School Admission Appeals

Refused a place at St Philomena's Catholic High School for Girls?

You are not alone. In 2026/27, 44 families who named St Philomena's Catholic High School for Girls as their first choice did not get a place: the school offered 231 and 235 put it first.

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

1.02

first choices for every place available

235 first preferences for 231 places, 2026/27

Appealing a refusal at St Philomena's Catholic High School for Girls

There is no published appeal success rate for St Philomena's Catholic High School for Girls, or for any individual school in England. The Department for Education collects appeal outcomes and publishes them by council. The figures here are for Sutton 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 Sutton, 7.9% of secondary appeals heard were upheld — 42 of 534 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 Sutton.

What a panel here can act on

These are national rules, not Sutton 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

St Philomena's Catholic High School for Girls turned first-choice families away in every one of the 12 years published. More families named it first than it had places in 11 of those years. In the other 1 it had places on paper and still turned first-choice families away — which happens where families who may not meet a school's criteria rank it below a safer choice — common at selective, faith and single-sex schools, and it means the first-preference count understates how wanted the school is.

First preferences per place at St Philomena's Catholic High School for Girls, 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 1.34 per place 271 first choices 202 places 2016/17 1.08 per place 248 first choices 230 places 2017/18 1.14 per place 265 first choices 232 places 2018/19 1.04 per place 252 first choices 243 places 2019/20 1.07 per place 253 first choices 237 places 2020/21 1.29 per place 307 first choices 238 places 2021/22 1.05 per place 250 first choices 238 places 2022/23 1.26 per place 309 first choices 246 places 2023/24 1.13 per place 293 first choices 260 places 2024/25 1.21 per place 293 first choices 242 places 2025/26 0.98 per place 225 first choices 230 places 2026/27 1.02 per place 235 first choices 231 places
First preferences per place at St Philomena's Catholic High School for Girls. Years with too small an intake to carry a ratio are left blank rather than plotted. Latest year: 235 first preferences for 231 places.
View as a table
Places, first preferences and offers at St Philomena's Catholic High School for Girls, by year. A ratio is shown only where the intake is large enough to carry one.
Year Places First choices Offered Per place
2015/16 202 271 173 1.34
2016/17 230 248 192 1.08
2017/18 232 265 205 1.14
2018/19 243 252 193 1.04
2019/20 237 253 195 1.07
2020/21 238 307 211 1.29
2021/22 238 250 193 1.05
2022/23 246 309 222 1.26
2023/24 260 293 232 1.13
2024/25 242 293 215 1.21
2025/26 230 225 186 0.98
2026/27 231 235 191 1.02

Places offered

231

in 2026/27

Named first choice

235

771 named it at any preference

First choices offered a place

81.3%

191 of 235

Offers to families outside the council

48%

111 of 231 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

1,229

2024/25, whole school

Pupils in them

1,204

98% of capacity

Unfilled places

25

across Years 7 to 11

Sixth form places

320

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 St Philomena's Catholic High School for Girls 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 St Philomena's Catholic High School for Girls reported 25 unfilled places across Years 7 to 11, at 98% 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 St Philomena's Catholic High School for Girls from 2009/10 to 2024/25. Where the roll meets the places line, the school is full. 0 800 1,600 places on roll 09/10 11/12 13/14 15/16 17/18 20/21 22/23 24/25 2009/10 1,282 places 1,260 on roll 2010/11 1,340 places 1,261 on roll 2011/12 1,340 places 1,264 on roll 2012/13 1,359 places 1,234 on roll 2013/14 1,359 places 1,256 on roll 2014/15 1,359 places 1,282 on roll 2015/16 1,342 places 1,252 on roll 2016/17 1,519 places 1,285 on roll 2017/18 1,535 places 1,380 on roll 2018/19 1,549 places 1,403 on roll 2020/21 1,549 places 1,450 on roll 2021/22 1,549 places 1,468 on roll 2022/23 1,549 places 1,477 on roll 2023/24 1,549 places 1,459 on roll 2024/25 1,549 places 1,405 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
Voluntary aided school
Admissions policy
Non-selective
Religious character
Faith
Entry point
Year 7
Council
Sutton

Postcode SM5 3PS. School details from Get Information About Schools (URN 103013).

Other contested secondary schools in Sutton

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.