To think closing schools or making them "optional" during the heatwave is putting pressure on working parents and is just a bit silly?

School isn’t childcare

It's unpaid for most people though. A lot of people will find it very difficult to lose almost a full week's pay.

Not to paid parental leave. Parents need to earn.

Eh? My point is that for kids at that school, who have very hot homes,it's almost definitely better to be at school. That might not be true for all schools. But I'd wager that almost all schools will have areas cooler than a 30th floor flat where the windows don't open, even if you keep a cool zone in the hall and a couple of other places.

Do what you like with your own kids, but don't say it's the 'sensible' thing to do for all parents. Which plenty of posters have said.

@Tulips94 Yes absolutely - even if you're a teacher.

You are entitled to parental leave. Whether your employer likes it or not

It’s pretty ridiculous to expect schools to say what the plan was last week: we all know it can change in a flash! They couldn’t say they were shutting a week ago - can you imagine the uproar.
People are however capable of warning employers there is a possible heatwave coming and they’ll see what happens nearer the time with the schools.

Then maybe employers need to be held to task and be more considerate?

That’s awful. Someone needs to send the pregnant women home - they should have a risk assessment

I think if you drop your kids off in a short walk or air con car it’s a different life to bus or tube commuters

Ok do you want to tell that to our bosses though? Not everyone has the freedom to just drop everything and not show up to work. We have to work to keep a roof over our heads & food on the table

Making it optional is the worst, laziest scenario.

Either its safe for kids & teachers to be in, or it isn't.

An optional approach tends to disadvantage the poorest, most vulnerable children, and those who already have weak attendance records. They are kept home & miss out on more learning, while children of working professionals tend to be sent in.

Convenience? It’s how they pay the bills, keep the lights on. Survive.

People get fired for not working when they are contracted to work.

People die if some professions fail to turn up to work.

Actually i need to see a GP but im leaving it till next week as the heat exacerbates my bowel issues (ive been ill with it for the last week) so going to a stifling GP surgery with no air con is too risky so im leaving it till next week.

Ok I’m going to get shot for this but here’s my honest opinion

schools exist for our children to get an education, not to look after our kids while we work.

so if the school says they need to close, we look after our kids. It’s not their responsibility

I don’t know how helpful “have you seen the Met office alert/the temperature/the forecast” is at this point.

Yes. We’re all aware of the alert, the forecast, the temperature outside and inside, we all have phones, and eyes and skin, we’ve seen the news, and the Facebook posts, and the various MN threads.

It is hot. Some kids are better off in school. For others it’s just more convenient. People have jobs they can’t just not do because of the change in temperature, or don’t actually have the facilities to keep their kids as cool as they’d like.

But I think it’s safe to say, yes. We all know what the weather currently is and is expected to be.

So when people cant get an appointment with a GP this week because the GP has had to ring in as their childs school is closed and they need to be at home with them the general public will be understanding will they.

I doubt it very much.

How do you know that because your 5 year old was ok that all children in all classes at the school were ok?

One of the kids in one of my classes was still wearing a blazer and seemed completely oblivious to the heat but the rest of them were very much affected by it.

Erm, my 5 year old was absolutely fine at school today (zone 2 south London). It does not have air con. She skipped out perfectly normally at 3.30 happily talking about her day, seemingly oblivious to the heat.

I’m not sure that fact brings anything to the debate, apart from highlighting that the degree of issues experienced in schools during a heatwave is very building specific and blanket polices (or opinions) aren’t helpful. I don’t doubt some schools are clearly struggling and should close, but closing my kids’s school would be entirely unnecessary (and I say that as someone very happy and willing to keep her at home the second her school tells me it’s necessary).

It's probably just as easy to be sanctimonious when your kids are going to a school with air con and not somewhere utterly intolerable.

A lot of children, especially in cities, live in dangerously overheated flats or temporary accomodation. So it's not always 'sensible' to keep them at home where it will be even hotter, as well as overcrowded.

Primary DC's school is fully open (aircon, although not amazing, but have a big field with lots of trees). Secondary is doing a half day although they also have Aircon and DD said it was 'fine' today. Hopefully schools will do as hers has done and let it be known to parents that if it is better to keep the kids in school, they can.

It's easy to be sanctimonious about your Aircon and ability to lay on water play. Not everyone can do that (shades of COVID where lots of us who had to send our children in while we kept everyone else safe were shamed for it).

I'm actually really not trying to be combative but surely you can see this isn't an argument? Crisis experts and meteorologists? Could you have picked 2 more unreliable disciplines? They are literally trying to predict the future - a notoriously and inherently fallible endeavour.

Some things have to change. We have to take really stringent measures to limit climate change, we have to build smarter and maybe we have to change our summer school hours.

I don't disagree with any of that, but also it's also not realistic - not practically and not financially. Certainly not before we've had maaaany more years of this.

@drdoolittlejennubs As an ex primary teacher I fully understand; it's so difficult having to look after 30 other people's kids in this severe heat when you can't go and get your own little ones.

I work in an office with no air conditioning. We all got sent home and hour early and are working from home tomorrow and Thursday.

DS school is staying open, but it has air conditioning so he's better off there than at home! If they didn't I'd fully support them closing. If risk assessments say it's too hot for me to be in the office, it would be too hot for my son to be in school in the same temperature.

These are not normal circumstances - have you not seen the updates from the Met Office.,