School Admission Appeals

Refused a place at Whitburn Church of England Academy?

You are not alone. In 2026/27, 43 families who named Whitburn Church of England Academy as their first choice did not get a place: the school offered 201 and 241 put it first.

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

1.20

first choices for every place available

241 first preferences for 201 places, 2026/27

Appealing a refusal at Whitburn Church of England Academy

There is no published appeal success rate for Whitburn Church of England Academy, or for any individual school in England. The Department for Education collects appeal outcomes and publishes them by council. The figures here are for South Tyneside 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 South Tyneside, 27.2% of secondary appeals heard were upheld — 59 of 217 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 South Tyneside.

What a panel here can act on

These are national rules, not South Tyneside 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

Whitburn Church of England Academy turned first-choice families away in 11 of the last 12 years. In each of those years more families named it as their first choice than it had places available.

First preferences per place at Whitburn Church of England Academy, 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 1.2 per place 229 first choices 191 places 2016/17 1.23 per place 234 first choices 190 places 2017/18 1.39 per place 269 first choices 193 places 2018/19 1.25 per place 257 first choices 205 places 2019/20 1.17 per place 237 first choices 202 places 2020/21 1.18 per place 242 first choices 205 places 2021/22 1.14 per place 232 first choices 204 places 2022/23 1.1 per place 222 first choices 202 places 2023/24 1.12 per place 229 first choices 204 places 2024/25 1.08 per place 218 first choices 202 places 2025/26 0.97 per place 188 first choices 193 places 2026/27 1.2 per place 241 first choices 201 places
First preferences per place at Whitburn Church of England Academy. Years with too small an intake to carry a ratio are left blank rather than plotted. Latest year: 241 first preferences for 201 places.
View as a table
Places, first preferences and offers at Whitburn Church of England Academy, by year. A ratio is shown only where the intake is large enough to carry one.
Year Places First choices Offered Per place
2015/16 191 229 191 1.2
2016/17 190 234 190 1.23
2017/18 193 269 193 1.39
2018/19 205 257 205 1.25
2019/20 202 237 200 1.17
2020/21 205 242 202 1.18
2021/22 204 232 203 1.14
2022/23 202 222 201 1.1
2023/24 204 229 202 1.12
2024/25 202 218 199 1.08
2025/26 193 188 187 0.97
2026/27 201 241 198 1.2

Places offered

201

in 2026/27

Named first choice

241

406 named it at any preference

First choices offered a place

82.2%

198 of 241

Offers to families outside the council

21%

43 of 201 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

1,065

2024/25, whole school

Pupils in them

1,001

94% of capacity

Unfilled places

64

across Years 7 to 11

Sixth form places

240

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 Whitburn Church of England Academy 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 Whitburn Church of England Academy reported 64 unfilled places across Years 7 to 11, at 94% 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, 2010/11 to 2024/25

Places Pupils on roll

Places and pupils on roll at Whitburn Church of England Academy from 2010/11 to 2024/25. Where the roll meets the places line, the school is full. 0 700 1,400 places on roll 10/11 12/13 14/15 16/17 18/19 21/22 23/24 24/25 2010/11 975 places 964 on roll 2011/12 975 places 966 on roll 2012/13 975 places 976 on roll 2013/14 979 places 976 on roll 2014/15 979 places 976 on roll 2015/16 1,255 places 1,081 on roll 2016/17 1,255 places 1,171 on roll 2017/18 1,255 places 1,180 on roll 2018/19 1,255 places 1,216 on roll 2020/21 1,305 places 1,218 on roll 2021/22 1,305 places 1,228 on roll 2022/23 1,305 places 1,220 on roll 2023/24 1,305 places 1,232 on roll 2024/25 1,305 places 1,196 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
Academy converter
Admissions policy
Non-selective
Religious character
Faith
Entry point
Year 7
Council
South Tyneside

Postcode SR6 7EF. School details from Get Information About Schools (URN 136386).

Other contested secondary schools in South Tyneside

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.