Parents and carers who have children who are due to start in Reception or to move to a Junior School in September 2023 are being given extra support to get ready for making their school place application.
This extra support includes an animated video with guidance on how to choose schools, and online webinars where they can get advice from the Warwickshire County Council school admissions team on how to submit a successful application.
Parents and carers with children born between 1 September 2018 and 31 August 2019 must submit their application for a place in a Reception class before the deadline of 15 January 2023. Last year, over 6,000 children applied for a Reception place in Warwickshire.
The 15 January deadline also applies to children who are currently in Year 2 at an infant school, who want to move to a junior school. This transfer does not happen automatically, even between schools with the same name, and so parents and carers must still submit an application.
For most parents and carers, applying for a school place is a simple process. However, to help increase the number of children who are offered a place at one of their preferred schools, Warwickshire County Council have produced a useful video full of advice and guidance for parents and carers on how to make their school choices and submit their application. For those parents and carers who want to learn more, or ask questions of the school admissions team, they are also holding two online webinars in early December, which are open to everyone and free to join.
Cllr Kam Kaur, portfolio holder for Education at Warwickshire County Council, explains: “Starting school for the first time and moving to a junior school can be a big transition, but it doesn’t need to be scary for parents or carers. There’s lots of advice and guidance available on how to decide which schools to include on the application, as well as information about the process itself. I’d especially encourage parents and carers to watch our new video on applying to a primary school and join us for one of our webinars if they can – and if they can’t, they can watch the recording back afterwards. It’s all part of our efforts to make this process as easy as possible for everyone and to make sure Warwickshire children are getting the best start to their education.”
Applications should be submitted at: www.warwickshire.gov.uk/primaryplace by 15 January. Those families that apply by the deadline will receive their child’s school offer on 17 April 2023, which is National Offer Day.
They key things for parents and carers to do are to look at the admissions criteria for each school they want to apply for, use at least three of the six preferences that they have available, including their priority school if they have one, and to submit their application by the 15 January deadline. Any application submitted after the 15 January deadline will only be considered once those submitted on time have been made offers, by which time many schools will be full, and the child is much less likely to be offered a place at their preferred school.
To watch the video, sign up to one of the webinars, or to submit an application, visit: https://www.warwickshire.gov.uk/primaryplace