Apply for an In-year School Place

Parents can make an application for West Berkshire school places at any time in the year. This is known as an 'In-year application'. Applications made in this way can be processed up to 6 weeks, or half a term, in advance of your requested start date.

The schools you can apply for

The West Berkshire school admissions service coordinate [32KB] in-year school applications for all West Berkshire Schools, including academies (but not private schools) with the exception of Englefield Church of England Primary School. Please contact Englefield CE Primary School directly if you want to apply for a place there.

Before applying you should:

1. contact us for advice and to see which schools have spaces.
2. read the  in year guide [42KB]  before completing an application.
3. consider how your child will get to school. free school transport is normally only provided to your child's nearest school, which maybe outside of West Berkshire. Distance criteria also apply and there are exceptions for low income families. Please read the Free Home to School Transport  policy to see if your child would qualify. The School Catchment Areas page also shows which schools are nearest to your home address and the distance. You need to apply for your nearest school even if it is full to be considered for free school transport to another.

Applying

You can apply for any West Berkshire school by sending your Primary school application [134KB] ,  Secondary application - years 7-8 [136KB]  or  Secondary application - years 9-11 [137KB]  to the School Admissions Team.

If you want to change schools, you should always contact your child's current school, and schools you are considering applying for, to be sure you are making the right decision.

Asking for a school year that isn't normal for your child's date of birth

You need to complete the  request form [82KB]  in advance of your application. 

What happens after you send in your application

Upon receipt of an in-year application, we aim to notify applicants of the outcome in writing within 10 school days and not longer than 15 school days.

Where an applicant is offered a school place and the offer is accepted, the school will make arrangements for your child to start as soon as possible. A child who is currently without a school place will be offered a start date as soon as possible but always within 10 school days.

A child with a current school place within a reasonable distance, or a child who is being electively home educated, will also be offered a school place as soon as possible. This will normally be between 15 and 20 school days. It will not be longer than 20 days.
 

Children without a school place

If you move in to West Berkshire and your child's current school is too far away, we may have to refer your application to the council's   Fair Access Protocol [133KB] . This would normally only be necessary if you move to an area where all of the local schools are full.

Waiting lists

If we don't offer your first or other higher preference school, your child will be placed on a waiting list or lists. Waiting lists are always ranked using the oversubscription rules and not the date the application was received. If a place becomes available in a school we will offer it to the child who is first on the waiting list.
 

Making an appeal for a school place

You may decide to appeal against an admission decision for a school place. You should read all the information available before submitting an appeal.

Please also be aware that some schools already teach in classes of 30, which is the maximum allowed in Infant classes. An appeal for such a school is classified as an Infant Class Size Appeal and will normally only be successful if it can be proven that a mistake has been made and your child would have been offered a school place if the application had been processed correctly.
 

Oversubscription criteria

Oversubscription criteria are used when schools are already full and we need to set up a waiting list. The criteria enable us to give each application a priority. The priorities are based on a number of different things, such as School Catchment Areas and whether a child is a 'child in care' (or had been in care until adoption or a residence/special guardianship order).

The oversubscription criteria for West Berkshire community and voluntary controlled schools are provided on our Admission Arrangements page.

The criteria for academy, voluntary aided and foundation schools are available on the school's websites.

You may have to provide supplementary information or complete a supplementary form to meet certain over-subscription criteria. Supplementary forms are available for  St Finian's Catholic Primary School [59KB] , St. Joseph's Catholic School [92KB] , and St. Paul's Catholic School [111KB] .