For each section of this report there’s a summary in italics at the top. Feel free to skip to the bits that interest you.

SCC Committee meetings are not usually like yesterday’s (Tuesday 12th February).  Although for most of Surrey there is ‘no change’ , groups of parents from the Oxted and Effingham areas arrived at County Hall in coloured vests with slogans; feelings ran high.

Yesterday’s special meeting of the Schools and Learning Committee was an ‘extra’ concentrating on school admissions, and the criteria used to decide how places in most of the County’s Community and Voluntary Controlled schools are allocated.

The starting point was a set of proposals very much like last years, including an unresolved sore point around admissions to the Howard of Effingham School, and a very controversial change to the catchment area for Oxted School. (Catchment areas only exist in exceptional cases.) The Chairman used her discretion to allow parent representatives to speak, which made for a more constructive and democratic session.

Deciding how decisions are made

… is itself a long process. The committee ‘decision’ was on what to recommend to the Executive before the proposal goes to Full Council. The recommendations could be totally ignored, but I wouldn’t bet on it.

Proposals went out for consultation in November 2007. Consultation documents went to a long list of interested parties including Headteachers, Chairs of Governors and Parent Governors in Surrey’s state-supported schools. Written responses had to be in by the end of January, and the consultation process was supposed to have finished with the meeting of the Schools Admissions Forum last Friday, 8th February.

The Admissions Forum advises and recommends, then when the consultation is over, the initial proposals come back to County Hall for a decision.
This starts off with the Schools and Learning Committee, which again considers the responses and makes recommendations to go to the Executive on the 26th of February, and the final policy goes to Full Council on the 4th of March.

You might well ask what we were doing all morning when we didn’t have the power to decide anything definitely beyond what recommendations we were going to make. Sometimes it can feel futile, but the iterative nature of the process does mean that proposals can get considered and refined all the way along. It feels a bit like all trying to steer a heavy boat away from disaster and towards a reasonable destination by pushing it along.

It doesn’t help when the bureaucracy trips over a tight schedule. The central paper was e-mailed the day before, but the vital map showing he new proposed catchment area for the Howard of Effingham was tabled at the meeting, in inadequate numbers of copies for those interested, and was not easy to read.

Admission Criteria for most Surrey state schools:

Same as last year

This is the recommendation accepted by the committee:

A. All Surrey schools will operate an Equal Preference System.
B. The majority of Surrey’s Community and Voluntary Controlled schools will use the
following criteria when a school is oversubscribed:
1. Looked After Children
2. Exceptional Arrangements
3. Siblings
4. Children for whom the school is the nearest
5. Any other applicant
The tie-breaker distance measurement by straight line.

(Item 4, Officer Report. Map of Catchment Area will be on SCC web site with this paper.)

Oxted School

Catchment area will include Lingfield, Dormansland and Godstone, but with criteria tougher on siblings and children not in named feeder schools

Oxted is unusual in having a fixed catchment area. It runs up to neighbouring County borders and around Lingfield and Dormansland includes a rural area that nevertheless has a fast train link north to Oxted. The proposal that went to consultation reduced the catchment area to exclude Godstone, Dormansland, and Lingfield.

This caused significant protest in these areas. On response forms, 2232 people disagreed, while only 50 agreed. There was a protest march from Godstone to Oxted, much news coverage, and the local (Conservative) County Councillors also objected.

The compromise that has been reached is a restoration of the larger catchment area, but combined with a feeder school criterion, and with a tie-break of furthest away from the nearest alternative school.

This is the wording:

vi) In response to the consultation:
1. For Oxted School revert back to the extended catchment area to
include Godstone, Lingfield and Dormansland and give joint priority
status to those children living within the catchment area and
attending a named partner / feeder school. Phase in a change to
the sibling criterion from 2010 to ensure that local places are not
jeopardised by siblings who move into / live outside the fixed
catchment area. The September 2009 admissions criteria would
therefore be:
i) Looked after Children
ii) Exceptional arrangements
iii) Siblings
iv) Those children who both live in the catchment area and
who attend one of the following partner / feeder schools:
Dormansland, Godstone, Holland, Lingfield, St Catherine’s,
St John’s, St Mary’s, St Stephen’s, Tatsfield, Woodlea
v) Any other applicant
The tie-breaker within each criterion will be those who live furthest
from the nearest alternative school as measured by a straight line.

(Item 4, Officer Report. Map of catchment area will be on the SCC website with this paper)

The Howard of Effingham

New catchment area. Horsleys in, part of Fetcham out. Tie-breaker distance from nearest alternative school.

Last year the introduction of ‘Equal Preference’ and the standard admissions criteria led to children from East and West Horsley not getting admission to the Howard of Effingham school and being assigned schools as far away, difficult to reach by public transport, and relatively unpopular as Bishop David Brown in Woking.

They appealed to the Schools’ Adjudicator and got an in-year variation that nominated partner schools and after that used distance from the nearest alternative school as a tie-breaker.

The proposal that went to consultation would have retained this arrangement. It disadvantages children in Fetcham and Bookham who also have the Howard of Effingham as their nearest school, but are also fairly close to Therfield in Leatherhead. But Therfield is often over-subscribed, so that child might well have to travel even further to find a school.

The interests of the different communities are opposed, and as was remarked in committee it would take the wisdom of Solomon to settle this one (though no-one suggested closing the Howard of Effingham down).

The compromise proposed is a new fixed catchment area which excludes part of Fetcham. Partner schools are abandoned, but the’ furthest away from nearest alternative school’ tie-breaker is retained.

I asked about the children not within the catchment area whose nearest school was the Howard of Effingham, which would not now be a realistic option. Would entry procedures be changed so that Therfield became their ‘nearest school’?

The answer was that discussion was still taking place with the Head. As the (Conservative) Chair of the Committee said: ‘Hasn’t the consultation period finished? … [this] makes a mockery of dealing with the parents …’. But at the same time, we had to agree that negotiation should not be abandoned solely to keep to the timetable.

This was the recommendation that went forward:
For The Howard of Effingham School change the criteria as
follows:
i) Looked after Children
ii) Exceptional arrangements
iii) Siblings
iv) Applicants living within the catchment area
v) Any other applicant
The tie-breaker within each criterion will be to give priority to those
children living furthest away from their nearest alternative school as
measured by a straight line.

A quick trot through the other recommended exceptions:

The Oaktree and Hermitage Schools here in Woking to get partner/feeder status; Acorns Infant and Brockham Primary School to revert to sibling criteria which favour non-siblings for which it is the nearest school over siblings for whom it isn’t; discontinue ‘shared school status’ to Knowle Park Infant and Kingscroft Junior Schools, and Marshfields Infant and Christchurch Junior Schools.