to be annoyed ith the school - how many times can you penalise a child for poor attendance

[654321]

There are mixed opinions about taking your kids out of school, and we made a choice to take DS out of school for 5 days in total.....these were treated as unauthorised absence. Now bearing in mind that since reception DS's attendance has always been in the high 90's (around 98%) Im not typically a parent that takes non attendance lightly...and there were genuine non financial reasons for not taking holidays during the appropriate holidays - but I also accept that no one twisted my arm to go on holiday.

DS did not qualify for the xmas treat - day trip to the panto because of his attendance - which he accepted as he knew we had been away on holiday and got to do things whist other kids were in school - however now he has been told in addition to that he cannot attend the end of year christmas disco...

How many things can they disqualify him from - he is being punished for something that was technically my choice. It seems that the message is that anything nice coming up he wont be able to do because of his attendance - it just seems to be labouring the point at the expense of the child...DS is 12YO btw :)

Reindeerbollocks - if your child is excluded from activities because of a chronic health issue I would start questioning whether this is disability discrimination

I think all the striking teachers should be banned from the staff xmas bash.

Mabel is just saying that holidays during term time are wrong, regardless of reason.
i don't see how that's insensitive at all. Of course it's different if your child is ill

Oh Lyingwitch...we will continue on and on....I do care, I care that my son is learning that people can move the goal pasts with their punishments...there is no clear direction with the consequence of missing school days and rather that take on the parents maybe the tougher option) the school chooses to pick the easy target, the student

"But how Tethers? Means tested fines? Name and shame? Threat of prison? Some parents just won't care."

Parents who won't care, won't care if their child suffers either.

Are you really arguing that because we cannot think of an effective punishment for the parent, we should punish the child? That makes no sense to me.

Children with 'bad' parents are often punished twice with this ridiculous system.

Mabel what utter, utter nonsense, some of the most well educated people I've met have had disrupted education for different reasons. A few days off school has no adverse affect on long term education. My children missed a month at school this year due to us returning from living in Australia, in fact DS missed the entire Y6 as he was in Grade 5 in Oz (and only halfway through) but due to his birthday went straight into Y7 here with no academic problems whatsoever.

I think parents should endeavour to take holidays in school holidays but sometimes this just isn't possible. OP YANBU, I think penalizing your son in this way is a very mean and inexcusable thing to do - I hope you take it up with the school.

ReindeerBollocks. I wasn't referring to optician, doctor or hospital or dentist appointments. I know what they are like. Or measles or mumps or scarlet fever. I meant something that the children go to school with like autism or ...... Sorry if I didn't make that clear.

Why should schools be 'punishing' adults at all? We aren't in a police state when I last looked. Haven't we got more pressing social issues to focus on as a society than if a child misses 5 days of school in an entire year? It's like fiddling while Rome burns, quite frankly.

It seems that the school has targetted the softer option because there are some hard faced parents who wont really care - just to clarify, I do care - I care that the school feels it has to target my son rather than administer a fair consequence to his 5 day absence

lol hardgoing....I may use that quote "fiddling while rome burns" classic :D

No, I don't think the child should be punished. I think there needs to be a better system of managing absent children, which would include special circumstances where a child needs to be absent. I don't think a holiday falls into that.

OP... you care that the school feels it has to target your son... did you know that these would be the consequences? I read that you knew about the panto trip and that was ok to you and your son.

I'm not saying that the school should punish your son, they shouldn't - they should punish the parent, but what is going to work when your attitude is that it's your choice to take him out?

... and no, we won't go on and on... you can justify this to yourself as much as you like but will you go and tackle the school about it or just post here?

654321, i really don't understand why you are pissed off.

as i said in my previous post. my son has heath issues and will never get the attendance treats (well until peadatrions think that school aged children should have appoinments after school hours)

I'm all curious. What WAS the reason for the holiday in termtime?! Go on...

We have had to take holidays in school time. This was directly down to DP's company being very VERY restrictive on what holiday they allowed employees to take. I made sure that the time did not conflict with anything important, eg SATS, and the head authorised it in any case.

There was no chance that DP could get holiday during the school holidays at that time. Both DCs are still doing well at school, I don't agree that one week off ruined their education.

I don't like the DCs to take time off school but in this case we got a holiday as a family that we would simply not have had otherwise during school hols.

Luckily DP's company has relaxed their rules somewhat so we may be able to go away in the school hols next year.

God there are some anal types out tonight. 'Computer says "no" ' types. OP, you sound like a decent, thoughtful parent. It's a silly, ill-considered policy. Speak to the school and politely point out the unfairness of 'double' withdrawal of treats. They need to know.

Merymarigold - scroll back a bit I explained earlier :)

Lyingwitch - yes I will take it up ith the school, I have emailed his year head this evening.

I dont understand what Im justifying....choice is simple and we live with the consequence - my question is how far can the school stretch this consequence befroe it becomes unfair.

Thankyou Delia, my email to his year head was in a polite tone, just asking her to clarify exactly what the policy was, but not in a confrontational way :)

We just had a newsletter from the school listing the number of days of both authorised and unauthorised absences in each class. In one class it was pointed out that one child was responsible for 20 of those unauthorised absences.

At the end of the newsletter the head reminded parents that the school will be closing at 1.30 on the last day of term . Of course they will register the children so although every child in the school will miss one session it won't count on the statistics. Makes me fume

It's just endless. Rewards for walking to school (child unable to control). Rewards for constant attendance (child unable to control). Rewards for healthy eating lunchboxes and penalized if chocolate found on their person (child unable to control). It's petty, really petty. What is this teaching children about fairness and autonomy?

I think they can strech to the end of the term during or following the school time was missed for a holiday.

What the school is doing is fair enough, although I think they should have been clearer about their intention to do this at the start. It can't be used as an incentive to discourage parents for taking term time holidays if the parents don't know about it.

But you took the risk, so you should accept it gracefully.

But they might have brought in the additional consequence while op's son was on holiday so he missed the announcement...

"If a school did nothing in response to unauthorised/illegal absence, then the school would bear the brunt of the consequences. Schools have a legal duty to act on this. If your school has found that attendance related rewards are successful in deterring unauthorised absences, then why should they not continue this?"

If a school found that telling the children that their parents would die if they were off school deterred unauthorised absences, would that be ok? Of course not. Strategies to increase attendance should not be at any cost to the child.

"What is this teaching children about fairness and autonomy?"

Exactly.

hocus...they only decided to have the christmas disco a month ago...We had been on holiday....it just seems like "oh theres another thing we can exclude him from because his mother did the unthinkable and took him out of school for 5 days..." :D

Oh god its petty -

tethers I think that they would get more response from DS if they told him we would suffer a zombie invasion if he missed a day of school :D - I think Im starting to lighten up :)