Help! for you all you wise people in here :)

[Alan]

hey alan ... so thankful that you replied, my appeal is for a catholic school near us, they sent me the paperwork and they are so full! problem is my son is going to be in year 10 this september, works in top sets in all subjects and according to the school all of the core subjects that my son needs to be at this september is full... they sent me and my husband some paperwork that for the life of us we do not understand.. something to do with net capacity! here in ipswich there are so little schools that do well in ofsted reports, most of he school here is crap. but maybe i left it too late to try to move him school? this is my son from my ex husband btw, we use to share custody but when my son turned 14 he moved in with me and my husband.
his current school is like 3 and half miles away, i take him to school and back as there is no direct bus that would take him to school everyday, and with traffice it takes us half an hour sometimes more if there is an accident.

please give me some tips on how i can get him in our preferred school... thanks so much in advance!

You may find this hard to believe - but it is absolutely the truth.
The roll of a school is determined by square footage of the school premises, so, so many square feet in a school building, so many pupils can be accepted.

I am not really the one to ask as to how you can 'get past' the Appeals Panel, as I was always the one submitting against the appeal as my school was full. When I used to lose my appeals, no reason was ever given to me by the Local Education Authority (LEA) - who - incidentally - had set the maximum roll for my school in the first place

Perhaps the best avenue for you is, as I mentioned before, the socio/economic one. I appreciate that your child is very bright and deserves the best - I am 100% behind you on that!!

Nevertheless, the LEA are not academics, nor do they have much experience of education. They are merely bureaucrats who 'follow a script.'

Sorry - not much help to you I'm afraid. Best of luck!

Al.