Children born in the summer face a ‘lottery’
School admission delays vary by area
PARENTS ACROSS the region hoping to delay their children being sent to school are subject to a postcode lottery, new figures obtained by The Yorkshire Post reveal.
Education Minister Nick Gibb announced in September 2015 that the Government intended to change admissions rules to prevent summer-born children from being forced to go straight into Year 1, providing greater flexibility for parents and teachers.
But data released under the Freedom of Information Act indicates that ongoing delays to the proposed reform has meant that councils have no clear guidance when it comes to making a decision.
From September 2014 up until April this year, there were 419 requests from parents to the county’s 15 local education authorities to delay the school start time for their summer-born children, with 335 applications approved and 80 rejected – almost a quarter. The figures show huge disparities across the region when it comes to approving requests, with some councils, including North Yorkshire and York, approving all of them and others, such as Leeds and Sheffield, granting the majority.
However, some are taking a tougher stance, with Kirklees rejecting almost half of its 37 applications during this period.
And when councils do agree to the delay, many are placing pupils straight into Year 1, rather than reception, according to campaigners.
One mother of premature summer-born twins, who suffer with severe anxiety issues, told
The Yorkshire Post how she had been forced to endure an eightmonth battle with Kirklees Council, which initially refused to allow the four-year-old girls to start reception a year later.
Now MP for Batley and Spen Tracy Brabin, who has a summer-born daughter, has called for more uniformity and transparency from councils.
Mrs Brabin, who has been helping Kirklees mother Laura Riach to secure a delayed reception start time for her twins, said: “It can’t be a postcode lottery, can it? I will be pushing for more open conversation around these decisions. It shouldn’t just be people in a locked room talking about a child’s future.
“There needs to be a kinder, more transparent and more consistent approach across local authorities. We all went the best for our children. A parent wouldn’t want to hold back their child unless their child really wasn’t ready.”
A Department for Education spokesperson said: “We want all children to have an equal chance to excel in school and are concerned that some children may be missing the reception year. We are carefully considering how best to address these issues and any impact this may have on the admissions system.”
WHEN Laura Riach decided to exercise her right to delay her fouryear-old twins’ start to school life, amid fears her summer-born identical daughters would struggle as the youngest in the class, she hoped the process would be straightforward.
But it soon became clear that the journey would be far from simple for the Yorkshire mother.
In February Kirklees Council told the 39-year-old that her little girls, who turned four just weeks before being due to start school in September, would instead have to go straight into Year 1, effectively missing a year of their education.
Now the twins are set to be given a place in reception at Mrs Riach’s top choice of school after the council accepted her appeal.
However, it has not been without its challenges, with Mrs Riach saying she had had to “jump through hoops” to provide evidence from health professionals to back up the request.
She is now calling for an end to the postcode lottery that sees some councils take a stricter stance than others on the issue.
Mrs Riach, from Gomersal, near Cleckheaton, said: “My twins were premature and they suffer with huge anxiety issues around school. That’s why we wanted to delay them a year.
“They are just not ready and are nowhere near where their brother was when he started school. I didn’t want them to miss reception because it is such a vital year.
“I think parents know their children best, it’s not a decision for a person that has never met them. The whole thing has been a huge mess to be honest, it has just been really horrible.”
Hoping to highlight the huge disparities among councils in the region in a bid to help other families, Mrs Riach added: “It shouldn’t be a postcode lottery. It is incredibly unfair. There are councils that say yes after 24 to 48 hours, and others where parents are battling for almost a year, and this is dependent on where you live.
“There’s no Government appeal process and it is very subjective based on the people involved.
“Some people just don’t understand it and don’t want to give parents that right.”
Mrs Riach said it had been two years since Schools Minister Nick Gibb put a letter out advising that there would be a consultation over when summer-born children could start school, and it still hadn’t been addressed.
“It’s leaving a lot of parents in a really horrendous place because local authorities are just interpreting it how they want to,” she said.
“I’ve been trying to move a mountain so we can help other families. I don’t want others to go through this.”
Department for Education (DfE) guidance says children in England must be in education from the term after their fifth birthday. But the law also allows for pupils to start school earlier.
As a result, most children begin their education by taking up a reception class place at the age of four. But the DfE guidance brought in two years ago gives
I’ve been trying to move a mountain so we can help other families. Mother of summer-born twins Laura Riach, from Gomersal.
flexibility to parents of those born between April 1 and August 31 to wait until the September after their fifth birthday if they feel that they need more time to develop.
The rule was introduced after research showed summerborn children were more likely to struggle at school, do worse in exams and have less chance of getting into university.
But some councils are still sending youngsters straight into Year 1 – skipping reception altogether – if their parents hold them back.
They say “exceptional” circumstances must be proved to allow the child to start in reception. This means the child has only six years of education instead of seven before moving to secondary school, therefore wiping out much of the intended benefit.
Mr Gibb launched a review in 2015 to investigate the admission rules for summer-born children.
That September he announced the Government would amend the admissions code so schools had to admit summer-born fiveyear-olds into reception classes. But a consultation over the plans has still not been launched.
IT IS hard not to have sympathy with both parents and local authorities when considering the thorny issue of when children born in the summer months should start school.
An investigation by The Yorkshire Post reveals how a lack of clear guidance from the Government seems to created a postcode lottery on the issue of children who would otherwise be the youngest in their year being allowed to join school later and not miss out on the valuable time in a reception class that their peers enjoy.
While some councils are approving all such requests in the wake of a Government announcement in September 2015, others are rejecting the majority of applications. It is undoubtedly a complicated issue, not least because there has to be a cut-off point at some stage, but the figures appear to suggest that local authorities are essentially making policy arbitrarily.
The Department for Education acknowledges as much when it says that it is “carefully considering” how to address the concerning issue of some children missing out on the reception year.
Education begins at home and should be a partnership between schools, children and parents if it is to be a success. While children do develop at different rates, with some thriving early despite being among the youngest in their class and others doing better later on at school, it is clear that there should be a level playing field so everyone is subject to the same rules, no matter where they happen to live.