School Admission Appeals

School admission appeals in East Riding of Yorkshire

East Riding of Yorkshire heard 77 school admission appeals in 2025, and 5 of them were upheld. The figures below come from the Department for Education and cover every state-funded school in the authority — they describe East Riding of Yorkshire as a whole, not any single school.

Over the last three years the East Riding of Yorkshire success rate has run 8.4 percentage points lower than the England average of 19.8%.

11.4%

of appeals heard in East Riding of Yorkshire were upheld

44 of 386 appeals heard in 2023–2025

2025 at a glance

Appeals lodged

109

by parents in East Riding of Yorkshire

Appeals heard by a panel

77

71% of those lodged

Appeals upheld

5

6.5% of those heard

England, same year

19.4%

7,498 of 38,639 heard

If your child is going into Reception, Year 1 or Year 2, read this first

53.4% of the primary appeals heard in East Riding of Yorkshire 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 East Riding of Yorkshire, 7.4% of infant class size appeals were upheld (7 of 94 appeals heard in 2023–2025) against 9.8% 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.

Which appeals succeed in East Riding of Yorkshire

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.

Appeals upheld by phase, three-year pooled rate
0% 15% 30% Secondary 10.5% England 20.5% Primary 12.5% England 17.4% Infant class size 7.4% England 9.8%

Vertical marker shows the England figure for the same phase.

View as a table
Appeals heard and upheld by phase, pooled across three years.
Phase Heard Upheld Rate England
Secondary 210 22 10.5% 20.5%
Primary 176 22 12.5% 17.4%
Infant class size 94 7 7.4% 9.8%

Infant class size appeals are counted within the primary figures, not added to them.

Ten years of appeals in East Riding of Yorkshire

Appeals upheld, East Riding of Yorkshire and England, 2016–2025
0% 7.5% 15% 22.5% 30% 2016 2018 2020 2022 2024 2025 19.4% 6.5% 2016 7.6% 22.3% 2017 13.3% 21.8% 2018 12.2% 21.8% 2019 7.9% 22.2% 2020 14.6% 21.2% 2021 13.3% 19% 2022 16.2% 20.1% 2023 11.6% 19.8% 2024 13.2% 20% 2025 6.5% 19.4%
View as a table
Appeals heard and upheld in East Riding of Yorkshire, by year. A rate is shown only where at least 10 appeals were heard.
Year Heard Upheld East Riding of Yorkshire England
2016 66 5 7.6% 22.3%
2017 90 12 13.3% 21.8%
2018 41 5 12.2% 21.8%
2019 63 5 7.9% 22.2%
2020 103 15 14.6% 21.2%
2021 90 12 13.3% 19%
2022 68 11 16.2% 20.1%
2023 112 13 11.6% 19.8%
2024 197 26 13.2% 20%
2025 77 5 6.5% 19.4%

How East Riding of Yorkshire compares

Success rate ranking

115 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

98 of 151

by number of appeals heard over the same period — 386 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.

Schools in East Riding of Yorkshire

East Riding of Yorkshire has 141 state-funded mainstream schools — 123 primary, 17 secondary and 1 all-through. The largest concentrations are in Hull, Goole, Driffield and York.

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.

Other councils in Yorkshire and The Humber