Two days teacher training sprung on us with less than three week's notice

[Wheels79]

Just had a letter from school saying reception will be closed for two days after half term for teacher training.
I'm new to being a school parent but I find that 1) a bit short notice; 2) lacking in an apology or acknowledgement that it might leave parents with a childcare issue; and 3) hypocritical given that their policy is to refuse to authorise any holiday requests and yet missing two days out of the blue is fine when they say so.
Am I being unreasonable for feeling miffed? Should I accept now that school will arse around with our lives willy nilly?

they were pencilled in years in advance at prevous school but did change. however there was always explanation/ apology for short notice. usually it was to ensure they could get a specific trainer.
r

Your child is not missing any education and there is no hypocracy on the part of the school. Schools have 5 INSET days per year. Mostly these are booked well in advance. Occasionally this can change if a particular training is required and is the only time it can happen.

I do think 3 weeks short notice. If you want you can give your feedback to the school about giving parents more notice before these changes occur.

If I can't take my DS out for 2 days because it risks his education then why can they do this?

You're a doctor? Can't see the bigger picture? Wow.

Has the school told you which two days your DC will now have to attend on top of the term dates you already have?

I think it is shirt notice. We try to give more than that.

Can you raise it with the governors / parent body.

Short. I think a half term is adequate.

So you would rather the staff didn’t have up to date training?

On a side note it is always handy to have someone local who can help - you never know when he will be ill, or a problem will occur meaning School will have to close unexpectedly (a School locally had to close unexpectedly today due to a burst water main) if you don’t have friends/family who may be free worth getting to know School mums at least!

Can’t believe people don’t think that short notice. Many people would be required to give more than 3 weeks notice for annual leave and will find it nearly impossible to get theses days off. While I appreciate school is not childcare etc etc I do organise my childcare around school hours and the term dates I have been given. I would be very unimpressed with this.

The preoccupation with "safeguarding" by people who don't actually grasp the concept kills me!

Can you clarify what you mean by this, otters? I am a teacher, and am keen to know what it is you think I can't grasp about the concept of safeguarding.

We can afford to throw money at the issue and buy in childcare and I know we are lucky. We could also call on my parents (some distance away) if we really had to. But for some parents this would cause a real problem and hardship. An acknowledgement of that would be nice!

I'm not a doctor but I work with them.

We get the inset dates at the start of the school year, and they are pretty much the same every year. 2 days at the start of Sept, a day at the end of Oct half term, first day after Christmas and Easter hols. Not sure where the fifth has gone this year! But you know where you are in terms of planning. I would find 3 weeks notice annoying - it might be ok or not.

I’m a teacher and a parent. I’m sorry but schools are not baby sitting services. I’m getting really fed up of the backlash we get - on here and in real life. Try teaching English to 180 different pupils each day and see how easy it is. We need our training days to help YOUR children get the best education. Please remember that we are educators, not babysitters!

Good grief I hope they don't want two later inset days back. We've booked a holiday on those days!

Teacher training is completely fine.

3 weeks notice IS short notice for most families, so YANBU to be annoyed.

Come on, even if you don't need childcare and can take days off easily at work, wouldn't you be a bit annoyed to have booked a holiday coming back on the most expensive day (Sunday) whilst you could have taken a plane back on Monday or Tuesday?

GertrudeBelle it is the third point the OP has clearly labelled so I would say it is what s/he is on about.

YANBU to be annoyed as this is very short notice.

YABU to say that the school is hypocritical over not allowing children to be taken out - this is an unrelated issue.

Please remember that we are educators, not babysitters!

I don't treat the school as a babysitting personally, and I organise our entire life around the school because that's what most parents do. I would still prefer knowing the days off at the beginning of the year so we can plan ahead.

I’m a teacher and a parent. I’m sorry but schools are not baby sitting services

So parents should just work on the basis that their child could be out of school at a moments notice and be able to drop everything

You, as a teacher, should realise how ridiculous that is.

We do not live in a country with decent flexible working across the board, many people have low paid, inflexible jobs where they just cannot afford to pay for extra short term childcare.

It is very difficult.

I say that as someone who luckily can afford flexible childcare and has a flexible job.

Backtoblack1
When the government stops requiring lone mothers to go back to work when their child goes to school I will stop expecting school to provide a consistent space for my child to be during the published school hours. The government clearly assumes it is childcare.

It is 2017 surely we are not expecting that one parent will stay at home to be at the beck and call of the school'a whims.

A school near me rearranged an INSET day as a teacher had died and staff were able to attend if they so wished. This was arranged with a few days notice.

If it's a local authority school then it has to provide 190 days of education to your children. If it's now taking 2 extra of them for INSET after half term then yes, it should be adding them back on somewhere else.

Assuming it's a state school, your DC has to have 190 days of education every year, by law, so I would think that they will either reduce a holiday by two days, or cancel two days inset at some point. Unless these days were already classed as inset of course, in which case they would been on the schedule already.

would have been

tinytemper66
That is totally understandable and I would support those circumstances.

Does anyone know if these changes are really radical? Maybe they are and it is urgent that they do this training quickly.