Issue - meetings

Each local authority must have a Fair Access Protocol in place and all schools in a local authority area must participate in it. The Fair Access Protocol ensures that vulnerable and unplaced children, who are not successful in gaining a place through the normal in-year admissions process, are offered a place at a suitable school within 20 school days. This includes admitting children above the published admission number to schools that are already full.

The proposed Fair Access Protocol for 2024/25 sets out the criteria that the local authority will use to determine which children will be placed under Surrey’s Fair Access Protocol and how cases will be considered. It complies with the DfE’s School Admissions Code (“the Code”) which came into force on 1 September 2021 and with the DfE guidance on fair access that was issued in July 2021 alongside the new Code.

The Cabinet Member APPROVED the proposed Fair Access Protocol for 2024/25.