Cross sibling rule for WGSG and WGSB

[Hera]

Many thanks for taking time to respond.

I guess there is no chance of me banking on distance criteria then even though I only live 730m away from the school!

Feedback from local primary schools is that the 2013 entry year is a low bith rate year so if it is next year you are applying you might be in a good position for distance. But I think what the last person said is right, just apply under as many criteria as you can!

[watford]

Thanks Guys!

But the 729m refers to distance without the cross sibling rule so when this comes into play it will be even harder as the distance will increase?

[watford]

Hello all

I have just spoken to the admissions secretary at Watford Girls Grammar. She was very helpful and mentioned that the cross sibling rule may not be decided until Sept 2012! Has anyone else heard the same??

[WP]

The schools have to publish their determined admissions arrangements next month, but if someone complains the Adjudicator may be considering the case until the summer.

[watford]

Thank you for your response.

Yes I did think around Summer was rather strange!

Perhaps they may introduce these proposed arrangements for the following year i.e. 2014 intake as it's too late this year?

Sorry just panicking as this cross sibling rule reduces my chance of a distance place although I am going to try for all other criteria too.

This is just too much pressure!

[decaff]

Yes I wonder if schools are aware of a pending appeal to school adjudicator. If this is the case surely its most likely to come from families who live close to either schools who may miss out on a place if rule is reintroduced.

[WP]

Perhaps they may introduce these proposed arrangements for the following year i.e. 2014 intake as it's too late this year?

It's not too late. They're following the standard cycle: consultation on changes Jan-Feb, determined arrangements April, objections to Adjuducator due by end of June and heard over the following months, preferences due end of Oct.

Yes I wonder if schools are aware of a pending appeal to school adjudicator.

They may have received objections at the consultation stage, but no-one can object to the Adjudicator until the schools publish their determined arrangements in April.

[Allgirls]

I live less than 200 metres away from the girls school and if my DD loses out to another pupil living a mile away who got in because her brother is in another school, I will raise the matter to the adjudicator. If that does not work, then further legal advice. The way I see it, cross sibling allows a closed system, already tight due to staff children plus girls sibling. The adjudicator noted there was at least one occasion zero girls got in on distance due to demand from staff, sibling and cross sibling. How fair is that to those who live very close to the school? We all have to make choices where to live and how much we want to pressure our children to get into a grammar school, paying for that choice in money and emotions. What I can't accept is people who cover both bases through the cross sibling rules, very nice if you can get it but unfair to single gender families. Such people would benefit more by staying near co-Ed grammar school and rely on sibling rules. If you choose to give your son some sort of special advantage by placing him in a boys school ( whatever that advantage is), you cannot also deny a place of another child who hails from an all girls family by claiming sibling advantage arising from a different school. To claim that both schools are under the same trust is not good enough as if that logic is extended, then all schools are related as they are under one country, i.e England, so cross sibling policy must apply everywhere. Not acceptable. So parents like me will complain and appeal. I see someone is ready to call people like me selfish. Well, it cuts both ways.

[bcd]

I have a dd at WGSG and know that over the past few years since the abolition of the cross sibling rule that some staff have had concerns about the 'academic quality' of some of the intake and they have therefore been very keen to re-introduce the cross sibling rule because they have concerns about how the current intake may 'damage' their standing in the league tables. I do think that since the schools have taken on academy status that they have engineered their board of trustees etc so that they can bring back the cross sibling rule - supported by the new school admissions code. My own experience is that on a day to day basis that the schools have very little to do with each other and from what I have heard (through friends who are staff) - have a different ethos to each other. Nonetheless, parents with children in either school will for obvious reasons strongly support the cross sibling rule so I am sure that it will be in their published admissions rule for the 2013 intake. This will of course be to the detriment of distance children, in particular because children of staff will also gain priority as well. My other dd is at Parmiter's and I think that the school has decided that children of staff will not gain priority there - which I agree with. I do not understand why these schools should afford staffs' children priority - I do not think that such good schools have difficulty recruiting or retaining staff. I believe that objections to the Adjudicator have to be made once the admission rules have been formally published - complaining after the schools have been allocated is too late and will do no good. I strongly suspect however that the schools have made sure that they can now demonstrate - on paper anyway - close links, they will not want to have the cross sibling rule taken away from them again!

[herty]

I live less than 200 metres away from the girls school and if my DD loses out to another pupil living a mile away who got in because her brother is in another school, I will raise the matter to the adjudicator. If that does not work, then further legal advice. The way I see it, cross sibling allows a closed system, already tight due to staff children plus girls sibling. The adjudicator noted there was at least one occasion zero girls got in on distance due to demand from staff, sibling and cross sibling. How fair is that to those who live very close to the school? We all have to make choices where to live and how much we want to pressure our children to get into a grammar school, paying for that choice in money and emotions. What I can't accept is people who cover both bases through the cross sibling rules, very nice if you can get it but unfair to single gender families. Such people would benefit more by staying near co-Ed grammar school and rely on sibling rules. If you choose to give your son some sort of special advantage by placing him in a boys school ( whatever that advantage is), you cannot also deny a place of another child who hails from an all girls family by claiming sibling advantage arising from a different school. To claim that both schools are under the same trust is not good enough as if that logic is extended, then all schools are related as they are under one country, i.e England, so cross sibling policy must apply everywhere. Not acceptable. So parents like me will complain and appeal. I see someone is ready to call people like me selfish. Well, it cuts both ways.

I don't think you're being selfish - or at least no more selfish than any other parent who wishes their child to get a place on any grounds - but am unclear why you see your dd as being disadvantaged because she has no brothers. What about eldest children or only children? They have no extra help either. There is no inherent logic I can see that says schools ought to or must give priority to local children or to siblings - super-selectives like HBS do neither - but the advantages of both policies is that they help to foster a sense of community within the school, of different types. It's a moot point as to whether parents of multiple siblings are more inconvenienced (in terms of travelling time etc) if their children fail to get into the same or connected local school than parents who happen to live close to a school if their children have to travel further - are 2 different journeys more or less inconvenient than one long one?

As someone with a dd at WGGS who got in on exam - and who had to move into the catchment in order to be able to apply - we contemplated doing as you have done and renting right next to the school to guarantee a place. Instead, we risked moving further away and thus being dependent on the entrance exam, our thinking being that if she failed to get in on exam then maybe it wasn't the right school for her anyway. Now she is there I'd back that up - there is a considerable amount of homework, which dd is fine with as she's a pretty quick worker, however I know from some fellow parents that their dds are up till 10pm doing homewpork every night - not what I would want for my dd. I have a dd2 in year 5 and we have only just decided to take up her sibling place in due course, as I did not want to send her there if I felt she would struggle; her recent SAT results have been above her sister's at the same stage hence I am now confident she will be fine, but had this not been the case would have very seriously considered whether even with the convenience of having two girls at one school, this was the right school for her. (Oh, and I do have a DS, who will NOT be going to the boys' school, as I prefer co-ed for boys, so think I can speak about this in a fairly unbiased way... )

If I were you I'd save your energy and passion and use it to prepare your dd well for the exam, so that she gets in on exam anyway. And so that she doesn't struggle once there. I'd also add that according to the sticky, in every year recorded, the number of sibling places - even in the days when cross-sibling places existed - never fell below 18, so at 200m I think the chances of your dd not getting a distance place are pretty non-existent anyway.