Today parents will hear about secondary school place applications – online today or via 1st class post tomorrow.

For the whole of Southwark 58.7% of parents  have received their first choice. A smidgen up on last years 55.9%.  But this represents the fifth worst performance in the whole country.

Overall for London 71%, Lambeth and Lewisham managed 66%, Merton 65% and Wansworth 56%.

Overall 6.9% of Southwark parents were allocated a school they hadn’t chosen, down a little from last years 8%.

But it’s likely that across London more families obtained their first choice – last year 66% across London leaving Southwark some distance behind.

We’re trying to find out this data specifically for East Dulwich.

Any of 6 stated preferences – Southwark parents and carers had 93% success obtaining one of their up to 6 stated preferences whereas the average for London last year (we don’t yet have this years) was 95% with 88% offered one of their top 3 choices. So Southwark still has a long way to g o and with a pending secondary school places crisis is likely to get considerably worse. That’s why we think our area needs another excellent secondary school.

If you didn’t get the school you wanted a large number of places aren’t accepted and become free so a lot of shuffling of places is still to come so please don’t despair. Parents can go on waiting lists for schools they’d prefer a lot of movement usually occurs between now and September.

If you need support you can either contact the Councils School Preference Advisor Liam White liam.white@southwark.gov.uk they’ll also be drop-in sessions TBA.

OR  if you need any help or support around secondary admissions (or any other issue) please either call or email me or one of my colleagues:

James Barber james.barber@southwark.gov.uk 07900 227366
Jonathan Mitchell jonathan.mitchell@southwark.gov.uk 07903 967911
Rosie Shimell Rosie.Shimell@southwark.gov.uk 020 7525 3488

We’re available for home visits and have reserved time over this weekend and next week specifically for this.