Purpose

Ensuring there are sufficient school places to
meet parental demand is a statutory duty for councils. This means
that councils must make population and pupil forecasts in order to
anticipate changes in demand. Where additional places are required
the council is responsible for securing them. This applies to
maintained schools, voluntary controlled schools, voluntary aided
schools, free schools and academies.
Every year the council is required to make a school capacity (SCAP)
return to the Department for Education (DfE). This includes
information about the number of children on roll in each school
planning area by age, as well as details of the capacity of
schools.
The data from the SCAP return has, over recent years, identified
building pressure on places in the north of the city, mainly at
Whitecross High School, but increasingly at Aylestone School (which
neighbour each other’s catchment area). To put this into
context, using Autumn Term 2021 data, 1189 learners have Whitecross
as their nearest school, it has a capacity of 945. Likewise,
Aylestone has 695 learners living closest and a capacity of 450.
Both schools had a waiting list following admissions allocations in
September 2022.
Additional capacity is now required to meet growing numbers in the
north of the city. We are unable to build capacity at Whitecross,
for the reasons outlined below in alternative options, therefore
additional capacity at Aylestone School would relieve the overall
pressure in the north of the city whilst still allowing those who
might sit in the catchment of Whitecross High School to be able to
walk or cycle to Aylestone School.