Applications submitted after the deadline of 31st October 2024 are considered late. If you are applying between 1st November 2024 and 2nd December 2024 and exceptional circumstances prevented you from applying by the deadline, you can upload your reasons and any supporting evidence when submitting your online application. Alternatively, you can send the information to the Admissions & Transport Team. Late applications submitted with supporting evidence will be considered by a panel of officers and may be agreed as “on-time”. Your reasons and evidence must be received by 2nd December 2024.

Late applications received between 1st November 2024 and 30th January 2025 will be allocated a place on national allocation day (3rd March 2025). Please note that we do not process late applications until all on-time applications have been considered. Therefore, late applicants are much less likely to get a preferred school on national allocation day unless it is undersubscribed. Following national allocation day, all applications with unsatisfied higher preference schools will automatically be placed on continuing interest and considered as “on-time” for the first round of continuing interest in the week commencing 24th March 2025.

Late applications received after 30th January 2025 will not be considered for a school place on national allocation day. However, some schools accept new applications for the first round of continuing interest. If your preferred school accepts new applications for the first round of continuing interest, you will receive an outcome from us regarding that school in the week commencing 24th March 2025. If your preferred school does not accept new applications for the first round, your application will be considered during the second round of continuing interest in the week commencing 28th April 2025, and a school place will be offered at that time.

Your own (parent/carer) address is automatically used as the child's address. If the child lives at a different address, you can change this when creating your child's account.

The child’s permanent address is crucial for processing your application, so it must be accurate. It should be the permanent home address where the child resides at the time of application and must be located in Hertfordshire. If your child does not live in Hertfordshire, you will not be able to proceed with the application and will need to apply through your home Local Authority.

For the full definition of what constitutes your child’s permanent home address according to Hertfordshire County Council, please refer to the ‘Explanatory Notes and Definitions 2025-26’.

Children from Overseas

We will also consider accepting applications from families who can demonstrate their intention to return and permanently reside in Hertfordshire before the start of the new academic year (September). When making your application, you must use your overseas address, as that is where your child is currently residing. You will need to manually add your overseas address to your application. Please ensure you use the temporary postcode XX0 0XX when completing the mandatory fields.

Please record your child’s sex at birth.

Some secondary schools in Hertfordshire are single-sex schools, historically providing education for either male or female pupils. Current DfE definitions for single-sex schools do not account for children whose gender does not match their biological sex or who identify differently. Consequently, the online application system will only display mixed and girls’ schools when the female sex option is selected, and mixed and boys’ schools when the male sex option is selected.

Please enter your child’s current school name into the school search field and select it from the provided list. Since some schools have very similar names, ensure you choose the correct one if multiple options appear. If the school is outside Hertfordshire, use the Local Authority (LA) box to find and select the correct LA, then search for the school in the school search field.

If you can’t find the school, type * into the search box to display the following options:

• Educated abroad
• Home educated
• Independent school
• Not in education
• School not in list

Select the relevant option, and the Admissions & Transport team will contact you for further information once your application has been downloaded.

• The child is currently looked after in state care within England.
• The child was previously looked after in state care within England but was immediately adopted or became subject to a child arrangements order or a special guardianship order.
• The child was looked after in state care outside of England and ceased to be in state care because of immediately being adopted.

Please select “Yes” to this question only if the child meets the criteria outlined below.

An Education, Health & Care Plan (EHCP) is a legal document that specifies the additional support required to meet the specific needs of the child or young person. A child with an EHCP will be known to the Hertfordshire Special Needs Department, which oversees the plan.

If your child has an EHCP, while the details of your application will be uploaded, the Admissions Team will not offer a school place. Instead, your child will automatically be allocated a place at the school named in their plan. The Hertfordshire Special Educational Needs Team will handle this process, including any communication with parents/carers and schools.

If your child does not have an EHCP, you should select “No” to this question.

If your child does not have an EHCP but is receiving additional support at their current school, you might consider applying under the social/medical rule if the preferred school offers this option. Additional information about the medical/social rule is provided separately in this guidance.

If you are applying for more than one child, such as twins, triplets, or quadruplets, you should select “Yes” to this question. You must submit an individual application for each child. If a twin or multiple birth is offered the last available place at a school and you have applied for the same school for the other child(ren), we will attempt to offer a place to the other child(ren) as well.

If you are applying for more than one child in the same year group (not due to multiple birth), for example, if one child has been educated out of their year group or there is a close age gap between the children, you should select “No” to this question.

If the child is of Crown Servant/UK service personnel family, please tick Yes.

For children of UK service personnel and crown servants (and military families resident in countries with a Memorandum of Understanding with the UK), we will allocate a place in advance of the family arriving in the area, provided the application is accompanied by an official letter that declares a relocation date and a unit postal address or quartering area address in Hertfordshire, for consideration of the application against the oversubscription criteria. If the family already has an established alternative private address, that address will be used for admission purposes.

There is an option to attach supporting documents at the bottom of the Applicant Details page.

Alternatively, you can send the supporting evidence to the Admissions & Transport Team at transfer.admissions@hertfordshire.gov.uk

If you are relocating from overseas but you do not meet the requirements in the paragraph above, please tick No.

Please review the admission rules for each school you are interested in applying to, which can be found in the ‘School directory’. For schools with admission rules managed by the Local Authority, useful information, including previous statistical data, is available in the ‘Research Schools’ link on the website.

You must apply for at least one school, but we strongly recommend listing four preferences and considering your nearest school if possible. The online system will not allow you to apply to the same school more than once.

You can search for schools by typing a full or partial school name into the search box or use the Advanced Search to apply filters. Ensure you select the correct school, as some may have very similar names.

If you wish to apply to a school outside of Hertfordshire, use the Advanced Search and select the relevant County/Local Authority.

Only schools with a valid entry/transfer year group for your application type will appear in the drop-down menu. If a school is not listed, it likely does not have an entry/transfer year group for your application. For example, upper schools will not appear when making a secondary application. If you believe a school should be listed, please contact the Customer Service Centre at 0300 123 4043.

Supplementary information form

If you are applying to a voluntary-aided, foundation school, or academy, you may also need to complete the school’s supplementary information form (SIF). This is typically required for schools that allocate places based on faith, academic ability, or aptitude.

Please check the school’s entry in the ‘School Directory’ to see if a completed SIF is required.

A date of birth between 01/09/2013 and 31/08/2014 is considered to be in the correct chronological year for making a Secondary Transfer application for Year 7 in September 2025.

A date of birth between 01/04/2013 and 31/08/2013 is considered to be a summer born delayed application. If your child is summer born and is chronologically Year 7 but currently being educated in Year 6, please complete, and submit your application to apply for a secondary school place to start in September 2025.

For any date of birth outside of 01/04/2013 - 31/08/2014, you will not be able to make a Secondary Transfer application online. If your child’s date of birth falls outside of this range, it is considered an out-of-year group application.

To make an out-of-year group Secondary Transfer application, you must complete a paper application form. Please email transfer.admissions@hertfordshire.gov.uk to request one.

Please check the school’s entry in the ‘School directory’ to find out if your out-of-year group application for your preferred school(s) will be considered by the Local Authority or the school.

If the Local Authority consider the request, please provide professional evidence with your paper application form to explain why your child is currently educated out of year group. This could be a letter from your child’s current school.

If the school’s Governing Body/Trust Board consider the request, please provide the above evidence directly to the school you are applying to.

If you already have a decision on an out-of-year group application, please attach it to the paper application form.

If you have any queries, please email transfer.admissions@hertfordshire.gov.uk

Not all schools have a social/medical rule. You can check if a school has this rule by viewing the school’s admission arrangements on their website or through the ‘School directory’.

If your preferred school does have a social/medical rule and you believe your child has an exceptional medical or social need that can only be met by attending that specific school, you may want to consider applying under this rule. You can only make a social/medical claim for one school.

If you are making a claim for a school or academy whose social/medical arrangements are administered by the county council, you should also complete the Rule 2 application form. Please check the individual school’s admission arrangements for clarification on how to apply under the social/medical rule.

You must provide independent professional evidence to support your application, clearly demonstrating why only that one school can meet your child’s needs in a way that no other school can. This can be submitted on the Preference Claims screen or sent directly to the Admission and Transport team at transfer.admissions@hertfordshire.gov.uk.

If you want to submit a social/medical claim for a voluntary-aided, foundation school, academy, or an out of county school, you may need to send the information directly to the school. Please check the admission rules for the individual school by viewing their admission arrangements on the school’s website or through the ‘School directory’, as it will confirm who considers any social/medical rule.

More information about social/medical claims is available at www.hertfordshire.gov.uk/secondaryadmissionrules 

For applications to schools using Hertfordshire's determined admission rules, a sibling is defined as: the sister, brother, half brother or sister, adopted brother or sister, child of the parent/carer or partner or a child looked after or previously looked after and in every case living permanently in a placement within the home as part of the family household from Monday to Friday at the time of this application. A sibling must be on the roll of the named school at the time the younger child starts or has been offered and accepted a place.

If you are applying for a voluntary aided, foundation school or academy, they may have a different sibling definition. Please check the admission rules for the individual school by viewing their admission arrangements on the school’s website or through the ‘School directory’.

If you want to make a sibling claim for any of your preferred schools, please select this option from the list below the preferred school on the Preference Claims screen. You will then be able to enter the sibling information.

Not all schools have a Children of Staff rule. You can check if a school has this rule by viewing the school’s admission arrangements on their website or through the ‘School directory’.

If your preferred school is a voluntary-aided, foundation school, or academy that includes a Children of Staff rule in their admissions arrangements and this applies to your application, you can select/tick this on the Preference Claims screen.

Please note that only schools that include a Children of Staff rule in their admission arrangements will offer this option.

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