Termtime holidays, father wins High Court case

[namechangeparents]

Quite surprised about the outcome actually but haven't read the legislation to see exactly what it says. Just hope lots of local authorities don't have to pay back fines now, because there will be even more cuts to services.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-36277940

Looks like an Education Act might be added to the Queen's Speech next week to resolve the issue rather than relying on the Court of Appeal maybe?

I wonder how many employers would be happy for their employees to have a sickie every other week?

Bad comparison.

Education is NOT restricted to the classroom as it has been continually and repeatedly on this thread. I frankly find it rather arrogant and narrowminded of teachers to think like this - even if it does affect their precious targets and Key Stage results.

A better comparison would actually be the employee was working from home / away / doing research away from the office. It involves different tasks that they might do on a daily basis and might have a negative impact on those tasks that they need to achieve but in the long run have a positive and beneficial impact on the business and on the productivity of the employee.

Perhaps we DO need a national debate (or indeed a MN one) on 'what education is'?

Which is why it's much harder for teachers to have the backbone referred to by a previous poster.

Quite what individual teachers are expected to do about this situation I can't imagine.

Just because you disagree with a point doesn't make it stupid.

no, it's not disagreement that makes it stupid. It's the obvious point that employment and education are completely different in a huge number of respects, attendance is one of them.

It's up to people who think they are analogous to point out why.

It may be different with primary school children, but in secondary schools, especially Key Stage 4, two weeks' absence can result in significant gaps of knowledge/understanding and missing coursework/controlled assessments. (In my subject, missing two weeks for a holiday would equate to being seven hours behind their peers).

I have to say I do agree with this.

I speak as a child that attended more than ten different schools over my education due to being from a forces background. I only struggled once I got to secondary age. Primary we just picked up in once place where we'd left off before and never really struggled at all. I can pinpoint when I began to struggle and fall behind and it was in what was the third year - now year 9, when I moved into a new school and realised that I didn't have the faintest idea about what was being taught as I had missed a couple of weeks in the move. This is why I won't take dd out once she leaves primary school.

Just because you disagree with a point doesn't make it stupid.

Very true. It being stupid is what makes it stupid, and it would be stupid even if I thought it wasn't.

The basic premise of school and the holidays remains the same

Very untrue. The goalposts have changed in the past few years, which isn't a matter of opinion, and the majority of children currently at school started under a different set of goalposts. Also not a matter of opinion. Another thing that isn't a matter of opinion is that the population as a whole don't have a meaningful choice about the use of state education. You'd have to be in a position to homeschool or go private. Unless you think every family in the country is in a position to have at least one parent with the ability to HE and the means to forego their income, or the money for private, or the ability to get private education for free, you can't conclude that the population as a whole can make a different choice to state education. And even if we all could, which clearly we can't, that argument still fails to address the other problems with the 'don't like it, opt out' argument.

So in summary, stupid argument, convincingly dispelled several times on this thread, people look stupid when they keep making it.

Education is NOT restricted to the classroom as it has been continually and repeatedly on this thread. I frankly find it rather arrogant and narrowminded of teachers to think like this - even if it does affect their precious targets and Key Stage results.

Most teachers disagree with fines and do not beleive that education is restricted to the classroom.

Bonersibary

How have the goalposts changed?

I think what has happened here is 'creep'. Back in my day (70s, 80s) no one took time off school for holidays as a trip abroad wasn't expected. Now it's taken for granted and seen as a right every year so the question parents are answering is 'how to get my sun in the most cost efficient way' not how can my child experience new things and grow family relations.

Ten days off over the school career of a child seems ok not 40 days off per year and it being taken as a given that this is how the family holiday will be organised each and every year. Military or other circumstances that mean it's the only way for the family to holiday together are exceptions.

HTs used to have and frequently make use of more discretion to authorise absence. In my own area for example, all the local primaries now have policies routinely refusing to authorise anything. Every single one. This was not the case 10 or even 5 years ago. HTs are operating under much greater pressure to increase attendance now.

Are you going to bother addressing the point about how most people actually don't have any meaningful choice but to utilise state education?

BonerSibary

"Are you going to bother addressing the point about how most people actually don't have any meaningful choice but to utilise state education?"

This position is the same as it has always been since the state started to provide education, it is not a change of "goalposts".

Your "goalposts" appear to be one thing, But HT's can still authorise absence in exceptional circumstances, this has always been the case and is still the case.

The basic rules that HTs can authorise absence during term time in exceptional circumstances has not changed.

David Cameron's Conservative Party value no. 1: The more we trust people, the stronger they and society become.

Perhaps we also need to challenge the idea that in plenty of cases that if you do not get top marks in Key Stage 4, your life is somehow over.

There are plenty of careers and life opportunities which are great and have real importance and financial earning potential which are not from high academic achievement.

The life you have is not just about what you learn at school, even if employers do look for certain grades for certain jobs. I think this pressure is really part of the problem.

Not only that some kids will struggle at that stage regardless of many holidays they take and are damaged by this mentality. Equally there are kids who sail through it without having to do a minute's revision. Yet they will miss opportunities which could be of benefit to them. Then there are the kids who might be inspired and influenced by education away from the classroom and will look to alternative education pathways beyond school.

I can't speak for anyone else, but my life didn't turn out the way I thought it would from school. I'm glad it didn't. Yet we are heaping all this pressure on kids in increasing amount with the idea that if they don't do X then they will never get Y out of life. The reality is that Z was their life path that they only discover in their mid twenties. Or later. Because 'life' has a funny way of getting in the way.

Sometimes its simply OK not to be a high achiever at school.

Afterall, how much of the stuff you learnt at GSCE do you even remember, let alone use on a daily basis? Its the principles and patterns that you learn that are far more important than the method taught in school in sooo sooo many avenues in life. Teaching a kid to solve a problem isn't necessarily the same as teaching to the curriculum.

Perhaps I benefit from being the first year that went though school in the National Curriculum in that respect. They hated its perscriptiveness and the fact it didn't teach underlying principles and strategies for life and many still used the old methods they had used before for us. I think perhaps in the intervening years this has maybe been lost from teaching in many, many schools.

The law is that your child should attend school regularly. The High Court agreed that your child can still attend 'regularly' and have a week's holiday. It doesn't matter whether it is authorised by the HT or not.

Great post redtoothbrush.

The law is that your child should attend school regularly

It's not, actually. It's that your child should receive an education.

missing a week of school isn't going to have a massive impact (within reason), continually missing a class or series of classes will.

I have more issues around scheduled music lessons that start 15 minutes after my lesson starts, ending 15 minutes before my lesson ends and a music teacher that won't move (rotate) it, than a child going on holiday.

It's not, actually. It's that your child should receive an education.

Yes, true. Which is an important point.

I meant the bit about them attending school if they are registered with one.

Education is NOT restricted to the classroom as it has been continually and repeatedly on this thread. I frankly find it rather arrogant and narrow-minded of teachers to think like this - even if it does affect their precious targets and Key Stage results.

Funnily enough, I find it rather narrow-minded and arrogant of parents to assume I will give up my lunch breaks/time after school to help their kids catch up what they have missed whilst they were on holiday. Yes, you can be educated beyond the classroom, but that's not the knowledge and skills most KS4 students will be tested on in their GCSEs. Yes, I could say no - but the main reason I dont is that I am a professional and I dont like to see my students suffer as a result of decisions made by their parents. It's not just that we are (forced to be) target driven.

I wonder how many employers would be happy for their employees to have a sickie every other week?

Bad comparison.

I am referring to those students whose attendance is around 90% who have frequent one-off days off for simply sneezing/being tired because they'd stayed up late on X Box/feeling stressed/falling out with a friend/being hungover (yes, honestly). There is a small group of parents who allow this. What is that attitude teaching them about the working world?

The child who gets frequent and very genuine infections/bugs/poor immune system etc actually tends to have a higher attendance - nearer 94-98% - and has strings of absence rather than random one-offs. I have no issue, only sympathy, with these students.

I am surprised that 90% is deemed 'acceptable'. Looking at whole school statistics, in our school at least, this is well below the norm.

find it rather narrow-minded and arrogant of parents to assume I will give up my lunch breaks/time after school to help their kids catch up what they have missed whilst they were on holiday.

Does this happen often? I have never asked for or expected this.

NickiFury
"Does this happen often? I have never asked for or expected this."

More often than you think, and some do so in a threatening manner.

More often than you think, and some do so in a threatening manner.

some parents are idiots. so, everyone else should suffer?

I've just listened to the enraging Any Answers on this. The argument always seems to be if you are a bit skint so holiday time holidays are out of your reach, or a bit common and go on 'cheap foreign holidays' or God forbid 'to Florida' then you should jolly well know your place.

There is rarely any nuanced debate about families where the parents can't take time off during school holidays. Just a lot of 'well when you have children you have to make sacrifices' or 'when you decided to be a nurse/chef/airline pilot/farmer/factory worker at 18 you should have thought about wanting a week with your kids when you are 35 and if you didn't then you are too feckless for holidays anyway.'

Plus, sometimes the wedding/anniversary/deathbed isn't scheduled for British school holidays yet is not 'exceptional' unless the LA decides that the bride/corpse is a close enough relative.

I don't think everyone is 'entitled' to two weeks term time holiday a year but the whole thing is a sledgehammer to crack a nut and dripping in snobbery.

You're right NickiFury. There is definitely an expectation that we will provide work, especially at KS4 and 5. This is very common (and not always as easy to provide as it sounds). The number who demand catch up lessons is smaller, but certainly not unusual. Two months ago a Y11 went away during the fortnight that we were doing CAs. What was I meant to do? Just refuse to let the student resit? It wasnt their fault. I therefore sat with them through lunch hours to catch up - just as many of my colleagues do.

Sorry, that was aimed at Boneyback rather than NickiFury. However, NickiFury, your previous post re unnecessarily high expectations is spot on.