Reception

The Reception class is the first class of the main school. Children join when they are four, the September before their fifth birthday. 

All Reception class applications must be made using your home Local Authority’s common application form (CAF) and should be submitted to your Local Authority.  You can apply for up to six schools on one application form, which should be listed in order of preference and you are advised to use all six preferences.  Your preferences will be considered under an equal preference system; i.e. all preferences are considered separately, regardless of their ranking on your form, therefore, if your application is successful for more than one school, you will offered a place at the school you ranked highest on your CAF.

When considering your preferences, you will need to consider carefully the admissions process and the oversubscription criteria.  If a school receives more applications than the number of places it has to offer, the places will be offered in accordance with the London Borough of Hounslow’s oversubscription criterion, which is available on Hounslow’s website,www.hounslow.gov.uk. 

You can apply online or on a paper CAF form (which can be obtained from schools or from your Local Authority’s admissions department).  If you apply online, you will receive notification of the result of your application via email the day before parents who have applied on paper, who will be notified by post. 

It is extremely important to ensure that you return your application form by the deadline.  Late applications severely limit your chances of gaining a place for your child at your preferred school. 

The address you provide on the application form must be the address at which the child normally resides and you will need to provide proof of address along with your application.  It is a criminal offence to give a false address and the Local Authority / school reserves the right to withdraw any offer made on the basis of inadequate, inaccurate or deliberately misleading information.

Each year we hold open mornings for prospective parents, when parents are invited to look round the school, meet the Headteacher and other teaching staff, collect application forms and related documents, as well as ask any questions about the school or the admissions process.

Please telephone the school on 020 8570 6132 or email office@groveroad.hounslow.sch.uk  for details of open mornings, CAF application forms or for any other information.

Admission Criteria

1. Looked after children (as defined in the Children Act 1989) or a child who was previously looked after and has left care under a Child arrangements order, special guardianship order or who was adopted. (See page 4 in the Starting school in Hounslow brochure for further information)

2. Exceptional Medical/Social need – Applicants whose child’s medical or social circumstances require attendance at a particular school rather than any other school. (See page 4 in the Starting school in Hounslow brochure for further information)

3. Sibling – Children who will have a brother or sister, including all blood half-, step-, adoptive and foster brothers and sisters of the child (not cousins) who live at the same home as the child, in the infant, linked junior or primary school in September 2026. This would not apply if the sibling were due to leave in the July before the younger child would be admitted.

4. Children of staff – children of any member of staff, regardless of role in the school where;

a) The member of staff has been directly employed by the school for two or more years at the time of application or

b) The member of staff is recruited to fill a vacant post for which there is a demonstrable skill shortage

5. Distance – Where there are more applications that meet this criterion than there are places in the school, priority will be given to those children who live nearest to the school, with the distance from home to school being measured using a computerised mapping system.

For all schools where the Local Authority (LA) is the Admissions Authority (AA) for the school and any schools where the Admissions Authority (the Governing Body or Academy Trust) has a policy to use the LA’s measuring system, the walking route is measured by using a geographical information system.

It starts from a “seed point” which is a point of measurement in the footprint of the home address. The seed point is provided by the Local Land and Property Gazetteer (LLPG) from information compiled by the Local Authority or from the National Land Property Gazetteer (NLPG) for addresses outside our borough.

From the seed point, the route firstly connects to the nearest node of the digitised network. It will always measure using the centre of the road nearest to this point even if your home address is on the corner of two roads. The positioning of front doors, driveways and back gates are not relevant to the route or the measurement and are not programmed to be used by the measuring system. The digitised network is constructed from road data supplied by Ordnance Survey called OS Master map Highways Network. OS Master map Highways Network has been accurately digitised to measure along the centre of the road; the LA has no control over how OS digitise the road and footpath network.

The network starts from the seed point in the property provided as the child’s address and continues by the walking route to the nearest of the school gates which is used by pupils to enter the school grounds. Where there are multiple applications with equal distances, the LA’s database will randomly order these.

The walking route is established using an algorithm within the software used by the LA. This programme integrates with the LA’s database (Synergy/School Admissions Management) which is supplied by Access UK Ltd (www.theaccessgroup.com)

Other measuring systems may give a different measurement, but the Local Authority cannot take a measurement from another measuring system.

Tie breaker

If there is one place available and two or more children next in order of priority or next on the waiting list meet the appropriate criterion equally, the place will be allocated using the distance criterion.

Parents should note that admission to Reception classes is determined using the admission criteria for primary Schools. Attendance at a nursery does not guarantee a Reception place at the attached infant or primary school. 

ADMISSION TO THE PRIMARY SCHOOL FROM THE NURSERY IS THEREFORE NOT AUTOMATIC AND CANNOT BE GUARANTEED.

Useful Contacts:

The London Borough of Hounslow’s admissions department: 020 8583 2711 / 2721 or admissions@hounslow.gov.uk

www.hounslow.gov.uk and go to the education and learning page