Admission Criteria

Download Admission criteria

Children with a Statement of Special Educational Needs

If your child has a Statement of Special Educational Needs they will be admitted to the school named in the Statement.

Oversubscription criteria

When more applications are received than there are places available, the following criteria will be used to decide which pupils are offered a place at an Islington community school in the order listed below:

1. Children looked after
   This refers to children who are in the care of a local authority and children who have been adopted (or made subject to residence orders or special guardianship orders) immediately after being looked after.
2. Siblings
   A sibling is defined as a brother or sister, half-brother or sister, step-brother or sister or adopted brother or sister whose main residence is at the same address. Applicants who have a sibling living at the same address who will be on the roll of the school between reception class to Year 6 at the time of proposed admission in the new academic year.
3. Social/medical
   The Director of Children’s Services may give priority to applicants who can demonstrate that admission to a particular school is necessary on the grounds of professionally supported medical, social or special educational needs. Parents must supply details of any such special factors at the time of the original application together with recent supporting documentation, for these factors to be considered.If your child has an exceptional social (for example protection/safeguarding issues) or medical need (for example if your child requires wheelchair access) to attend a specific school, then please provide professional evidence (e.g. from a doctor or educational psychologist) and a letter from you explaining why this is the only school that can meet your child’s needs.Your case will be considered by a panel comprising of a senior admissions officer, educational psychologist and school representative. The panel will consider the evidence presented and consult relevant professionals as necessary to determine:
   1. whether your child has an exceptional social or medical need and
   2. that this need can only be met by a specific school.
      Please note late applicants applying under social/medical criterion can be prioritised only on the waiting list.
4. Distance
   Applicants will be prioritised by distance (starting with the nearest). Nearness to schools is measured on a computerised mapping system using a straight line distance measurement. Routes will be calculated from the home address (as defined by the Land and Property Gazetteer) to the midpoint of the school grounds (as determined by the London Borough of Islington).Please note distance will be used as a tiebreaker for criteria 1, 2 and 3.How we calculate home to school distances
   We use the Capita ONE system to calculate the distance from your child’s home (the start point) to the school (the end point). This system calculates the distance in miles to three decimal places. The routing database system uses two dimensional maps. This means it does not take into account any contours or terrains.The start point (applicant’s home)
   For calculation purposes, the local authority uses the National Land and Property Gazetteer (NLPG) database to determine the start point from the applicants address. Calculations are based on the assumption that the child’s home address is classified at the point of application as a residential property. If you live in a block of flats where you use a communal entrance, the local authority will use the NLPG point for the block and not the centroid of your individual flat for the distance calculation.The end point (school)
   The centre of the school grounds is used as the end point for calculation purposes of home to school distance as defined by the local authority.

   Please note that you cannot compare distances produced on the local authority’s Capita ONE system to those calculated using any personal or online geographical information system software you may have access to such as satellite navigations system or Google maps.

   Islington residents can obtain an approximate distance measurement to any Islington school by clicking on ‘Find My Nearest Schools’ at the following address: www.islington,gov.uk/admissions.

   Alternatively, you can call the School Admissions team for an approximate measurement on 020 7527 5515.

Multiple births

Key stage 1

If only one place is available at the school in reception class, Year 1 or Year 2 and the next child who qualifies for a place is one of multiple-birth siblings, schools will go over their published admission number to support the family. These children will be deemed ‘excepted’ pupils under KS1 class size legislation.

Key stage 2

For pupils in year 3-6, if only one place is available at the school and the next child who qualifies for a place is one of multiple birth siblings, we will ask community schools to admit the siblings and go over their published admission number to support the family.

Tie break

If only one place is available and two or more children qualify for that place, the child who is offered the place will be determined by random allocation using a computerised system.

Further advice

The School Admissions team will be pleased to help you and can be contacted on 020 7527 5515