Considering an appeal from overseas - please help.

[FirstExperience]

Can anyone offer any advice on our situation please. Our son passed the 11+ but with a score too low to been given an automatic place in Berkshire. He is 12th on the waiting list and very unlikely to make it in without an appeal.

We are confident that we can provide evidence of his academic ability because he took his key stage 2 SATS one year early and passed with level 6 maths (top result in the school with 100% in one paper and 96% in the other) and a solid 5a for English, despite being one year younger than his contemporaries. The school that he attended moved him up a year for maths of their own accord when he was in year 4 because they could not cater to his needs in his year group. We did not ask them to. By the time his maths set were preparing for SATS it became clear that if he was to be entered for SATS he would have to sit both maths and english. No one expected him to do so well in English but he also got one of the top results for the school. We decided to remove him from the school for this academic year (since he has already completed it) and have been travelling with him to try to broaden his education that way. We are currently in Asia. Any appeal against the decision not to offer him a place at the grammar school must be lodged within the next two weeks and I just don't know what to do. He has been offered a place at the local school and more than anything we are worried that he will be bullied and attacked for his naturally academic ways. He does struggle with some social situations and that is another reason that we have tried to travel this year - to help his confidence that way.

For the last two years the school have not had a consistent head teacher - just a stream of temporary and supply teachers and the current temporary head has never met our son. I will therefore not be able to provide a letter from the school head to support any appeal we might make although I could contact his last maths teacher and ask her for a letter. I can also supply all his school reports and official SATS results documents but I don't know if this will be enough. We don't seem to have any extenuating circumstances so I worry that our appeal will fail in that he simply should have performed better in the test.

Does anyone have any advice on how to proceed? Thank you in advance.

[hermanmunster]

Hi Firstexperience and welcome to the forum!

It sounds like you will be appealing for oversubscription as although your son reached the pass mark he did not get a high enough mark to get a place automatically and hence will need academic evidence in the appeal as well as information as to why it is the right school for him.

There is also a chance from the waiting list - have you contacted them lately to see if it has moved and whether his place has improved?

re the appeal, I think you can just notify them that you are appealing and that the actual evidence can follow later (please see FAQ http://www.elevenplusexams.co.uk/appeals/general" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; ). This should be the academic evidence from SATS / reports and also it would help to get some letter from the school etc. Particularly will need some background as to why he was doing the SATS early - was this an independent or state school?

I suspect the panel will want to know why he did not score higher if he was doing so well at school and I think you may have to discuss what academic work he has been doing this year while you have been away.

Have you checked when the appeals are so that you will be able to be back to attend?

[FirstExperience]

Thanks so much for your reply hermanmunster, I appreciate it.