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?

no we have been unable to access support, we have now moved areas, counties, LEAs, homes and schools in an attempt to find a school and an LEA that is more prepared to support us.

The move itself seems to have brought a measure of peace and at the moment we have no need for extra intervention, although from the contact I have had with the head, who is fully aware, I do not think we would struggle so much to get support.

When DC school refused here, head believed me and went to see DC and have a chat, in his old school I was treated like a hysterical parent making things up.

Interestingly, we have moved from a flagship, OFSTED outstanding school, to a small village school - smaller, less pupils and generally, so far, the DCs are flourishing in a way they haven't for a long time.

The problem is - need is need, and in our situation, it is need whether it is in a house where both parents have never worked and are trapped in a poverty cycle or a house where both parents are well educated professionals, abuse does not just strike the poor - sometimes, I think it would have been easier if I was less educated and I knew less about what "should have happened", if I had been more willing to accept our lot - I wouldn't have felt so betrayed.

i understand what you're saying coldlight, and the need to defend what you do and it's a reflex to challenge generalisations (it's all bad) with more generalisations (it's all good). the reality is that it's inconsistent and impossible to generalise. so the people who appear on these threads with horror stories of schools are not weird anomalies that can be brushed over but a part of the real picture.

it's great that you work in a school that you feel is reasonable and helpful and tackling the important things. others have very different experiences.

from that can you see why for some the idea that a headteacher will be fair and reasonable and should be given absolute carte blanche to make such decisions unilaterally and without the right to appeal is shocking?

someone sent me this today. i can imagine many of my students past and present identifying very strongly with it.

i also post it so people who only work at or are involved with primary schools can get a culture feel for what secondary is like.