SCHOOL ADMISSIONS:

The New Framework

February 2003

Introduction

The Education Act 2002 introduced wide-ranging changes in the law relating to school admissions. The regulations giving effect to the changes came into effect in the last few weeks, accompanied by much misleading press coverage on the subject of admissions to Catholic schools. This statement is intended to redress the balance by giving some facts about the recent changes in the law.

The Aim of the Changes

·       The government are introducing widespread reforms to the way in which all schools handle admissions. The aim of these reforms is to make admissions to all schools fairer for all parents and children. The Archdiocese of Westminster supports this aim.

The Rights of Catholic Governing Bodies

·       Under the new regulations, governing bodies of Catholic schools remain admission authorities and retain the right to decide and apply their own admission arrangements. As before, local education authorities must be consulted, but do not have any power over these arrangements.

·       The Church has successfully resisted moves to restrict the right and duty of Catholic governing bodies to give priority to Catholics. Despite proposals to the contrary from the government and others, this right is retained intact, and the Archdiocese of Westminster will continue to defend it whenever and wherever necessary.

Interviews

·       Church schools are currently the only type of schools which are allowed to use interviews for the purposes of admissions.

·       Every year the bishops receive many complaints from parents about the use of interviews. The very process causes anxiety for applicants and their families, and is often perceived as being unfair or divisive.  However wrongly, many people, Catholics and others, believe that interviews are being used as a means of covert academic or social selection (see e.g. The Times, 1st February 2003, TES 7th February 2003).

·       The Bishops of England and Wales, together with the Church of England, support the phasing out of interviews as a permitted part of the admissions procedures to Church schools. In doing so, they seek to ensure that all Catholic families applying to Catholic schools do so on a level playing field.

Consultations

·       This policy to phase out interviews has been held by the Bishops for at least ten years. The Church has set out its policy in numerous public consultations. It requested the removal of interviews in consultations on the 1998 Code of Practice, and again in the consultations on admissions in 2001 and 2002. It is only in the last round of consultations that the government has accepted the Church’s views.

·       The Archdiocese of Westminster consulted all schools on its response to the government consultation on admissions in November 2001. Our draft response to the consultation, which was drawn to the attention of all schools in our Schools Bulletin, included our long-standing support for the Bishops’ policy on interviews, as did the final version of our response.

·       The government’s more recent consultation on the draft regulations and codes of practice on admissions was very short. Unfortunately the government failed to send the document to all schools. The diocese was unable to consult more than about a fifth of its schools, and pointed this out in its response, but the policy of the diocese and of the Bishops remained the same as before.

·       A large number of Catholic schools in the diocese do not use interviews. Many more are of the view that the interview adds little to the admissions process. A large number of schools and clergy have stated their support for their removal from the process.

Priests’ References

·       The Archdiocese of Westminster is confident that, where necessary, schools will continue to be able to assess the faith practice of children by means of an objective reference from the parish priest. It is working with neighbouring dioceses to increase the support given to priests to ensure greater consistency of references across the diocese.

·       The diocese believes that the new arrangements will be more transparent to parents and will enable them to have confidence in the admissions procedures.  They will also help to quash any myths that Catholic schools, through covert selection, have a more favoured intake than other maintained schools.

·       Archbishop Vincent Nichols, Chairman of the Catholic Education Service, said: “Catholic schools have a mission to serve Catholic children of every race and background. The decision to move away from interviews has been made to ensure that the admissions process is as transparent and fair as possible and I believe it will be successful in achieving these aims.”

Co-ordination of Admissions Arrangements

·       The new Education Act also provides for the co-ordination of admissions to all maintained schools. Put simply this means that all LEAs will co-ordinate both parents’ applications and schools’ offers to ensure that, on a single “offer date” each applicant will be offered a single place in accordance with their expressed preference. In parts of the diocese where this already happens on a voluntary basis, experience is that more Catholics receive places at Catholic schools. This will be a complex task to accomplish, especially in London.

·       The diocese is working closely with its neighbouring dioceses and its nineteen local education authorities to ensure that co-ordinated admission arrangements are introduced smoothly. The diocese will seek to ensure that statutory schemes for the co-ordination of admissions do not impinge on the rights of Catholic governing bodies and maximise choice for Catholic parents.

Admission Forums

·       The new legislation also creates a new statutory Admission Forum in every local education authority area. These new bodies have a number of important functions centring around coherence and co-operation on local admission arrangements. The diocese is working hard to ensure that there is full Catholic representation on each one of these forums. In the Archdiocese of Westminster there will be diocesan representation at officer level on all nineteen Admission Forums.

·       The diocese expects all Catholic governing bodies to work with other local Catholic schools to ensure that the overall effect of their admission arrangements is the best possible service to the local Catholic community.