Govt extending school day by a few minutes in ignorance of how schools work

[noblegiraffe]

The government have decided to mandate a minimum 32.5 hour week for schools - the equivalent of being open from 8:45 to 3:15

This is not a specified teaching time, but opening time. Schools who are under will have to find ways to tack extra time onto the teaching day, perhaps by making lunchtime longer or adding an extra break. A school that has, for example, 20 minutes form time, 5 hours of lessons, 20 minutes of break and 40 minutes of lunch is not open long enough. One that has the same arrangement but 50 minutes lunch is fine.

Why? Fuck knows. What they have once again completely failed to do is consult schools about why their opening hours are as they are. Schools in my area, for example, have finely co-ordinated finishing times to avoid massive congestion. Schools who are under would have to consider opening earlier which will mess up buses, and screw those with childcare commitments. It's going to be logistically challenging to arrange, but of course, it won't be the DfE doing it.

schoolsweek.co.uk/schools-asked-to-offer-32-5-hour-week-by-2023-and-ofsted-will-check/

Our school already runs to these times.

Private school is sometimes 8am start 4.15 finish.

I agree it should be down to the school to do their hours.
Personally I think shorter bursts are better and attention has gone by 3 ish

As a parent, I don't want this. The school day is long enough. But I guess no parents or staff were consulted for our opinions.

tbf, there can't be many schools who don't meet this requirement.
When I read this this morning, my initial thought was that this is trying to put a stop to the finishing early half day once a week that some primaries have adopted. There aren't any round here that have but I have read on here that some do (presumably to allow PPA time without cover implications and costs).

That's the time most chikdren end up coming out anyway.

Finishes at 3.00 but still waiting till 3.15 sometimes.

They should have enough funded after school clubs. The government can pay outside groups for sports and art activities even tutoring/homework club.

They shouldn't rely on teachers.

Perhaps they should look at the holidays they're far too long Easter ours break up this Wednesday for a training day Thursday then start of the holidays not back until the Wednesday after Easter so nearly 3 weeks when it used to be 2!!

The summer is far too long aswell

Our school already has longer hours than these.

Buses usually review their timetables to coordinate with certain places, and schools are one of them.

It’s completely bonkers.

Education minister saying some kids miss out on 10 minutes of lessons a day.

They don’t, some kids get a slightly shorter lunch - so they finish slightly earlier and don’t get into fights with kids from a neighbouring secondary school.

Utterly pig ignorant.

@worriedaboutmoney2022

Perhaps they should look at the holidays they're far too long Easter ours break up this Wednesday for a training day Thursday then start of the holidays not back until the Wednesday after Easter so nearly 3 weeks when it used to be 2!!

The summer is far too long aswell

The number of days holiday have always been the sane. The training days used to be holidays for the teachers too. That changed in 1985 as part of a pay deal.

It will add an extra 5 mins onto the day at DDs schools. DS already starts at 8.45 and finishes at 3.30, he has 2 breaks and a longer lunch so less teaching time than DDs shorter school day. Doesn’t make much sense unless the school has significantly less time than stated.

When I was at primary school in the 60s the summer holidays were 7 weeks but half terms were only a Friday and a Monday tacked on to a weekend.

@TheSnowyOwl

Our school already has longer hours than these.

Buses usually review their timetables to coordinate with certain places, and schools are one of them.

Yes and Secondaries round here finish earlier than primaries so older students can pick their younger siblings up from school.

My dc do 8.30 til 4 at an independent school.

There is a state school near me that finishes at 2.45! They certainly don't seem to start an earlier either.

It might be a good thing if it gives a longer lunch - our school does 8.20 - 2.30, with only half an hour for lunch so there is no time for any lunch time clubs. Hope they don't start even earlier though.

My school is just down the road from a primary school. If our end time were to increase to match govt requirements, we'd be kicking out at around the same time and the traffic would be horrendous.

I'm not entirely sure where primary parents would then be able to park to do their pick-up.

I mean 9-3:30 sounds like a pretty normal school day to me? I am generally quite sympathetic to schools regarding the nonsense requirements the government comes up with but this really doesn't sound very unusual?

I may be remembering wrongly but I am sure that at secondary school level they concluded that later finish times reduced the amount of unsupervised after school time that children had before parents returned home from work and therefore reduced the "risky" time during which children were more likely to end up getting into difficulties - whether with groups of friends just getting out of hand or anything else. I can't for the life of me remember where I read it though.

One of the secondary schools near me is finished by 14:50 every day and even earlier one day a week - maybe I am being silly but my school didn't finish til 3:50 (starting at 9am) and so this seems very short to me.

Surely if anything is going to be mandated, it should be teaching time. What's the point of extending the day by giving kids a longer lunchbreak?

And yes, it's true that some schools have started finishing early on a Friday afternoon in order to reduce costs. Perhaps if the government provided adequate funding for education, they wouldn't have to do this?

Ours run from 8.30 till 3pm in primary except the nursery attached which is 8.45 till 3.15 so youngest can be dropped of last it works

it would help if you read the article properly

it does not say it is being mandated, rather that it is an expectation rather than statutory duty. Ofsted will be asked to report on schools that miss the target if they are otherwise providing poor quality education.
it further notes that most schools are already meeting the target or are nearly there

If they want to target schools that are doing half days on Fridays because they can't afford to stay open all day Friday then target those (with extra funding).

Don't fuck around with schools that have finely tuned their opening hours around local needs.

Yes and Secondaries round here finish earlier than primaries so older students can pick their younger siblings up from school

Yes-same here. This will really screw a lot of our working parents if they can no longer rely on older siblings to collect the smaller ones any more.

The school times are very carefully aligned to match the needs of local schools and transport. It stops everyone finishing at exactly the same time which used to happen-we used to get lots of fights when the two local secondary schools finished at the same time. You start moving things by ten minutes (for no apparent reason) then whole systems that work well, stop working well!

@Ted27

it would help if you read the article properly

it does not say it is being mandated, rather that it is an expectation rather than statutory duty. Ofsted will be asked to report on schools that miss the target if they are otherwise providing poor quality education.
it further notes that most schools are already meeting the target or are nearly there

And if you know anything about schools, you'll know that if Ofsted will be looking at it then it will be jumped to. Ofsted is the stick with which the government beat schools.

'Nearly meeting the target' still means schools will have to change opening hours - and to what benefit if it's only a few minutes per day?

Our local outstanding primary school is open from 8.55 to 3.15. So it will presumably have to change its hours to meet this new requirement. I can't imagine that 10 mins extra - whether teaching time or lunchtime - is going to make a blind bit of difference to the children.

It sounds like a sensible plan to me.

Stupid idea. All it means is that some schools will add 5/10 mins to break and lunch. How is that benefiting the children's education?

@alrightfella

My dc do 8.30 til 4 at an independent school.

There is a state school near me that finishes at 2.45! They certainly don't seem to start an earlier either.

They won't start earlier, no, because they will have made the lunch hour shorter.