Getting a Place in Sydney’s Best Schools

In the same week as the British government released figures showing that about one in six children don’t get into their first choice school in England, the Sydney Morning Herald ran a story about the lengths Sydneysiders are going to in order to get their children into Sydney’s best state schools.

In especially high demand are places at Burwood Girls, Cheltenham Girls, Cherrybrook Technology High School, Epping Boys, and Killara High School.

Places are allocated on the basis of who lives closest to the school. In the most popular schools this means that pupils living within the schools’ catchment areas are being turned away in favour of pupils who live closest to the school.

Parents see the extra money they spend on buying a house close to the best schools as a better investment of living elsewhere and spending high fees each year to educate their children privately.

Mark Carter, the principal of Killara High School, told the newspaper that parents were going to great lengths to establish an address in the area to meet enrolment requirements.

“We are seeing an emerging trend of multiple family occupancies of properties that have local addresses. It is understandable that parents have a desire to enrol their child in a school where they would see some advantage. However, it does place extraordinary pressure on the school to be fair in the administration of its enrolment policy.”

In Melbourne, schools are catching onto the idea that some parents are renting in the schools’ catchment areas solely in order to gain their children admission to their chosen school. Once this has been secured, the families move back to their original homes, outside the schools’ catchment areas. Schools are responding by reserving the right to withdraw places if a family moves outside the school zone.