School admission appeals: guidance for parents and carers

Appealing for a place at a school for your child may seem daunting, so these notes have been written to help you through the process.

Top tips

Provide evidence to support your case - see our guidance notes on evidence
Ask for help - including requesting an interpreter or IT support
Check the papers for the appeal immediately - let us know if any evidence is missing
Have the pack of papers with you at the hearing - you will need to refer to it
Attend the Teams hearing if possible - it is your only opportunity to present your case and answer questions
Join the hearing from a quiet place - so you will not be distracted, and your confidential information will not be overheard
Give the Panel as much information as possible - you cannot add more later
Remember you are appealing for a place at this school - not against the school your child has been offered

Refer to the Portsmouth School Admissions Booklet for further information about the process - it contains lots of useful information about Admissions and Appeals.

Contact us

To make an appeal, discuss school options, find out waiting list places or ask for an interpreter or other assistance, contact the Admissions Team:

phone 023 9268 8008
email admissions@portsmouthcc.gov.uk

To find out more about the arrangements for your appeal hearing, contact the Appeals Service:

email educationappeals.admin@portsmouthcc.gov.uk
phone 023 9260 6255

The Portsmouth Education Appeals Service is independent of all schools and the Council’s School Admissions team.

General information

Why didn’t I get the school or one of the schools I applied for?

Details are provided in the email or letter you received about the outcome of your application. First check the links in the letter or email from the Admissions Team. If you are still not sure of the reason, contact the Admissions Team.

What is my position on the waiting list?

Please contact the Admissions Team for waiting list information.

Can I appeal for a place for more than one school?

Yes. You can lodge an appeal for any school you expressed a preference for but were not offered a place. You will be invited to attend a separate appeal hearing for each school you appeal for.

Will accepting the school place I have been offered affect my appeal?

Absolutely not. Accepting a place at an alternative school will not in any way affect your appeal for your preferred school.

If you refuse the place you have been allocated, and are not successful at appeal, you may be offered a place at another school which is further away from your home.

Who decides the admission criteria for each school and why do they vary?

The Local Authority decides the admission arrangements for community or voluntary-controlled schools, but for foundation and voluntary-aided schools, academies and free schools, it is the school’s governing body or academy trust that decides the admission criteria and sets the oversubscription criteria.

My child qualified for a place under the admission criteria but was not offered a place at the school - surely this is a mistake?

Not necessarily. If a school receives more applications than places available, places will be allocated strictly in the order of the admission criteria stated in the admission policy. These are slightly different for each school.

Depending on the number of applications with higher priority, it may not have been possible to offer your child a place if they qualify for a lower priority criterion.

Living in the catchment area does not guarantee your child a place in a school
A sibling link at the preferred school does not guarantee a place
Attending a linked feeder school does not guarantee the offer of a place

Why was my child offered a place at a school further away than my catchment school?

If you do not name your catchment area school as one of your preferences, you will not automatically be offered a place there if you are unsuccessful with your other preferences.

Your catchment area school may have been filled by pupils who did express a preference for the school. If a place cannot be offered at any of your preferred schools, a place will be offered at the next nearest school with places available.

Why was my child not offered a place at our preferred school when they would have been in previous years?

The pattern of applications changes from year to year for each school. There is no guarantee of a place at a particular school based on what happened in previous years.

The appeal process

What is the deadline for submitting my appeal?

Please return your appeal request form by the deadline set out in the letter offering your child a school place.

If we receive your appeal request after the deadline, you will not lose your right of appeal, but your appeal may be heard after other appeals for the same school.

How long will it be before my appeal is considered?

Most Starting School, Junior Transfer and Secondary Transfer appeals are heard between mid-May and mid-July.

If you make an appeal request after the deadline, known as a late transfer appeal, it will be heard as soon as possible.

In Year Appeals are usually heard within 30 school days of being received. However, appeals received towards the end of the summer term may not be arranged until after the start of the new academic year.

How do I appeal for a place at a school outside Portsmouth?

If you want to appeal for a school outside the city, contact the school concerned for information and advice.

I’ve changed my mind about appealing, what do I do?

Please contact the Admissions Team and say you wish to withdraw your appeal.

Ask for help

Can you arrange an interpreter for me?

Yes. Use the section on the appeal form to request an interpreter or a British Sign Language interpreter, or let the Admissions Team know as soon as possible.

Remember to tell us which language and dialect you need help with.

What if I do not have the technology to join the Teams hearing?

Don’t worry. Contact the Admissions Team if you do not have access to a mobile phone, tablet or laptop.

We will arrange for you to join the hearing from a hybrid meeting area in the Civic Offices. A member of staff will be on hand to help you.

What if I’ve never used Teams before?

If you are unsure about joining a Teams hearing, please contact the Appeals Service and ask for a trial session in the days before your appeal hearing.

We will send you guidance on how to join the hearing using Teams with your appeal hearing pack.

Can you make reasonable adjustments to help me at the appeal hearing?

Yes. There is a section on the appeal form where you can tell us what your needs are, for example needing information in large print or another format, or contact the Admissions Team immediately.

Evidence to support your appeal

See our more detailed guidance on submitting evidence.

Can I submit information or evidence to support my appeal?

Yes. You can provide any information or evidence you think will support your case.

Will the Appeal Panel make enquiries on my behalf?

No. It is your responsibility to provide all the information and evidence relevant to your appeal.

The Panel cannot make enquiries about your appeal or ask for additional information from your GP, social worker or any other person.

Is there a deadline for evidence to support my appeal?

Yes. You will be given a deadline for submitting additional information. This is so that the information can be shared with the Panel, Clerk, school and Local Authority before the hearing.

If you submit evidence after the deadline, it may not be accepted, or your appeal may be adjourned.

The appeal hearing

How will my appeal be considered?

Your appeal will be decided by an Independent Appeal Panel of three trained volunteers.

Our appeals are held in accordance with the law and follow the procedure set out in the School Admissions Appeals Code, which is used by every admission authority and Appeal Panel in the country.

In Portsmouth, all our appeals are heard using video or telephone conferencing facilities on Microsoft Teams. This means you can join the appeal hearing using a mobile phone, tablet or laptop and do not need to come into the Civic Offices.

Do I need to attend the hearing?

We always advise parents and carers to attend the hearing if possible. The Panel will listen to your case and will ask questions.

If you do not attend the hearing, your case will go ahead without you and will be considered based on the evidence you provide in support of your appeal.

Can you rearrange the appeal hearing if I can’t attend?

In most cases it is not possible to rearrange the hearing due to the number and availability of the people involved.

For transfer appeals in the summer term, we arrange all on-time appeals for the same school to be heard by the same Panel, sometimes over several days.

Junior and secondary school appeals (Years 3 to 11)

How does the Panel make its decision?

These appeals are known as ‘two-stage’ or ‘prejudice’ appeals and the Panel will conduct a two-stage process before making its decisions.

Stage 1: School case

The admission authority will explain why it believes an extra child could not be offered a place at the school.

Other parents may be present for Stage 1. The Panel will question the school on its case, and you will have a chance to ask questions.

Parents must not say anything about their own family circumstances at Stage 1.

After Stage 1, the Panel will decide whether:

the admission arrangements complied with admissions law
the arrangements had been correctly and impartially applied
the admission of an additional child or children would prejudice the provision of efficient education or efficient use of resources

If the Independent Appeal Panel is satisfied that the admission authority has made its case, then the appeal moves onto Stage 2.

Stage 2: Parents’ case

Stage 2 takes place as a personal 20-minute appointment and you will be able to give the Panel all the reasons you would like your child to attend the school.

You may be accompanied by a relative or friend to help you.

Remember you are appealing for a place at this school, not against the school your child has been offered.

Following Stage 2, the Panel will consider:

whether your child would have been offered a place if the arrangements had been correctly applied (has a mistake been made?)
your reasons for wanting your child to attend the school, including what the school can offer them that the allocated or other schools cannot
all the written evidence submitted, information presented orally, and questions asked on the evidence

What does ‘prejudice’ mean in two-stage appeals?

The admission authority (school) must convince the Panel that to admit an additional child or children would have an adverse impact on the school’s resources, and that this will compromise the quality of education received by pupils at the school.

To support its case, the school may present information about:

the organisation and size of classes
the availability of teaching staff
pressures on staffing and workloads
the number of children with high needs
classroom sizes
the size of shared spaces such as dining areas, assembly areas, sporting facilities and examination areas
any pressures on physical space which may result in health and safety concerns

What does ‘balancing the arguments’ mean?

Having heard all the evidence, the Panel will then ‘balance’ the harm to your child for not attending the school against the ‘prejudice’ to the school in taking an additional child.

If the Panel considers that your case outweighs the prejudice to the school, it must uphold the appeal, and your child will have a place at the school.

Infant Class Size appeals (Year R, Year 1 and Year 2)

Why are Infant Class Size appeals rarely successful?

The law says that no 5, 6 or 7 year old child in an infant class may be in a class of more than 30 pupils with a single qualified teacher (not teaching assistants).

The Panel’s task is to review the decision not to admit your child to your preferred school, including checking that a mistake was not made at the time. It cannot take your personal and family circumstances into account.

My child attended the nursery attached to the school but was not offered a place?

For children starting school, attendance at a nursery, even on the school’s premises, is not a criterion and does not guarantee a place in the school.

What are the grounds for an Infant Class Size appeal?

The only grounds for an Infant Class Size appeal are:

Ground A - the school did not have 30 children in the class (Infant Class Size)
Ground B1 - the admission arrangements were not lawful
Ground B2 - the admission arrangements were not correctly applied in your case (a mistake was made)
Ground C - the decision to refuse your child a place was not ‘reasonable’ (as defined by the law) in the circumstances

What happens if the school does not have 30 children in an infant class?

Unless the Published Admission Number is 45 pupils (see below), where the Panel agrees that the school does not have 30 pupils in an infant class, the appeal will be heard as a two-stage ‘prejudice’ appeal.

See the section on prejudice appeals above.

What if the Published Admission Number (PAN) for the school is 45 pupils?

Infant class size rules apply to schools with a PAN of 45 because, in future years, classes may otherwise exceed 30 children.

A school with a 45 admission limit will have two smaller reception classes and when they move up to Year 1, the year group will be mixed with Year 2 to give three classes of 30 children.

When can an Appeal Panel uphold an Infant Class Size appeal?

The Panel may uphold an appeal if it considers that the child would have been offered a place if the admission arrangements had not been ‘contrary to mandatory provisions in the School Admissions Code’ (Ground B1).

This is something which should have been sorted out well before an appeal, but if your child missed out on a place because of this, the Panel should uphold the appeal.

If the admission authority has made a mistake in applying the admission criteria (Ground B2), which means you have been wrongly denied a place, then the Panel will uphold the appeal.

Such mistakes might be:

not taking account of a sibling at the school
not measuring the home-to-school distance accurately
not considering the child an ‘excepted’ pupil (see School Admissions Code 2021)
wrongly allocating a place to an out-of-catchment child

The Panel can also uphold an appeal if it considers that the decision not to offer a place was ‘perverse in light of the published admission arrangements’ (Ground C).

What might be ‘perverse’?

Most parents who have been refused a place at their preferred school consider this refusal to be perverse and they appeal on Ground C. But the word has a stronger meaning in its legal sense.

It means ‘beyond the range of responses open to a reasonable decision maker’, or ‘a decision which is so outrageous in its defiance of logic or of accepted moral standards that no sensible person who had applied his mind to the question could have arrived at it’.

Reasons such as your child having attended the nursery at the school, having children at different schools, the need for ‘wraparound’ childcare, not being able to continue work, or difficulties getting your child to school on time are not grounds of appeal the Panel can consider.

If none of the circumstances (Grounds A, B1, B2 or C) apply in your case, then the law says the Appeal Panel must refuse your appeal. The Panel has no choice in the matter.

What happens after the appeal?

When will I get the result of the appeal?

You will receive an email with a detailed letter setting out the Appeal Panel’s decision. This will include information aboutg, the main points the Panel considered, the reasons for the decision and the evidence the Panel relied on to make its decision.

We will send you the decision letter as soon as possible after the hearing. If your appeal is one of many transfer appeals for the same school in the summer term, it may take longer for the Clerk to write all the letters as the Panel will not make any decisions until all the appeals for the school have been heard.

You will normally receive your email within 5 school days of the decision.

The Independent Appeal Panel’s decision is binding on the admission authority. If your appeal is successful, your child will be admitted to the school. If the appeal is refused, your child will not have a place.

Will my appeal be successful?

Parents often ask whether their appeal is likely to be successful. We are unable to comment on the likelihood of success in specific cases as every appeal is different and considered on its own merits.

On average however, around 10-20% of prejudice appeals are successful. Infant Class Size appeals are very rarely successful.

Information about the numbers of successful appeals for schools in previous years can be found in the Portsmouth School Admissions Booklet.

What happens if my appeal is not successful?

If your appeal is unsuccessful there is no further right of appeal. You can seek a judicial review of the decision in the Courts. In these circumstances you will need legal advice.

What if my appeal is unsuccessful and I do not want my child to attend the school allocated?

You should contact the Admissions Team to ask about waiting lists and spaces in other schools.

What if my appeal is unsuccessful and I decide to home educate?

Some parents tell Appeal Panels that they feel so strongly about their child’s education that they will home educate rather than send them to the school allocated or until a place becomes available at their preferred school.

Parents should be aware of the legal requirements of home educating before they make this decision. See the Elective Home Education guidance issued by the Department for Education.

You should also talk to the Admissions Team before making this decision.

How do I make a complaint about how the appeal hearing was conducted?

If you feel that your appeal hearing was not properly or fairly conducted, you can complain.

The Panel’s decision cannot be overturned but if maladministration is found, you may be offered a new appeal with a fresh Panel.

For maintained schools, complain to the Local Government Ombudsman and fill in the online complaint form.
Fill in the academy Appeal Panel complaint form to complain about an appeal made to free schools and academies, including studio schools.

Further information

Further information about school admissions and appeals in Portsmouth is available from Waiting lists and appeals for a school place.

Information about schools, admissions and appeals is also available from the Department for Education:

Advice for parents and guardians on school admission appeals

Please also see:

School Standards and Framework Act 1998
School Admission Appeals Regulations 2012
School Admissions Appeals Code 2022
School Admissions Code 2021
Elective Home Education guidance issued by the Department for Education

The Coram Children’s Legal Centre offers free legal advice on education law, including advice on school admission appeals and exclusions.

Coram provides online access to legal factsheets and a telephone advice service:

phone tel:030033054850300 330 5485 (8am to 6pm, Monday to Friday)
visit the Child Law Advice website

Key steps in the appeal process

You will complete and return your appeal request form.
We will send you a letter acknowledging receipt of your appeal request.
You will let us know if you need an interpreter, other reasonable adjustments or would like IT support to help you take part in the appeal hearing.
We will notify you by email with the date and time of your hearing, the deadline for further evidence and other details.
You will send us any additional evidence in support of your appeal before the deadline we give you.
We will send you a pack of papers for the appeal hearing including an agenda, the school case, your case including any evidence you have submitted, our guidance notes and advice on using Teams.
The independent appeal hearing takes place on Teams.
We will email you a letter notifying you of the Independent Appeal Panel’s decision.