Secondary admissions
How to apply
Applications for Year 7 are co-ordinated through the applicant's home local authority and parents must complete the Common Application Form (CAF) issued by their home borough. Parents will be required to complete a supplementary information form to provide information that relates to the religious criteria for admission. The supplementary form must be returned to the academy by the closing date for admissions.
For complete details of our admissions policy, please download the document on the right.
Timetable for secondary places in Year 7, 2013
July 2012 St Matthew Academy will publish information about the arrangements for admission, including oversubscription criteria, for September in the following year. This will include details of open evenings and other opportunities for prospective pupils and their parents to visit the academy. St Matthew Academy will also provide information to the local authority for inclusion in the secondary schools guide.
September/October 2012 Open days for parents to visit the academy.
October 2012 The CAF should be completed and returned to Lewisham LA. The supplementary information form should be completed and returned to the academy. For Lewisham residents the final date to return the forms will be stated on Lewisham’s CAF; for other applicants it will be on their home local authority's CAF and will be sent to Lewisham via the Pan London Register.
Lewisham sends applications to the academy.
January 2013 The academy advises Lewisham of the ranked order of places to be offered.
February 2013 Lewisham applies its agreed scheme for its own schools, informing other LEAs of offers to be made to their residents.
March 2013 Offers of secondary places are sent out in writing to parents by the home LEA.
Criteria for Year 7 admissions
After the admission of students with statements of special educational needs where the St Matthew Academy is named on the statement, the remaining places will be allocated in the following order:
1. Pupils transferring from Year 6 of the St Matthew Academy.
2. Catholic Children in public care(1) and children looked after(1) by Catholic families
3. Baptised Catholic children (2)
4. Other children in public care
5. Baptised Eastern Orthodox children(3)
6. Children of other Christian denominations whose applications are supported by a minister of religion
7. Children of other faiths whose applications are supported by a religious leader of a designated place of worship
8. Other applicants.
If it is necessary to distinguish between applicants within any of the above categories, places will be allocated first to those applicants who have a sibling who will be attending the academy at the proposed date of admission of the applicant. After siblings, the remaining places will be allocated to those whose home addresses are closest to the Academy, as measured by straight line distance from the main entrance of the Academy to the main entrance to the child's normal place of residence. If it is necessary to distinguish between two applicants with a sibling connection, this will be done on the basis of closeness to the Academy as determined by straight line distance as described above.
For the purposes of the criteria set out above the following definitions will apply:
1. Children in public care (Looked After Children) are children who are (a) in the care of a local authority or (b) being provided with accommodation by a local authority in the exercise of their social services functions and children who were looked after, but ceased to be so because they were adopted (or become subject to a residence order or special guardianship order).
2. Baptised Catholic children are those with a certificate of baptism from a Roman Catholic parish or a parish of an Oriental Rite Church in communion with the See of Rome and those Roman Catholic Catechumens who have a certificate of enrolment in the Catechumenate.
3. Eastern Orthodox children are those with a certificate of baptism from an Eastern Orthodox parish.
4. A sibling is a person who has the same natural father or mother or legal guardian as a student on the roll of the academy at the time of admission and who shares permanent domicile with that parent/legal guardian and that student.Arrangements for appeals panels
Parents will have the right of appeal to an Independent Appeal Panel if they are dissatisfied with an admission decision of the St Matthew Academy. The Appeal Panel will be independent of the Academy. The arrangements for appeals will be in line with the Code of Practice on School Admission Appeals published by the Department for Education as it applies to Foundation and Voluntary Aided schools. The determination of the appeal panel will be made in accordance with the Code of Practice on School Admission Appeals and is binding on all parties. The Academy will prepare guidance for parents about how the appeals process will work and provide parents with a named contact who can answer any enquiries parents may have about the process