School Abscense Fine - huge amount

[PMDD]

If I am correct, if you take your child/ren out of school without prior agreement, there is an automatic fine of £60/day/child/parent?

So for us, a family with 3 children, a 2 week holiday in (say) June, would cost us £3600 - or double that if we don't pay within a certain amount of time!

Is it me to think that is totally unreasonable?!

That is a huge amount. The people who take their children out normally can't afford the hike in holiday prices, so how on earth would they afford the fine?

"I rather like a thread that disputing taking children out of school in term time with a title with such a simple spelling error.

Go on many term time holidays op?"

Thats a bit mean.

That's your opinion ouryve for parents that work all year round, full time, piss poor wages, a two week break is something for them to look forward to. Luxury to? Seriously? You can get holidays very cheap in term time, especially if you go last minute or whatever, if you work hard all year round, running after kids then a two week break is well entitled i think. It's not down to you or anyone else to dictate what or what is not a luxury to some people.

coldlight i admire your optimism but ds's school sends children out with stickers on their jumpers to say their parents haven't paid for timetabled activities and thought it was funny when i was shocked and complained. i have also heard such gems as, 'well of course poor kids won't do as well as children with involved parents'

also - my child doesn't need extra support thanks

there was a time when travel was valued, when family was valued, that time is rapidly passing in this country - I am currently making a photo book of our last holiday - you know what at 5 my son got a lot more out of that than 2 weeks in school which is apparently all about play at this age (and not about indoctrination)

it's not down to anyone to dictate things like this to families imo. when on earth did we sign over such liberties?

they're also setting up our children for accepting and thinking nothing of a state in which you can't breath without permission from an official and you have no rights over your own life.

No we never did numpty I also get sick of the Lunchbox Police. It's none of their business if I give MY son, yes, MY son squash ffs! For the record, he only drinks aspartame free stuff or water/milk but it's not the point. If I want to send him off to school with a fruit shoot, greggs sausage roll and a mars bar that is my business. I don't know why people are so with strangers telling us what to do with OUR children.

I feel sad and sorry for people who think that a holiday isn't a necessity. And I'm not talking two weeks abroad, I'm talking about anything really, a week in a caravan in Weston Super Mare, whatever.

It's about spending time together, isn't it? I think we all need a bit of that.

our list of duties as citizens and things we can be punished for seems to be getting longer and longer whilst our list of rights, expectations, services etc that we can expect from the state we finance is getting shorter and shorter.

surely we know that's not right. we don't owe the state our souls simply for being born.

apparently anything other than being an obedient little citizen and doing as you're told is a luxury and one that only the super wealthy should be allowed. apparently we're born slaves and stay that way unless we can buy our way out of it with a serious chunk of wealth.

oh dear god is this how people turn right wing?!?!? except there's no right or left anymore is there? just a political class stuffing their pockets and stamping on everyone else.

I agree with your last three posts, Numpty. :)

Exactly the rich can do whatever they damn please.

The rest of us should just slave away paying off a national debt we never ran up,living a life of austerity and ever increasingly being told what we can and can't do with our children.

It's like we're all little worthless drones only fit for the poorhouse who should be continuously lectured to by the big cheese above re all areas of life and doff our caps when they reward us with the odd penny thrown out of the carriage window.

Naff off.

thanks marmalade. this thread has quite scared me! feel like i'm stuck in the crowd of sychophants (spelt wrong, cheap dig opp if you need one) falling over themselves to praise the emperor's new clothes.

Marmalade even them weeks away in caravans/butlins/centre parcs are so much more expensive in half terms but even if we just want a caravan break in bognor it's a "luxury" I am honestly shocked at how many people have this attitude! I certainly will not be following any rules that's for sure.

Absolutely, numpty. It's on threads like this that I start to think that the conspiracy nuts who believe that the government contaminate the water with chemicals that make us more compliant might have legs...

I'm not following rules either, Downstairs. I'll take a cheque in for the fine on the day I go on holiday. :)

What a lot of hysterical and hyperbolic posts! It's nothing to do with thinking your children are 'the state's property', or being right wing, or a sheep, or anything of the kind.

School attendance is very obviously linked to achievement, and frankly taking your child out of school to go on holiday somewhere hot, whether they're a year ahead or a year behind, is a decision you make and you have to face the consequences. If you send your child to a school, I think you have to be supportive of that school and what they're offering your child - not just decide that some weeks are of no value and you'd be better on a beach.

I don't like or support Gove at all, and I suspect his motives for this policy - I object to parents equating Gove's policy with teachers ('how come I can't go on holiday but they can strike' etc). But nobody is making anybody pay these fines - people can choose whether they want to incur fines, and if they don't, they needn't take the child out of school.

thats right but why do the children of the wealthy deserve less?

A week in Bluestone this week is £150 - its over a thousand in ths school hols, thats because these people need to make money as a business that emplys hundreds

What links? Can you provide the studies? Pretty much all of my friends at school had a holiday IN term time every year or two. The school had a very high pass rate. If you believe all that rubbish then good for you.

Well, to be perfectly honest, Numpty, there's a time and a place for pulling up posters on their spelling, and if ever that was the case it is when someone who says she is a teacher, and that she's going to be responsible for her son's 'enrichment' on a holiday in the sun, but doesn't know the difference between EFFECT and AFFECT, and thinks 'beholdance' is a word!

I've not got to time to finish reading the whole thread, but following the logic behind the theory that if you take your kids out of school you should have to refund the taxpayer, what if I chose to send my child to private school, could I then get a tax rebate?

You don't think there's a link between attending school and educational attainment?

a holiday isn't a necessity though is it? Yes spending time together as a family is invaluable, but does that have to be on a holiday away from home, whether that be 2 weeks in the Maldives or a week in Bognor? No holidays aren't a necessity as a family at all. There are plenty of people who can't afford even n overnight stay in a Travelodge at the seaside let alone take children out of school to save a few hundred pounds on an expensive holiday (realistically a family holiday is going to run to over £1000 for most families)

It certainly is not the fault of teachers and as is stated on mumsnet a million times, teachers are the scapegoat everywhere. If they say well we can't take holidays in term time then they should have known what the job entailed when they signed up for it, if they complain that it takes ages to help little johnnie catch up after his little jaunt to see mickeymouse the art galleries of Paris, they are told stop complaining you work short hours get long holidays and get paid squillions.

Again its the I'm alright jack everyone else mentality, that's made this country like it is today.

Numpty - couldn't agree more! I had real issues with the lunch box police in reception. At the time he was severely underweight and on a diet prescribed by a clinical dietician. Strangers peeling back the bread on his sarnies meant he then didn't want to eat them.

Illegal exclusions are on the rise exponentially and the numbers of SN kids forced to accept part-time or no education for long periods makes a mockery of the whole "attendance" malarkey for me. My own DS has had one term with 50% max lessons permitted - took the threat of legal action to for him to be able to do a full day. It's common place for SN kids to wait terms/years for a school placement. That's OK though because that's the authorities choice.

I want schools to educate, not parent - especially in the all important primary years. If they excel at their historical purpose & core function teaching the 3R's, it's so much easier to do mine.

I find it all very hypocritical and do wonder when we agreed to give over some of the most important choices about raising our kids to a nanny state. There is a good reason the numbers of home educators is rising exponentially year on year. It's also why the independent sector, as a whole remains strong despite all the economic turmoil of recent years.

Steaming my dc have excellent attendance(well the G&T kid doesn't thanks to his courses but thats ok) which is only a tiny part of why they're doing so well at school.

You still haven't told me what is so worthy in July re stripping classrooms,DVDs and worksheets that 1 paultry week away should be ridiculously fined for.Ditto kids sitting in school halls during Dec rehearsing plays they're not even in.

You also haven't told me why the sporty kids can have weeks worth of fixture days etc off,rich kids can go on expensive school trips only a few can afford etc without having their education damaged.

Continual truancy damages education,1 week taken in primary school at a carefully thought out time doesn't.I know as during my teaching career I experienced several who did it.In fact I'd say it enhanced their education.