Decision details

Having complied with paragraph 15 of the Council’s Access to Information Procedure Rules:

(i)  To approve the Admissions Policies and the Published Admissions Numbers (PANs) for Community and Voluntary Controlled schools and the schemes for coordinating Primary and Secondary admissions for the school year 2018/19 as set out in appendices 1 to 5.

(ii)  To authorise the Service Director, Children and Families Services to take any action necessary to give effect to the admissions policies and to make any changes necessary to the admissions policies where required to give effect to any Acts, Regulations or revised Schools Admissions or School Admissions Appeals Codes or binding Schools Adjudicator, Court or Ombudsman decisions whenever they arise.

1.  This report is submitted for consideration as a General Exception under paragraph 15 of the Access to Information Procedure Rules in Part 4 of the City Council’s Constitution, notice having been given to the Chair of the relevant Scrutiny Panel and the Public. The matter requires a  decision to comply with the Council’s duty to determine its admission arrangements for school year 2018/19 before 28 February 2017.

2.  The Local Authority has a statutory duty to determine the admission criteria annually and to ensure that all rising 5s have an allocated education place.

3.  The proposed policy is at Appendix 1. There are no changes from the 2017/18 arrangements.

The only alternative option considered was to not determine local admission arrangements. This has been rejected because it would result in the imposition of admission arrangements upon local schools by the Secretary of State for Education.