School admission appeals in Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole
Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole heard 217 school admission appeals in 2026, and 34 of them were upheld. The figures below come from the Department for Education and cover every state-funded school in the authority — they describe Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole as a whole, not any single school.
Over the last three years the Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole success rate has run 4.3 percentage points higher than the England average of 19.4%.
of appeals heard in Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole were upheld
182 of 767 appeals heard in 2024–2026
2026 at a glance
Appeals lodged
262
by parents in Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole
Appeals heard by a panel
217
83% of those lodged
Appeals upheld
34
15.7% of those heard
England, same year
18.5%
6,414 of 34,711 heard
If your child is going into Reception, Year 1 or Year 2, read this first
46.9% of the primary appeals heard in Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole were infant class size appeals. These are a different kind of appeal with a much narrower test. A panel can only uphold one if the admission arrangements were unlawful, they were applied incorrectly, or the decision to refuse was one no reasonable authority would have made. How much your child wants the place, or how strong the school is, cannot come into it.
In Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole, 0% of infant class size appeals were upheld (0 of 46 appeals heard in 2024–2026) against 9.4% across England. That is far lower than other appeals, and it is the single most important thing to establish before you spend time on a case.
The three grounds one can be upheld on, and how to tell if yours is even an infant class size case →
What counts as grounds in Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole
The rules are national, so this part does not vary by council: a panel works through two fixed stages, and the Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole rate above tells you nothing about which arguments it can act on. Most appeals fail because the case put to the panel answers neither stage.
- Infant class size
- A mistake in how the decision was made
- Distance and catchment
- Siblings
- Faith and religious criteria
- Medical and social need
- Special educational needs without an EHC plan
- A late application
- In-year admissions
- Grammar schools and the 11-plus
- Sixth form places
- Twins and multiple births
Which appeals succeed in Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole
Secondary and primary appeals are judged on different tests, and the gap between them is usually wide. Pooling three years gives a steadier picture than any single year.
Vertical marker shows the England figure for the same phase.
View as a table
| Phase | Heard | Upheld | Rate | England |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Secondary | 669 | 163 | 24.4% | 20.1% |
| Primary | 98 | 19 | 19.4% | 17.1% |
| Infant class size | 46 | 0 | 0% | 9.4% |
Infant class size appeals are counted within the primary figures, not added to them.
Appeals in Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole since 2020
View as a table
| Year | Heard | Upheld | Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole | England |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2020 | 478 | 225 | 47.1% | 21.2% |
| 2021 | 411 | 92 | 22.4% | 19% |
| 2022 | 362 | 64 | 17.7% | 20.1% |
| 2023 | 344 | 49 | 14.2% | 19.8% |
| 2024 | 300 | 100 | 33.3% | 20% |
| 2025 | 250 | 48 | 19.2% | 19.4% |
| 2026 | 217 | 34 | 15.7% | 18.5% |
How Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole compares
Success rate ranking
50 of 151
English councils, ranked on the pooled 3-year success rate, LAs with 10+ appeals heard. Position 1 is the highest rate.
Appeal volume ranking
47 of 151
by number of appeals heard over the same period — 767 in total.
Success rates vary enormously between councils, from under 5% to over 50%. Some of that is real difference in how panels and admission authorities operate; some of it reflects which schools are oversubscribed and how many hopeless cases get lodged. A high local rate is not a prediction about your appeal.
Before Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole existed
Poole was replaced in 2020. Figures for Poole are shown separately because they cover a different area — they are background, not this council's record.
| Year | Heard | Upheld | Rate |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2016 | 175 | 64 | 36.6% |
| 2017 | 124 | 53 | 42.7% |
| 2018 | 102 | 44 | 43.1% |
| 2019 | 157 | 83 | 52.9% |
Bournemouth was replaced in 2020. Figures for Bournemouth are shown separately because they cover a different area — they are background, not this council's record.
| Year | Heard | Upheld | Rate |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2016 | 74 | 27 | 36.5% |
| 2017 | 121 | 29 | 24% |
| 2018 | 117 | 37 | 31.6% |
| 2019 | 169 | 99 | 58.6% |
Schools in Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole
Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole has 90 state-funded mainstream schools — 66 primary, 22 secondary and 2 all-through. The largest concentrations are in Bournemouth, Poole, Christchurch and Broadstone.
What we can't tell you
Nobody publishes appeal outcomes school by school — the Department for Education collects returns from individual schools but only releases them added up to council level. Any site claiming to know your school's appeal odds is guessing. What matters far more than a local average is whether your particular grounds are ones a panel is allowed to act on.
Where places are hardest to get
What is published, school by school, is how many families applied and how many got in. These are the Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole schools with the most first choices for each place available in 2026/27 — the places where refusals, and so appeals, are concentrated. High demand does not mean an appeal is more likely to succeed; it means more families are refused.
See all 15 secondary and 26 primary schools in Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole →
| School | Places | First choices | Per place |
|---|---|---|---|
| Poole Grammar School | 177 | 243 | 1.37 |
| Bournemouth School | 179 | 238 | 1.33 |
| Bournemouth School for Girls | 180 | 239 | 1.33 |
| Glenmoor Academy | 190 | 232 | 1.22 |
| Livingstone Academy Bournemouth | 136 | 164 | 1.21 |
| Winton Academy | 184 | 217 | 1.18 |
| St Edward's Roman Catholic/Church of England School, Poole | 170 | 190 | 1.12 |
| Parkstone Grammar School | 192 | 213 | 1.11 |
| The Bourne Academy | 171 | 181 | 1.06 |
| Magna Academy | 171 | 174 | 1.02 |
| School | Places | First choices | Per place |
|---|---|---|---|
| Avonwood Primary School | 59 | 113 | 1.92 |
| Springdale First School | 60 | 89 | 1.48 |
| Twynham Primary School | 28 | 39 | 1.39 |
| St. Walburga's Catholic Primary School | 59 | 77 | 1.31 |
| Bearwood Primary and Nursery School | 30 | 36 | 1.20 |
| Highcliffe St Mark Primary School | 58 | 68 | 1.17 |
| The Epiphany School | 58 | 68 | 1.17 |
| St Katharine's Church of England Primary School | 60 | 69 | 1.15 |
| Merley First School | 60 | 68 | 1.13 |
| Canford Heath Infant School | 120 | 134 | 1.12 |
Department for Education, Primary and secondary school applications and offers, school-level file, 2026/27.
Admission rules challenged in Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole
Separately from appeals, anyone can object that a school's admission arrangements break the School Admissions Code. The Office of the Schools Adjudicator decides those objections and publishes a determination naming the school. Since 2011 it has reached a decision on 20 objections about schools in Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole, and found the arrangements did not comply in 12.
| School or authority | Determined | Outcome |
|---|---|---|
| Twynham School | 31 October 2025 | Did not comply |
| St Mark’s Church of England Primary School | 2 November 2023 | Complied |
| Twynham School | 9 July 2021 | Complied |
| St James’ Church of England Primary Academy | 11 November 2020 | Did not comply |
| Poole High School | 28 July 2020 | Did not comply |
| Poole Grammar School | 14 August 2018 | Complied |
| Parkstone Grammar School | 14 August 2018 | Complied |
| St Peter's Catholic Primary School | 26 August 2016 | Complied |
| St Katharine’s Church of England Primary School | 9 August 2016 | Complied |
| St James’ Church of England Academy | 21 July 2016 | Did not comply |
Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole does not write the admission arrangements for every school in the table. Academies, foundation and voluntary aided schools are their own admission authority, so a finding against one of them is a finding about that school's governing body or trust, not about the council. An upheld objection also requires the arrangements to be revised, so an older determination describes rules that have since had to change.
How often admission rules are found not to comply, nationally →
Office of the Schools Adjudicator, published determinations, 2011–2026.