General school admissions

Travel arrangements need to be an important consideration when you’re making your school preferences. Very few primary children qualify for travel assistance from us.

Since September 2015, travel assistance is only offered to pupils attending their nearest qualifying school (the school that is closest to the pupil’s home address) if it is more than the statutory walking distance.

This may not necessarily be your catchment school if there are nearer schools to your home address with places available.

If you choose to accept a place at a school that is not your nearest qualifying school for travel assistance purposes, you do so on the understanding that transporting your child to that school is your responsibility.

You will need to take any practical arrangements and potential travel costs into account when making your preferences to ensure that your child can to get to and from school at the appropriate time each day.

Please be aware that our home to school transport policy is different from our admissions policy. School places are allocated in accordance with the oversubscription criteria and home to school distances are calculated in a straight line.

Home to school transport distances are assessed using an in-house GIS mapping system that measures the nearest available walking route. This means the result for the nearest qualifying school for transport can be different from the nearest school for admissions purposes.

We recommend that you contact our school transport team to discuss your application and to find out which school is your nearest for travel assistance purposes.

Transport for pupils with special education needs (SEN) and/or disabilities

Once a pupil’s Education, Health and Care (EHC) plan is finalised, the SEN Team will assess their eligibility for home to school travel assistance.

If a pupil is attending their nearest qualifying school and the distance from home to school is over the statutory walking distance, they will be eligible for travel assistance.

If a pupil is attending their nearest qualifying school, but their home to school distance is less than the statutory walking distance, then eligibility will be assessed on their individual needs.

If a pupil is not attending their nearest qualifying school, they will not be eligible for travel assistance and it will be the parent/carer’s responsibility to arrange transport for their child to and from school. For further information contact the SEN team.

Our school transport policies are reviewed annually and therefore are subject to change.

Faith schools

We do not provide travel assistance to faith schools unless it is the nearest qualifying school (the school that is closest to the pupil’s home address and it is more than the statutory walking distance).

From September 2014 the Council no longer provides travel assistance to post 16 students, however will consider individual cases where hardship can be demonstrated.

The address stated on the school application must be the address the child is living at the time of application, that is the address where the child lives and wakes up between Monday to Friday.

The school admissions code gives us the right to withdraw any school place offered on the basis of a fraudulent or intentionally misleading application. If we receive notification of a potentially fraudulent application our fraud and investigations team may be asked to review the information that has been provided. This may include interviewing and taking a signed statement from the applicant.

You must inform us immediately of a change of address. You can notify us of a future house move by including the details as additional information but until a house move actually takes place the new address will not be used.

We will require supporting evidence to show that the child’s place of residence has changed. Documents required are:

• proof of purchase of new property or signed tenancy agreement
• confirmation of the family’s move from the previous property, this can be in the form of: an invoice from a removal company, a disconnection certificate from previous address, documents for the sale or lease of the property, or legal transfer arrangements to another third party, etc
• Council Tax or utility bill (e.g. gas, electric or water bill) confirming usage at the new property
• a formal document confirming the residency of your child, this can be: proof of receipt of Child Benefit or Child Tax Credits at the new address, evidence of your change of address with a bank/building society/Trust Fund account in your child’s name, proof of change of address with a GP/doctors surgery, or a doctors/dentist/hospital appointment letter

Please be aware of timeframes that may impact your reception application or timeframes that may impact your secondary school application.

Where parents/carers have shared responsibility for a child, the place of residency - for the purposes of the school admissions process - will be determined as the address where the child resides for the majority of the week. That is where the child wakes up from Monday to Friday.

Only one application can be considered for each child and we would expect that in most cases parents/carers will take the above residency requirement into account, agree on their preferences and submit one application.

In the event of two applications being received for a child with shared residency we will then only consider the application from the parent/carer with whom the child resides the majority of the time. that is unless a copy of a Court order is provided with the application which contains a specific direction regarding the child’s education.

If the child resides with two parents/carers equally and both submit applications, then neither will be considered and the parents/carers will be asked to agree a single application between themselves.

Any supporting documentation must be provided by:

• 10 December 2022 for secondary applications
• 20 February 2023 for reception applications

to enable the local authority to determine before the allocation of school places begins.

Where a parent who is not the applicant wishes to know where their child/ren has been allocated a school place, in the first instance the parent should contact the applicant for information. The authority cannot release this information unless legal proof is received that allows the authority to do so.

The Information Advice and Support Service provides impartial information for parents, children and young people on special educational needs and disability. Staff and volunteers offer personal contact and support with paperwork, attend meetings in school and with the local authority, provide information on voluntary groups and other sources of help including the local offer.

The service is available to parents whose children have special educational needs (SEN) as soon as their needs are identified and at any age from birth until age 25 years.

Section 324 of the Education Act 1996 requires the governing bodies of all maintained schools to admit a child with an education, health and care plan that names their school. Academies will normally be subject to a similar requirement through their agreement with the Department for Education.

For more information contact our special education needs team.

Applications received for a child who is looked after or a child who was previously looked after (but ceased to be because they were adopted or became subject to a child arrangements order or special guardianship order) who require admission to a school outside the normal admission round will normally be offered a place at the school serving the address at which the pupil is/will be living. E.G. the catchment area school, or the most appropriate school as determined by the Local Authority even if that school is full.

For children of UK service personnel places will be allocated before the family arrive in the area. If accompanied by an official government letter which declares a relocation date and a unit postal address or quartering area address for considering the application against Local Authority oversubscription criteria.

The School Admissions Code has included children of multiple births as a permitted exception. This is to ensure that, as far as possible, twins, triplets or children from other multiple births can attend the same school. The Local Authority and school will consider if this will be detrimental to the education and use of resources at the school before making any decision to offer such places.