School Admissions

Nursery

There is only one nursery intake each year, commencing in September. Your child will be admitted in the academic year (1st September to 31st August) in which he or she is four years of age.  The admission procedure for the upcoming academic years can be found below:

Nursery Admissions

Parents wishing to register their child can do so by contacting the school office during the school day.  A copy of the admissions policy is available for parents to inspect. We offer a combination of funded and paid nursery provision.

Application Form

 

Reception Class

Children may be admitted into school at the beginning of the Autumn Term of the school year in which they reach the age of five, (i.e. a child who reaches the age of four by 31st August may start in the Reception year in September).  The admission procedure for the upcoming academic years can be found below:

Reception Class Admissions

In the summer term before starting school in the reception class in September your child will be invited to visit the school. They will have an opportunity to meet their class teacher and familiarize themselves with their classroom. These visits have proved very successful in helping every child to settle well into school.

Primary School Admissions

 

In consultation with the school governors, the Local Authority determines the number of pupils that may be admitted to a school in each year: this is generally referred to as the school’s published admission number (PAN).

Oversubscription Criteria

If the total number of preferences for admission to a school exceeds the academy’s published admission number (PAN), the following order of priority is used to allocate the available places. (N.B., after applying the oversubscription criteria, where an applicant can be offered a place at more than one preferred school then they will be offered a place at the school ranked highest on their application.) 

1) Children in care and children who ceased to be in care because they were adopted (or became subject to a child arrangement order or special guardianship order), including those children who appear (to the admission authority) to have been in state care outside of England and ceased to be in state care as a result of being adopted. 

2) Children who satisfy both of the following tests: 

Test 1: the child is distinguished from the great majority of other applicants either on their own medical grounds or by other exceptional circumstances. 

Medical grounds must be supported by a medical report (obtained by the applicant and provided at the point of application). This report must clearly justify, for health reasons only, why it is better for the child’s health to attend the Academy rather than any other school. 

Exceptional circumstances must relate to the academy and the individual child, i.e. the circumstances of the child, not the economic or social circumstances of the parent/carer. They should be supported by a professional report (obtained by the applicant and provided at the point of application), e.g. social worker. This report must clearly justify why it is better for the child to attend the academy rather than any other school.  

and 

Test 2: the child would suffer hardship if they were unable to attend the academy 

Hardship means severe suffering of any kind, not merely difficulty or inconvenience, which is likely to be experienced as a result of the child attending a different school. Applicants must provide detailed information about both the type and severity of any likely hardship at the time of application. 

3) Children who have an elder sibling in attendance at the academy and who will still be attending the school at the proposed admission date; (For admission purposes, a brother or sister is a child who lives at the same address and either: have one or both natural parents in common; are related by a parents marriage; are adopted or fostered by a common parent or are unrelated children who live at the same address, whose parents live as partners.) 

4) Children living within the catchment area of the academy 

5) Other children arranged in order of priority according to how near their home address point is to the main gate of the academy, determined by a straight-line measurement as calculated by the local authority’s geographical information system. 

Where it is not possible to accommodate all children applying for places within a particular category then the academy will allocate the available places in accordance with the remaining criteria. If for instance, all the catchment area children cannot be accommodated at a school, children who are resident within the catchment area will be arranged in order of priority according to the remaining criteria.

Admission Appeals 

If your child's application for a place at the academy is unsuccessful, you will be informed by admission was unsuccessful and given information on how to appeal which can be found at Staffordshire Appeals

Procedure for Dealing with In Year Applications

For further details of how to apply for a place at our school please follow the link to Staffordshire School Admissions. This also gives details if you wish to apply for a mid-year transfer but we would request that you contact the school first.

All applications are considered against published criteria with no priority awarded for early applications. Late applicants will only be considered in exceptional circumstances.

The School Admissions Team allocates all school Reception class places.  They will not be issuing application forms as the Service is keen to provide a paperless system in all its admissions processes wherever possible.  For further details of how to apply for a place at our school please follow the link to Staffordshire County Council Admissions.  This also gives details if you wish to apply for a mid-year transfer but we would request that you contact the school first.

For admission to County Council maintained schools and voluntary maintained schools click here.

• Department for Education school admissions code
• Department for Education schools admissions appeal code