Local Authority Report to The Schools Adjudicator from Local Authority to be provided by 30 June 2020 Report Cleared by: David Adams Interim Director of Education Telephone number: 03000 414989 Email: [email protected] Date submitted: 23/06/2020 By: Craig Chapman Interim Head of Fair Access Telephone number: 03000 415934 Email: [email protected] www.gov.uk/government/organisations/office-of-the-schools-adjudicator Please email your completed report to: [email protected] by 30 June 2020 and earlier if possible Contents Section 1 - Normal point of admission ................................................................................. 4 A. Co-ordination ................................................................................................................ 4 B. Looked after and previously looked after children ................................................. 4 C. Special educational needs and disabilities .............................................................. 6 Section 2 - In-year admissions .............................................................................................. 6 A. Co-ordination of in-year admissions ......................................................................... 6 B. Looked after children and previously looked after children .................................. 7 C. Children with special educational needs and/or disabilities ................................. 9 D. Fair access protocol .................................................................................................. 10 E. General comments on in-year admissions……………………………………………………. 12 Section 3 - Other matters ..................................................................................................... 13 Section 4 - Feedback ............................................................................................................ 14 Introduction and guidance on completing the report – Revised April 2020 1. Section 88P of the School Standards and Framework Act 1998 (the Act) requires every local authority to make an annual report to the adjudicator. The Chief Adjudicator then includes a summary of these reports in her annual report to the Secretary for State for Education. The School Admissions Code (the Code) sets out the requirements for reports by local authorities in paragraph 6. Paragraph 3.23 specifies what must be included as a minimum in the report to the adjudicator and makes provision for the local authority to include any other matters. This is a revised template issued in the light of the Covid-19 pandemic. 2. This template requests local authorities only for: 2 a) information about how admission arrangements in the area of the local authority serve the interests of looked after children and previously looked after children, children with disabilities and children with special educational needs, including any details of where problems have arisen; b) an assessment of the effectiveness of Fair Access Protocols and coordination in their area, including how many children were admitted to each school under them. 3. We would be grateful if local authorities would follow the approach used in statutory provisions and in the Department for Education Statistical First Release1 and the Education Middle School (England) Regulations 20022. 4. Local authorities are, of course, free to comment on any other matters not specifically addressed in this template if they wish to do so under section 3. The views expressed by local authorities in previous years also remain a matter of public record. 5. The report must be returned to the Office of the Schools Adjudicator by 30 June 2020. Information requested Section 1 - Normal point of admission A. Co-ordination 1 Department for Education Statistical First Release 2 The Education Middle School (England) Regulations 2002 3 i. How well did Not A large number of small Well with few Very coordination of the well problems or a major small problems well main admissions problem round work? Reception X Year 7 X Other relevant X years of entry ii. Please give examples to illustrate your answer if you wish: KCC invests considerable effort each and every year to ensure that the coordination operates correctly and that offers are made with a high level of accuracy. County- wide training sessions, detailed multi-stage guidance and a broad suite of validation processes ensured that both the secondary and reception rounds were completed with minimal problems. Where small misranking issues resulted in a child failing to be offered a place at a school they should otherwise have been offered on National Offer Day, these were resolved, and the necessary offers made to remove disadvantage. The COVID-19 pandemic and subsequent nationwide lockdown resulted in the entire co-ordinated admissions team working from home. This presented certain challenges to normal operations mostly related to accessing paperwork and printing resources in the admissions office, especially around Primary National Offer Day. A large reduction in the team’s reliance on paper in recent years and a robust online admissions portal for parents significantly reduced the impact of this crisis. B. Looked after and previously looked after children i. How well does the admissions system in your local authority area serve the interests of looked after children at normal points of admission? ☐ ☒ ☐ 3 Not at all ☐Not well ☐Well Very well Not applicable ii. How well do the admissions systems in other local authority areas serve the interests of children looked after by your local authority at normal points of admission? 3 ‘Not applicable’ will only be appropriate if there are no children falling within this definition. 4 ☐ ☒ ☐ 3 Not at all ☐Not well ☐Well Very well Not applicable iii. How well does your admissions system serve the interests of children who are looked after by other local authorities but educated in your area at normal points of admission? ☐ ☒ ☐ 3 Not at all ☐Not well ☐Well Very well Not applicable iv. How well does the admissions system in your local authority area serve the interests of previously looked after children at normal points of admission? ☐ ☒ ☐ 3 Not at all ☐Not well ☐Well Very well Not applicable v. Priority in admission arrangements for 2021 for adopted children previously in care abroad. Please comment on the use of a priority in admission arrangements for a child adopted who was previously in care abroad if you wish. Although KCC consulted to include this criterion for 2020 admissions arrangements this did not form part of the determined policy due to overwhelming resistance to proposals from interested parties. A small number of schools for whom KCC are not the admissions authority did include adopted children outside England as part of their 2021 determined admissions arrangements following their addition in during 2020 consultations. Kent remains open to the implementation of this criterion if this remains government’s intention, but it is likely that this will prove challenging without a clear legal driver to require its inclusion. vi. If you wish to please give any examples of good or poor practice or difficulties which exemplify your answers about the admission to schools of looked after and previously looked after children at the normal points of admission: Kent County Council’s admissions arrangements for Voluntary Controlled and Community schools give the highest priority to Looked After Children (LAC) irrespective of faith. While some Voluntary Aided schools continue to split their LAC applicants by faith this rarely results in an offer not being available as the nonfaith LAC criterion is still positioned higher than other non-faith applicants. KCC ensure, wherever possible, that LAC applicants are given the opportunity to be included in the first round of offers. This is to ensure our procedure reflects the unplanned or unexpected changes in circumstances for Looked After Children that can occur during the admissions round. 5 C. Special educational needs and disabilities i. Please provide any comments you wish to make on the admission of children with special educational needs and/or disabilities at the normal points of admission: Kent County Council’s admissions team acts as an intermediary between colleagues in Special Education Needs and schools to ensure EHCP placements are correctly communicated prior to national offer day. This can be complicated by EHCP statutory deadlines differing from those of admissions and the lack of an agreed framework for cross border EHCP placements. Section 2 - In-year4 admissions A. Co-ordination of in-year admissions Please provide any comments on the co-ordination of in year admissions if you wish. Kent do not co-ordinate in-year admissions, our team signpost parents to schools with spaces. Where they identify a child without a school place or a child whose parents are unable or unwilling to secure a school place, they refer these to our children missing education team. There are ongoing concerns regarding schools’ failure to follow the admissions guidance, for example, not informing the LA of an application and its outcome, or verbally informing a parent the school does not have a school place. Consequentially the parent has not then applied formally, removing their right of appeal. Appeals not being heard by an independent body or being heard at all. While KCC challenges this behaviour where it is identified, the current Code does not include sufficient provision to ensure that own admission authority