Parents have launched a mass protest after being told their children cannot attend the schools of their choice.

Families in Long Lee are frustrated that their first choice, Parkside Secondary School, is not available in spite of 70 children from Long Lee Primary School being offered places at the Cullingworth school last year.

Only one child from Long Lee has been offered a place at Parkside -- on the sibling ruling, where a child is offered a place because a brother or sister is already at the school.

Parents are also angry that the only places offered to them are at Greenhead High School, Keighley, where two thirds of the pupils are from the Asian community.

They are now sending a 400-name petition to the local education authority to bring about a change to the current situation.

Individual parents have also vowed to go to an independent appeal this summer in a bid to get their children into Parkside.

More than 40 concerned residents attended a meeting on Wednesday evening at Long Lee Primary, which was attended by Bradford LEA representatives.

Susan Barlow, 35, from Dale View Grove, has a son, Thomas, 11, who will be moving to a secondary school this September and a daughter, Laura, aged nine.

She said: "We feel as though we've been led down the wrong path because Parkside strongly felt our children would be accepted this year.

"Everyone thought there was a choice of three schools and most people put down Parkside first, Oakbank second and Bingley Grammar third. We couldn't believe it when we got the letter saying our kids' were going to Greenhead.

"Children from Oxenhope and Haworth have got places at the school and are ahead of us if any more become available, and yet geographically we are just as close to the school as Haworth and closer than Oxenhope.

"Long Lee was in that original catchment area but that has been changed along the way by the LEA and we feel we've been kept in the dark. We just can't believe that the decision has been made for us."

She added that their feelings against Greenhead were not based on race but on the schools performance.

"Our argument is that Greenhead is not an improving school. Our 11-year-old children will also have to travel a further distance and through a busy town centre to get there."

Residents predict that the current situation will have a detrimental effect on the local community as more families take "flight" over the border into North Yorkshire to get their children into Skipton and South Craven schools.

Bradford principal education officer Jennie Sadowskyj said: "When we were carrying out the school reorganisation, the whole rationale for Parkside was to take pressure off the Aire Valley schools and Oakbank.

"Parkside was there predominantly to serve Cullingworth, Denholme, Wilsden and Harden, and places left over to include Haworth and Oxenhope.

"In the Keighley area there is a definite admissions policy and Long Lee is a named feeder school for Greenhead.

"Seventy children got into Parkside last year because it was under-subscribed so people from other areas got in. This year it is over subscribed."

Vice-chairman of Long Lee Primary School governors Ian Ford said: "We were in the initial draft document and were consulted by Parkside, but in the final draft we weren't consulted.

"The LEA can further take pressure off Aire Valley schools by putting Long Lee in the catchment area for Parkside."

Assistant director of pupil and community services Dennis Williams said: "I don't know why Long Lee was taken out but anything drawn up by the admission authority was subject to change.

"As far as including Long Lee in a future catchment area, there will be a decision with Bingley schools about new admission policies for the future."

Parents now have until Wednesday to lodge an appeal and decisions will be made by an independent panel on May 7.

Parkside head teacher Dr Tony Rickwood said: "I can understand the distress of parents at Long Lee but the situation we find ourselves in is difficult because we have no control whatsoever over our admissions.

"The admissions authority effectively places at our school those students that fit the criteria for a community school predominantly based on distance from school.

"The governors and myself have sought meetings with the education authority and other local schools at primary and secondary level to put forward the most appropriate way to establish a feeder school scenario.

"It would enable parents to have a very clear conception of where their children could go, avoiding the situation we are in now."

Dr Rickwood added: "I do think we need to move to a situation where at least for the majority of students we build a system of mutual co-operation between ourselves and primary and secondary schools which is beneficial and clear."

Keighley North Labour councillor Malcolm Slater said: "I would suggest the links between Long Lee and Parkside are far stronger than with people in Haworth and Oxenhope."

Keighley North Labour councillor Malcolm Slater said: "I would suggest the links between Long Lee and Parkside are far stronger than with people in Haworth and Oxenhope."