How to appeal a school place in England
How to appeal a refused school place in England: the deadline, the hearing, the two-stage test, infant class size rules and how many appeals succeed.
If your child is refused a place at a state school you applied for, you can appeal. Write to the admission authority named in your refusal letter before its deadline, which must be at least 20 school days after the letter was sent, and explain why your child should be admitted. An independent panel hears the appeal, and its decision is binding: if it upholds your appeal, the school must admit your child.
Appeals do succeed, but most do not. For places starting in September 2025, 15.0% of primary appeals and 19.5% of secondary appeals heard by a panel were successful, according to the Department for Education. This guide explains the deadlines, what happens at the hearing, the test the panel applies, the stricter rules for infant classes, and how to give your child the best chance.
The appeal timeline at a glance
These are the minimum standards in the School Admission Appeals Code, which every panel must follow. Your admission authority must publish its own appeals timetable on its website by 28 February each year, so check it for the actual dates.
| Stage | What the Code requires |
|---|---|
| Lodging your appeal | At least 20 school days from the date the refusal letter is sent |
| Notice of the hearing | At least 10 school days, unless you agree to less |
| Hearing, on-time applications | Within 40 school days of the deadline for lodging appeals |
| Hearing, late applications | Within 40 school days of the lodging deadline where possible, or within 30 school days of your appeal |
| Hearing, in-year applications | Within 30 school days of your appeal |
| Hearing, sixth form places that depended on exam results | Within 30 school days of the results being confirmed |
| Decision letter | Within 5 school days of the hearing wherever possible |
For September 2027 entry, national offer day is Monday 1 March 2027 for secondary schools and Friday 16 April 2027 for primary schools, so most normal-round appeal deadlines fall in the weeks after those dates.
Who to appeal to and how
You appeal to the admission authority for the school, not to the school you were offered. That is usually the local authority for community and voluntary-controlled schools, the governing body for foundation and voluntary-aided schools, and the academy trust for academies and free schools. Your refusal letter must give the reason your child was refused, your right to appeal, the deadline and who to contact.
Set out your grounds in writing and attach your evidence. The admission authority cannot limit the grounds you use, and it must comply with reasonable requests for information you need to prepare, such as how the oversubscription criteria were applied to your application. Appeal each refusal separately: you can appeal for as many schools as you were refused, but only once for each school in the same academic year.
If you miss the deadline, your appeal must still be heard, but it will follow the later timetable the admission authority has published, which can matter if places are filling from the waiting list.
If your child has an education, health and care (EHC) plan, a disagreement about the school named in it, or no school being named, goes to the First-tier Tribunal (SEND), not an admission appeal panel.
What happens at the appeal hearing
The panel has a chair and at least two other members, and must include at least one lay person and at least one person with experience in education, knowledge of local schools or a child at school. Nobody with a connection to the school that could raise doubts about their impartiality can sit on it, and nor can anyone involved in refusing your child. An independent clerk advises the panel on the law.
Before the hearing you receive the appeal papers, including the admission authority's case. The hearing notice tells you whether it is in person, by video or a mix of the two. A presenting officer explains why your child was refused and why the school cannot take another pupil, and you can ask them questions. You then present your case and answer the panel's questions.
You can present your case yourself: you do not have to be represented. You can bring a friend for support or be represented if you prefer. GOV.UK points parents to Child Law Advice, which may be able to give you advice about appeals.
The two-stage test the panel uses
For most appeals, where the school says it is full, the panel works through two stages.
- Were the rules lawful and correctly applied, and would one more child cause real harm? The panel must uphold your appeal at this stage if the admission arrangements were unlawful or were not applied correctly and your child would have been offered a place otherwise. It must also uphold it if admitting another child would not prejudice the efficient provision of education or the efficient use of resources. Reaching the published admission number is not enough on its own: the admission authority has to show harm beyond that.
- Does your case outweigh the harm to the school? If the panel accepts there would be prejudice, it balances that against your reasons, including what this school can offer your child that the allocated school and other schools cannot. If your case outweighs the prejudice, the panel must uphold your appeal.
This is why a strong appeal is about your child and this particular school, not general unhappiness with the offer.
Infant class size appeals
Different rules apply in Reception, Year 1 and Year 2. By law, infant classes must not have more than 30 pupils per school teacher. When a school refuses a place because admitting your child would breach that limit, the panel can uphold your appeal only if:
- admitting your child would not in fact take the class above 30
- the admission arrangements were unlawful or were not applied correctly, and your child would otherwise have been offered a place
- the decision to refuse was one no reasonable admission authority would have made in the circumstances
That last ground is a high bar. The Code says the decision must be perverse in the light of the admission arrangements, not simply harsh or disappointing. The panel cannot weigh your family's reasons against the school's in the usual way. That helps explain why only 8.1% of appeals heard for infant classes succeeded for September 2025 entry, compared with 26.4% for older primary year groups.
A school can go over 30 only for limited "excepted pupils" set out in the School Admissions Code. These include children admitted outside the normal admissions round with an EHC plan naming the school, looked-after and previously looked-after children admitted outside the normal round, children of UK service personnel admitted outside the normal round, a twin or other multiple-birth sibling of a child admitted normally, and children admitted after an appeal is upheld or because of a procedural error.
Grammar school and sixth form appeals
For a grammar school, if you believe your child did not perform at their best in the entrance test, the panel needs evidence that your child is of the required academic standard, such as school reports or a letter from their current school explaining why they are of grammar school ability. If the admission authority ran a local review of test results before places were allocated, the panel only checks that the review was fair, consistent and objective. Our guide to the 11-plus explains how the tests and pass marks work.
For a school sixth form, if your child was refused for missing the entry requirements, the panel does not reassess their ability. It decides whether the school's decision was reasonable on the information it had. If they met the requirements but the sixth form was oversubscribed, the normal two-stage test applies.
How to build a strong appeal
A good case is specific, factual and backed by documents.
- Check the arrangements first. Ask how the oversubscription criteria were applied to your child, and check the distance measurement, the sibling link and the home address used. A mistake that would have won your child a place is the strongest ground there is. Our guide to catchment areas and distance explains how distance is usually measured.
- Explain what this school offers your child. Link your child's needs to something this school provides and the offered school does not, with evidence such as letters from a doctor, social worker or current teacher.
- Cover practical points honestly. Travel, childcare or a sibling already at the school can help, especially with documents such as journey times or an employer's letter.
- Send everything by the evidence deadline. The hearing notice sets a deadline for further evidence, and the panel may not consider anything you bring later.
Some things will not help. The panel cannot take account of your child's place on the waiting list, or of other parents not appealing, and it must not accept letters of support from the school you are appealing for. For an infant class size appeal, focus only on the three legal grounds above.
After the decision
The decision letter must explain the panel's reasons. If your appeal is upheld, the school must admit your child. If it is dismissed, you cannot appeal again for the same school in the same academic year, unless, in exceptional circumstances, the admission authority accepts a new application because of a significant and material change in your family's, your child's or the school's circumstances and refuses it again. You can apply again for a later academic year, with a fresh right of appeal.
You cannot complain about the decision itself, but you can complain about how the appeal was run, for example if the panel did not follow the correct procedure or did not act fairly. For maintained schools, complain to the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman. For academies and free schools, use the Department for Education's academy appeal panel complaint form. Either may recommend a new hearing with a different panel. Only the courts, through judicial review, can overturn a panel's decision.
Keep your other options open
Accept the place you were offered while you appeal. GOV.UK is clear that accepting another offer has no bearing on your appeal. Stay on the waiting lists for the schools you preferred too, because a place can come up at any time and some appeals are withdrawn for exactly that reason. Our guide to how school waiting lists work explains how they are ranked.
FindMySchool can help you plan a fallback alongside the appeal:
- Use the school search and map to find other schools near you, and open any profile for its FMS Inspection score and catchment distance data, where available.
- Try School Match for a shortlist based on what matters to your family. You sign in with a free account just before your results, and your top match on your first search is free.
- Read the full admissions guide and the primary or secondary timeline to understand the criteria a panel will check.
Before the hearing, do three things: confirm your appeal and evidence deadlines, write a focused case about your child and this school with the evidence attached, and keep your waiting-list places active.
Frequently asked questions
Yes. If your child is refused a place at a state school you applied for, you have the right to appeal to an independent panel. You appeal each refusal separately and can appeal for more than one school, but you can only appeal once for each school in the same academic year.