The Bilingual Primary School

Admissions at Bilingual Primary School

Please contact Brighton and Hove School’s Admissions Team for applications in all year groups including the annual September Reception admissions.

• Contact details for Brighton & Hove School’s Admissions Team:
  • Email: SchoolAdmissions@brighton-hove.gov.uk
  • Telephone: (01273) 293653
  • Please click here for the Council website

Please see the document below for our admissions policy.

When the school is oversubscribed, priority for admission will be given to those children who meet the criteria set out below, in order:

Priority 1: Children in the care of a Local Authority (looked after children) and previously looked after children

Priority 2: Children with a medical need requiring admission to this school only (see Supplementary Information below)

Priority 3: Children of staff members who have worked here for 2+ years

Priority 4: Children with a sibling at the school

Other children - Random allocation will apply thereafter as a tie-breaker for children living in the postcodes: BN1, all BN2 codes, BN3 and BN41. Places will only be allocated by ballot to children living outside these postcodes if there are still places remaining when all the children living within them have been awarded a place.

Note: Being a Spanish speaker will not be a criterion for admission.

The School’s Admissions team will operate a waiting list for each year group. When, in any year, the Bilingual School receives more applications for places than there are places available, a waiting list will operate.

If you have not been offered a place at your first preference school, your child’s name will be placed on the waiting list for that school.  Your child’s name will be removed from the waiting list at Christmas 2019.  If you wish your child’s name to remain on the list after Christmas, you will need to contact the admissions team at the end of the autumn term 2019 and each subsequent term. 

A child's position on the waiting list will be determined solely in accordance with the oversubscription criteria. When places become vacant, they will be allocated to children on the waiting list in accordance with the oversubscription criteria.  In the event of more than one child falling within the same oversubscription criteria available places will be subject to random allocation by Brighton & Hove School’s Admissions team.

To appeal against a decision on an application, parents/carers must contact the school for an appeals form, which must then be returned to the school. The appeal will be managed by an independent appeals panel.

Contact details for appeals forms:

• Email: info@bilingualprimaryschool.org.uk
• Bilingual Primary School, The Droveway, Hove, BN3 7QA
• Telephone: (01273) 916212 
• Where a child is not successful in achieving an offer of a place, the child’s parents will be told the reason why admission was refused and that they are entitled to appeal to an independent admission appeal panel within a specified amount of time under the provisions of the School Standards and Framework Act 1998. The school will provide information to parents about the appeals process and provide the parents with a named contact who can answer any enquiries they may have about the appeals process. Parents lodging an appeal must set out the grounds of the appeal in writing. 
• The admission appeal panel will be independent of the school.
• The determination of the admission appeal panel will be made in accordance with the Schools Admission Appeals Code 2012 and will be binding on all parties.

Priority 2: Children with Medical Need requiring admission to this school only

Children for whom the Bilingual Primary School is the only school that is appropriate for the child to attend because of the child’s medical needs will be allocated places under this priority. Applications within the category must be supported with evidence from an appropriate professional. It is vital that you supply any supporting evidence for compelling medical reasons for admission by the closing date. It is up to you to provide this evidence. A decision on whether to admit a child under this priority will be made by the Admissions Panel who will take care to apply a consistent approach to all such applications received.

Priority 4: Children with a sibling at the school

A sibling will include a full brother or sister (with the same two parents), a half brother or sister (with one parent in common), a step brother or sister (with different parents but with one parent of each child who are married to the other), an adopted brother or sister, a foster brother or sister, the children of a parent’s partner where the parent and their partner are co-habiting, or any other child of the family, but in all cases the sibling must be being brought up with the applicant child as a sibling within the same core family unit, and their main residence must be at the same address as the child for whom the application is made. For the avoidance of doubt, other children within the family (for example, cousins) who live at the same address because several members of the child’s extended family (for example, aunts and uncles) also live there, will not be regarded as siblings for the purpose of this priority. A parent will include the natural or adoptive father or mother, the foster father or mother, or the legal guardian or person with parental responsibility for the child and with whom the child lives.

Twins and Children from Multiple Births

Where a child who is a twin or a child from a multiple birth has achieved a place in the usual way, but there are no places remaining to admit their twin or siblings from a multiple birth, the school will admit the twin or siblings from a multiple birth over and above the academy’s published admission number (PAN). In those cases, those additional children admitted over the PAN will be admitted as “excepted pupils” and will not count towards the statutory maximum class size.

The school admits “rising five” children, which means that children will normally be admitted to Reception Year at the school in the September following their fourth birthday. A child does not, however, reach compulsory school age until the first prescribed day on or following their fifth birthday. The prescribed days are 31 December, 31 March and 31 August. 

Following the offer and acceptance of a place, parents can defer the date that their child takes up their place, or decide that their child will attend school part-time, until their child reaches compulsory school age or (for children born between 1 April and 31 August) until the beginning of the summer term of that academic year, without their child losing their place.

If you decide to defer admission, you must inform your allocated school when you accept the place.

Where a place is deferred, it cannot be given to another child, but the child must enter school both:

• by the beginning of the school term following their fifth birthday and
• in the school year for which the offer was made

If your child’s fifth birthday falls between:

• 1 September 2020 and 31 December 2020, they would normally start school in September 2020. However, you may defer until January 2021.  
• 1 January 2021 and 31 March 2021, they may start school in September 2020 or you can ask to defer admission until the beginning of January 2021 or until after Easter 2021.
• 1 April 2021 and 31 August 2021 and you choose not to send your child to school until the September following their fifth birthday, an application under the 2021/22 admissions policy will be required and will normally be considered for Year 1 rather than a Reception class. Parents should keep in mind that there is a high possibility that there will not be any available places in Year 1 the following year.

Admission of Summer Born Children outside of their Normal Age Range

Parents of children born between 1 April and 31 August (referred to as “summer born children”) may decide that they want to delay their child starting school until the September after the child has reached compulsory school age on 31 August. However, any place already achieved for the child in Reception Year in the usual way cannot be deferred (i.e. held for that child) for the duration of that school year, and parents will need to re-apply for admission the following year. Such applications will be considered with all other applications in the usual way, applying the oversubscription criteria for that year as necessary. As a place cannot be held for their child in Reception Year, Parents of summer born children may request that their child is admitted the following year outside of his or her normal age range into Reception Year instead of Year 1, however there is no automatic right to this. The school will make a decision, having taken into account the circumstances of each case. Where the request is agreed by the school, the application will be considered with all other applications in the usual way, applying the oversubscription criteria as necessary.

In-year Admission and Applications to Other Year Groups

The Bilingual Primary School participates in the Local Authority’s co-ordinated in-year admissions scheme and follows the protocol set within it. Applications for admission to year groups other than Reception Year, and applications for in-year admission, must be made directly to the Council. Once the application has been received, if there are no places available within the relevant year group, the child’s name will be added to the waiting list in accordance with the procedure set out above.