Anger grows over rejection of Horsham children's choice of secondary schools

Some children in Southwater have been allotted places 16 miles away at a school in Burgess Hill and others have been given places at the all-girl Millais School in Horsham against their wishes.

Dozens are now demanding answers from West Sussex County Council over how the school placements have been decided. Many say they will refuse to send their children to the schools allocated to them.

Amanda Ramm and her daughter had chosen Horsham’s Tanbridge House School as their preferred school, but were instead given Millais.

“It appears that because Southwater children live too far away from the Horsham schools therefore they have not been able to obtain places at the oversubscribed schools – Tanbridge and Forest – because those spaces have been filled by those living closer.

"The frustrating thing is that we have no other choice in Southwater because the Horsham schools are our closest options. As a result, the girls affected have been given places at Millais,which was clearly undersubsribed and therefore the closest school with places available, and the boys affected have been given places at Burgess Hill due to the lack of spaces for boys in Horsham schools following the conversion of Forest to be co-ed.

“We feel highly uncomfortable with our daughter going to a single sex school.”

She added: “Overall I am angry that we were made to believe that choosing between the schools was such an important decision. We visited all the schools and listened to the head teachers ‘sell’ their schools and my husband and I discussed at length with my daughter what her preferences would be. This now seems like a total waste of time and has meant the impact on my daughter has been profound.”

She said she was ‘devastated’ on hearing the news. “She is an incredibly resilient child but this has really affected her. It makes me incredibly angry and upset as a parent to see her suffer in this way, after going through what we all thought was a process of ‘choosing a school’ which set her hopes and expectations, only to see them come crashing down around her.”

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Southwater parent Chris Cotterill’s daughter was also allocated a place at Millais, despite stating Forest, Bohunt and Tanbridge schools as their preferred choices.

“I am personally against using Millais as it is not co-ed so, in my view, discriminates against gender,” he said: “I believe my daughter would be educated in an antiquated approach to education and would not prepare her for the real world.”

Linda Basiony says that her daughter has also been allocated a school place at Millais, against her will. “I am absolutely not willing to send my child to a same sex school and only bought my house in the Southwater village on the grounds I was advised Tanbridge is our catchment school.

“It looks like due to loads of new builds my daughter’s education has become of no concern.”

Other parents have spoken out about their dismay on hearing that their children would have to travel 16 miles each way from their homes in Southwater to Burgess Hill Academy after having all three of their preferred schools rejected.