St Mary’s Catholic Dukinfield Determined

Admission Policy 2010/11

St. Mary’s is a Catholic Primary School under the trusteeship of the Diocese of Shrewsbury. It is maintained by Tameside Education Authority. As a Voluntary Aided School, the Governing Body is the Admissions Authority and is responsible for taking decisions on applications for admissions. (The co-ordination of admissions arrangements is undertaken by the Local Authority). For the school's year commencing September 2010, the Governing Body has set its admissions number at 30.

Admissions To The School will be made by the Governing Body. All preferences listed on the Local Authority Preference Form will be considered on an equal basis with the following set of ADMISSIONS CRITERIA forming a priority order where there are more applications for admission than the school has places available. Please note that the criteria should be read in conjunction with the Notes.

1. Children in public care (Looked After Children).
2. Baptised Catholic children who have a sibling at the school at the time of admission.
3. Baptised Catholic children residing in the parish of St Mary’s, Dukinfield.
4. Baptised Catholic children residing in other parishes.
5. Non- Catholic children who have a sibling in the school at the time of admission
6. Non Catholic children whose parents wish them to have a Catholic education

Notes

a) All applications submitted on time will be considered at the same time and after the closing date for admissions which is _______________________. (insert date provided by the LA)*
Applications received after the closing date will be dealt with as late and will be considered after all applications received on time have been processed.

b) All Catholic applicants will be required to produce baptismal certificates.

c) It is the duty of governors to comply with class size limits at Reception and Key Stage One.

d) Children with Statements of special educational needs where the school is named in the Statement will be allocated places before the oversubscription criteria are applied

e) If category (3) is oversubscribed, children who satisfy (3) and (2) will have priority over children who satisfy only (3). Subsequently if in this or any other category there are more applications than places available, priority will be given on the basis of distance from home to school, those living nearer to the school having priority. Distance will be measured as a straight line from the child’s home address, using the address point assigned by the National Land and Property Gazetteer, to the main gate to the school property. Measurements will be made using the local authority’s school admissions data mapping software, which employs a Geographical Information System based on Ordnance Survey.

f) The address from which distance will be measured will be the permanent residential address, at the time of application, of the parent with whom the child lives. Where a child lives with parents with shared responsibility, each for part of a week, the home address is the address from which the child travels to school for the majority of school days per week. If the number of days is exactly equal the home address will be that of the parent who receives the Child Benefit.

g) In the event of distances being the same for 2 or more applications where this distance would be the last place/s to be allocated, a random lottery will be implemented between the applications where the distance is the same. The random lottery will be carried out in a public place and supervised by someone independent of the school. All the names will be entered into a hat and the required number of names will be drawn out.

h) The sibling criterion includes; natural sisters/brothers; half sisters/brothers; step sisters/brothers; adopted sisters/brothers; sisters/brothers of fostered children, and in each case living at the same address. This allows for the admittance of children whose siblings will still be attending the preferred school. In cases where twins, triplets, other multiple birth siblings, or other siblings whose date of birth falls within the same academic year, are split when allocations take place, parents will be offered a choice of breaking the sibling link and being offered places at two or more schools or all siblings being offered a place at the same school which may not be a preference school named on the common application form.

i) Admission authorities will not allow preferences, ranking order, or pupil details to be changed after the closing date except in exceptional circumstances; for example, if the family has recently moved address. Evidence must be provided to support the request. No changes can be considered after 15 January 2010 when the allocations process has started.

j) If an application for admission has been turned down by the Governing Body, parents can appeal to an Independent Appeals Panel. Parents will be allowed at least 10 school days from the date of refusal in which to submit their appeal. Parents must give reasons for appealing in writing and the decision of the Appeals Panel is binding on the Governors.

k) For occasional applications received outside the normal admissions round and if places are available then children qualifying under the published criteria will be admitted. If there are places available but more applicants than places then the published oversubscription criteria will be applied. (Occasional and late applications will be treated as per the admissions arrangements published by the Local Education Authority).

l) If the school is oversubscribed the governors will maintain a waiting list. The waiting list will operate until the end of the autumn term 2010 for those parents who have submitted an appeal or who have opted to go on the list. All pupils on the waiting list will be ranked according to the oversubscription criteria. Places will be offered, should any become available, to the highest ranked application received by the date the place becomes available. If new or late applications have a higher priority under the oversubscription criteria, they will be ranked higher than those who have been on the list for some time. A significant change of circumstances, such as a change of address, will be taken into account: evidence must be provided. Children who have been referred under the local authority’s Fair Access protocol or who are the subject of a direction by the local authority to admit must be given precedence over any other children on the waiting list.

m) If an application for admission has been turned down by the Governing Body, parents can appeal to an Independent Appeals Panel. This appeal must be sent in writing to the Clerk to the Governors at the school within 14 days (10 working days) of refusal. Parents must give reasons for appealing in writing and the decision of the Appeals Panel is binding on the Governors.

n) The Governing Body reserve the right to withdraw the offer of a school place where false evidence is received in relation to baptism, sibling connections or place of residence.