll ignore your advice. And your quote "work is a lifestyle choice" work is a moral right and obligation. I can only assume you are unemployed from that absurd comment.

Chrismal you have been given the correct advice so many times now yet you have still ignored the question

Did you fail in your application due to not meeting the admissions criteria set by the school ...... this is key to any appeal

You cannot make your own criteria up to what suits you and your family.

JoJoArmani

We are appealing for my middle daughers primary school place. Catholic VA school. Big sister already in school.

The school has a physical capacity of 320, a net capacity of 300 and admissions of 45 this year. It has 11 class rooms (used to be 10) and 11.6 full time equvalent teachers, 2 HLTA and 18 teaching assistants.

Currently the classes are 2 receptions (23 and 23 in each); 3 classes each of years 1/2; 3/4 and 5/6 mixed ages.

Children in school in 2011 based on 46 reception admissions - Rec - 46; Yr1 - 45 and yr2 - 45 = 136 KS1 in 5 classrooms. Total of 312 in whole school (309 2010)

There was a massive 127 applications this year (is it a boom year?) as opposed to 50 the year before.

We have not been allocated a place as I had neglected to have my 2 youngest baptised. I know 2 other non-catholic siblings have been allocted a place that live closer to school. We are currently 2nd on the list and she has now been baptised. We live about 1.3 miles from school (or 1.004 as the crow flies).

Now then, on the appeal papers we have the school are stating that "addmissions over the pan would possibly prejudice the provision of efficient education and the efficient use of resources, as well as creating an issue with regard to infant class size regulations in years 1 and 2".

Can I agrue that they can reorganise the classes next year and the year after to ensure infant class sizes are in line with regulations - and therefore they could admit my daughter?

(they have already admited 1 more due to a parent finding out someone was admited as a baptised catholic when they weren't - I am waiting to find out more about this as I want to know how far from school this other lucky parent lives).

Savvy_Sue

JoJoArmani wrote: »

Can I agrue that they can reorganise the classes next year and the year after to ensure infant class sizes are in line with regulations - and therefore they could admit my daughter?

I think you CAN argue this, but I'm not sure it has a legal basis. Just because they CAN, they do not have to. It might work, if they WANT to have your DD.

JoJoArmani wrote: »

(they have already admited 1 more due to a parent finding out someone was admited as a baptised catholic when they weren't - I am waiting to find out more about this as I want to know how far from school this other lucky parent lives).

But I think that may be a different thing - they made an error, which they have corrected before it goes to appeal, because presumably it would have won on appeal. It's not clear that in your case they made an error.

And actually I'm not sure what their error was - did they admit someone on the 'baptised catholic' grounds and then found they weren't, so someone else leapt up and said "oi, if they get a place, I certainly do too", or did they admit one 'baptised catholic' and not another one who had an equal or better claim?

You need to go through the way they prioritise with a fine toothcomb and see if you can find out if anyone was admitted from a lower 'level' than you, if that makes sense. Although when this was relevant to me, 'The Unbaptised' were right at the bottom of the heap - something which changed after I pointed out that not all Christians use water in their child initiation ceremonies. And although you have had your DD baptised now, I don't think that counts for much, because it's the situation at the time of application which is relevant - otherwise there would be a flood of baptisms as soon as the places were allocated!

JoJoArmani

Savvy_Sue wrote: »

I think you CAN argue this, but I'm not sure it has a legal basis. Just because they CAN, they do not have to. It might work, if they WANT to have your DD.

Thank you - that is what I thought.

And actually I'm not sure what their error was - did they admit someone on the 'baptised catholic' grounds and then found they weren't, so someone else leapt up and said "oi, if they get a place, I certainly do too", or did they admit one 'baptised catholic' and not another one who had an equal or better claim?

Well the head told me 2 non-baptised were admitted on the first round. Therefore this other lucky person must not have been baptised or they would have got in 1st time. The 2 parents must know each other and when lucky person questioned why they had not been given a place they must have found jammy person was in the wrong category and admitted in error over other applicants. But then how do we know that jammy person doesn't live 3 miles away? I have asked for this info from the LEA.

You need to go through the way they prioritise with a fine toothcomb and see if you can find out if anyone was admitted from a lower 'level' than you, if that makes sense.
Unfortunately we are on the 2nd from bottom rung - Other with a sibling in school. There is no provision for practising or not - only baptised or not. I'm annoyed with myself for not sorting out her baptism ages ago but it was always put off - no money, family can't come - my brother lives abroad, too busy (had 2 babies in 12 months) etc etc. My fault but not her fault.

Just hope I can argue her case.

poet123

I am a governor in an RC VA school and I occasionally sit on the appeals panel (although I have been too busy of late to do so) Here is my take; You can try to argue point 1 (re organisation) but the panel will take account of the fact that this would impact resources for all children for the sake of one, we recently as a school successfully defended an appeal on these grounds.

Additionally, if the number goes above 30 on appeal, the school has, by law, to fund another teacher, they would not go to appeal unless they were pretty certain of winning under those circumstances.

The facts are that unfortunately you neglected to ensure you fully met the published criteria and now want to redress that balance. Unless the school acted outside that criteria (either in your case, or in the case of another child who has won a place) you will lose at appeal.

Baptism is a requirement at the date of application closure, the fact that your child has now been baptised is irrelevant I am afraid.

Re the baptism issue, it was probably that the parents had insisted the child had been baptised but had prevaricated about sending in the cert, and somehow the school had let their application slip through (extremely bad practice for obvious reasons) when it was noticed (or they were challenged by someone with a vested interest who knew the facts re that child) they had to reverse their decision. This is correct procedure to avoid a win at appeal.

You could try to see if a place has been given to a child lower in the criteria than you, but that would be hard to do, and frankly in our school we take such care over the sorting of applications, and they are second and third hand checked, that it is unlikely to have happened.

I would put my efforts into getting another school that you are happy with and which meets your child's needs.

JoJoArmani

Thank you for your reply. It is very interesting.

Yes I do want to redress the balance, you are right. It was my fault, and now she might miss out on going to the same school as her sister, and miss out altogether on going to a Catholic school. Also if she does not get in, next year I will be in a horrible poition of having to choose which school my youngest daughter will go to.

I am also disappointed that children of non Christian faith who live closer than us have been given a place based on the admissions criteria. But, it is my own fault - I know that.

They used to mix up the classes year by year depending on the numbers in each year. Now they have fixed the classes. They have 5 classes assigned to ks1. I believe from the figures that they do have the capacity to take 1 more child. In 2012 they would have 137 children at ks1 with 5 class rooms. 27.4 children per class.

Well, all I can do is have a go. It is the head that is representing the governors and there will be 3 panel members. No doubt I will be a terrible mess (I feel sick at the thought of it all) and cry all over the place like a massive idiot, but at least I will know that I tried.

I have been told that God answers all prayers, usually with the tools required to help yourself. Hopefully I have enough tools