School admissions to be “fairer and simpler”

Released 03/11/2011

Significant changes made to schools admissions codes include national “offer day” for primary schools and priority status for vulnerable children

Oversubscribed schools will now have the opportunity to expand without permission from local authorities and without limitation other than space restrictions and compliance to health and safety regulations

The Department for Education (DfE) has announced “fairer and simper changes” to the schools admissions codes following a 12-week consultation on proposals to overhaul the current system.

Changes to the admissions process include a “national offer day” for primary schools, replacing the current system where different admissions authorities release information on different dates.

This new “national offer day” is set to commence on 16 April of each year starting in 2014, although a three-week consultation on the code’s specific regulations, including this date, is set to begin shortly.

The move will see all 800,000 primary school places offered on a single day.

Limitless expansion

According to the DfE, changes made to the applications process aim to give more power and autonomy to schools and parents and increase “fairness” between privileged children and those from deprived backgrounds.

ASCL general secretary Brian Lightman welcomed the DfE’s intention of simplifying the admissions code, but insisted the “changes must be fair and give all pupils an equal chance to receive a good education.

We fear the proposed changes will have the opposite effect,” he said. “Allowing ‘popular’ schools to expand will do nothing to improve social mobility. It will create sink schools in many areas of deprivation and hit hardest those children whose parents do not or cannot take an interest in their education.”

Schools will also be permitted to take multiple-birth children and children of armed forces personnel into infant classes even if the class exceeds the 30-child legal limit.

Furthermore, schools will be allowed to prioritise the children of staff who have been recruited to fill a particular skills shortage within the school and council “lotteries” that have been used to determine pupil placement in the past will now be banned.

The DfE says parents have been supportive of all the proposed changes throughout the consultation process.

Adopted privileges

Under the new code, adopted children who have previously been in care (or those who have left care under special guardianship or residence order) are to be granted the same priority as those who still remain in care – affecting around 5,000 children each year.

The DfE justified the decision to maintain the priority status of children who had been in care due to “anecdotal evidence that some adoptive parents delay applying for the adoption order so they can take advantage of the priority given to children in care”.

Schools Minister Nick Gibb commented on the change, he said: “All these measures and the priority we are giving to children who are adopted from the care system are all designed to help raise the standard in our schools and close the attainment gap between those from poorer and wealthier backgrounds.

“Children in care should continue to be given special priority in school admissions after they have been adopted… Many of these children have had traumatic experiences in their early lives. They don’t stop being vulnerable just because they are now in a loving home.”

The DfE has upholds that these changes ensure a “system that will be fairer and simpler for all parents”, but despite utilising parental guidance and alengthy consultation period, several teachers unions remain sceptical about the new system.

Lightman concluded: “Tinkering with the admissions code is not the way to achieve the coalition government’s key principle of fairness. The only solution to this is to work with school leaders to ensure that every school in the country is able to provide a first-class education.”

NAHT response

The National Association of Head Teachers (NAHT) welcomed greater clarity of the new school admissions codes but suggested that it could have done more to level the playing field.

Russell Hobby, general secretary of the NAHT, said: “We think more could be done. Children on free school meals should have automatic priority - alongside other vulnerable groups - to access any school their family chooses, academy or maintained. At a stroke this would eliminate much potential for unfair practices and give confidence that schools' results came from their teaching quality not their catchment area or admissions policy.

“On the subject of school expansion; we have no issue with good schools taking on more pupils but it is vital that they consult and inform their neighbours before they do so, so that the education of children in other schools is not harmed.”

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