OK, one vote each...

[ClockWatchingLady]

Should schools/LEAs allow parents to take children out of school for a holiday (once per year, say) during term time?

There's been plenty of debate already, so let's just have a little show of hands so we can count up...

I say YES.

"seems like if you have to use state schools you just have to agree to follow someone else's rules for your own children."

What a very odd statement. Particularly when you only apply it to state schools-have you experienced the rules in most private schools?????? They tend to go a bit beyond send your child to school on school days and do!5' give them coke and a Mars bar for lunch!

if you have to use state schools you just have to agree to follow someone else's rules for your own children

Well of course you do. There are too many families at schools for each family to make up it's own rules about when they should go, how long the DC should spend there, what they should do whilst they are there etc.

What do you think they should be doing?

If you don't like the system, it is perfectly legal for you to take your dc out of that system and you could home educate.

Or you could use your vote to elect the government who would most closely reflect your views, to try to get things changed.

With the new additions:

No: 101 (42%)
Yes: 141 (58%)

Yes because of the double standards.
When schools stop illegally excluding children that want to be in school receiving an education then fair enough. But education is either important for all children or it's not. Some HT's happily use their 'discretion' when it suits but woe betide you if you choose to do the same.

Tempted to naughtily sockpuppet and have eleventy votes

No

Other than exceptional circumstances

No

It's funny though, a lot of the 'no' and 'yes' are actually saying the same things, a lot of people say 'no, but with X and Y as an exemption' and 'yes, for X and Y'.

Yes

"When schools stop illegally excluding children that want to be in school receiving an education then fair enough."

Say more?

No

Yes.

DS's school is ok with it as long as the child's attendance is good and it's only once a year. They have a much bigger problem with days off here and there than holidays. I was when I found out that some children had missed as much as 8-10 weeks of school due to duvet days.

Yes

I need to go to visit my children's family in another country. I'm still paying off last summer's debt when we traveled in the summer holidays. Year before, it cost 1/4 of the price. Not sure what to do this year- not see grandparents?

Yes, but only a) in Primary school b) at HT's discretion c) if above 90% attendance.

No for senior school.

Mary puts it perfectly, it punishes exactly the wrong sort of parents, the ones who care deeply about education and their family's well being.

The vast majority of us have no choice, but to use the state system.

The vast majority of people can neither afford to go private or to HE.

I'm lucky enough to be able to afford to be a SAHM, but even so I'd an awfully impatient reception teacher and clueless at MFL, English, Art and Drama. And anyhow, DD1 needs and DD2 enjoys the social side of school.

For the vast majority of DCs and their families state school is the one thing in life you cannot escape. Legally children have to receive an education and their allocated school is often the only way this can happen.

Not surprisingly having no choice means people get very angry when they feel the government and/or HTs are abusing their position and being petty and controlling.

Yes.

curlew can't say much more at the moment I'm afraid. Lets just say that I'm aware of actions that schools might take to avoid accurately recording and therefore 'hiding' absences to make it look better for them. In the meantime a child suffers socially and educationally because of their actions.

There seems to be no fine or consequences for the school yet if a parent kept a child out of school for that amount of time they would be fined and taken to court. There's a lot of publicity about fines for parents breaking the law but not much about schools breaking the law.

No.

Ah. A conspiracy.

Yes. I think you'll get a skewed view of the actual support for 'no' on Mumsnet. Because a lot of people on here will be able to afford the more expensive holidays no problem. But they'll be happy consign poorer children to never having a holiday abroad.

Or at all. If I scraped up all year I could possibly afford a term-time holiday at Pontins or something, but not in the school holidays.

No

Yes

Is a holiday abroad a basic human right these days? I'm aware holidaying in the UK isn't any cheaper, BTW. There are options: shorter holiday, different type of holiday, no holiday in alternate years, etc. It used to be called living within your means.