A quick re-cap

Alfie was refused a place in his local state school.

Alfie has lived in catchment for his local state school all his life.  The school is oversubscribed but this is only temporary; additional facilities are under construction. 

The education authority installed temporary classrooms to increase the year 7 capacity.  Just 31 one additional places were needed so that every in-catchment child got in. 

The local authority accepted an additional 30 year 7 pupils, leaving one single, solitary, in-catchment child excluded. 

The problem is not class size.  The year 7 classes range from 29 to 31 pupils. Neither the school nor the local authority claim that class size is an issue.

There is just one reason that Alfie cannot go to his local catchment school with all his friends. The school and the education authority claim that one additional pupil, out over 1,800, will create significant additional pressure on the communal areas of the school.  That is it!

The school and the local authority consider that the prejudice caused to the school’s communal areas by one additional pupil among 1,800 is great; greater than the prejudice to Alfie of being singled from all his friends for exclusion, of being taxied across the city every day to the only school with spaces, at a cost of over £8,500 a year to the local education authority, 

The alleged prejudice to the school is the only reason for Alfie’s exclusion. 

No other child in the whole local education authority area was declined a place.  No child in catchment for Alfie’s catchment school was ever excluded before.

Alfie appealed, but surprisingly lost on a majority vote.

A list of procedural issues came to light, most of which I have written about previously.  The local authority does not see any issue.

A quick update

We made a complaint to the ombudsman, but they did not think there was any issue; I'll write more about the ombudsman process soon.

Alfie can make a year 8 application and have a fresh appeal, but the local education authority chooses not to accept evidence about children’s mental health! Bizarrely, the appeal panel can consider evidence that the local authority would not.

It seems to me that there is an endless procession of inexplicable decision making.  Perhaps it’s just me, I do see the situation from a particular point of view.  So, if anyone is interested, I will post in detail about particular issues in the coming weeks and see what others think.

The school in question is Bassaleg School in Newport, South Wales.  The local education authority is Newport City Council.