Scramble for school places leaves more than half of city schools oversubscribed

Out of the 10 secondary schools in Brighton and Hove, six of them – Blatchington Mill School, Cardinal Newman Catholic School, Dorothy Stringer School, King's School, Patcham High School and Varndean School - are completely full and Hove Park School is close to capacity.

Yet three – Brighton (BACA) and Portslade Aldridge Community Academies (PACA) and Longhill Hill School – could be left almost half empty.

Four in five children – 81.35 per cent - in Brighton and Hove will go to their first choice secondary school in September, which is up fractionally on last year’s figure.

Nationally, the figure last year was 84.2 per cent. This year’s national figures are not expected until June.

More than a hundred children were not allocated their first, second or third choice schools and will now be sent to their nearest school with spaces left.

The imbalance in parents favouring some schools over others is highlighted by 1,023 total applications to Dorothy Stringer this year compared to 138 for BACA and 182 for PACA.

A total of 495 chose Dorothy Stringer as their first choice out of 330 places while only 87 chose BACA, out of 180 places, and 85 chose PACA, also out of 180 places.

Dorothy Stringer was top of the GCSE league table last year with a 73% 5 A*-C pass rate including Maths and English with only public schools Brighton College and Brighton and Hove High above them.

PACA received record GCSE results last year at 63% - above the national average of 59.2% - but Longhill and BACA's were both below at 50% and 29% respectively.

BACA headteacher Dylan Davies said he was confident their numbers will continue to increase and it will become fully subscribed while PACA headteacher said Katie Scott said the number of people asking for their school as first choice has increased.

The figures were released yesterday as Brighton and Hove City Council announced the school admissions policy will be discussed by councillors on Monday where there will be a review of the catchment area system in the city.

Justine Roberts, chief executive of parenting website Mumsnet, said some families are left feeling anxious and struggling to find a spot at the school they want for their youngster and also criticised the current admissions system.

She said: "How well the school admissions system works depends almost entirely on where you live.

“Lots of parents are very content with the school places allocated to their children, but in some areas the admissions system is starting to feel seriously creaky.

"Many Mumsnet users say that their children can't get into schools that are a few hundred metres away from their front doors."

Also read: The Argus comment: Choice is vital for us

DISPARITY IN PARENTS’ APPLICATIONS IS STRIKING COMPARED TO OTHER AREAS OF COUNTY

AS WAS the case last year, and the year before that, parents have been left scratching their heads thanks to the admissions process.

In a city with a modest 10 schools and just 280,000 people living here, the disparity in Brighton and Hove is striking.

Dorothy Stringer had 1,023 parents asking for their children to fill the 330 spaces.

It has now taken on an additional 14 pupils, as has Varndean School, to help the council cope with their bulging list of applicants.

Of those 1,023 applying at Dorothy Stringer nearly half were first choice applications.

Blatchington Mill had 888 total applications for their 300 spots while Varndean’s total number of applicants reached 957 for its capacity of 270.

Cross over to the city’s only two academies in Brighton and Portslade Aldridge Community Academy and the picture is a very different one.

In the West, only 85 parents picked PACA as its number one choice.

Over in Falmer, BACA had only 87 parents convinced it was the school for their child.

As a result, BACA has 99 and PACA has 94 new pupils signed up for September in a school with a capacity of 180 for that new school year.

The school churned out the worst GCSE grades in the city with only 29 per cent of students achieving five GCSEs including English and maths last year.

Head teacher Dylan Davies said: “We have a very productive relationship with Brighton and Hove City Council and the admissions team.

“We have extremely positive relationships with the local primary schools and are confident that our numbers will continue to increase and BACA will become a fully subscribed school.

“This year’s Year 7 will have fantastic opportunities at BACA and we will work very closely with our prospective students and families to show this.”

Its sister school in Portslade, who although returned admirable GCSE results of 59 per cent achieving five GCSEs including English and maths, is also struggling to convince parents it’s the place to learn for their children.

New head teacher Katie Scott said: “We are pleased that the number of parents selecting PACA as their first choice has risen this year and by the real excitement we have seen at parents’ evenings for the many new initiatives at the academy, from the Brighton Digital Media Academy to the launch yesterday of our new dance course with South East Dance.

“Last year PACA had record GCSE results, the fourth highest in the city, and 100 per cent success with university applications.

“As we maintain that momentum I’m sure PACA will be first choice for more and more parents in future.”

With reports of parents moving to certain areas in the city to better their chance of getting their child into a better school and other stories of people living on the same roads as schools being sent elsewhere, an overhaul of the catchment area system has been in the pipeline for a while.

Now, on Monday, these changes could finally be agreed by councillors.

The need for change has been triggered by two key factors, the council said.

One is rising demand for school places at secondary level, and the other is the University of Brighton’s proposal to create a new secondary free school in the eastern central area of the city.

The current system uses a combination of catchment areas and a range of published admissions priorities to determine how places are allocated.

However, as of September 2018 the projected rise in the number of secondary age pupils means that in some catchment areas there will be too many pupils for the places available.

The deputy chairman of the children, young people and skills committee and chairman of the council’s cross party school organisation working group Councillor Daniel Chapman said: “We want to ensure that children from all backgrounds have the same opportunities and the same chances to achieve their full potential.

“With this in mind we are committed to closing the gap in achievement between children from disadvantaged families and children who are not.

“Over the next couple of months we want to engage with people’s views on the general principles of how they think the catchment areas should work.

“The boundary lines indicated are suggestions at this stage. The feedback we get from this engagement exercise will help us draw up concrete proposals that will be the subject of a formal consultation process in the autumn.

“No admissions system will please all parents, but our aim above all is to arrive at a new system that is as fair as possible to as many parents and children as possible.

“We also want to see whether we can make more schools more accessible to children from disadvantaged backgrounds.

“We look forward to hearing residents’ views on the different options being put forward.”

The issue does seem exacerbated in the city.

East Sussex’s schools received 5,240 total applications, 88.5 per cent of which resulted in children going to their first-choice school.

And the picture is even better in West Sussex, as a spokeswoman said: “Ninety nine per cent of pupils whose application was received on time have been offered a place at one of their top three schools.

“This compares to 97 per cent last year.

“Meanwhile 93.9 per cent received a place at their most preferred school.

“This compares to 89.7 per cent last year.

“Applications received after the admissions deadline has passed are only considered once all on-time applications have been processed.

“Therefore of the total number of applications received, 97.6 per cent were allocated one of their three preferences and 91.8 per cent obtained their first choice.

“This compares to 95.3 per cent and 87.5 per cent respectively last year.”