Memorandum from Mrs J P Urquhart
1. The issue I would like to raise is the
difficulty in getting a place at the school of your choice on
return to the UK.
2. I have three children, two now at boarding
school and one at an SCE school in Germany.
3. All three have been to SCE schools and
all of their education had been abroad until we had a home posting
three years ago. We were lucky as we managed to get the two younger
ones into the school of our choice whilst the eldest was starting
boarding school, however there were other people in the same "patch"
who were unable to get a place at the same school for their children
as the classes were full.
4. The problem is this:
— Many service families move in
the summer holidays in order to change schools at the end of a
year rather than part way through. We are generally given up to
six months notice of posting and up to four months notice of a
quarter address—however both these timings are often considerably
shorter.
— Applications for school places
generally close in October for secondary schools and January for
Primary Schools and most schools require an address to consider
your child for a place. If your posting date is in July or August,
you often have no idea where you will be posted until after the
closing date for applications for most schools! Thus when you
apply for a place at your preferred school, if it is a good school,
it is often oversubscribed before you have even applied.
— Because LEAs always have a place
somewhere, there is always a school for your child, but it generally
is not at the most popular schools as they are already full. This
means that the element of parental choice often does not exist
for service families and they are forced to accept places at schools
which may well not be their local school and which are generally
considered to be a "less good" school that the one they
might have chosen in different circumstances. It can also mean
complicated journeys involving different buses just to get there.
This, on top of the disruption to their education that Service
children inevitably suffer, makes it hard for service children
to achieve their potential.
— The probability of being unable
to get a place at a school of our choice in the UK is one of the
main reasons we have taken the boarding school option for our
children. Even with the generous allowances available, this is
still a significant financial decision and one which many families
cannot afford to take, so their children have no choice but to
to take up the places at unpopular schools. Parental choice is
not a reality for many service families.
3 April 2006
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