School Admission Appeals

Refused a place at Whitmore High School?

You are not alone. In 2026/27, 191 families who named Whitmore High School as their first choice did not get a place: the school offered 257 and 407 put it first.

Below: what an appeal in Harrow actually involves, and how contested this school has been over 12 years of official figures.

1.58

first choices for every place available

407 first preferences for 257 places, 2026/27

Appealing a refusal at Whitmore High School

There is no published appeal success rate for Whitmore High School, or for any individual school in England. The Department for Education collects appeal outcomes and publishes them by council. The figures here are for Harrow as a whole and cover every state-funded school in the authority. Anyone quoting you odds for a named school is making them up.

Across Harrow, 4.7% of secondary appeals heard were upheld — 9 of 191 appeals heard in 2024–2026. The England figure is 20.1%.

A panel is not deciding whether you want the school. It decides whether the admission arrangements were lawful and correctly applied, and then whether the harm to your child of not being admitted outweighs the harm to the school of going over its published number. Cases built on preference rather than on those two questions are the ones that fail.

See the full appeal figures for Harrow.

What a panel here can act on

These are national rules, not Harrow ones. Whichever school you are appealing for, the panel works through the same two stages and is required to ignore the same things.

How contested this school has been

Whitmore High School turned first-choice families away in every one of the 12 years published. In each of those years more families named it as their first choice than it had places available.

First preferences per place at Whitmore High School, 2015/16 to 2026/27. A value above 1 means more families named the school first than there were places. 0.0 0.5 1.0 1.5 2.0 one first preference per place 15/16 17/18 19/20 21/22 23/24 25/26 26/27 2015/16 1.15 per place 299 first choices 259 places 2016/17 1.26 per place 330 first choices 261 places 2017/18 1.29 per place 341 first choices 265 places 2018/19 1.43 per place 378 first choices 265 places 2019/20 1.68 per place 443 first choices 263 places 2020/21 1.74 per place 454 first choices 261 places 2021/22 1.56 per place 409 first choices 263 places 2022/23 1.78 per place 453 first choices 255 places 2023/24 1.56 per place 392 first choices 252 places 2024/25 1.78 per place 453 first choices 255 places 2025/26 1.33 per place 348 first choices 262 places 2026/27 1.58 per place 407 first choices 257 places
First preferences per place at Whitmore High School. Years with too small an intake to carry a ratio are left blank rather than plotted. Latest year: 407 first preferences for 257 places.
View as a table
Places, first preferences and offers at Whitmore High School, by year. A ratio is shown only where the intake is large enough to carry one.
Year Places First choices Offered Per place
2015/16 259 299 205 1.15
2016/17 261 330 214 1.26
2017/18 265 341 218 1.29
2018/19 265 378 223 1.43
2019/20 263 443 223 1.68
2020/21 261 454 218 1.74
2021/22 263 409 213 1.56
2022/23 255 453 224 1.78
2023/24 252 392 207 1.56
2024/25 255 453 220 1.78
2025/26 262 348 207 1.33
2026/27 257 407 216 1.58

Places offered

257

in 2026/27

Named first choice

407

1,338 named it at any preference

First choices offered a place

53.1%

216 of 407

Offers to families outside the council

0%

1 of 257 offers

Was the school full?

This is the question a panel spends most of its time on. At the second stage of an appeal it weighs the harm to the school of taking an extra child against the harm to your child of being refused — and how much room the school has is the heart of that. The admission authority has to show harm over and above the fact that its published number has been reached, so it is fair to ask what the specific harm is — how the second stage actually works.

Places, Years 7 to 11

1,434

2024/25, whole school

Pupils in them

1,343

93.7% of capacity

Unfilled places

91

across Years 7 to 11

Sixth form places

308

excluded from the figures above

Read this before you use these numbers

These are whole-school figures across Years 7 to 11, not the year group you are appealing for. A school can hold spare places in its upper years while the year you want is genuinely full, and the panel will have the year-group numbers in front of it. So this does not show that Whitmore High School has room for your child.

They are also the school's own reported capacity, as at 1 May 2025 — a year behind the application figures further up this page, and a description rather than a finding.

On the published figures Whitmore High School reported 91 unfilled places across Years 7 to 11, at 93.7% of capacity. That is worth asking about — but ask it as a question, not an assertion. A panel will want the figure for the year group in question, and the school may have a good answer about staffing, rooms or timetabling.

Places and pupils on roll, whole school, 2009/10 to 2024/25

Places Pupils on roll

Places and pupils on roll at Whitmore High School from 2009/10 to 2024/25. Where the roll meets the places line, the school is full. 0 900 1,800 places on roll 09/10 11/12 13/14 15/16 17/18 20/21 22/23 24/25 2009/10 1,040 places 1,266 on roll 2010/11 1,474 places 1,579 on roll 2011/12 1,617 places 1,608 on roll 2012/13 1,617 places 1,610 on roll 2013/14 1,625 places 1,655 on roll 2014/15 1,658 places 1,647 on roll 2015/16 1,658 places 1,670 on roll 2016/17 1,658 places 1,675 on roll 2017/18 1,658 places 1,677 on roll 2018/19 1,658 places 1,678 on roll 2020/21 1,658 places 1,709 on roll 2021/22 1,658 places 1,693 on roll 2022/23 1,658 places 1,732 on roll 2023/24 1,659 places 1,723 on roll 2024/25 1,742 places 1,740 on roll
Whole-school figures including any sixth form, as at 1 May each year. 2019/20 is missing because the 2020 School Capacity survey was cancelled.

Department for Education, School capacity, school-level file, 2024/25. Published under the Open Government Licence.

What these figures do not tell you

About the school

Type
Community school
Admissions policy
Non-selective
Religious character
No religious character
Entry point
Year 7
Council
Harrow

Postcode HA2 0AD. School details from Get Information About Schools (URN 102239).

Other contested secondary schools in Harrow

Applications and offers: Department for Education, Primary and secondary school applications and offers, school-level file, 2026/27. Appeal figures: Admission appeals in England. Both under the Open Government Licence.