How are school places allocated?

Every state school in England must follow the School Admissions Code. Community and voluntary controlled schools are administered by the council; academies, free schools, grammar schools and faith schools are their own admissions authority. All of them must publish their criteria and the distance at which the last place was offered the previous year.

The order of priority

1. Looked-after and previously looked-after children — always highest under the Code.
2. Medical or social need requiring a place at that particular school, supported by professional evidence.
3. Siblings already at the school at the time of application.
4. Catchment area, then distance, measured by straight line or safe walking route.

Faith schools may prioritise children of that faith; grammar schools select on the 11-plus. No school may prioritise on ability otherwise, on parental occupation, or on financial contributions. Catchment areas are set annually against demand, so they shrink in busy years — and being inside one guarantees nothing if higher criteria fill the school.

Deadlines, waiting lists and challenges

Apply through your home council's portal by 31 October for secondary and 15 January for primary, even for schools in another local authority area. Offers land on 1 March and 16 April. Accept the offer you are given — it does not weaken an appeal or your position on any waiting list, which schools must maintain for at least the first term and which must be worked in strict order rather than reopened for late applicants.

If you receive no offer at all, the council must find your child a suitable place. Moving house mid-process means telling the admissions authority in writing at once: some assess on the address at the closing date, others at offer day.

Two challenges run separately and can be used together. An individual appeal goes to an independent panel. A breach of the Code itself — an unlawful criterion, or one applied wrongly — is referred free of charge to the Office of the Schools Adjudicator for maintained schools and grammar schools, or to the Education and Skills Funding Agency for academies. Anyone can make that referral, and doing it before the main round closes may benefit current applicants. In-year applications, for a mid-year move, follow the same criteria, and a refusal can be appealed in the same way.