If the number of preferences received for a school is below the school’s Admission Number, all applications for admission to the school will be granted. Places cannot be reserved for ‘in catchment’ children unless they are children of reception age whose parents have applied for their entry to school to be deferred until a later date in the same school year.
If the number of preferences received for a school is above the school’s Admission Number the following oversubscription criteria will be applied, in the priority order listed, to determine the allocation of available places:
- Priority Category 1: 'Looked After' children (children in public care) & previously 'Looked After' children.
- Priority Category 2: Children whose home is inside the school’s catchment area and have an older sibling attending the school from the same address, at the date of application, who will continue to attend that school in September 2024.
- Priority Category 3: Children whose home is inside the school’s catchment area who do not have an older sibling attending the school.
- Priority Category 4: Children whose home is outside the school’s catchment area and have an older sibling attending from the same address, at the date of application, who will continue to attend that school in September 2024.
- Priority Category 5: Children whose home is outside the school’s catchment area who do not have an older sibling attending the school.
For the avoidance of all doubt the reference to ‘home’ in the oversubscription categories above and the 'tie breaker' below refers to the actual location of the residential dwelling in which the child lives.
Please note that childcare/childminding arrangements or a parent’s place of work cannot be taken into account when applying admissions criteria.
The date a parent/carer requests with a school that their child’s name be put on their school’s initial list is not criteria for entry and does not guarantee a place; it merely enables further information to be sent out at the correct time.
Tie breaker
Children will be admitted up to the Admission Number in order of priority as outlined above. If, within anyone of the priority categories listed, all the applicants cannot be offered a place, preference will be given to children living nearest to the school. Distance will be measured by the Authority using the shortest, safe walking route between the home address and the nearest open school gate. For the avoidance of doubt, in areas where no safe walking route has been identified by the Authority, the shortest driving route between the home address and the nearest open school gate will be used. The distance will be measured by using the Mapinfo System only, in order to ensure equality of opportunity to all applications.
Measurements calculated by any other system will not be considered. The home address in instances where parents have shared responsibility for children, will be the address to which Child Benefit is paid.
Note
Siblings
Children will be classified as siblings if-
- (a) they are half or full brother or sister
- (b) they are an adoptive or fostered brother or sister
- (c) they are children i.e. step brother/step sister living full time/permanently in the same household
Please note that cousins, nephews and nieces are not counted as siblings.
In relation to secondary school, siblings must be in years 7 to 11 of the relevant school in September 2024. Siblings attending the sixth form at a comprehensive school in September 2024 are not considered for purpose of admissions of younger children.