Information for parents/carers thinking of submitting an appeal where:
- a class is already full; AND
- the class has reached the infant class size limit.
Your letter refusing a place will explain if the infant class size limit was a factor in the school place being refused.
It is important for you to read this guidance before making a decision about whether or not to submit an appeal. This is because the majority of infant class size appeals are unsuccessful.
Infant class size limit
An infant class is a class where the majority of children will reach the age of 5, 6 or 7 during the school year. The law states that infant classes must not contain more than 30 pupils with a single school teacher.
Personal circumstances considered by an appeal panel
A parent/carer can appeal for a place in an infant class that has already reached 30. The panel’s task is to review the decision that has been made.
Children can only be admitted over 30 in very limited circumstances.
The panel does not have the flexibility to say that your personal circumstances mean that your child should have a place in a class already at 30. The majority of infant class size appeals are unsuccessful because of this.
What will the panel consider if I decide to appeal?
There are two stages to infant class size appeals. The panel may only decide that your child should be offered a place at the first stage if:
- it finds that the admission of extra children would not breach the infant class size limit; or
- it finds that the admission authority:
- made a mistake in setting or applying the admission arrangements and
- your child would otherwise have been offered a place; or
- it decides that the decision to refuse admission was ‘perverse in light of the published admission arrangements’.
The threshold for ‘perverse’ is very high. It means that the refusal was completely unreasonable. This is taking into account the law and the school's admission arrangements.
What makes infant class size appeals different to other school admission appeals?
The panel does not have the flexibility to say that your personal circumstances mean that your child should have a place in a class already at 30. The vast majority of infant class size appeals are unsuccessful because of this.
This makes an infant class size appeal different to other school admission appeals.
Can children ever be admitted to an infant class that has already reached 30?
The Government has listed the very limited circumstances in which a child could be admitted over the 30 limit as an ‘excepted pupil’.
These include children in care and children with an Education, Health and Care Plan. See the School Admissions Code 2021, paragraph 2.16, for more details. If a child leaves the year group, the class size and its limit would return to 30.
