Inclusion through admissions: How a community brought about change in Brighton and Hove
by Carlie Goldsmith, Curtis James
Originally published by the Sutton Trust on 17/11/25. Reposted here with permission. Please share the Sutton Trust version if you are linking externally.
Class Divide have successfully campaigned for groundbreaking changes to school admissions to create a more socio-economically diverse school system in Brighton and Hove. Carlie Goldsmith and Curtis James, Co-Founders of the organisation, discuss the significance and impact of these upcoming reforms on the ground.
It started with a challenge from parents living on the Whitehawk estate - one of the poorest areas in the country, where just over a third of young people achieve basic GCSEs, and the place we were raised. Could we, they asked - a fledgling band of novice activists with lives irrevocably shaped by the ways the education system fails working-class communities - create more choice of secondary school for families on our estate?
In this moment, Class Divide, a grassroots campaign comprised of residents, people with lived experience, and allies from the wider city and determined to raise awareness of and change the persistent and indefensible education inequalities in Brighton and Hove, was born.
Five years on, all of us older and wiser, we have the answer: yes.
In February this year, Brighton and Hove City Council voted in favour of a series of groundbreaking changes to school admissions and catchment areas to take effect in 2026. The changes include an Open Admissions policy requiring community schools in more affluent neighbourhoods to set aside 5% of places for children from communities with higher levels of socio-economic deprivation; a revised catchment map giving our estate access to two secondary schools instead of one; and an update to the Free School Meal (FSM) priority, ensuring that from 2026 onwards all community schools will have at least 30% FSM-eligible pupils in their Year 7 cohort.
This month, the Schools Adjudicator upheld all these changes, rejecting multiple appeals from parents and schools. In doing so, they ruled the changes we fought for as lawful, fair, and non-discriminatory.
Our campaign was driven by one idea: that creating a more socio-economically diverse school system increases both the choices and the chances available to children from our community - and others like it. In many places across the country, the social make-up of a school reflects the affluence of its postcode. Families pay a house price premium to live in the “right” catchment, effectively locking out children from lower-income households. In Brighton, the area covering the most sought-after schools even has a name - the Golden Triangle - living there the equivalent of getting a “golden ticket,” and highly desirable for families, as we say locally, “down from London.”
Meanwhile, schools on the edges of town, with between a third and two thirds FSM eligible pupils, have no choice but to spend lots of additional time and resources helping children manage the daily impacts of poverty in a system that rewards compliance to a narrow version of success.
Efforts to create a fairer system had been tried before - and failed. But the cost of inaction was stark. In Brighton and Hove, home to some of the wealthiest areas in the region, just 34% of young people from our estate achieved GCSE English and maths at grade 5 or above, compared with 56% citywide and 75% in the highest-performing ward (2022/23).
The Sutton Trust Opportunity Index ranked Brighton Kemptown and Peacehaven - where Whitehawk is located - 527th out of 543 constituencies for FSM pupils’ education and employment outcomes. Only 4% of FSM-eligible young people from our area earn a degree by age 22, and fewer than half are in stable employment by age 28. Of course, many factors create such outcomes, but unfair admissions systems and lack of socio-economic diversity in schools is central to this.
Against this backdrop, it’s hard to express just how much these changes mean. From 2026, Class Divide members, their families, and our wider community will finally have access to a wider range of schools, as will children in other neighbourhoods like ours. The link between house prices and “good” schools has been weakened.
Class Divide used storytelling, petitions, speeches, and communications, alongside our democratic processes, to make a case for change and make change happen. We engaged with the both the main parties on the council, and through setting out our case and reassuring those with concerns about the practicalities, we were able to secure cross-party support for this change.
What has happened in Brighton and Hove shows that inclusion through admissions can be achieved. It provides a blueprint for others who find themselves in the same position that we were. The Adjudicator’s judgement shows local admissions and catchment systems can be made more equitable as long as the purpose of the change is clear, consultation requirements are adhered to, councils are responsive to calls for additional information and requests for public meetings, and proposals account for a range of views. In our specific case, the public support of local secondary headteachers to a reduced Open Admissions percentage was key.
This campaign began with a simple question from parents who refused to accept that where you live should determine where you learn. It ends with proof that collective action, persistence, and hope can make education fairer for everyone.