What Does The Panel Consider?
Appeals by Parents Seeking Admissions to an Infant Class Where a Limit of 30 Children Per Teacher Applies:
Infant classes are those in Reception, Year 1 and Year 2 in a Primary School. The law limits the size of an infant class to 30 pupils with a single class teacher. This is known as the “class size limit”. Some schools may have more than 30 pupils in each of these year groups, but the classes must be arranged in such a way to avoid breaching the limit of 30 pupils in each class.
If the admission of an additional child would mean that a school would have to take additional steps to comply with the class size limit, resulting in detrimental consequences for the efficient provision of education or the efficient use of resources, this is known as “class size prejudice”.
If the decision not to offer a place to your child was made on the ground of class size prejudice, there are only three circumstances in which the Appeal Panel can determine that a place is to be offered to him/her:
1. Where the admission arrangements did not comply with the mandatory provisions of the School Admissions Code or the relevant legislation AND your child would have been offered a place if they were compliant, or
2. Where the admission arrangements were not properly implemented AND your child would have been offered a place if they had been properly implemented, or
3. Where the appeal panel is satisfied that the decision to refuse admission was not one which a reasonable admission authority would make in the circumstances of the case. In order to determine that the decision to refuse admission was unreasonable, the Panel must be satisfied that it was “perverse in the light of the admission arrangements”. The courts have stated that, for a decision to refuse admission to be considered unreasonable, the panel must be satisfied that the refusal was “beyond the range of responses open to a reasonable decision maker”.
The circumstances of the case include the published admission arrangements, the circumstances of your child and family, the preference expressed by you and the practical consequences for the school if any or all of the appellants were successful.
Appeals by Parents Seeking Admission Where a Limit of 30 Children Per Teacher Does not Apply:
This includes appeals for:
- All Secondary School places.
- Primary School places in infant classes where the circumstances are such that the class size limit does not apply (for example, where the organisation of classes would keep the number of pupils below 30 in each class)
- Primary School places in year groups other than Reception, Year 1 and Year 2
In determining these appeals, the panel must follow a 2 stage process:
Stage 1: establishing the facts
The panel must consider whether the admission arrangements were correctly and impartially applied to your child. This means that the panel must consider whether the admission arrangements complied with the mandatory provisions of the School Admissions Code or the relevant legislation, and if they were properly applied in your child’s case. If the admission arrangements were not compliant and/or were not properly applied in your child’s case AND your child would have been offered a place if they had been, then the panel should allow your appeal.
The panel must then consider whether the efficient provision of education or the efficient use of resources would be prejudiced by the admission of your child or, if there are several appellants for the same school and year group, by the admission of all the children appealing. If the panel consider that there would be no prejudice if all of the children appealing were admitted to the school, then it should allow all the appeals. However, if the panel consider that there would be prejudice if your child or all the children appealing were admitted, then it must go on to the second stage.
Stage 2: balancing the arguments
The panel must consider whether the your grounds for your child to be admitted outweigh any prejudice to the school. The panel must take into account your reasons for expressing a preference for the particular school (for example, why you want that school in particular and what it can offer your child that others cannot).
In situations where several children are appealing for the same school and year group, this stage involves the panel considering, for each individual case, whether the appellant’s grounds for admission to the school outweigh any prejudice to the school. If there are several cases which outweigh the prejudice to the school and merit admission, but the panel decides that the school could not cope with that number of successful appeals, the panel must then compare all of the cases and decide which of them to allow.
If the panel decide that the prejudice to any child appealing does not outweigh the prejudice to the school, then the panel should refuse that appeal.
Independent Appeals Panel Decision
The Panel will make their decision once all the appeals for the particular school being held before that Panel have been heard. You will be notified in writing as soon as possible – usually within 5 days – after the decision. It is not necessary to telephone the Council or school for the decision.
