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AFC - Previously looked-after children
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Previously Looked-After Children

Support and advice for previously looked-after children's parents, guardians and schools

Priority school admissions

From September 2021, AfC schools will offer priority of admission to children who are adopted from outside England and Wales. Here is the relevant excerpt from page 10 of the admissions code, which you can find in full in a pdf at the bottom of this page. 

1.7 All schools must have oversubscription criteria for each ‘relevant age
group’ and the highest priority must be given, unless otherwise provided in this
Code, to looked after children and all previously looked after children, including
those children who appear (to the admission authority) to have been in state
care outside of England and ceased to be in state care as a result of being
adopted. Previously looked after children are children who were looked after
but ceased to be so because they were adopted  (or became subject to a child
arrangements order or special guardianship order). All references to
previously looked after children in this Code mean such children who were
adopted (or subject to child arrangements orders or special guardianship orders)
immediately following having been looked after and those children who appear
(to the admission authority) to have been in state care outside of England and
ceased to be in state care as a result of being adopted. Oversubscription criteria
must then be applied to all other applicants in the order set out in the
arrangements.

For more general information, Adoption UK offer a good, general primer about admissions for previously looked-after children in the FAQ section of their education blog