Primary school place allocation chaos has started!

[craigy]

so has anyone received any new offers in the shakedown.... my neighbour is going through it all too with a bad offer of a place...

[tor]

nope, no offers here. we are 3rd for goodrich, 12th for heber, 2nd for fairlawn and 2nd for horniman.

nothing has moved other than we've gone back a place at goodrich.

great!

[clux]

Tor,

We were told that if you're in the top 3 of the waiting list you stand a very very good chance of getting in. we were 7th on the list for our school and got a place 2 weeks into term.

Good luck.

[toast]

No offers yet but hopeful for Lewishams second round this weekend.

[prdarling]

Tor I don't understand how you are 2nd for Fairlawn and we are 7th. Very strange indeed.

I have been away for a week so I haven't checked up but I know that we moved back a place so are 5th for Goodrich.

No news is bad news though re offers

[toast]

Hi Tor

Thanks for shairing your positions. Were the Fairlawn and Horniman ones recent?

[prdarling]

Tor I've just been told I am 2nd for Horniman. This is getting more alarming by the day

[tor]

that just doesn't make sense unless maybe now i'm 1st for horniman?

and as for me being 2nd for fairlawn and you being 7th - that's just ridiculous. (for anyone reading this, me and prdarling live three doors away from eachother)

anyone get the feeling they're making it up as they go along?! i'm going to call lewisham now and find out ... will let you know.

[tor]

horniman - 1st

fairlawn - 2nd

pdarling - i don't understand how you can be 7th for fairlawn and me be 2nd? very strange...

have you been to look at the horniman? i haven't even though i put it down :-S - on paper it looks great and at this stage looks like the most likely school we're both going to get into!

[Fuschia]

tor Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> and as for me being 2nd for fairlawn and you being

> 7th - that's just ridiculous. (for anyone reading

> this, me and prdarling live three doors away from

> eachother)

A computer maps the addresses and distance from the school, probably to the nearest metre! So it is quite possible if you imagine a series of very close concentric circles drawn around the school.

You could both ask Lewisham how many metres they make you from Fairlawn...

[toast]

They measured in cm! My neighbour and i were less than 2m apart as she is across the road. Hopefully this all means we will all get in somewhere well before the summer holidays. Good for Lewisham i say!

[Fuschia]

toast Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> They measured in cm! My neighbour and i were less

> than 2m apart as she is across the road. Hopefully

> this all means we will all get in somewhere well

> before the summer holidays. Good for Lewisham i

> say!

I did wonder if I should say possibky even 10ths of a metre! But it's 100ths of a metre!

[toast]

Lewisham wont tell us where we are now which i am taking as a good sign, the next Lewisham round is tomorrow so good luck everyone.

Sounds like we will all get sorted out by Lewisham eventually, and its still likely that lots of people who were offered Lewisham places before Southwark offered will have given up their places and these will come up in the Southwark second round. Fairlawn and Goodrich offers overlaped significantly due to the Fairlawn bulge.

Hope that made sense

[prdarling]

Toast any idea when the Southwark next round is?

Tor good news - I was feeling a little concerned when I read that you were second! I am now 6th for Fairlawn.

Fingers crossed for some good news soon x

[toast]

Hi All

We have been offered a place we Love and have taken ourselves off all lists. Not totally sunk in yet, more relieved that celabrating. Will still be holding my breath until we are all sorted, Prdarling and Tor hope you get good news soon.

Thanks to everyone for getting your acceptances and declines in quickly and speeding things up.

[Pickle]

Great news Toast, glad to hear it's all worked out for you.

[craigy]

Excellent news Toast- can I ask, is it Lewisham that have come through for you or Southwark?

[Trish]

Congratulations Toast - you've worked tirelessly to remedy this problem. You do deserve it.

prdarling and Tor - keeping everything crossed for you.

[toast]

Thanks everyone, bit worried that im a pushy parent before we have even got into a school, i honestly dont make a habit of this sort of thing. I think i have blown my cover enough, Craigy i'll PM you.

Edited to say

I have written a very long letter to our councillors as the population bulge is expected to grow for a few more years yet and this new council is inheriting a bit of a mess with all the obvious schools bulged already. If any regulars on the forum are worried about next year and fancy picking up the challenge, PM me and i can pass on lots to you as it was passed to me.

I know this thing is far from over and if anyone still did not get in anywhere 'local' PM me and i may have some info, but nothing too exciting.

[prdarling]

I have just got back from camping so haven't spoken to anyone but as I have not received a phone call or an email I can only assume we haven't been offered anything. PM me will you Toast ?

[toast]

Hi Prdarling,

You must not have got the PMed message i sent Friday. I'll PM again. I know of at least two others still in limbo, one is on holiday so might have been offered a place and there are probably others who are forum shy, or just dont know what an issue it has been. Would be really good if we had a better idea of numbers. Anyone still without a 'local' school do PM me and Prdarling. If its only a few will probably all be sorted out by Southwark this week, if there are loads then we still dont have local school provision.

[Pasta]

It's good that they've decided to allow summer birthdays to start later on in the year or to go part-time until ready. I've always found Lewisham to be really helpful, when I applied last year for my daughter I got a place at a local school and told them I wouldn't be able to start in January as we were going to be abroad for a few months due to work reasons and they allowed her to start in April. They are allowed to defer places but not more than one term - so they wouldn't be able to hold the place for more than an academic year. If you wanted them to start at 5 then you'd have to reapply the following year (so for summer birthdays the october-dec after they are 4) and go straight into year 1. sorry I've probably repeated what others have already said, just wanted to say i found lewisham to be really good and surprisngly flexbile.

[Smiler]

Thanks for the offer of information Toast. This is likely to be a recurring issue, since they can't do bulge classes at the more popular schools every year, and the bulge classes for last year and this year could mean that the catchment area for those schools shrinks for future years.

[sb]

.

[mrs.lotte]

Last year the catchment area for open places was minute; eg just beyond all fired up was outside the catchment area! I live very close indeed and not only did we not secure a place a year later we have still not been offered a place as I am told that there has been little movement. As it happens we were allocated Goose Green where my son is happy and thriving so the angst was, mercifully, unnecessary. I have heard nothing about the allocation of open spaces at St.John's this year, I suspect that a good deal of people took a lesson from the class of '09 and were more realistic in their choices this year (just a guess).