The hardest primary schools to get a place at in Cardiff The most oversubscribed schools
MAKING an application for your child’s primary school place can be a daunting process for many parents.
And in Cardiff, even living within a school’s catchment area is sometimes not enough to secure a place.
A total of 531 applications were turned down for 2020-21, and 14 schools were oversubscribed.
The most oversubscribed school in the city for 2020-21 was Cyncoed’s Rhydypenau Primary School, which had 105 applications for 60 places.
Only people living within 0.58 miles of the school, which is close to the city’s most oversubscribed secondary school – Cardiff High School – secured a place.
Last year’s most oversubsribed primary school – Pontprennau – was second most popular this time around.
The school, which opened in 2015, previously hit the headlines when parents queued overnight to get their children a school breakfast club place.
The new figures cover every primary school across the city and show the number of children who missed out on places for September 2020.
Cardiff operates a system where the criteria falls in the following order:
■ children who are looked after by the local authority;
■ children allocated a funded individual development plan;
■ children with a sibling already in the school – with priority “given to multiple birth siblings”;
■ children with compelling medical or social grounds; and
■ children living nearest the nursery school/ class as measured by the shortest available walking route.
■■ 1. Rhydypenau Primary School
■■ 2. Pontprennau Primary School
■■ 3. Rhiwbeina Primary School
■■ 4. Marlborough Primary School
The only an■■ 5. Lakeside Primary School
■■ 6. Llanishen Fach Primary School
■■ 7. Pen-Y-Bryn Primary School
■■ 8. Pencaerau Primary School
■■ 9. Ysgol Mynydd Bychan
■■ 10. Mount Stuart Primary School
■■How oversubscribed were the rest of Cardiff’s primary schools? ... and Herbert Thompson Primary School, Ysgol Gynradd Gwaelod Y Garth Primary (Welsh), and Ysgol Gynradd Gwaelod Y Garth Primary (English) all refused one application each.
■■ If a school is not listed above then all pupils who applied were given a place or they still have spaces available.