Parent applying for FY1

[tinsel]

Hi, i'd like a bit of advice about the application thing. As a parent with young children is there anyway of applying and knowing in advance where i'll be working? I get the impression you apply to specific foundation schools with no idea of which hospitals you'll be at or the hours you'll be working. Is this the case? Are there ways round it for parents?
Starting F1 will coincide with my eldest strating school so ideally we would like to settle somewhere convenient and permanent. I understand that this would be poss if i applied for academic posts but what about 'normal' FY1?
Many thanks

[Frank's mum]

For foundation years you can apply for sepcial circumstances, they are strict but having a child counts. Then you are pre-allocated to the foundation school which covers your home address, unless you can show a good reason why another school would be more suitalble (for example, you only moved to go to med school and want to return to another area).

Once allocated that is the extent of their requirement to you, however some foundation schools do have further concessions that they give you, for example south thames say that you will not have a commute of more than one hour.

Ideally the best thing is to get the best score you can on the application form and that will give you more chance of a job that suits you. And also FY1/2 can also be done 'less than full time' ie you do them over 3 years instead of two, but this has turned out to be difficult to organise, I've not met anyone who's done it, and the FS don't seem to like it.

[tinsel]

thank you for the reply, that's very helpful.