Hi all
Very grateful if anyone can advise on how easy it is to switch preference in March? We are in the fortunate position that my son passed for all the schools, so we don't know anything about his marks. We put on the CAF 1.Wilson's 2.SGS but for various reasons including transport practicalities are now leaning more towards SGS. If he should have done well enough to be offered Wilson's, will we be able to go on the SGS waiting list with a decent chance of a place there? Very grateful for any advice/practical experience.

Your DS would be able to go on the SGS wait list, if he gets his top preference Wilson's. If place becomes available in SGS, he will be considered in order of rank scores of the candidates in the wait list.

If he gets Wilson’s then it is very likely that he would have scored above the SGS cut off scores.

Do you live in one of the SGS catchment postcodes? If so, then you may have a decent chance, although I suspect that there may be fewer boys dropping out from these postcodes. Otherwise it depends on whether your son has scored high enough to get one of the top 60 OOC places.

Thanks! We don't live in a catchment area postcode, that's partly why it's taken us a while to work out our preference. But the head of SGS said at the open day we went to that the cut-offs ended up being pretty similar last year for in and out of catchment area kids, so that the catchment area didn't greatly influence who they took. So if he's a high scorer, there would probably be enough movement that he'd get taken off the SGS waiting list relatively soon?

Last year SGS made offers to more children than they had spaces for (about 18 extra from memory). That meant that they didn't start to make offers to the waiting list until they had had 18 declines from people they'd offered to in the first round.

We were in the same position as the OP last year - had put a different school higher than SGS on our CAF and then changed our minds. My DS was top of the OOC waiting list but we didn't get the call from the school until the end of April, so a bit of a nervous wait. DS has now settled into SGS and we're very happy with our final decision.

Thanks, helpful to know! Presumably can stick with original offer while waiting?

Yes, always stay with your allocated school until you have a place confirmed elsewhere, unless you would be happy to home educate or are also holding a place at an indie to fall back on. Always best to check with your own LA with regard to their rules on going onto ve waiting list for lower preference schools, though.

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In theory it is very easy to request you are added to waiting list for another school

You hold onto the place you are offered until the alternative comes up (if it comes up) then accept the new one and cancel the original offer

The problems are : your wait list position may not be near the top, as you will be ranked with all others waiting, there is no guarantee the list will move far enough to get a place (basically having to rely on others rejecting the school). Of course you may not get either and be offered a place at another school.

Hello all,

Just have a quick question, after 1st march, i am sure we will be getting the school name from the councill, do anyone one know is there any time limit to accept the offer or any deadline date that you have accept the offer otherwise that will not be acceptable.

Many thanks

It might vary from LA to LA but that usually ask for a response within 2 weeks, then start chasing.