A state-aided Charedi girls’ high school whose entry requirements were the subject of a complaint to the admissions regulator is dropping a reference to mothers wearing sheitels.

The Office of Schools Adjudicator upheld several objections to the entry policy of Menorah High School for Girls in Dollis, North-West London.

The heavily oversubscribed school, which has  60 first-year places, was ranked sixth in the country last year for academic progress from entry to GSCE.

While faith schools can set detailed rules for entry, they must comply with the requirements of the admissions code to be objective and clear.

Schools adjudicator Peter Goringe said Menorah’s rules generally fell short because they did not meet the requirement to be based on published advice from its religious authority.

Mr Goringe said the condition that sheitels worn by mothers of girls “must be refined in terms of length and style” was too subjective. He was similarly critical of a requirement that clothes add “an air of dignity and finesse”.

In proposed new guidelines, the school has dropped the reference to sheitels.

But it has kept its insistence that girls do not wear leggings under skirts which the complainant argued went beyond the demands of Jewish law.

Menorah has also said it will drop a question about synagogue membership. The complainant had argued that membership of an Orthodox synagogue required parents to be halachically Jewish — but the Supreme Court ruling on JFS ten years ago said the ethnic origin of parents could not be used for determining school entry.

Mr Goringe noted that it was against the code to ask a rabbi to confirm religious observances done privately in the home if he could not do objectively. 

Under its new entry proposals, he said, “ A rabbi signs the form to confirm that the family meets the requirements of public religious observance and that he has the option to report if he has clear evidence that the family fails to meet the private elements.” 

The revised policy must be in place for September 2021 entry, the OSA said.

A complaint was also partly upheld against another state-aided Charedi school, Pardes House Primary for boys in Finchley. The school needed to spell out in what circumstances it would contact a rabbi to verify a family’s religious observance.