Schools and learning

School admission appeals

Unfortunately, it is not always possible to offer your child a place in your preferred school. If your child is refused a place you have the right to appeal against the decision to an independent appeal panel.

Before you submit an appeal

The council does not manage appeals for all schools.

  • If your appeal is for an academy, trust, foundation or voluntary aided school, you must contact the school directly or visit their website to submit an appeal.
  • If your appeal is for a school in another local authority area (for example, Wirral or Knowsley), you must contact the school or the relevant local authority for their appeals process.

How to appeal

This appeals process is for voluntary controlled and community schools, including in-year transfer appeals. These are schools that are managed by Liverpool City Council.

Before you start your appeal, read the admissions appeals guide which includes details on:

  • how to prepare your case
  • documents you may wish to include to support your appeal
  • what to expect from the panel
  • how decisions are made

If uploading documents to support your appeal, the file size should not exceed 10MB in total. You can upload images/scanned documents from your computer, tablet or mobile device.

Remember: If the school you are appealing for does not appear in the appeals form, this means that we do not manage appeals on behalf of that school - please contact the school directly for their appeals process.

Submit a notice of appeal

Closing dates and hearings

Secondary schools

  • You must submit the notice of appeal form by 29th March 2026.
  • Appeal hearings to be held in May, June and July 2026.

Primary schools

  • You must submit the notice of appeal form by 17th May 2026.
  • Appeal hearings to be held in June and July 2026.

We aim to hold all appeal hearings within 40 school days after the deadline. In some exceptional circumstances we may need to hold hearings after this date. We will give appellants 10 days notice of an appeal hearing date and time.

All appeals will be held remotely via video link with our clerking service.

If you are not successful

If you do not win your appeal you will be told what your options are.

Parents can only have one appeal to an individual school in any school year - you may wish to appeal for a number of schools at the same time.

Appeals data for local authority maintained schools

The table below shows the number of appeals submitted to local authority maintained schools (voluntary controlled and community schools) and how many appeals were successful.

Appeals submitted and won for Voluntary Controlled and Community Schools
Academic year Appeals submitted Appeals won:
Year 7		 Appeals won:
Reception		 Appeals won:
In year transfer
2024/25 (September 2025 intake) 333 5 1 1
2023/24 (September 2024 intake) 332 6 0 3
2022/23 (September 2023 intake) 324 2 1 1