Appeals process (Chelmsford)

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Corkie
Posts: 1
Joined: Sun Jan 16, 2011 10:02 pm

Appeals process (Chelmsford)

Post by Corkie »

Hi
My daughter did the eleven plus in Chelmsford in November
she, together with fourteen others were sat apart in a seperate classroom ( due to numbers )
They were told by the invigilator that they had to use scrap paper to do their workings on, instead of using the question booklet thus wasting time transferring data from one paper to the other and possibly increasing the chances of mistakes.
The rest of the children in the main hall were allowed to write on the question book.

The school has admitted to human error, and we have been told by the school we will have to take this to appeal if nescessary

My question is, if my daughter fails to achieve the pass mark for her 1st choice grammer school but is close to the pass mark for her 2nd choice grammer has the appeal committee got the authority to get her admitted to the 2nd school, despite the fact it was the 1st choice schools fault.

many thanks

Corkie
Etienne
Posts: 8978
Joined: Mon Dec 12, 2005 6:26 pm

Re: Appeals process

Post by Etienne »

An appeal panel can only take a decision with regard to the appeal it is hearing.

Not sure how appeals are organised in your area, but you may find that you have a different panel for each school you're appealing for.
Etienne
dutchy005
Posts: 117
Joined: Thu Sep 24, 2009 2:11 pm

Re: Appeals process (Chelmsford)

Post by dutchy005 »

I don't know if this answers the questions but:

Our DS sat 11plus at KEGS in November 2009. He failed to gain a place at either KEGS or CRGS but by 7 and 3 marks respectively. We had personal mitigating factors and the support of school and excellent academic evidence demonstrating that he would reasonably have been expected to comfortably attain a high enough standard to win a place at both schools. On top of the personal mitigating factors there was also a disturbance in the exam room that day in the paper our DS underperformed in and one of the two boys crying was sitting right in front of him.

At the first appeal to KEGS the PO accepted the disturbance happened, put his hands up to it but focussed his argument on the reasons why admitting our son would have a negative impact on the ability of the school to deliver a high standard of education to the other boys. We lost this appeal on a majority decision.

We then appealed to CRGS - our first choice but our son's second choice. The PO contested what our son had said and it became apparent from the response of the panel that the paperwork completed by the invigilator was not as they would have wished and the PO from CRGS struggled to answer some of their specific questions. THe long and short of it was that we were there all day and eventually won the appeal. The first appeal granted at CRGS in living memory!

So something went wrong at KEGS, we didn't win that appeal but did win the CRGS one. Hope this helps. If you want more detailed information PM me.
Minesatea
Posts: 1234
Joined: Sat Oct 31, 2009 12:08 am

Re: Appeals process (Chelmsford)

Post by Minesatea »

You will need to appeal separately for each school. Each panel will only consider that school they cannot award places at a different school.

The scrap paper error occured at several schools in Essex this year, with certain sittings / rooms affected - there is a thread about it in the essex forum, so you may find that there are children affected who sat the exam at your second choice school as well.

Good luck!
moved
Posts: 3826
Joined: Fri Oct 12, 2007 1:42 pm
Location: Chelmsford and pleased

Re: Appeals process (Chelmsford)

Post by moved »

From the few successful appeals that I have heard of to the eight Essex grammars you will need a very well documented appeal. List your mitigating evidence and provide sound evidence of very high academic ability.
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