The Admissions appeals survey is a statutory survey collected from local authorities and covers all primary and secondary level schools which are under local authority control i.e. community and voluntary controlled schools only. It provides totals for the local authority on the number of parents who have appealed against a refusal to admit their child into a school for a given year, the number of those appeals which were heard and the number which were successful or were rejected. Three sets of figures are provided by each Local Authority: secondary level appeals; primary level appeals; and infant class appeals which are a subset of primary appeals.
The survey is annual and is undertaken between January and February each year. The same data are gathered directly from the other school type's foundation, voluntary aided and from 2014, data for academies should be collected via the school census and the two are combined to create an overall admissions appeals dataset at both secondary and primary level and an infant class subset.
Note this collection did not take place in 2013, as work was undertaken to improve the central collection of appeals data to cover academies via school census and to change the time period the data refers to for both school census and the admissions appeals survey. The admissions appeals survey collection is being reintroduced in 2014 and will collect data on appeals that are lodged prior to the start of the 2013 and 2014 academic year rather than throughout the whole of 2013 and 2014 meaning the data will be more timely.