Time to apply for your child's secondary school place

Coun Philip Owen, chairman of the children and young peoples
committee at Nottinghamshire County Council. — Coun Philip Owen, chairman of the children and young peoples committee at Nottinghamshire County Council.

Nottinghamshire residents need to apply to the county council even if their preferred schools are in other areas, such as Nottingham City or Derbyshire.

You have until Thursday, October 31, to get your application in and I cannot stress enough how important it is to apply within the deadline.

The easiest way to apply is online here.

And those parents who apply online will receive email confirmation that their application has been received.

If parents do not apply on time, they substantially reduce the chances of getting a place at one of their preferred schools.

The applications process means that late applications will only be processed after all on-time applications.

By then, the schools that parents would really like their child to attend might all be full, so the council will make an alternative offer of a place at a school which could be at a distance from the home address.

It’s also important to use all four preferences.

This gives you a better chance of being offered a place at a school that both you and your child are happy with.

READ THIS: Council delight as thousands of children get their first-choice primary school places.

Every school will have its own admission oversubscription criteria so it’s good that you’re familiar with the schools you’re applying for.

Include at least one school within the four preferences where your child will have high priority within the admission oversubscription criteria and will therefore be most likely to get a place.

The good news is that last year 98 per cent of the parents who applied on time got one of the four preferences they had listed.

Of those families that were not successful for any of their preferences, 58.4 per cent had expressed only one preference.

Secondary school offers will be made on Monday, March 2, 2020.

If parents apply online an email will be sent on this day and applicants can log in to the online application service to view the outcome of their application.

For parents who apply by telephone or by completing a paper application, the outcome of preferences will be posted second class on Monday, March 2, 2020.

For more information about the process, click here or call 0300 5008080.