Allocations 2010 - an early view

Marylou · Post by **Marylou** » Sat Jan 23, 2010 8:11 pm

Surely this means that if Complete Novice has qualified and is in catchment they will automatically be offered SWB, provided there aren't at least 24 successful appellants who live closer?

Complete Novice · Post by **Complete Novice** » Sat Jan 23, 2010 8:21 pm

Thank you Sally-Anne that is very interesting. I wonder what happened this year!

SWB is actually our second choice after the very competitive Reading School which we will find out about only 1 March. I had assumed that if we didn't make Reading, SWB was extremely unlikely and as we aren't that keen on the third choice, this is encouraging news!

Sally-Anne · Post by **Sally-Anne** » Sat Jan 23, 2010 9:26 pm

Marylou wrote:RLS was on 227 for qualified first preferences as at 2 March last year. Even though this figure will have included some successful appeals, I think the number of 1st preferences might still be lower this year.

'Fraid not, Marylou. Qualified first prefs this year are up 10 at 194.

Marylou wrote:Surely this means that if Complete Novice has qualified and is in catchment they will automatically be offered SWB, provided there aren't at least 24 successful appellants who live closer?

I think you mean 44 (76 first prefs, PAN of 120), but don't forget catchment siblings who live further away - they are higher up the food chain.

There are lots of other interesting titbits in the numbers. For example, Burnham GS had 64 first preferences post-qualification, but it was the first preference in Bucks for 306 qualifiers, i.e. 242 people put at least one other non-Bucks school above it. Riveting stuff, you see?

If anyone wants to know about Upper Schools, I have those figures too, but it would be a fiddle to post them all unless a lot of people desperately want them. Most of them look pretty similar to last year, at a glance.

Marylou · Post by **Marylou** » Sun Jan 24, 2010 12:47 am

Sally-Anne wrote: I think you mean 44 (76 first prefs, PAN of 120).

Maths was never my strong point!

I'm still confused though - maybe I'm being dim but if there are "76" qualified first choices and everyone who put the school as their second choice were offered and accepted their first choice elsewhere (purely hypothetical, I know) then wouldn't this mean that anyone in that 76 was offered whether in catchment or not? (Sorry - I was assuming that CN had listed it as first choice.) And for RLS - 194 is lower than 227? Or did the 227 just refer to people who listed it as one of their choices and not necessarily the first?

Hope · Post by **Hope** » Sun Jan 24, 2010 10:52 am

Do we know why there are so many more appeals this year? Has the amount of children passing reduced or is it just because parents think it may be worth a try?

Sally-Anne · Post by **Sally-Anne** » Sun Jan 24, 2010 1:34 pm

Marylou wrote:I'm still confused though - maybe I'm being dim but if there are "76" qualified first choices and everyone who put the school as their second choice were offered and accepted their first choice elsewhere (purely hypothetical, I know) then wouldn't this mean that anyone in that 76 was offered whether in catchment or not?

It would, but it depends on the other first choices all being given. As some could be for Berks grammars, requiring a pass in a different entrance test, that could mean that some second preferences for SWB are elevated to first preference if the child doesn't pass that test. They might live nearer to the school and therefore jump first preferences living further away. (With SWB being right on the edge of the County boundary I suspect that happens quite a lot.)

There are 58 qualified second preferences, so if all of them happened to be applying to a Berks GS, they don't get in and they all live in catchment, that would mean that SWB would be oversubscribed. That is just theoretical though, and it seems a most unlikely scenario given the considerable drop in first preferences.

Marylou wrote:And for RLS - 194 is lower than 227? Or did the 227 just refer to people who listed it as one of their choices and not necessarily the first?

The 227 was as of 2nd March, so it included successful appeals and - potentially - late testers who had moved into the area but whose results were not known on Results Day.

The comparable figure for Results Day, 21st November 2008, was 184.

Hope wrote:Do we know why there are so many more appeals this year? Has the amount of children passing reduced or is it just because parents think it may be worth a try?

I suspect, for some reason, that there were more near misses this year than last year. I haven't got last year's graph to prove it, so it's just a hunch.

Another factor may have been the leak of the first test paper before the OoC tests, with either in-county parents or OoC parents crying "foul". (I don't think it will do them much good though.)

Lastly, I think that the recession really is biting this year, and the number of parents appealing in a last bid to avoid school fees may well be up on last year.

newgirl · Post by **newgirl** » Mon Jan 25, 2010 9:30 am

Are these fairly standard figures or are these unusually low. Have the figures ever been posted for previous years? It would be good to do a comparison do know what our chances are.

Marylou · Post by **Marylou** » Mon Jan 25, 2010 10:12 am

Thanks for that expanation, Sally-Anne. We are in a completely different situation here since RLS is the only grammar for miles around, which is obviously not the case for schools near the Berkshire boundary. Therefore any OOCs including it on their form will almost inevitably list it first as they will have gone to a fair amount of trouble to apply for the test anyway.

I don't remember seeing the figure of 184 for last year, I think it would have rung a bell as I'd have felt quite hopeful, with it being only 10 over PAN. Just as well really, as the disappointment would have been greater on learning that the school was effectively oversubscribed by 53 on 2nd March!

It's incredible how that figure shot up between November and March, so we can only assume that there must have been a lot of late testers and successful appeals.

Incidentally though, our local comprehensive was also oversubscribed by exactly the same number and ended up allowing quite a few appeals. This situation was very unusual though, and just shows how the numbers applying can fluctuate quite dramatically in different years.

Sally-Anne · Post by **Sally-Anne** » Mon Jan 25, 2010 10:52 am

newgirl wrote:Are these fairly standard figures or are these unusually low. Have the figures ever been posted for previous years? It would be good to do a comparison do know what our chances are.

Which school are you looking at?

As I mentioned before, these are very early figures and they can chance a great deal.

Your best guide to your chances remains the allocation profiles for previous years:http://www.elevenplusexams.co.uk/11-plu ... rofile.php

newgirl · Post by **newgirl** » Mon Jan 25, 2010 11:04 am

Thanks for the reply. I'd seen the March allocation sticky already, I was just curious as to how the preference list compared with previous years at the same stage. I've been back through the forum but can't find whether or not the results have ever been posted. Would you know how they compare of the top of your head, or perhaps could point me to a previous posting?