Disappointment for 600 children as school preferences are rejected

4:00pm Saturday 21st March 2009

By Mariam Ghaemi

MORE than 600 children in Essex have not been given any of their preferred secondary school places.

A total of 17,716 parents were applying for 19,393 places to start school in September, but the number of children getting their first choice was 81 per cent, just under the national average.

The percentage of children who did not get one of their four preferred places offered was 3.3 per cent. They were offered a place at the nearest school with space.

Lesley Townsend, of Nichols Grove, Braintree, criticised the secondary school admissions process after her daughter missed out on all of her choices.

Ruby was offered a place at Alec Hunter Humanities College, in Stubbs Lane, Braintree, a school she did not include as one of her choices.

The 11-year-old was not allocated any of the three schools she would have preferred: Notley High School in Notley Road, Braintree; Tabor Science College in Panfield Lane, Braintree; and Honywood Community Science School, Coggeshall.

The 52-year-old said: “It gives people false hopes, thinking they are going to get the school they want.

Toby Allanson, a county hall spokesman, said children may miss out on their preferred secondary school because there are too many applicants for places or because the application arrived late.

“Where it is not possible to offer a child a place at any of their selected schools, we are obliged to offer a place at the next nearest school that does have spaces available,” he said.

Government figures show that almost one in six children in England failed to gain a place at their first choice secondary school this year.

Nationally, figures from the Department for Children, Schools and Families, showed 83.2 per cent were offered a place at their preferred school for September, an increase of 1.1 per cent on last year.

Lord Hanningfield, leader of Essex County Council, said he is delighted so many pupils have had good news.

“I am proud of the work that all partners, council officers, school staff and parents, have put in to achieve this result, where even more parents than last year have landed their first or second preferences.”