DB potentially missing the first two weeks of secondary school. Are we/my parents being unreasonable?

[notamum3210]

I've posted about my younger brother before- there's a big age gap between us and my parents often ask me to help them make important decisions about him/his future. I'm not a third parent but I think they value my input which is nice.

He is in year 6 and next September is due to start at secondary school- this is a new environment for him obviously and there'll likely be only a few other children from his current primary school. I'm not too old to remember how hard it was making friends and feeling shy in the first few weeks of term.

My brother has recently auditioned for a big role in a west end musical. It's not the title role but probably the next biggest and requires a huge amount of energy and commitment. We are not based in London but it's one of the roles where the theatre company will house the child performers with chaperones and pay for everything: food, tuition and fun activities for the duration of the contract. He'll essentially be moving to London in January for rehearsals and then when he starts performing in the show he'll be working in alternate weeks- one week in London being tutored and living with chaperones and other children and one week at home. His contract is due to end towards the end of September next year which will mean potentially missing one or two weeks of a brand new school.

He has performed in a similar kind of show before (though there were key differences) but back then he was in primary school and had been at the school since he was very young. It was disruptive and hard work but he loved it.

He's worked incredibly hard to get selected as the auditions were tough and we're all very proud of him. However, I'm a little concerned about the potential impact of missing a few weeks of school right at the very start and whether this will affect him making friends. We haven't signed the contract yet but I wondered whether it would be unreasonable to let him go for it?

He should do it , if he broke his leg or similar he would have to miss school. It's not the end if the world .

I'd say go for it too, as long as he's happy. They won't be two consecutive weeks that he misses, will they? So he might well be there for the first few days. And people chop and change friends a lot in those first few months. The schools near here have a form class that they stay with for ages to start with, and lots of settling in activities throughout the term, and then later on (after half term, and more after christmas) they are setted into different classes for some subjects. So many chances still to mix and integrate and get to know people. And the teachers are so much more responsive now to difficulties settling and making friends, so if there are any problems, they'd be likely to help. He will be there for some of it, if it's alternate weeks, and other children do get ill for several days at a time, so it's not unheard of to miss most of a week, even near the start. The others will probably be impressed that he is in such an important role - in fact, the thing that might stop him being socially accepted isn't so much missing school, but being big-headed about things, so if he is down-to-earth, nice, not arrogant about it at all, then he should be absolutely fine.

Absolutely let him do it!

Another one who was going to say no way, presuming it was a holiday.

This is different - don't let him miss out on such an opportunity! Speak to the new school and arrange for him to visit and to meet his form teacher, see his form class before he leaves year 6.

Great- thank you for all the tips especially about looking into a possible induction day (I think I had one too). My parents are speaking to his present head who is superb and very supportive.