https://assets.ctfassets.net/knkzaf64jx5x/5foPC3PrBPptqCU3dUikrF/27270ab31e01300570c35fa68115f853/Essex_County_Council_Secondary_school_admissions_brochure_2021_to_2022_with_form.pdfIf you are in catchment for KEGS, you must be submitting your CAF to Essex. The document above (which is linked to from the ECC website) explains the process. please.17 has information regarding post allocation change of preference:
I’ve decided I would prefer a lower
preference school than the one I have
been offered
If, having received your offer, you decide you
would rather your child attends one of your lower
Essex preference schools please put this request
in writing to School Admissions. Your application
to that school will then be reactivated and, if there
are no places available, added to the appropriate
place on the waiting list. If you want your child’s
details added to a non-Essex school’s waiting list,
you need to put this in writing to School
Admissions. It should be noted that different
waiting list systems may apply, and it is yourresponsibility as the parent or carer to find out
how waiting lists for schools in other LA areas are
operated. This includes what happens if an offer is
made from a non-Essex waiting list. If you already know that you would prefer your DS to be on a local school than to travel to SHSB every day, then it might make more sense to place your local non-selective preference(s) directly below KEGS from the outset? Otherwise you increase your risk of having to go to appeal (with no particular chance of success) for a local school if you don'tget KEGS and decide to turn SHSB down if you have named it as your second preference and it is allocated. If you are actually in Chelmsford, pretty much all the local secondary schools, bar Hylands, usually see a number of appeals each year, although the opening of Beaulieu Park may have taken the pressure off so some extent now.
It's not because it was 3rd on your list
per se that makes it unlikely that your DS will drop straight into a place at you local comprehensive if you turn down a(n apparently) higher preference offer; it will be because you, on your personal list, said that you would prefer a place at another school which was also able to offer your DS a place. Even if your DS was ranked within PAN by your 3rd (or 4th, 5th or even 6th) preference school, if he was also selected to be offered a place at a school
you ranked higher, he would not be offered the place at your third preference. But someone else would.