UP TO 70 children will be told before Christmas that there’s no room for them at Woodmill High School.

It’s set to reach capacity which means Primary 7 pupils in the catchment area face an anxious wait to see where they will be going next summer.

After admitting it may go to a ballot, Fife Council have now outlined the “priority criteria” for deciding who gets a place with the unlucky ones to be told in the next few weeks.

And it could come down to how far away they live from the school gates.

In a letter to parents, Shelagh McLean, head of service in education and children’s services, said: “Staff are now working through the pupil data to establish the priority placing for each of the Primary 7 pupils in the catchment area of Woodmill HS.

“I will write out to individual parents of pupils who are at risk of not obtaining a catchment place at Woodmill, prior to the Christmas holidays, advising them of the next steps.

“It is entirely possible that the pupils identified will currently be attending any one of the associated primary schools.”

For those who live in the catchment area, top priority will be given to pupils with additional support needs and then to children with a brother or sister already at Woodmill.

All remaining catchment pupils “will be allocated places by reference to the distance between their home and Woodmill, with the shortest distance being offered places first”.

Placing requests to the other four West Fife high schools – Dunfermline, Inverkeithing, Queen Anne and St Columba’s – will not be approved before all places are allocated at Woodmill.

Education chiefs have known for some time that the high school was set to reach capacity by the summer of 2018 and came up with proposals to change the catchment areas, essentially to fill up the other high schools but also to address some long-standing issues.

However, last month, councillors rejected the measures and no changes can now be implemented until August 2019.

That leaves children and parents in limbo and Ms McLean said “there will be a number of Primary 7 pupils (approximately 50-70) living within the Woodmill catchment area who are unlikely to be able to obtain a place at Woodmill in August 2018”.

The most controversial proposal was the rezoning of addresses within the Masterton Primary School catchment, which would have sent pupils to Inverkeithing High instead of Woodmill.

Parents and politicians argued that, if the catchment was to change, the children should go to Dunfermline High.

The council also wanted to change the catchment areas for the Limekilns, Torryburn, Tulliallan, Canmore, Pitreavie and Commercial primary schools.

Housebuilding is forcing the council’s hand with thousands of new homes built in the east of Dunfermline, in the Woodmill catchment, over the past decade.

Children from those homes have helped fill classrooms and with 12,000 more new homes planned for Dunfermline and West Fife in the next 20 years, it’s clear solutions are needed.

They were two of the issues that prompted the Press to launch our Action for Schools campaign in January that called for all parents, teachers, politicians, councillors, Fife Council and the Scottish Government to work together to tackle the crisis facing West Fife schools and ensure our kids continue to receive the best education they possibly can.

The most immediate problem is at Woodmill but, unless something is done, all four high schools in Dunfermline are set to reach capacity in 2021-22.

The council believe a new West Fife high school is likely to be needed to cope with demand and they also want to replace crumbling buildings at Inverkeithing, Woodmill and St Columba’s, at a cost of around £150 million.

They’ve set aside £50m and must await the announcement of the next round of Scottish Government funding for education before they can submit a bid for the rest of the money.