Secondary school admissions - September 2026

The information on this page explains how we allocate secondary school places to children in Peterborough.

An introduction to allocating school places

The law states that you have a right to express a preference for where your child attends school. As an admissions authority, we are required to comply with your preference subject to the availability of school places.

When you apply for a school place you will need to list three school preferences. You may have one in mind already. Perhaps it’s the nearest school to your home.

Many schools in Peterborough are heavily oversubscribed. This means that they receive more applications than they have places available.

Each school has a ‘Published Admissions Number’ also known as a ‘PAN’. This is the maximum number of children a school can facilitate in each year group.

If a school receives more applications than it has places available, then we (or the school) must refer to the oversubscription criteria to allocate places.

Oversubscription criteria put applications into a priority order. Each school has its own individual oversubscription criteria and admissions policy. These consider different factors such as:

• Does the child have an Education, Health and Care Plan (EHCP)?
• Has the child been in local authority care at any point during their life?
• Does the child already have a sibling attending the school?
• Does the child live within the catchment area of the school?
• Does the child have a parent who is employed at the school?

Once the applicants have been sorted into a priority order as per the oversubscription criteria, they will be offered places in a numerical order until the PAN has been reached.

For the applicants who were not offered a place, but listed the school as a preference, the child will be placed on a waiting list. If other parents decline a place at this school, the child at the top of the waiting list will be offered that place.

Why you must choose three school preferences

If your child isn’t offered a place at your first preferred school due to oversubscription, you need to have two back-up options. We ask you to choose three school preferences, so your child doesn’t end up without a school place.

We treat each of your preferences as if it was a separate application. Schools are unaware of your preference order or the other schools you have applied to. The school will consider every application it receives against its oversubscription criteria.

Your preferences and ranking

• You should list three schools in order of preference. There is no advantage in listing only one school.
  
  
• We recommend that you include your catchment or nearest school as one of your three preferences.
  
  
• If you qualify for more than one school, we will offer the one that you ranked highest. We will withdraw the remaining schools you qualified for.
  
  
• Think about travel and how you will get your child to school. Your preferences could affect your eligibility for home to school transport.
  
  
• If you submit invalid preferences, such as an independent school. You will not get the opportunity to name other schools.
  
  
• If you apply for a school outside Peterborough, we'll send your application details to the local authority where the school is. They will then tell us if you qualify. We will offer a place based on your preference order.
  
  
• There is no guarantee of a place at any school even if you live in the catchment area, having a sibling link at the school, or attend the nursery on the school's premises.
  
  
• If your child does not qualify for any of your preferred schools, we will offer a place at the nearest available school to you. This is only done after considering all other applications so places will be limited. You could be responsible for getting your child to a school some distance from your house.

Your reasons for applying for each preference

You will need to explain why you prefer each preference on your application form. For example, you can mention that your child has a sibling at the school.

Please include your reasons. It will assist in accurately applying the oversubscription criteria. If you don't tell us about a sibling already at the school, we can't consider it.

How to change your preferences

How your preferences may affect home to school transport eligibility

Parents have a duty to ensure that their children attend school and to make any necessary transport arrangements, including accompanying their children, when necessary, on their journeys to and from school. If you make a preference for a school other than your catchment or nearest you will be expected to make your own arrangements for your child’s journey to and from school and meet any costs involved.

We will provide free school transport for:

• Children in Years 7 to 11 who attend their catchment or nearest available school and live at least three miles from the school
• Children who attend any one of the three nearest available secondary schools, where that school is between two and six miles from their home, are entitled to free school meals, and live at least two miles from the school (low income families)
• Children who attend their nearest available secondary school chosen on grounds of religion or belief, where that school is between 2-15 miles away from their home, and are entitled to free school meals

Secondary aged children will not be eligible for school transport assistance if:

• They attend a preference school (regardless of preference rank), and that school is not the catchment or nearest available school
• Their address has changed, and the address and school preferences have not been updated with the School Admissions Team to reflect this

If you believe your child is eligible, visit our school transport page to apply.

Catchment areas

A catchment area is a defined geographical area surrounding a school from which it will usually take most of its pupils. Most schools have a defined catchment area.

You find catchment area maps for each individual school on our school directory.

• In a small number of cases an address may be in the catchment area for a school that falls under a neighbouring council. If you are a Peterborough resident, you will make your application through the Peterborough School Admissions Team. They will then share your application with the relevant council.
• Living within the catchment area of a school does not guarantee your child a place at that school if the school is oversubscribed.
• Catchment and nearest school are based on the child's home address.

How home to school distance is calculated

Most schools use distance as part of their oversubscription criteria. For school place allocations, distances are calculated by measuring a straight line. To decide if a child can get home to school transport, we calculate that distance using the shortest walking route.

We use ‘OS AddressBase Premium’ to calculate the distance from the child’s home address to the school gate. To measure distance for people outside of Peterborough, we use both local maps and online resources.

You can find the furthest distance that places were offered at each school in previous years.

Example preferences

We provide the following examples to illustrate what may happen. These scenarios are possible outcomes, your circumstances may be different.