How to apply

As an Academy, Meadowhead School is its own admission authority. However, the school has chosen to retain the Local Authority’s admission arrangements, and applications for admission are handled by the Secondary Admissions Team at Sheffield City Council.

For applications in the normal admissions round you should use the application form provided by your home local authority (regardless of which local authority the schools are in). You can use this form to express your preference for a minimum of 3 state-funded schools, in rank order.

You will receive an offer for a school place directly from your local authority.

Requests for admission outside the normal age group

Parents are entitled to request a place for their child outside of their normal age group.

You can ask for your child to be educated with a different age group. This could be because they are gifted and talented or have experienced problems such as ill-health.

If your child already attends school, you can ask the Headteacher about this. If your child is not yet on a school roll, please contact the Local Authority for information and advice.

Decisions on requests for admission outside the normal age group will be made on the basis of the circumstances of each case and in the best interests of the child concerned. In accordance with the School Admissions Code, this will include taking account of:

• Parents’ views
• Information about the child’s academic, social and emotional development
• Where relevant, their medical history and the views of a medical professional
• Whether they have previously been educated out of their normal age group
• Whether they may naturally have fallen into a lower age group if it were not for being born prematurely
• The Headteacher’s views

Wherever possible, requests for admission outside a child’s normal age group will be processed as part of the main admissions round. They will be considered on the basis of the admission arrangements laid out in the Admissions policy (below), including the oversubscription criteria listed in section 6. Applications will not be treated as a lower priority if parents have made a request for a child to be admitted outside the normal age group.

Parents will always be informed of the reasons for any decision on the year group a child should be admitted to. Parents do not have a right to appeal if they are offered a place at the school but it is not in their preferred age group.

Allocation of places

Admission number

The school has an agreed admission number of 340 pupils for entry in Year 7 for the academic year 2024-2025.

The closing date for returning application forms to the Local Authority for Year 7 admission was 31 October 2023, or 13th October 2023 for online applications.

On 1^st March 2024, parents of Year 7 students joining secondary schools in 2024 were informed of their single allocated school place.

Oversubscription criteria

All children whose education, health and care (EHC) plans name the school will be admitted before any other places are allocated.

If the school is not oversubscribed, all applicants will be offered a place.

In the event that the school receives more applications than the number of places it has available, the Local Authority will allocate places to those children who meet any of the criteria set out below, in order until all places are filled.

1. Highest priority will be given to looked after children and all previously looked after children who apply for a place at the school.

2. Pupils living in the catchment area, with a sibling* who is already attending Meadowhead School, and will still be on roll when the Y6 pupil transfers to Meadowhead School.

3. Pupils living in the catchment area and currently attending a Feeder Primary School. The named feeder schools are:

• Abbey Lane
• Bradway Primary
• Greenhill Primary
• Lowedges Primary
• Lower Meadow Primary
• Norton Free
• Woodseats Primary

4. Pupils living in the catchment area only.

5. Children who do not live in the catchment area who will have siblings* attending the school on the day of admission

6. Children who do not live in the catchment area but attend a designated Feeder Primary School.

7. All other applications

*A child will only be afforded ‘sibling’ status if the older sibling has attended the school prior to Sixth Form.

Tie break

A pupil may be prioritized within their admission category if they provide third party evidence in support of their application and the circumstances are deemed to be exceptional by the Admission Committee. In the case of 2 or more applications that cannot be separated by the oversubscription criteria outlined above, the school will use the distance between the school and a child’s home as a tie breaker to decide between applicants. Priority will be given to children who live closest to the school. Distance will be measured in a straight line from the child’s home address to the school’s front gates on Dyche Lane. A child’s home address will be considered to be where he/she is resident for the majority of nights in a normal school week. Where the distance between 2 children’s homes and the school is the same, random allocation will be used to decide between them. This process will be independently verified.

Challenging behaviour

We will not refuse to admit a child on behavioural grounds in the normal admissions round or at any point in the normal year of entry. We may refuse admission in certain cases where the specific criteria listed in the School Admissions Code (paragraph 3.8) apply, i.e. where section 87 of the School Standards and Framework Act 1998 is engaged. We may refuse admission for an in-year applicant for a year group that isn’t the normal point of entry, only in such a case that we have good reason to believe that the child may display challenging behaviour that may adversely affect the provision we can offer. In this case, we will refer these pupils to the Fair Access Protocol. We will not refuse admission on these grounds to looked after children, previously looked after children and children with EHC plans listing the school.

Fair Access Protocol

We participate in Sheffield City Council’s Fair Access Protocol. This helps ensure that all children, including those who are unplaced and vulnerable, or having difficulty in securing a school place in-year, get access to a school place as quickly as possible.

In-year admissions

Parents can apply for a place for their child at any time outside the normal admissions round. As is the case in the normal admissions round, all children whose EHC plans name the school will be admitted.

Likewise, if there are spaces available in the year group you are applying for, your child will be offered a place.

If there are no spaces available at the time of your application, your child’s name will be added to a waiting list for the relevant year group. When a space becomes available, it will be filled by one of the pupils on the waiting list in accordance with the oversubscription criteria listed in section 6.3 of this policy. Priority will not be given to children on the basis that they have been on the waiting list the longest.

As an Academy, Meadowhead School is its own admission authority. However, the school has chosen to work with the Local Authority in-year coordinated admission processes, and applications for in-year admissions are handled by the Secondary Admissions Team at Sheffield City Council.

Application forms for in-year admissions are available on request from the school and should be sent to the following address:

Sheffield City Council School Admissions
Admissions
Floor 5, West Wing
Moorfoot
S1 4PE

Tel: 0114 2735766
Email: ed-admissions@sheffield.gov.uk

Parents will be notified of the outcome of in-year applications in writing within 15 school days.

Appeals

If your child’s application for a place at the school is unsuccessful, you will be informed why admission was refused and given information about the process for hearing appeals. You have the right of appeal to an Independent Appeal Panel (IAP), which is managed by Sheffield City Council on behalf of Meadowhead School.

If you wish to appeal, you must set out the grounds for your appeal in writing and send it to the following address:

Sheffield City Council School Admissions
Admissions
Floor 5, West Wing
Moorfoot
S1 4PE

Tel: 0114 2735766
Email: ed-admissions@sheffield.gov.uk

You can download appeals guidance, details of the school appeals timetable and relevant forms using the following link:

Oversubscribed schools and appeals (sheffield.gov.uk)

 

Open Evening

We plan to hold an Open Evening for Y6 students and their families in early October (For further details, click here)

Prospective parents are also encouraged to visit the Transition section on the school website here

 

For the full policy, please see the document below