School admissions: How fair is fair banding?

Most schools using banding tests have more academically able cohorts than neighbouring schools, analysis finds
31st January 2025, 5:00am

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School admissions: How fair is fair banding?

https://www.tes.com/magazine/news/general/school-admissions-how-fair-is-fair-banding
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Since taking office, the Labour government has been clear that inclusion is a driving principle of its planned school reforms.

And some feel this focus on inclusion should encompass school admissions - another area covered by the Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill.

The bill creates a duty for schools and councils to cooperate on admissions, amid warnings that when this does not take place, it can disproportionately affect disadvantaged and vulnerable children.

However, there are calls for greater scrutiny of school admissions, specifically around the use of banding - whereby schools set a quota of students for different ability groups, based on a test.

Schools can use fair banding to ensure their intake reflects the ability range of children nationally, or that of applicants, or local children.

But how fair is it? Some trust leaders argue it allows a school to have a more diverse intake.

Others worry it could hinder the government’s efforts to boost inclusion in mainstream schools. They say this is underlined by new findings showing that the majority of schools that use it have a more academically able cohort than their neighbouring schools.

Higher-attaining intakes

Our findings show that, on average, fair-banding schools have more students with high prior attainment - and fewer with low prior attainment - than the nearest neighbouring school that does not use banding.

The same pattern is found when comparing fair-banding schools to the average for all other schools in the districts where banding is used, according to the analysis carried out for Tes by FFT Education Datalab.

The analysis is based on more than 100 schools that use banding as part of their admissions according to published admission brochures and Tes freedom of information requests.

It looks at key stage 2 performance by the last Year 11 cohort, classing them as having low, middle or high prior attainment.

Across all schools using fair banding, 17.6 per cent of students had low prior attainment, compared with 21.9 per cent across non-fair-banding schools in those districts.

And 24.8 per cent of students in fair-banding schools had high prior attainment - compared with 18.9 per cent across all non-fair-banding schools in these areas.

Dave Thomson, the chief statistician for FFT Education Datalab, says the analysis shows that fair-banding schools seem to have more academically able cohorts than neighbouring schools that do not use fair banding.

Neighbouring schools

The analysis also compared fair-banding schools with their nearest non-fair-banding neighbour. Tower Hamlets and Hackney - where most secondary schools use fair banding - were excluded from these figures.

Some 17.9 per cent of students in fair-banding schools had low prior attainment, compared with 21 per cent of students at the nearest neighbouring schools.

Fair-banding schools also had a higher proportion of students with high prior attainment - 24.5 per cent compared with the neighbouring school score of 19.1 per cent. 

The nearest neighbouring schools had a higher proportion of students whose key stage 2 ability was unknown - at 8.8 per cent compared with 5.5 per cent.

Banding schools across England compared with nearest neighbouring schools.

 

Banding schools in London compared to nearest neighbours.

 

Banding graph

 

The FFT analysis has provided figures for fair-banding schools, their nearest neighbours and for all non-fair-banding schools in districts where banding occurs.

For Dr Nuala Burgess, chair of Comprehensive Future, the research “raises concerns that some schools have found ways to manipulate the fair-banding system in order to admit students likely to boost academic results”.

She suggests banding could be allowing some schools to operate “selection through the back door”.

But Mr Thomson says the data could reflect fair-banding schools “tending to have more affluent applicant pools than their neighbours”.

“Not all schools which use banding do so to ensure a cohort which is nationally representative, ability-wise,” he adds. “Some use it to ensure that their cohort is representative of their applicant pools.”

Another factor could be who is taking the test. “Perhaps applicants who did not attend the tests, and were therefore less likely to receive an offer, were more likely to underachieve at KS2 than those who attended,” he posits.

Some key differences

Of the 79 schools compared with neighbouring schools, 50 had fewer prior low-attaining students and 54 had more prior high-attaining students than their nearest neighbours.

In some cases, the difference in academic ability between fair-banding schools’ students and their nearest neighbour was striking. At one school, 2 per cent of students had been low attaining compared with 28 per cent at its nearest neighbour’s students.

The analysis also looks at the number of students on free school meals (FSM): the picture here is a bit more complex.

Across all schools using fair banding, nearly a third (32.5 per cent) of students are on free school meals, compared with 28 per cent for non-fair-banding schools in districts where banding is used.

In London, the difference is more striking: 35 per cent of students at fair-banding schools are on FSM in London, compared with 29.2 per cent of students in other schools in the same boroughs.

However, when Tower Hamlets and Hackney are removed, the gap narrows, leaving the London figure at 28.2 per cent and 29.1 per cent respectively.

Banding ‘can increase social diversity’

Mark Wilson, CEO of Wellspring Academies Trust, in Yorkshire, which does not use banding, says the admissions process can be used to ensure an even distribution of students when used across an area as a universally agreed approach.

“However, when it is used by a small number of schools in an area where this is not the universally agreed approach, then it can be used by schools to gain a competitive advantage in public service,” he warns.

Charley O’Regan, the Sutton Trust’s senior schools engagement manager, agrees that fair banding can increase social diversity when used effectively, “especially when it is used across a number of schools within a community”.

The Sutton Trust awarded its first Gold Fair School Admissions Award for a multi-academy trust to Trinity Multi-Academy Trust, which uses fair banding.

But it is “important to maximise the number of students in the local area taking the test,” so that the intake will fairly represent the local community, Ms O’Regan says.

Using the national ability range as the benchmark is another potential way of ensuring fair representation, she adds.

Local council concerns

A council complained last year to the Office of the Schools Adjudicator (OSA) that Trinity MAT’s use of fair banding has meant that students living nearest to the school can miss out on a place.

Calderdale Council’s complaint also cited a lack of information over making in-year applications. The adjudicator ruled that the trust’s use of banding was both reasonable and fair, but that arrangements in respect of in-year admissions were not clear for parents.

The authority’s cabinet member for education, councillor Adam Wilkinson, says the council remains concerned that fair banding can disadvantage some local families.  “A number of local children fail to secure a place each year whilst others from further afield do,” he adds.

Trinity’s chief executive Michael Gosling says the OSA has consistently ruled favourably on its use of banding after complaints across a number of local authority areas.

In socio-economically deprived areas, it is important for cohorts to be representative of local communities, he says.

The trust admits students across four bands in direct proportion to assessment outcomes. So, if 40 per cent of applicants are allocated to the lowest attaining band, then 40 per cent of the cohort comes from this band.

Easy access to banding test is crucial

Mr Gosling says it is crucial to work closely with all its partner primary schools in the area to ensure that all local students have easy access to the assessment. 

“We appreciate that only running a ‘Saturday morning session’ or the like could disadvantage some students who may not have the support at home to attend such a thing,” he adds.

Dixons Academies Trust, which runs schools in West Yorkshire and the North West, uses banding in 2 of its 16 schools. This includes its founding school Dixons City Academy, and Dixons Kings Academy - which already used fair banding before it joined the trust.

Luke Sparkes, Dixons’ school and college trust leader, says fair banding has allowed Dixons City Academy, in Bradford, to have a less monocultural intake “in a very divided city” made up predominantly of two communities which would otherwise have little contact.

In addition, he adds, using banding as an admission policy - with a wider catchment area - for a new free school ensures its opening impacts less on its nearest neighbouring school.

What the code says

But some school leaders warn that the current admissions code does not ensure fair banding is being used equitably.

“At present, the school admission code is vague on the use of banding tests,” said a headteacher, who asked to remain anonymous.

Allowing schools to decide who gets put into each band, and what the thresholds are for these bands, is “eye-watering”, he states.

The code states that pupil ability banding is a permitted form of selection used by some admission authorities “to ensure that the intake for a school includes a proportionate spread of children of different abilities”.

It also says that when a school is oversubscribed, looked-after children and previously looked-after children must be given top priority in each band, and that priority must not be given within bands according to the applicant’s performance in the test.

“I do not think the issue is with schools who get their banding tests managed externally - but the DfE should look at its use when schools are managing it all themselves,” says the headteacher.

Admissions is a ‘big player’ on inclusion

Is this likely to be addressed under plans to reform school admissions? 

It should be, if the government is serious about inclusion, the head asserts. “So far, a big part of the noise around reform to promote inclusion has been accountability measures such as Ofsted and performance tables, but the admissions code is also a big player in this.”  

He sees banding as a loophole that needs closing to “ensure fairness and equity across the whole school system and so that opportunity isn’t ring-fenced for a certain type of child”.

The DfE has been approached for a comment.

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