School Admission Appeals

Refused a place at Paddington Academy?

You are not alone. In 2026/27, 136 families who named Paddington Academy as their first choice did not get a place: the school offered 174 and 296 put it first.

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

1.70

first choices for every place available

296 first preferences for 174 places, 2026/27

Appealing a refusal at Paddington Academy

There is no published appeal success rate for Paddington 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 Westminster 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 Westminster, 5.3% of secondary appeals heard were upheld — 8 of 152 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 Westminster.

What a panel here can act on

These are national rules, not Westminster 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

Paddington Academy 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 Paddington 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 1.52 per place 260 first choices 171 places 2016/17 1.47 per place 253 first choices 172 places 2017/18 1.44 per place 249 first choices 173 places 2018/19 1.34 per place 235 first choices 175 places 2019/20 1.6 per place 280 first choices 175 places 2020/21 1.3 per place 228 first choices 175 places 2021/22 1.49 per place 261 first choices 175 places 2022/23 1.35 per place 235 first choices 174 places 2023/24 1.34 per place 233 first choices 174 places 2024/25 1.34 per place 233 first choices 174 places 2025/26 1.64 per place 286 first choices 174 places 2026/27 1.7 per place 296 first choices 174 places
First preferences per place at Paddington Academy. Years with too small an intake to carry a ratio are left blank rather than plotted. Latest year: 296 first preferences for 174 places.
View as a table
Places, first preferences and offers at Paddington Academy, by year. A ratio is shown only where the intake is large enough to carry one.
Year Places First choices Offered Per place
2015/16 171 260 149 1.52
2016/17 172 253 140 1.47
2017/18 173 249 142 1.44
2018/19 175 235 140 1.34
2019/20 175 280 160 1.6
2020/21 175 228 141 1.3
2021/22 175 261 152 1.49
2022/23 174 235 148 1.35
2023/24 174 233 161 1.34
2024/25 174 233 158 1.34
2025/26 174 286 161 1.64
2026/27 174 296 160 1.7

Places offered

174

in 2026/27

Named first choice

296

720 named it at any preference

First choices offered a place

54.1%

160 of 296

Offers to families outside the council

16%

27 of 174 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

959

2024/25, whole school

Pupils in them

941

98.1% of capacity

Unfilled places

18

across Years 7 to 11

Sixth form places

340

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 Paddington 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 Paddington Academy reported 18 unfilled places across Years 7 to 11, at 98.1% 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 Paddington Academy from 2009/10 to 2024/25. Where the roll meets the places line, the school is full. 0 650 1,300 places on roll 09/10 11/12 13/14 15/16 17/18 20/21 22/23 24/25 2009/10 1,175 places 1,169 on roll 2010/11 1,175 places 1,151 on roll 2011/12 1,149 places 1,182 on roll 2012/13 1,149 places 1,190 on roll 2013/14 1,149 places 1,192 on roll 2014/15 1,149 places 1,198 on roll 2015/16 1,149 places 1,223 on roll 2016/17 1,149 places 1,212 on roll 2017/18 1,149 places 1,191 on roll 2018/19 1,149 places 1,210 on roll 2020/21 1,240 places 1,235 on roll 2021/22 1,240 places 1,229 on roll 2022/23 1,240 places 1,240 on roll 2023/24 1,240 places 1,264 on roll 2024/25 1,299 places 1,258 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 sponsor led
Admissions policy
Non-selective
Religious character
Faith
Entry point
Year 7
Council
Westminster

Postcode W9 2DR. School details from Get Information About Schools (URN 130912).

Other contested secondary schools in Westminster

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.