School Admissions Policy (next academic year)

Unsuccessful Applications (2024-2025)

8.1  Appeals

Letters requesting an appeal will need to be sent by the parents to the Director for Education within 10 days of the date of notification that an application for a place was unsuccessful. Appeals against admissions decisions will be heard by an independent appeals panel.  Appeal forms and information for parents are available online. Arrangements for the appeals panel to meet are made through the Legal Services department of Pembrokeshire County Council, and will be heard within 30 school days of the specified closing date for the receipt of appeals.  During the summer holidays, appeals will be heard within 30 working days of the appeal being received in writing.

There is no right of appeal against non-statutory nursery provision.

Refusals are not lightly made decisions and will only be taken where the admission number has been reached and/or where an infant class (i.e. reception, year 1 and year 2) will exceed 30 children per class. The Welsh Government Regulations require Authorities to limit infant class sizes to no more than 30 pupils. Admitting further pupils would create class size prejudice, that is to say, prejudice to efficient education or efficient use of resources. Infant class size prejudice would not be found in cases where the school admission number had not been reached.

There are however exceptions to these regulations (called “excepted pupils”) which may allow the 30 pupil class limit to be exceeded. A full list of these ‘excepted pupils’ can be found in Appendix B.

 

8.2  Waiting Lists

Any child not offered a place at their first choice of school will be kept on a waiting list until the 30th of September of the relevant academic year.

Should places become available then they will be awarded in accordance of the published oversubscription criteria rather than the amount of time since the applications was submitted.

For applications received outside the normal admission round, waiting lists are held until the end of the half-term for which the application was made.