Grounds for Sec29 appeal to DoEd refusal to enrol into secondary school.

Has anybody any experience of Section29 appeals to the Dept of Education regarding inability to get a child into a particular secondary school.

My daughter has just been refused entry into a local secondary school where not alone I and my sisters attended (trouble-free I might add!) but she would be third generation.

But anyway that is irrelevant because they changed their admissions policy two years ago whereby children of past pupils were removed from the list who would get automatic entry to the school.

Those who get automatic entry are
A: Children of current staff members
B: Children from the same local religious organisation feeder school
C: Children who have a sister in the school.
D: Whatever places are left after that go into a drum and it is a "lottery". As names are drawn, places are allocated until such time that all places are gone.

Unfortunately ours was not drawn within the numbers for available places.

I am considering a Section 29 appeal as I have no other school place but am also hesitant as I dont have what I would consider very strong grounds for appeal but I am totally desperate. I also dont want to risk scuppering any tiny tiny chance I still might have of getting the place if I beg from now until September 2011.

Has anybody any experience as to what would be considered strong grounds by the department in such a case?

Im no expert but I think you can only appeal if there has been a specific reason for refusal. In your case it appears that your daughter lost out on a lottery system.

I may be wrong but think you can only appeal if your child has been refused on particular grounds such as past disciplinary issues or specific difficulties.

Your first port of call should be to appeal to the board of management and the principal to lay out your case. Explain that you have no other options in your area and explain that you and your sisters are both past pupils etc.

The school have a right to change their admissions policy and they generally jump through all the right hoops to do do things like that.

I would say that unless you can say that their policy is unfair against your daughter or that you have been discriminated against in some way or another you may not have much of an argument.

You could always check with the department of education as to your right to appeal or check with your local citizens information office.

If you believe it to be unfair and you genuinely have no other options Do speak to the principal and try to come to some resolution that way first.

Best of luck

It looks like they followed their enrolment policy to a tee.

I don't think your appeal would have any chance of succeeding.

Thank you very much for both of your replies. I think you both reiterated what I was thinking myself. I have already appealed to the Principal and Board of Management and was advised that "all procedures were followed" in the selection procedure. As i already said i cannot in any way say that they did not follow their own procedures to the letter of the law. My only fear is that a number of other parents are definitely appealing to the Dept on the same weak grounds as mine. I have been told that the school has never allowed a judgement to proceed against it and that a place has always been found at the last moment. What I risk is that if I appeal and am unsuccessful I may have "affected" any possible slim shance my daughter has to get in and if I dont appeal other parents will and may get a place purely because the school dont want an appeal to proceed. Damned if I do, damned if I dont! Any views on that.

Go with your gut ... and be happy with your decision and the outcome.

Any update on this Happy Girl? I have a son in much the same boat and he is now on a waiting list.

Can you offer to make a donation to the school hall or something along those lines?

I don't think a bribe would count as part of enrolment selection criteria.

Imagine the uproar from other failed applicants if they heard a brown envelope got Johnny/Mary into the school with a warm, welcoming smile from the Principal!

mohawk said:

Any update on this Happy Girl? I have a son in much the same boat and he is now on a waiting list.

Click to expand...

Just got letter back last week following the section 29 Appeal on 13th Jan last. We were unsuccessful in our appeal. I felt we had a great case as we had unearthed a number of issues regarding enrolment that we were not aware of originally. The appeal took 2&half hours and the school representatives were grilled to the last about policy. However we did not win the case. My understanding is that the Appeals committee will only check that the school followed its own enrolment policy correctly - which we never disputed. However what we were arguing was that their enrolment policy was discriminatory towards us (wont bore everybody with all the details here). None of the other 4 parents who took the section 29 against the same school were successful either. Without doubt it has been the most stressful 3 months of our lives so far. Mohawk you are more than welcome to PM me if you are taking the section 29 and anything I can help you with I certainly will.

Hi I am in the process of applying for a section 29 appeal on the grounds of non admission to a secondary school because of a lottery system which we were not aware of any help or advice would be appreciated ,thank you

gordo said:

Hi I am in the process of applying for a section 29 appeal on the grounds of non admission to a secondary school because of a lottery system which we were not aware of any help or advice would be appreciated ,thank you

Click to expand...

Gordo can you post a little more information if you can. Is the process of the "lottery system" not clearly outlined in the schools admission policy details. If it is you will find it very very difficult to win a Section 29 Appeal. From my own experience of Section 29s over the past 6 months of eating, drinking and sleeping it - I would stress that the role of the Section 29 Committee is to ensure that the school followed its own guidelines for enrolment to the school. It does not (as I naievely believed) examine those guidelines to examine the fairness of them. Each school is within its rights of setting its own enrolment admission policies (provided of course that they conform to the Equality legislation currently in force). The appeals committee just double checks that it has done so. PM me for any other information that I can provide for you.

Sorry you are so disappointed, what are you going to do now? Is there no other school within reach?
I think your child most of all needs to be given a positive attitude of hope and good will towards whatever school he/she goes to; how your child does as regards education largely depends on the work put in, and the family attitude and involvement.
I've a load of experience of teens and families and believe me the actual school doesnt matter in the end.

we went through the exact same system a number of years ago and I sympathise with anyone going through the ordeal of the whole thing. We were one of a number of parents who took Section 29s in the same year against the same school. Each one of us lost our appeal even though the school was told to tighten up its policy for the future. Majority of appeals centered on the lottery system and its openness as it was not witnessed by anyone and could not be verified, and there was no proof of randomness of selection, etc. Since then alot of schools have had their policies checked by legal people to ensure they are watertight.

I agree to some extent that the actual school might not matter but it can and does shape your future, your subject choices, your friends, your ability to be good in a particular field of say music, art, sports, etc. We felt it was important to fight for our child to avail of the opportunities the chosen school could provide. We also felt it was our duty to see that fair play was followed and that it was seen to be followed. The school hadn't followed fairly and it was well known for enroling the children of "who knows who". It now at least has a more open policy and appears to be much fairer in the selection of its pupils.

I wish you luck in your appeal Gordo and I can only hope that it works out well in the end for you and your daughter Happy Girl.

There are 2 possible grounds of appeal that might be open to some people. First is to challenge the whole admissions policy - that the use of the lottery on the basis that there are other fair and objective criteria a school would reasonably be expected to use before resorting to lottery e.g. distance from school, whether in catchment area for other similar schools,

Another way may be to challenge the schools verification of the rules - are they e.g. checking that the addresses of applicants are genuine? There is a big problem in my area whereby a lot people who were born in the area, but no longer live here, use their parents addresses to apply for school places as one of the local schools is considered to be very good.

The schools admission procedure was outlined in their admission policy, however we did not receive any information regarding this until Jan 2011, when we were informed about the open night for students.

We applied to the school in 2008 and during that time we never received any info on the procedure even though we visited the school on 4 different occasions with enrolment forms etc..

Also there is no mention of the lottery system on the web site of the school, any help or info would be greatly appreciated.

csirl said:

Another way may be to challenge the schools verification of the rules - are they e.g. checking that the addresses of applicants are genuine? There is a big problem in my area whereby a lot people who were born in the area, but no longer live here, use their parents addresses to apply for school places as one of the local schools is considered to be very good.

Click to expand...

THis happens a lot. It also takes away from the community basis of the school, as the kids who travel long distances tend to be less involved in after school activities and even the social activities.

I know of a case in the UK where a school said the students needed to live within a certain distance of the school. An appeal was taken by one student on the basis that it didn't specify if it was "as the crow flies" or road distance or from what starting point. The student won the appeal on the basis that he was within the required distance from the back gates of the school but not the main front gates.

Complainer said:

This happens a lot.

Click to expand...

Yes, but living within a particular catchment area is not one of the criteria set out by the secondary school in question by the OP. I know that catchment area is a big deal in the UK and perhaps in Ireland it is Dublin/Cork thing (Im not sure)?

Happy Girl said:

Those who get automatic entry are
A: Children of current staff members
B: Children from the same local religious organisation feeder school
C: Children who have a sister in the school.
D: Whatever places are left after that go into a drum and it is a "lottery". As names are drawn, places are allocated until such time that all places are gone.

Click to expand...

gordo said:

we were not made aware of changes to admission policy

Click to expand...

Is a failure of the school to make parents of prospective students aware of the changes to the admission policy a grounds for appeal?

ajapale said:

Is a failure of the school to make parents of prospective students aware of the changes to the admission policy a grounds for appeal?

Click to expand...

I raised this issue at our Section29 appeal. If you received a copy of the school's admissions policy which they subsequently followed then the school are well covered. They do not need to specifically highlight any part of the procedure which has changed from the previous year. Again I would stress that the role of the Section 29 appeal is to ensure that the school followed its own enrolment procedure to the letter of the law. It's role is not to said whether that enrolment policy is fair or not. It will only ensure that the enrolment policy is non discriminatory and most schools cover themselves well when drawing up their policies.

It seems the only law is that they have to adhere to their own admissions policy.

Our local school has changed its catchment, and we were in the catchment for the last 10+yrs, but are now effectively excluded from it. But it seems there nothing we can do about it. They are also removing the "length of residency" criteria as its discriminatory apparently, to new residents. Seem to be discriminatory to longer term residents, and it makes it impossible to plan where to live, or indeed buy anywhere if you have no idea what the school situation will be like. Once you buy and put down roots, it may be impossible to move.