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Consultation on School Admissions for the School Year 2004-2005

To: Statutory Consultees, Schools and Local Councils in Hertfordshire

Fax : Telephone E Mail : My ref : Your ref : Date :

County Hall Hertford SG13 8DF 01992 555719 01992 555700 Ray.Shostak@hertscc.gov.uk RS/NP/slh 21 January 2003

Dear Colleague,

SCHOOL ADMISSIONS FOR THE SCHOOL YEAR 2004-2005

In accordance with legislation and the requirements of the Code of Practice on Admissions, the County Council is consulting on the admission arrangements for schools for the academic year 2004-2005.

I enclose three consultation documents for your consideration.

1. PRIMARY, JUNIOR, INFANT AND NURSERY SCHOOL ADMISSION RULES 2004-2005 (Appendix 1)

This document sets out the admission rules which the County Council proposes to use for community and voluntary controlled primary, junior, infant and nursery schools. It is proposed to make the following amendments to the current admission rules and processes for 2004-2005:

• Amend the wording of Rule 2 to give greater clarity about the priority that needs to be given to Looked After Children under the revised Code of Practice. There will be a small impact as a result of this change, with some schools admitting one or two Looked After Children.

• Amend the wording of Rule 4 to take the sibling link for infant and junior schools into account. This change makes the rule clearer for parents, but will not affect the allocation of places.

• Introduce the same system for measuring distances for primary, junior, infant, and nursery applications as have been introduced for secondary schools for September 2003 admissions, in order to provide consistency across the admission process and greater clarity for parents. This change will have minimal impact, and is likely to result in few changes to the pattern of allocation.
  
  

The rules are applied only when a school is oversubscribed, to determine which pupils should be given priority for places. When there are sufficient places, all those who apply will be offered a place.

2. SECONDARY SCHOOL ADMISSION RULES 2004-2005 (Appendix 2)This document sets out the admission rules which the County Council propose for voluntary controlled and community co-educational and community single sex schools in Hertfordshire, including priority areas to be used to administer applications. It is proposed to make the following amendments to the current admission rules and processes for 2004-2005:

• Amend the wording of Rule 2 to give greater clarity about the priority that needs to be given to Looked After Children, under the revised Code of Practice. There will be a small impact as a result of this change, with some schools admitting one or two Looked After Children.

The admission rules for Tring voluntary controlled co-educational school are also shown.

Again, these rules are applied only when a school is oversubscribed.

3. THE ARRANGEMENTS AND TIMETABLE OF CO-ORDINATION FOR ALL ADMISSION PROCESSES 2004-2005 (Appendix 3)

This is based on the co-ordination currently practised in Hertfordshire, with the following amendments:

• The introduction of a co-ordinated scheme for junior schools admissions in order to bring this process into line with all other processes in the county. The impact of this change will be to ensure that unsuccessful applicants for voluntary aided and foundation junior schools can be offered an alternative school. In addition, it will ensure that no child is offered more than one Hertfordshire school.

• Considering late applications before any non-rank allocations in order to maximise the opportunities for parents to secure places at schools that they rank.

• Collecting sufficient information from schools at the outset of the process about applications and allocations in order to ensure that schools and the LEA do not need to exchange a succession of e-mails or faxes to maintain the momentum of the allocation process.

Casual admissions is not part of this co-ordinated scheme.

The admission number for each community and voluntary controlled school will reflect the net capacity calculation.

Please send any responses to this consultation to Amanda Cassidy, Education Access, County Hall, Hertford (e-mail: amanda.cassidy@hertscc.gov.uk) by 28^th February 2003.

Yours sincerely,

Ray Shostak

Director of Children, Schools and Families