Bristol secondary schools see rise in applications from city families

Bristol looks set to reverse the trend of pupils going outside the city's borders for secondary education this year.

Figures announced on Monday show that schools within the Bristol boundary – including faith schools, academies, trust schools and community schools – received 301 more applications from city families for places for September 2009 than they did a year earlier.

Bristol City Council and the Government say this is a sign that huge investment in new school buildings and an ever-growing programme of academies is beginning to pay off.

But there is still a long way to go – the figures indicate that about a sixth of pupils will still travel to schools in South Gloucestershire, North Somerset and B&NES, although this is better than the one fifth of a few years ago.

Parents throughout England will receive letters this week telling them whether they have got their 11-year-olds into their preferred secondary school.

Nationally, about four out of five are expected to be allocated their first-choice school.

In Bristol, the city council says it has been able to offer 94.5 per cent of families one of their three preferred schools.

Spokeswoman Julia Walton said the authority had received 3,810 applications for places, of which 3,132 were for Bristol schools, and it had issued 3,440 offers of places.

Among the schools with the largest increases in applications were the Bridge Learning Campus in Hartcliffe, Brislington Enterprise College and Bristol Brunel Academy – all of which were rebuilt under the Government's Building Schools for the Future Programme.

Ms Walton said the number of applications from Bristol residents for schools in neighbouring local authorities were: Bath and North East Somerset 175 (down 61); North Somerset 124 (down 58) and South Gloucestershire 379 (down 87). A total of 588 places have been offered.

Marius Frank, head of Bedminster Down School, which has already seen success over recent years in halting "pupil drift", said the fact that this was now being reflected across Bristol was excellent news.

He said: "The hard work of the past five years is really beginning to pay off. Bristol schools are becoming a positive choice rather than a default choice. Parents are starting to make informed choices based on positive statistics rather than negative ones and they are beginning to have confidence in the system."

Bristol will have eight academies from September 2009 – as well as the John Cabot Academy just across the border in South Gloucestershire – and these are becoming popular with parents.

City Academy and the two former fee-charging schools, Colston's Girls' School and Bristol Cathedral Choir School, are all oversubscribed and the number of first-preference applications is continuing to rise at the others.

Julian Mines, the Government's director of academy development for Bristol, said: "The numbers certainly demonstrate that people are staying in Bristol in greater numbers, which is great news."

Councillor Clare Campion-Smith, the member of the new Lib Dem cabinet with responsibility for children, said: "The rise in applications for Bristol schools does show signs of increased confidence, especially where schools have been rebuilt with exciting new facilities and new academies have been introduced.

"It is encouraging to see that less Bristol parents are choosing schools outside of the city – this demonstrates that the improved quality of secondary education is at last being noticed. We now need to ensure that this becomes an upward trend based on improved results."

North Somerset Council said it had received 2,214 secondary school applications. Everyone had been offered a place, with 90.25 per cent being offered their first choice and 95.9 per cent being offered one of their three preferences. B&NES and South Gloucestershire figures were not available last night.