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School admissions policies and reports

For admission arrangements and outcomes see our separate web pages.

Personal information policy

Surrey County Council ('The Council') respects your rights and is committed to ensuring that it protects your details, the information about your dealings with the Council and other information available to the Council ('your information').

In accordance with the Data Protection Act 2018 and the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), the Council will use your information, for the purpose of processing your application for a school place, to: (a) deal with your requests and administer its departmental functions, (b) meet its statutory obligations, and (c) prevent and detect fraud.

The Council may share your information (but only the minimum amount of information necessary to do the above and only where it is lawful to do so) within the Council and other agencies (including schools, other admission authorities, other councils, central government departments, law enforcement agencies, statutory and judicial bodies, contractors that process data on its behalf and medical advisors).

The Council may also use and disclose information that does not identify individuals for research and strategic development purposes. You can find out more about how we manage your data on the privacy notice section of our website.

Educating children out of their chronological year group

If you would like your child to be educated outside their normal age group the admission authority for each school will consider your request according to your child's circumstances and what is in the best interests of your child. You must state clearly why you feel admission to a different year group is in your child's best interest and, if you wish, provide evidence to support this. Parents are advised to contact the local authority at the earliest opportunity for advice. Please also see Surrey's guidance on the education of children out of their chronological year group. (PDF)

Admission of children from overseas

If you and your child live abroad, you may only apply for a school place if you can provide evidence of your child's likely return/arrival to the UK.

If you wish to apply for admission as part of a normal intake to a school, you must also apply by the deadline and be able to demonstrate a residential link to Surrey.

For normal round or in year applications, you must provide information about where you are living and when you intend to return. We will initially consider the application based on your child's address abroad and any subsequent change will be considered in line with our change of address policy. For more information see the advice on our school admissions pages.

When making an application for a school place, it is the responsibility of the parent to ensure that their child has a right, under their visa entry conditions, to study at a school and that they will not be contravening the conditions of any visa or United Kingdom immigration law if they take up the school place. School admission authorities must not refuse to accept an application or refuse to admit a child on the basis of their nationality or immigration status, nor remove them from the school roll on this basis.

For more information please read our: Guidance on admission of children overseas (PDF).

Admission of children in care

Children in care receive top priority for a school place. If an in year admission is needed, we will arrange a place at the school most appropriate to the child's needs, in line with our Protocol for the processing of in year admissions for children in care (PDF).

Fair access protocol

Our Fair Access Protocol (PDF) ensures that, outside the normal admissions round, unplaced and vulnerable children, and those who are having difficulty in securing a school place in-year, are offered a place at a suitable school as quickly as possible. It also ensures that, when seeking to place a child under this Protocol, no school – including those with places available will be asked to take a disproportionate number of children who have been permanently excluded from other schools, who display challenging behaviour, or who meet one of the other categories of the Protocol. Applicants are asked to answer the questions on fair access admissions honestly and accurately to ensure that qualifying children can be identified quickly.

Address of convenience

Use of false information may lead us to withdraw an offer of a place, even after a child has started at a school.

We can only investigate the following cases:

  • Where a new round application has been made to us as part of the normal intake to Reception, Year 3 and Year 7
  • Where an in year application has been made to us on the CMA form

However, in each case, the decision on which address should be used for the allocation of places will rest with the admission authority for the school.

We can't investigate cases where an in year application has been made directly to the school on an SMA form. Please write to the school/schools where applicable.

More information on how we will investigate applications is available in our Address of Convenience Assessment Protocol (PDF) and if you wish to make a referral please use the Address of Convenience Referral Form (PDF).

Reports

Local authority annual reports

We are required to submit an annual report to the schools adjudicator by 30 June each year on matters connected with school admissions. The School Admissions Code stipulates what information must be included in the report.

Files available to download

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