Admissions
St Charles College welcomes students of all religious backgrounds who wish to pursue their studies in an explicitly Christian context. All students are invited to make a statement about why they might wish to study at a Catholic college. We do not use this statement to determine the offer of a place, but it allows students to reflect upon and engage with the religious identity of the College.

All applicants who submit their application to the College by the 31st March 2009 will receive an invitation to interview.

The entry requirements for the different programme levels are made clear in the Courses section on the web-site. The entry criteria for individual courses can be viewed on the individual course pages in that section. These entry requirements are the same for all applicants.

The College has an inclusive admissions policy and all applicants who successfully complete the application process, irrespecitve of academic ability or prior achievement, can expect to receive an offer. The College, similarly, has an inclusive curriculum offer which is designed to cater for the needs of all students at its partner schools and beyond.

Order of Priority for Admissions:

1. Applicants with Specific Physical or Learning Needs
The governors will give priority of consideration to applications from students with specific physical or learning needs. An open choice of course will be made at enrolment provided the required entry qualifications for specific courses have been met.

2. Applicants from Catholic Partner Schools
The College has a partnership with four secondary Catholic schools: the Sacred Heart High School in Hammersmith; Saint Thomas More Specialist Language College in Kensington; the Sion-Manning School in Kensington; Saint George’s School in Westminster. Year 11 applicants will receive application forms in their schools in September. On application to the College the College will ensure the offer of a place to the pupils of these schools provided satisfactory references are met. The required entry criteria for courses will still operate in all cases.

3. Applicants from outside the Partner School group
Such applicants, if made an offer following an interview at the College and the submission of a satisfactory reference, will receive a conditional offer related to an agreed course programme. This programme will be guaranteed to the applicant provided the published entry criteria are met. Should the required entry qualifications not be met by the applicant, the College will endeavour to make an alternative course offer at the point of enrolment. In the event of all appropriate courses being full, the College reserves the right to withdraw the right of admission. Applications must be received by the 31st March.

Applications for the CACHE Diploma in Child Care and Education
The course is the only programme that might be described as vocational training in that it can lead directly to employment in the child care sector. Admissions criteria are slightly different for this course, in that students applying from any school are given absolutely equal preference for consideration, as long as the application is received before March 31st and none of the considerations described below apply.

Unsuccessful Applicants
The College reserves the right to refuse the offer of a place at the College if:

a) the reference from the student’s current place of study is unsatisfactory
b) the student’s course or career preferences( as discussed at interview) cannot be accommodated by the College
c) the interview is unsatisfactory
d) the application is received after the 31st March and/or the College has no availability (such applications may be placed on the waiting list)

Admissions Procedure
Paper application forms, downloadable from this website or available for the College, can be submitted by post, or you can apply online from this website – the option is accessible from this page. Your applications will be acknowledged, either by post or by email. You will then be required to submit a reference form to your Head of Year which we will send you, together with a pre-paid envelope. Once we have received this form then we have all we need to set up the interview. Interviews are normally held from December onwards, although most take place after Christmas.

We inform you of the outcome of the interview by post. If you have received an offer of a place we expect you to decide whether or not you wish to take up that offer, and inform us accordingly.

Those students who have accepted offers are then given further information about enrolment times and procedures in the summer.