Where to Start	More Info on Scotland
School Admissions	More Info on Northern Ireland
Types of School	Organisations

Education is compulsory in the UK for everyone between the ages of five and sixteen and all children of compulsory school age have the right to a school place. The vast majority of school-age children attend one of the 34,000 state schools in the UK. The respective education departments of England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland determine state school policy and overall funding. Successive governments have striven to improve the quality of state education and have introduced and reviewed national curriculum guidelines to this end.

State education is generally broken down into the following stages:

Variations exist within the UK – compulsory school age begins at four in Northern Ireland and pupils transfer to secondary school at age 12 in Scotland; for more information, we recommend the British Council website, which provides detail on the primary and secondary phases of education throughout the UK. 

You are entitled to arrange alternative education for your child in the independent school sector or at home, and your Local Education Authority is responsible for ensuring that this education is satisfactory. For more information please see our sections on Choosing an Independent School or Home Education.

WHERE TO START

The Department for Education and Skills (DfES) have a very helpful website, the Parents’ Centre, that covers a host of issues of interest, including choosing a school.

It also features a search facility for local schools and their inspection reports.

There are various ways of finding out about local schools and these are examined below:

Local Authority Booklets

The Local Education Authority is part of the local council and is responsible for providing education for all pupils of school age in the area. They supply booklets that contain information about all the state schools in their area, explaining how they are managed, their admission policies, how popular they are and how to get in touch with them. A list of contact information for all Local Educational Authorities is available from the DfES. The LEA is accountable for school improvement, school access, special education provision and school management. Parents can choose to educate their children at state schools outside the boundaries of their own LEA if they wish to do so.

In Scotland, Education Authorities produce annual handbooks.

School Prospectus

Every school must publish a prospectus with detailed information about the school, its admissions policy, how it is run and its results. Prospectuses are available from each school, contact details for which can be found in our school directories section and in the LEA booklet (see above).

Visiting the School

This is probably the best way to find out what you think of a school and to get a feel for the place. Primary schools vary in their visiting arrangements and may offerdays or an appointment system. It is therefore important to contact any primary school that you are interested in to find out its visiting arrangements. Contact details are in the LEA booklet (see above).

Secondary schools holddays and evenings when you can meet the Head and some of the teachers, observe the children and generally get a feel for the place. These are usually in September and October, but if you are unable to attend the scheduleddays, it may be possible to visit and talk to the Head teacher by appointment. Again, contact details are in the LEA booklet.

School Performance Tables

Performance tables cannot give a complete picture of a school, but they do provide a basis for academic comparison between all the schools in a LEA and the national average. The DfES produces primary school and secondary school tables. Further information and school results are available in our Performance Tables section.

School Inspections Reports

The Office for Standards in Education (OFSTED) is a government department with a remit to improve standards of achievement and quality of education in English schools through routine inspection; OFSTED’s counterparts in Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland carry out inspections along similar guidelines. Links to all state school inspection reports are available from our School Inspections section.

Talking to Parents

Parents who already have children at a school you are considering have first-hand experience of the school and can be a valuable source of information. They will be able to offer a parents’ perspective of the school, parental involvement, the teachers and the levels of homework. Bear in mind that schools can change significantly over a few years, especially with a new headteacher, so try to talk to people whose children are still at the school.

Online School Searches

For contact details for local schools, try an online school directory, where you can search for primary, secondary, independent, specialist and special schools by school type and/or by area. Please visit our School Directories section for more information.

SCHOOL ADMISSIONS

Admissions Policies

All schools must publish their admissions policy clearly in their prospectus. It is worth checking the criteria carefully to avoid applying for schools where you will be unlikely to secure a place.

When to Apply

Primary Schools

You will need to apply for a primary school place before your child reaches the age of five. You can apply to more than one school, in or outside of the LEA in which you live. Arrangements for admission to reception classes in primary schools vary across the country; all children start either in the school term in which they have their fifth birthday or earlier. Depending on their dates of birth, some schools take all the children in September, others take them in September and January and still others have three points of entry in September, January and April. The LEA booklet will give this information, as will the school prospectus.

Secondary Schools

Applications should be in before Christmas of the year before your child is due to start, so you will need to have chosen your schools by then. There are usually plenty ofdays in September or October so you should have the opportunity to do your research early. It is usual to apply to more than one secondary school, in or outside of your LEA, in case you do not get into your first choice. If you do not apply for a place your child will have to wait until all those who did apply have been found a place; by this time your local school may be full. Never assume that you will get a place without applying.

How the Admissions Process Works

Admissions are dealt with either by the LEA or by the schools’ governing body, depending on the type of school to which you are applying. Admissions policies vary and the LEA booklets and school prospectus provide the details for how to apply to each school. Admission authorities should ensure that the admission criteria are clear and objective. If the LEA handles admissions to the school that you are applying to, you must fill in an LEA admissions form stating your preferred school. However, if the school handles admissions, you will have to apply directly to the school. Sometimes you will need to supply extra information with your application (for church schools for instance) so it is worth checking this with the admission authority. Once you have applied the admission authority will deal with your application. Find the school’s contact details in our School Directories section or from the LEA booklet.

If the school you have chosen is very popular the admission authority will follow a set of rules, or over-subscription criteria, to decide who will be offered places. The LEA booklet and school prospectus publish these criteria, which often take into account whether the child has siblings at the school, lives within close proximity to the school and whether he or she is at a feeder school (a nursery or school linked to the school of your choice). However, these policies vary from LEA to LEA and from school to school so it is important to know the one for the school of your choice.

The admission criteria might also vary further due to the type of school to which you are applying. Partially selective schools select a percentage of their pupils on the basis of ability or aptitude. Grammar schools select all their pupils by academic ability. In these cases your child may have to take an entrance test in order to gain admittance. The form of these tests is at the discretion of the admission authority. LEA booklets list any grammar and partially selective schools and the selection criteria they impose.

In some comprehensive schools children are tested to identify their ability and then banded by their test results. Each school then takes a percentage of its intake from each band. Again it is up to the admission authority to decide upon the form of these tests and how the children will be ‘banded’ by the results. If there are more applications than places in a specific ‘band’ the school must employ the over-subscription criteria rather than select the children from another band. This is to ensure than they admit a selection of pupils across the ability range.

Once the admission authority has offered a place it cannot be withdrawn unless the application was fraudulent or intentionally misleading (thus denying a place to a child with a stronger claim) or if you have not responded to the offer within a reasonable time.

For more information on admission policies try these links:

The DfES Code of Practice - School Admissions

The DfES Parents’ Centre has information on school admissions and applications.

The Welsh Office’s Code of Practice for school admissions is available. You will need to download Adobe Acrobat Reader, which is free, in order to view this document.

The Good Schools Guide has a good article on the UK school system on its site, which includes information on applying to schools.

Further information on admission to schools in Scotland and Northern Ireland is available below.

How to Appeal

If you are dissatisfied with the school place allocated to your child you have the right to appeal to an independent panel. Information about your right to appeal and how to go about it will be enclosed in a letter explaining why your child has not been offered a place at your preferred school. Just as you can apply to more than one school, you have the right to appeal against rejection from more than one school.

Clear advice about what you can do if your child is not offered a place at your chosen school and you wish to appeal is set out in the DfES Parents’ Centre, which goes through the entire procedure.

You should lodge an appeal within the period specified by the admission authority and you should receive notice at least 14 days before the date when the appeal is to be heard.

Appeals against admission authorities’ decisions usually have two phases:

·        An independent panel will hear the admissions authority’s case and decide whether there is a good reason for turning down the application.

·        If the panel feels there was good cause for turning down the application then it will hear your case.

The panel then decides whether the benefits of your child going to the school are greater than the effects on the school of having an extra pupil in the class.

Reception, Year 1 and Year 2 Only

If your application has been refused because the school has reached its legal intake limit, the appeal panel will only consider two things. First, whether the admission authority kept to its own published rules, and secondly, whether the decision to refuse admission was reasonable in the circumstances of the case.

The 1998 School Standards and Framework Act ensured appeal panels were independent from those who took the original decision:

·        The appeal panels are restricted to a maximum of five people and must never be less than three.

·        They are independent of the LEA and the school governing body that made the original decision.

·        The panel, which is appointed by the LEA, or governing body, cannot include any governors or employees of the LEA.

·        The panel must contain one person without experience in management of any school.

This is to ensure that the appeal panels weigh up all the evidence presented objectively and both parties receive a fair hearing.

If your appeal succeeds, the admission authority must offer your child a place. If the appeal fails you can ask to be placed on the waiting list, as places do sometimes become available after the start of the school year. If you are still dissatisfied with the appeal hearing you can complain to the Local Government Ombudsman, who may recommend a fresh appeal hearing. You can download information on how to complain (including a complaint form) from the Local Government Ombudsman site but you will need to download Adobe Acrobat Reader, which is free, in order to view it.

Further Information on Appeals

For more detail on appeals, you may want to have a look at the DfES Code of Practice - school admission appeals online. This also has information about appeals by governing bodies against LEA decisions to admit ‘twice excluded’ pupils.

Statistics on admission appeals 1998/99 are also on the DfES website and are based upon the information collected in the Annual Schools’ Census and the Survey of Admission Appeals. The site provides data on the number of appeals lodged, how many were heard and the number decided in the parent's favour.

The National Assembly of Wales Code of Practice - School admission appeals is available online. You will need to download Adobe Acrobat Reader, which is free, in order to view this document.

Further information on appeals in Scotland and Northern Ireland is available below.

TYPES OF SCHOOL

Different state funded schools are managed in different ways. It is the type of school management that defines a type of school. The British Council offers a brief synopsis. The Citizens Advice Bureau provides further information on the types of school in England and Wales and Scotland under 'Education'.

An outline of the managed state schools are explained in this list:

England and Wales

·        Community schools are owned and run by the LEA. Comprehensive schools tend to be community schools.

·        Foundation schools were once grant-maintained schools which opted out of LEA jurisdiction and are now owned by the governing body or by a charitable foundation and run by the governing body. Partially selective and grammar schools are more likely to be foundation schools.

·        Voluntary aided schools are owned by a charitable foundation and run by a governing body that will also contribute to the schools running costs. Church schools are more likely to be voluntarily aided.

·        Voluntary controlled schools are usually owned by a charitable foundation, but run by the LEA.

Scotland

The provision of education in Scotland falls under the responsibility of the 32 Scottish Unitary Authorities, known as Education Authorities, assisted by school boards. There are three types of school in Scotland:

·        State schools, controlled by the LEA

·        Self-governing schools

·        Grant-aided schools that include schools for children with special educational needs.

Northern Ireland

·        Controlled schools are under the control of Education and Library Boards and their function and contact details are available from the Department for Education.

·        Voluntary maintained schools are mainly under Roman Catholic management.

·        Voluntary grammar schools are grant-maintained integrated schools, which take both Protestant and Roman Catholic pupils.

All schools areto pupils of all religions. The Northern Ireland Council for Integrated Education promotes integrated education for all religions throughout Northern Ireland; their site explains the aims behind integrated education and information on where these schools are.

MORE INFORMATION ON SCOTLAND

Much of the information in the ‘Choosing a School’ section is useful no matter which part of the UK you live in, but there are a number of sites specifically orientated to parents in Scotland.

The National Grid for Learning Scotland site includes a section on choosing a school in Scotland. It provides a brief synopsis of the various issues worth familiarising yourself with before choosing a school, such as the education system, catchment areas, placing requests, how to appeal, information about schools and the various types of schools available in Scotland.

The Scottish Executive also produces an online booklet to help parents choose a school; this offers advice for every stage of the process and is especially good on the appeal procedure in Scotland. It also has a list of the Scottish school councils.

Scottish Education provides a useful factsheet covering the structure of the Scottish education system. The National Grid for Learning Scotland explains the education system concisely. The Citizen's Advice Bureau also has education information covering school choice and the types of school in Scotland. 

MORE INFORMATION ON NORTHERN IRELAND

Northern Ireland’s Department of Education has a parents and students section providing a wide range of information specific to Northern Ireland’s education system. You will need Adobe Acrobat Reader in order to read some of the offerings, which is free to download.

ORGANISATIONS

The Campaign for State Education (CASE) campaigns for the right of all to quality state education, regardless of race, gender, home circumstances, ability or disability.

The Advisory Centre for Education offers an advice service for parents and may be able to help with further questions.