Parents Information Evening Transfer to Secondary School 2017/18

Secondary Admission Kent resident parents will be able to apply for their child’s school place either online or using a paper form known as the Secondary Common Application Form (SCAF) SCAF or online application is used as a means of expressing one or more preferences of secondary school. SCAF invites parents to express up to four preferences and to rank each school in order of preference

Secondary Admission 31 October 2017 is the National Closing Date for applications. Schools to be sent list of children that have applied online Children with a SSEN or an EHCP do not apply for schools for a place through the main round of admissions

Secondary Admission Entry to grammar schools is restricted to children who have been assessed as suitable through the relevant tests Receiving a grammar assessment in the Kent Test does not guarantee a grammar school place at offer day as they may be oversubscribed Registration for the Kent grammar school tests will open on 1 June 2017. Parents wishing their children to sit the tests are required to register with the Kent Admissions Team (either online or paper) no later than 3 July 2017

Secondary Admission Kent test will take place in school on Thursday 7 September 2017 (Saturday 9 September for non Kent schools) By 6 July 2017 schools will receive a list of their pupils that have applied to sit the Kent grammar school tests. Schools have until 14 July to contact parents of children who are interested in grammar school and who have not yet replied In the following exceptional circumstances arrangements will be made for testing to take place by the end of January 2018: Illness on one or both test dates, confirmed by a doctor’s certificate A move into the KCC area

Secondary Admission Assessment decision letters will be sent out by 1st class post on 12 October 2017 Online applications will be sent an email after 4pm on 12 October 2017 No right of appeal against the assessment decision but parents/ carers may make an admission appeal to an independent appeal panel if their child is refused admission to any school, including a grammar school after 1 March 2018

Secondary Admission National offer day – 1 March 2018 KCC will send an offer email after 4pm to those parents who have applied online Send decision letters to ALL paper SCAF applicants and, as a minimum, all online applicants that did not receive an offer of their first preference

Secondary Admission By 16 March 2018 parents must inform the school whether they wish to accept or refuse the place offered on offer day All parents/ carers have the statutory right to appeal against any decision refusing them a school place and must lodge their appeal by 29 March 2018 for it to be considered as on time

Procedure for Entrance to Secondary Education 2018 (PESE) Any Y5 pupil must register for testing by 3 July 2017 to take part in the September tests. This includes children with a SSEN or EHC Plan. Registration opens on 1 June 2017 Pupils will be assessed on the basis of their performance in two nationally- standardised assessment tests

English and Maths test in multiple choice format lasting approximately 60 minutes – two separate sections each with introductory practice items, English first Reasoning test in multiple choice format lasting approximately 60 minutes – one Verbal Reasoning section and five Non-Verbal, separately timed with introductory practice items Pupils will also be required to complete a writing exercise under test conditions which will take 40 minutes At least a 20 minute break in between tests A familiarisation paper is available on the Kent website

Non-verbal reasoning tests involve reasoning with abstract figures Non-verbal reasoning tests involve reasoning with abstract figures. Test questions consist of abstract figures and not words. Administration instructions are read out to the pupils. Verbal reasoning tests mainly involve reasoning with words, and typically include question types principally concerned with the production of, use of and relationships between words. In some cases, these tests will also include questions that require the manipulation of letters and numbers.