to think that if you send a letter from a school that might go public - you check for comma splices

[katmanwho]

School said it would give pupils bread and butter if they didn't have money.
Parents complain. Goes national in the news.
School retracts.

The letter is here:

www.albanacademy.org/assets/schoolmealsletterretraction-1.pdf

Part of it:

Following a number of parental concerns regarding the recent school
meals letter we have decided to rethink our policy and will not be
introducing the new system outlined in that letter.
I apologise if this has caused any offence, this was not our intention.

The letter itself was intended to explain the situation and trial a policy
that has been successfully adopted by other schools

Actually - commas seem lacking in the first sentence as well.

This is not a chatty letter. This is an official retraction.

Could do better

You are so self righteously indignantly determined to be so bloody right about this that you have put words in my mouth

Why are people so rude on here?

You've used FFS and now this.

What's so rude about that? You are indignant about this. Your tone to others s self righteous. And judging my the fact that you have started a thread about the issue, during which you've picked everyone who's disagreed with you apart, I'd say you are pretty determined to prove yourself right.

I'd also add that you're pretty touchy if a ffs is so offensive to your sensibilities

Whether a head's letter is 'formal writing' is besides the point, IMO. It's a letter representing the institution itself, distributed amongst all its 'end users' and it ought to be nearly perfect.

But as I said, this should be like breathing. If the head has to spend an inordinate amount of time making revisions in order to get it across the finish line, she's not up to the job.

I agree Apple. Am I not speaking English here? I agree the letter should be grammatically correct. But since the letter is not, in my opinion, a formal letter (and comma splices are only a sin in formal documents) then comma splices are not a grammar rule I'd be worrying about in a letter. I would be more worried about other grammatical issues in a letter which I would expect a HT to get right automatically as you have said, twice.

during which you've picked everyone who's disagreed with you apart, I'd say you are pretty determined to prove yourself right

Isn't that called debating? Someone says something and you make a point back?

I suspect that if you used "FFS" in a debating society, you'd lose.

Op as you have been so very keen to point out when anyone has picked you up on your grammar, this is an Internet chat forum. Not a debating society.

I agree that comma splices verge on stylistic license - probably best left to those who have superior writing skills.

The sample in this case is possibly too small to make this judgement, but it's certainly not that impressive.

Now I'm trying to figure out if I've inadvertently spliced several commas in my post.

Apple I've been splicing away with gay abandon!

So - bit

A child gets picked up for comma splices in their work. The teacher tells them that they are wrong except in chatty, informal writing.

The child then sees this letter and asks why the Head has done that.

Can you explain to the child why you think the letter from the Headteacher retracting a policy decision is an informal letter?

I think it's formal - because it's about a policy change and it's from a school.

I think it's perfectly obvious that it's not formal. It's a means of communicating effectively with a diverse audience and has no legal, commercial or contractual implications.

Is that ok with you? That I have that opinion? I suspect strongly that it won't be ok with you.

If I don't reply to your lecture reply about why I am so very wrong in that opinion, it's because I am off out now.

These threads are always fascinating on many levels. A psychologist would have a field day.
The 'methinks one doth protest too much' element from indignant OPs who have made far more glaring errors than those which they purport to loathe, and yet that's somehow OK. What's good for the goose not, clearly, Boeing as palatable for the gander...
Real, actual, respected linguists are rarely cited as sources on these threads because invariably the person taking umbrage resorts to the first page of google for their links and/or they have failed to notice that most people who know what they are talking about adhere to Crystallian logic rather than Mumsnet Whingey Dogma.
MN may 'only' be a talk forum, but there are some beautifully written posts. You never seem to see any of those users heehawing and putting others down on these threads, oddly. Or perhaps not..

And yes….obviously I am so thick that I think Boeing is the same as being...or maybe not...

"Emma Woodhouse, handsome, clever, and rich, with a comfortable home and happy disposition, seemed to unite some of the best blessings of existence; and had lived nearly twenty-one years in the world with very little to distress or vex her.

She was the youngest of the two daughters of a most affectionate, indulgent father, and had, in consequence of her sister's marriage, been mistress of his house from a very early period. Her mother had died too long ago for her to have more than an indistinct remembrance of her caresses, and her place had been supplied by an excellent woman as governess, who had fallen little short of a mother in affection."

Jane Austen obviously enjoyed a comma or two, but is she splicing?

Interestingly, on another thread, someone linked to a 2016 sample paper for the new KS1 tests (so, 6/7yo kids?)

They have to add the correct punctuation mark to

"The children went home ( ) Josh had enjoyed his party"

and can choose from comma, question mark, apostrophe and full stop.

So the government expects small children not to use comma splices.

There were quite a few articles recently suggesting Jane Austen's manuscripts were heavily edited for SPaG Her grammar didn't hold her back much.

Well - if we're talking about authors

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way - in short, the period was so far like the present period, that some of its noisiest authorities insisted on its being received, for good or for evil, in the superlative degree of comparison only.

I suppose it's "ok" because it's a narrative? So it's relatively informal, written in the first person and narrating a story?
(Disclaimer - I only know the opening line).

Someone's analysed it.

dysfunctionalliteracy.com/2014/04/14/bad-sentences-in-classic-literature-a-tale-of-two-cities/

"If I had written a sentence like that in school, my English teacher would have called it a run-on and said that I should have used periods and semicolons instead of a bunch of commas. If I had then showed him A Tale of Two Cities, he would have said that when I have a bunch of books published, then I could misuse commas and write repetitive run-on sentences whenever I wanted"

Of course it's a formal letter. It's a letter setting forth a decision on a school policy.

The day I switched off from English Lit O'Level at school and decided I wouldn't do English A'Level was the day I asked my English teacher why Jane Austen could start a sentence with And but I couldn't. Her response "because you girl, are not Jane Austen". That was the point where I decided the subject and its teachers were too bereft of logic for me to take it seriously.

Beaufort, completely agree with you about equality in the dr--patient relationship. Mine's a PhD not an MD though, so no patients for me

The last few weeks I've be answering phones at work, taking messages from members of the public. Most people leave their first and last names. Some insist on just leaving their first name. Others insist of just leaving Mr X or Mrs Y. I find it fascinating that there doesn't seem to be a common approach.

Persipicacia great name , the correct approach is first name and last name (unless one of your callers was Madonna in which case an exception can be made)

Mr X and Mrs Y have an inflated sense of their own importance.

IME Mr X and Mrs Y are quite often of an older generation and are used to a more formal approach. I just go along with it. It's when I need to resort to Debrett's that I worry.

Speaking of Debrett's. I'm sure the Duke of Norfolk is used to a more formal approach, too. But he signs his name simply "Norfolk."