Concerning the allocation of secondary schools in Brighton and Hove, at this moment, I am waiting.

By the time this reaches you, the letter telling us the school my son has been allocated to will already have arrived but, for now, today is the day and I am waiting.

My son is at school waiting.

And though we know the outcome, all we can do is wait.

My 11-year-old son walked to school with his brother and me this morning (he's usually too grown up for that now).

His life is about to move on and he's uncertain of how it will feel. In his innocence, he believes that, having been asked to visit a number of schools (six actually), and to put three preferences, he will surely get one of the schools we wrote on the form.

I struggle to find a rational explanation for why this might not happen. It does not help him to know it is a trick of geography.

He believes people in charge can find better answers than that.

It is a fragile time. The move to secondary school is a huge, daunting, unknown.

For both parents and children, the next few months should be a time of preparation - a chance to savour the last moments of primary school whilst gradually letting go and moving on.

But for many families across the city, the next months will be spent stressfully working on appeals, followed by more anxious waiting.

At the end of the day, is it right my child's future might depend on how articulate we are, on how well we are able (or not) to win an argument?

The current process of secondary school allocation is clearly unfair. Something has to change so, for anyone out there with younger children, now is the time to speak up.

-Fenella Potterton, Brighton