To invoke the ‘otherwise’ option for school absence?

OP.
You do know that deregistering your kids so you can go skiing educate them elsewhere temporarily means the school will erase any and all trace of them the day the letter arrives on the head's desk. Don't bank on them going back into the same class, sitting in the same space, having the same drawer, the same peg.

Besides, what education are you planning on providing while your children are in kid's clubs while you are on the piste you are temporarily HE them? Although there's no legal obligation to provide it, a lot of LA's now ask to see flight tickets HE plans.

You can deregister and re-register a child at any time; what you can't do is guarantee their school place will still be available. If the school is oversubscribed or someone new moves into the area, the school place will absolutely be gone by the time you try to return them. They have no obligation or reason to hold the place open for you.

If you deregister your child, you'll be expected to provide evidence to the local authority fairly soon. Some LAs have a two step policy where they want plans outlined for the education within a couple of weeks, some LAs will wait about six weeks for a response outlining the progress made and education provided so far. There's no option to be unknown to the LA if you're deregistering a child, so that will definitely happen.

Please don't deregister spuriously. There's a community of responsible, dedicated home educators pushing to maintain the rights of home educating families, and things like deregistering for a big holiday make it much harder for those of us who are in this for the long haul.

Is there not an online school, King's Interhigh or something, that is aimed at children who can't attend school in person for whatever reason but particularly kids who are acting/competing in sports? There's an option.

Ah, who knew that any complex policy issue could be resolved with a simple "Out with the old and in with the new!"?

I think some schools will work with special circumstances for children with exceptional needs for chunks of time away like high level sports or child actors but most of those children go the private route and also hire tutors.

Were you considering taking a tutor with you on your trip @KuanKaKu ?

Think the OP would find the idea of paying private school fees rather ‘antiquated’ too!

I love the idea that , as with the travelling community, wanting to take your kid skiing for less money means you're a protected minority and should be treated as such.

My parents couldn't afford to take us on holiday outside of term-time, so we just didn't go. If you can afford a holiday at all you're doing better than a lot of families are right now, so spend the time you're spending on this Chat GPT legalese nonsense on trying to find a break that's more suitable for your dates and budget. That would be more productive.

General School Governor here (sec) The simple answer is no .. you are welcome to withdraw your child from
school but they’ll be removed from roll with no guarantee of being able to return

In a neighbouring LA there was a deal of off-rolling when parents took children out of school to go on a pilgrimage to Saudi Arabia. The date changes every year and so when it coincided with the summer holiday - no problem. But when Hajj falls in term time children could return to find they'd lost their place.

Pressure schools attendance rates, lack of communication, pressure on places all exacerbated the problem.

Some of the schools in that area were quite popular and oversubscribed.

Hajj itself is a relatively short festival but some children would be out for 2+ months if the parents included a trip to see relatives in their heritage country. Often schools were not given a return date, sometimes the children were just not there.

As worries about forced marriages came into public awareness then social services would be involved if the child concerned was a 14-16 year old girl.

If you feel that you need to be away and take your child with you then honesty and an open discussion is probably best for all concerned.

What do you mean by antiquated? Didn't the more draconian attendance rules come in recently? Under Gove? Because of a link between missing chunks of school, disruption and poor educational outcomes.

If you don't like the system you have the choice of HE full time and take full control of your child's education exactly how you wish - so you don't have to use a system you disagree with. In some countries HE is not legal and you do have to use the system.

I'm getting, I can afford a fine, but just don't want to pay it. And I don't want another child to have the school place while I ponce about travelling.

When I was in primary school one of my friends went travelling around Australia for about 8 weeks (possibly longer). The school just accepted her absence. She didn’t have to do any extra homework. She just had a massive holiday.

In highschool that same person left year 12 months before graduation to get a job in an office. She came back to visit wearing her office clothes and high heels. The Deputy Principal still allowed her to graduate even though she didn’t meet the 80% attendance requirement and obviously never even submitted her assignments or attended tests. She also missed her final exams. It was so unfair that she was allowed to graduate when she didn’t earn her place.

It seems like the mother wants to take her child out of school to go on holiday and doesn’t want to get fined.

I would suggest you acknowledge receipt of her email and report her to be fined for failing to attend school as it’s very clear she isn’t going to be homeschooling her child and is only using the Act to get out of the attendance requirements. You either homeschool or not. It’s not up to you to make that determination- it’s up to the Court. She can explain to the Court the reason for the withdrawal from school.

I would formally acknowledge the request and tell her that it’s not possible to temporarily de-register from school and keep her child’s place and as she has not indicated she has registered for homeschooling you will escalate this matter.

Then send all correspondence through your normal channels for the purpose of a fine being issued.

You’re well within your rights to lobby for change on this issue at school trust level and higher. But on a single school basis, if you de-register you’ll have to re-register afterwards and then you might find your child’s place has been given to someone else in the mean time! Both my kids school have waiting lists and they can’t refuse school children are enrolled if a space comes available.

I had to de-register and re-register mid term on a single day when my child changed school last year and admin wise it wasn’t an easy thing to do.

Use private schools - they’ll hold places for you as you’ll still be paying fees. Over the years I’ve known children have a term/year off for travelling during a sabattical or returning to a home country. You just need to be happy to pay to keep your place. The onus would also be on you to ensure that your child can keep up with the curriculum on your return.

You haven't managed to give one single argument on how the actual education would work and be beneficial to the children?

aside from you wanting to swan on cheap holidays whenever and for how long you fancy, but having teachers available to do the catch up with your kids when you finally feel like coming back.

I cannot wait to hear how your new and better system would work.

I sincerely hope you are a bot, OP, because the thought that you are an actual parent, responsible for actual children and their wellbeing is, frankly, depressing and terrifying. Spaffing incoherent AI slop into an email makes you neither clever nor informed and it certainly isn’t going to effect any change in the law. But you knew that.

We went to another country for a period of 7 months. We had to deregister them and then hope the place was still there when we got back. The school was undersubscribed so we felt confident it would be but it was a risk.
You can't temporarily remove and hold a place. It doesn't work like that.
Neither is it fair to hold a place open. As there is no guarantee that you will come back and another family might move in near the school desparately wanting and needing a place. And its not fair to hold places open for if and when you decide to come back.
What if every one did this?

Then they will find themselves with their children either on forced school attendance certificates, parental supervision orders, forced to home educate or having to pay to provide a compatible education to meet their childrens needs.

I have sympathy for family life matters. But that's why we have the right to use systems other than state provided education.

How do you propose the education is provided consistently?

@KuanKaKu I started to read your post with interest thinking you were hoping to use this option for a family emergency or need with a large chunk of the school year - ie four months or more.

For example being sent abroad on a diplomatic mission, or a family emergency abroad. Or the chance for an experience of a lifetime like doing one of those tall ship adventures.

That’s where your ‘otherwise’ exemption could work. And you’d commit at least one parent to teaching, monitoring and reporting the educational development of each child during this period.

That it turns out you want a ten day skiing holiday is ridiculous - how many hours per day were you planning on doing school work in those ten days???

What an absolute load of shit op, your ai generated letter sounds ridiculous, do yourself a favour and keep your children in school.

Okey dokey. Would bet my bottom dollar that time will NOT tell and that the status quo will remain. You are not Rosa Parkes fighting for injustice with courage and dignity. You are just another out of touch person who wants their own way, which in this instance, means a nice sking holiday in term time.... Crack on OP.

So you want to take them out for a holiday then.

Oh I hope you send it, the teachers will have a good laugh. How totally ridiculous.

What an irresponsible way to play fast and loose with your children's education.