School Enrollment Process

uncleseano

Heya, love the site. Lots of great info here. I´m still a little bit lost though. I´m a total newbie when it comes to school choosing and when to even register the lil one so any advice would be great.

We have a 16 month old wee girl and I was wondering what process should I follow to get interested in to have her enrolled in a primary school? What are the pit fall and over sights etc?

Mainly I would love to know at what age should she be registered as I heard the waiting lists can be kinda crazy.

Thanks again now bring on the advice!

uncleseano

Shameless Bump

Gatling

uncleseano wrote: »

Shameless Bump

Most people my wife included put there kids down in the first few weeks if not month or two to guarantee a place at your chosen school the earlier the better in my opinion

uncleseano

Gatling wrote: »

Most people my wife included put there kids down in the first few weeks if not month or two to guarantee a place at your chosen school the earlier the better in my opinion

That's madness. Better get on it so

byhookorbycrook

Each school has its own policy. If you are interested in a particular school, contact them and ask what their policy is.

uncleseano

I got a good list on schooldays website Better start this today so

Moonbeam

contact all the schools that you are interested in.
All schools set their own enrollment policy.
2 of our local school require the kids name to be down before 6 months old and they still might not get a place.

uncleseano

This breaks my heart

How Strange

Every school has a different policy but a lot of schools take names from the October before the child is due to start. The it may be down to catchment area, religion, siblings etc. We put our child's name down when he was 6 months so he was guaranteed a place but lot of neighbours put their kids names down between 2-3.5 years and most if not all were offered places in the 2nd and 3rd rounds. Our school is now part of a common enrolment scheme with the other local schools so you can only put the child's name down the October before they start and the child will be offered a place in the nearest school to where they live.

pwurple

It depends hugely where you live. If there is high demand for specific schools in your area, then the school might employ a waiting list as part of the policy. Or not.. None of us can say. The schools we applied to did not.

When putting the name down ask for a copy of the enrolment policy. Schools differ in this regard.

uncleseano

Ok thanks guys for all the help, gotta get on top of this now so.

Bakemate

The number of schools you need to apply to will also depend on what religion you are. If you're not Catholic and are surrounded by Catholic schools, that leaves you at the bottom of all their lists, as they can exclude children based on their religion in the event of over subscription. If you're in this situation, then you need to apply to pretty much every school within commuting distance.
Mod Snip *

byhookorbycrook

Bakemate wrote: »

The number of schools you need to apply to will also depend on what religion you are. If you're not Catholic and are surrounded by Catholic schools, that leaves you at the bottom of all their lists, as they can exclude children based on their religion in the event of over subscription. If you're in this situation, then you need to apply to pretty much every school within commuting distance.

This is not true,not all schools prioritise by religion. The website Bakemate wants you to use (which as mod I have removed ) does not have Dept of Education approval and is, in fact, a commercial venture of theirs that does not have any influence or standing in the enrollment process.