To find it increasingly annoying, that parents send clearly ill children into school

Good grief since when did working trump a child being unwell. What has the world come to. Most (I assume, or hope it’s still most) children have 2 parents and many have family to assist. Some don’t but MOST do.

This!!!

There is a school round here (my DS should have gone there but didn't) where the HT's stance is that parents should send their child in and if he deems them unwell enough he'll send them home.

One of Ofsted's new focuses is attendance I believe and what school's are doing to maximise it. Not their fault that they have to challenge each and every one.

Usually one of three things:

1. Can't take time off work to look after them.
2. Can't leave them at home for fear of being accused of/arrested for neglect (in which case you get sacked anyway).
3. School has been complaining about poor attendance, but get a bollocking if you send them in anyway.

If it feels like everyone is out to get you, that's because there might be some element of truth to it.

Do you work OP? Because your job is not going to fire you for taking time off if your child is sick is the most naive thing I’ve read in a long time.

I agree that kids who are lethargic/febrile/vomiting shouldn’t be in. That doesn’t happen very often at our school at all though, I can’t ever once recall seeing a kid that poorly being dragged in through the gates (although granted my eldest is only year 1).

DC are in all the time with coughs and colds - because that’s what our school attendance policy states. They’d rather have them in and contact the parents later if they turn out not to be well enough.

I worked in education for over 20 years and the emphasise on 100% attendance was ridiculous. Many obviously poorly children traipsed into school spreading whatever they were suffering from. End of term certificates for attendance were given to those who came in everyday. The class with the lowest absence rate were rewarded with a school trip as a treat.

It doesn't have to be this way. The "attendance trumps all" attitude is self-defeating as it's leading to more illness absences. The Dept of Education data itself shows that illness is the leading cause of persistent absence.

I can share my experience from an Asian country where public health is still focused on infection control, unlike the UK. Diseases like RSV or flu are notifiable. More than three cases at once in a class and the class gets shut down for a few days to break the chain of transmission. Parents are regularly asked to do rapid COVID/flu/tests if there are cases, before sending children in, and to send the photos via the parents WhatsApp group (which teachers are also part of). Someone catches something, the parents inform other parents to watch out for symptoms. Masking is common, yes even amongst 3-year olds, it is perfectly normal and accepted. There is genuinely a culture of trying to avoid spreading illness to others.

The UK has gone in totally the opposite direction and is completely failing to mitigate against contagious illnesses, in both the education and healthcare sector. As a result, the population is sicker. And yes there's data showing this. No coincidence that this started in 2020.

We got a letter when my kid was so ill he had to go hospital, so his otherwise excellent attendance dipped below 90%. Never happened before or since, but that letter still burns. Sometimes kids are left upset because they won't get the 100% attendance award because they caught a bug.

Also, work/uncompromising management/service capacity challenges... Employees have kids who get sick, but it's not easy for many to take the day off. It's cruel to the kids, but an unemployed parent could be the outcome.

You’ve obviously never had a DC dip below 95% (through illness). They’re relentless.

Just because you’ve never had an issue with attendance doesn’t mean no one else has. Just because you’ve never had an issue with an employer doesn’t mean no one else has.

I’m lucky that my current employer allows me to work from home if my child is sick. In a previous job, after a few days I wouldn’t have been paid, and I had very limited childcare around me. Not everyone can afford to take unpaid time off work, especially in the current climate.

My youngest had what sounded like an awful cough for a month last year that just wouldn’t shift but she was fine. I couldn’t have kept her off that long.

Whilst I don’t agree with children being sent in when they are clearly unwell, I do think you’ve been in a very lucky position.

I’m a teacher in an ASN with children with compromised immune systems and life-limiting conditions. We’ve just had an outbreak of norovirus plus this flu that’s doing the rounds. Yet children are still sent in clearly unwell. They can’t even tell you how they are feeling either. A lot are dosed with Calpol and sent in with parents expecting a phonecall later in the day. The poor children are lying crying clearing very upset and nothing comforts them, or they’ve had 2/3 episodes of diarrhoea but the parents are arguing it’s their diet! (If it was their diet they would be having diarrhoea everyday).

For us it means other children getting ill, and also staff. Some have been reprimanded for having too much time off, they themselves are scared to stay off so drag themselves in. I know parents have to work and also need time to sleep etc but we aren’t respite care.

Many schools don't have that kind of space now. It's also no longer acceptable to leave a child unsupervised for that kind of period of time either.

@Howarewealldoingwhat work do you do? If a child is actually ill, I don’t think any parent will send them in. But the threshold has to be higher than just a snuffle or feeling under the weather

Ds7 woke up being sick a couple weeks ago. I kept him home, phoned the office. That evening I had a welfare phonecall from his teacher… this was his first day off sick this school year, mind you.

Schools do not have an issue with children being off when ill . It’s when parents lie and take them on holiday etc

Some absolutely do. I worked in schools for 20+ years and some are absolutely reasonable about illness and some aren't.

They are under huge pressure to show they push attendance.

My DS has flu (tested positive - we were all tested for covid and flu when my other child was hospitalised) so I obviously kept him home so as not to spread it round and the school agreed. Had a call the following day saying the school had been advised that if he's not feeling too unwell for school physically then he should be in.

They did sound very grateful when I lied said he was feeling much worse and wouldn't be in for the rest of the week.

You are so naïve OP and it shows. There have been plenty of posts even just on Mumsnet recently where parents are worried about keeping kids home when they are sick because the kids have had a lot of time off and the schools are hounding them about attendance. If your child isn't off a lot or if your school is good and doesn't worry about attendance when the child is genuinely sick, you are one of the lucky ones. "School don’t have an issue children having time of if ill" may sometimes be true, but don't act like it always is, because it isn't.

your job is not going to fire you for taking time off if your child is sick . So sending them in ill is selfish

My friend, a teacher, has to take 2 weeks off work as her child had chicken pox. She did not get paid for those 2 weeks as her child was ill, not her - That’s half pay for a single mother of 3 kids and rent to pay.

Do schools no longer have medical rooms or sick rooms? When I was a child, if I was taken ill at school I was sent to the medical room. Sometimes I was lying on a bed in there all day until home time. Parents were only called in exceptional circumstances - and many parents were uncontactable anyway, as they didn't have a phone. Sometimes one of the teachers would give a sick child a lift home, if they didn't seem well enough to walk home by themselves.

Nobody stayed at home if they had a cold.. But we were expected to stay away if we had an infectious disease (the most common ones that everyone had at some point during primary school were chickenpox, mumps, measles and German measles).

Of course parents get fired for unplanned time off! Yes you can take unpaid parental leave but that doesn’t stop bad employers penalising parents that aren’t in- also not everyone can afford to lose a days wage.