To think school heads should be contactable in school holidays

[EloiseMinch]

A secondary head is likely to be on 70k+ and a primary head of 50k+. Those are high salaries for positions of senior management responsibility. AIBU to think they shouldn't just cut off completely in the school holidays?

Maybe some heads really are working in the holidays but I know the head at DC's school definitely doesn't. She is, for example, completely uncontactable from the end of one term to the start of the next.

Shall we try one more time!

THE HEAD DOESN'T DEAL WITH COMPLAINTS OF THIS NATURE, THE DEPUTY DOES.
THE DEPUTY DIDN'T AGREE TO YOUR SUGGESTIONS BECAUSE THEY ARE FARCICAL
THE HEAD IS CONTACTABLE DURING THE HOLIDAYS, HE/SHE CHOOSES WHO THEY CONTACT ( AND IT ISN'T YOU)
WHETHER THE HEAD HAS 3/13 OR 30 WEEKS HOLIDAY IS NONE OF YOUR BUSINESS UNLESS YOU ARE THEIR EMPLOYER.

Your concern about bullying should be pursued through the complaints policy if you feel that the situation is unresolved. The complaints policy will be on the school website.

There are various ways in which you could make suggestions about how home/school communications in general can be improved. This is a different matter from the bullying complaint. There may be a parent/school forum already set up, or a parent questionnaire, or you could ask for governors to discuss it as part of their strategic leadership role. There may be a communications policy; if so, you could compare your experience with the principles and expectations set out in the policy and then follow it up through the complaints policy if you deem it necessary.

You have every right of course to express your own expectations for school holiday contact by the HT or any other member of the school team, but not to demand that he/she meet them. Either way, nothing that you've described can be resolved during the school holiday so you’re better off waiting until the new term starts.

This is just not the case! 😂

OP I have just about managed to read this whole thread and the other one as well.

It seems to me that the so called 'bullying' you claim your ds has suffered is a non-issue for you. If you were very concerned you would have taken far more decisive action, long ago. The real issue here is a very deep-seated envy of the HT and a sense of superiority which exudes from every one of your posts. Envy is very ugly, and it radiates from your every word. You are merely using the allegation of bullying as a vehicle to unleash the real issue here , which is your personal spite and venom. If your ds really is being bullied then all I can say is...poor him.

Your patronising intransigence in insisting on referring to the HT as a 'public sector manager' is, frankly, thick. She is a Headteacher.
As for the whole 'performance management' business, I think it would be perfectly in order (and highly desireable) for you to have some performance management imposed upon you as a parent from hell. You are a stirrer, a trouble maker. Schools should be able to deal with nasty types, don't you think?

In my dc's primary school (they are older now so this goes back a few years) there were a couple of parents like you who were eventually banned from the school premises. Eventually they had to withdraw their dc from the school as the whole situation became untenable. Don't think it doesn't happen.

I think you need to focus on your son's needs. I hope that during the holidays he is safe from the bullying and can have a good summer recuperating with lots of positive attention from you. You need to switch your mindset from personal criticisms of the Head (her work schedule is none of your business) and focus on helping your son.

Write a letter at the beginning of term. Focus on your son's issue and what has been done so far. Request a meeting with the deputy. If this does not resolve the issue then write to the Head and governors. The governor's will then investigate and if the Head is found to have been negligent they will deal with it through the proper channels.

Your current attitude is unpleasant. I understand that may be through sheer frustration but your demands that you should be dealt with in the school holidays are entitled and unfortunately make you THAT parent. You are doing your son no favours.

Absolutely perfectly put RhythmSticks. If I were this headteacher I would also not be giving you my email OP.

Headteachers clearly need to be contactable during the holidays about issues within their area of responsibility, and indeed generally are - I know the head at our local primary was actively engaged throughout the summer last year when there was quite a serious problem with the building. The exception would be periods when they're actually away on holiday, in which case there needs to be someone in their place to oversee things. Since dealing with parents comes within their area of responsibility, logically they should respond to them also.

The issue with this head is that he doesn't deal with parents during termtime either, and that is a serious issue that needs to be addressed.

I haven't got the energy to read the OP's other thread, but there are some interesting points that have come out of all this for me.

Having read the arguments, the post that really struck me was @rinoachicken 's. I'm really glad she tracked down the HT via a governor's FB - but it must be obvious that's not good enough, and there are other circumstances too including a death in the family - and indeed, severe bullying - which need a response before the school opens its doors on the first day of term. Hopefully incidents like this will only happen rarely to individual families but you'd expect at least 4-5 of them to be live every September.

It seems reasonable to me for a school to make it clear via its website that it will be in touch about urgent queries only the week before term re-starts. That way families dealing with DV issues / bereavement can at least be relieved of the stress of wondering if they can get hold of a teacher on the hectic first day of term. I'd also wonder if there should be two days set aside for meetings with parents relating to serious bullying issues, and then a chance for all teachers involved to meet and consider best practice and the bullying policy. There could be safeguarding advantages there too, for example if the school notes that all the siblings in one family are involved in bullying complaints, where they had never been in similar trouble before.

Note that I don't resent the holidays of school teachers at all. Just 13 weeks holiday for a highly paid public sector employee in a senior management role.

You plainly do resent it. More stupidly you resent something which doesn't exist. Teachers/heads do not get 13 weeks paid leave they get the same amount of paid leave as other public sector professional jobs (slightly less in fact compared to some). A point which you have deliberately ignored on this thread.

Head teachers are running businesses with turnovers ranging from a few hundred thousand per year to millions per year. If you think that leaves much time for managing a class as well then I assume you would be happy for your child to have an endless series of substitutes whilst the head is pulled out of class to actually do "running the business" stuff and seeing parents who want to contact you in the holidays just in case they want to whinge about something.

That makes you a goady fucker or a fool.

Oh and one other point. Not contactable doesn't actually mean "not working". It is more likely to mean "leave me the fuck alone so I can actually get some work done".

I'd also wonder if there should be two days set aside for meetings with parents relating to serious bullying issues, and then a chance for all teachers involved to meet and consider best practice and the bullying policy.

There are 190 school days for this to happen!

There could be safeguarding advantages there too, for example if the school notes that all the siblings in one family are involved in bullying complaints, where they had never been in similar trouble before. What do you think happens? at my school, every staff meeting begins with a discussion of concerns in each class, any concerns would either be raised then or, if more pressing, would be referred directly to the Safeguarding Officer who would be aware of patterns of behaviour.

As has been explained numerous times, staff will check emails during the holiday. they may not respond but they will be aware!

I still can't get over the OP's idea that the PTA should be raising money to fund extra TA's. (plural, too !)

Why don't you try to have a whip round for that, OP? Or maybe a bake sale would cover it?

FFS, you really are PEAK 'that parent', aren't you?

You clearly have issues with the school and it's organisation. I think you aren't going to get anywhere with the school which satisfies you and would suggest you look for somewhere else for your ds.

Longtalljosie
You say all that but the other thread is relevant.

Over the 2 threads the OP has claimed her child has been verbally abused and physically assaulted by students.
She first mentioned this in November!
Nothing was done and yet she continued to send her child to school know he was apparently being repeatedly harmed.
She only started to raise a formal complaint in July! (When it was the end of term and school said it will be picked up in September).

As this was going on, however, she's spent months gossiping in the playground, lots of time acquiring a group of parents who are annoyed they don't get to see the head as much (which may or may not be an issue as if they are all like OP i entirely understand). The OP has started a thread questioning whether she gets enough parents' eves a year even though she doesn't think they are worthwhile and thinks parents should just be able to go ij and talk to staff. She also started another accusing the head of nepotism & within her first few replies was on about how the governors would be interested in what she has to say

Then there was the last thread where she wanted to know how she could make concrete suggestions to the head's line manager and have a group of parents involved in the head's performance management. When that didn't go her way (people said raise a formal complaint through proper channels but YABU to he involved in their perf management), suddenly she's had no involvement, then tje deputy was involved, then there's victim blaming etc. But mainly it was why her and her mates are annoyed about not having the head's email.

And so they started a new thread (this one).

You clearly have issues with the school and it's organisation. I think you aren't going to get anywhere with the school which satisfies you and would suggest you look for somewhere else for your ds.

There's your reply from the HT OP!!!
Right there ^^

The head isn’t contactable by any parent at all.

And she doesn't have to be. The kids aren't in school.

Do read spaniel's words again and pay heed this time. You are coming across as a bit unhinged.

THE HEAD DOESN'T DEAL WITH COMPLAINTS OF THIS NATURE, THE DEPUTY DOES.
THE DEPUTY DIDN'T AGREE TO YOUR SUGGESTIONS BECAUSE THEY ARE FARCICAL
THE HEAD IS CONTACTABLE DURING THE HOLIDAYS, HE/SHE CHOOSES WHO THEY CONTACT ( AND IT ISN'T YOU)
WHETHER THE HEAD HAS 3/13 OR 30 WEEKS HOLIDAY IS NONE OF YOUR BUSINESS UNLESS YOU ARE THEIR EMPLOYER."

OP, you've gone on and on about how 13 weeks is too much time off for a manager on that salary. Except she IS working on that time - parents simply cannot contact her. It's not as if she's off on a jolly. No HT is able to get away without working in the holidays, so you can stop your sighing over how lazy you perceive this one to be just because she won't answer to parents. Not a correlation.

As a teacher, I can happily restate PPs that the issues you are demanding to discuss are not appropriate for a HT to deal with. You seem to be fairly resistant to being told you're unreasonable but I'll try to explain again.

A) Even if PTA funds could be used for staffing, no school advertises for jobs over the summer. What sort of crap candidate would you get who hasn't lined up a job for September? What a waste of funds because in case you hadn't realised, advertising for a job is costly. So that issue would have to wait until September. Except it's a non issue.

B) You cannot address behaviour issues outside of term time. This should be obvious but let's explain. Aside from the difficulty of getting all pupils involved and their parents into school - what sanction can you put in place? You can't set detentions or exclusions in the holidays? Also, these are small children, their attempts to improve their behaviour need to be done immediately - impossible to say 'right you need to be nicer to X, try again in 6 weeks when you see them'. Ridiculous.

C) class sets are done. If you had a request, it should have been made BEFORE TERM ENDED.

You are being completely unreasonable and you simply sound like you have a personal issue with the HT. You don't have a clue about how schools work and worse, nor do you care. Yes, parents are stakeholders, but that doesn't mean you just demand everything you want. Try working with the school, perhaps, starting with raising issues in term time.

OP has been very quiet. I think she's gone on holiday :)

So have you tried contacting the Head in each of the half terms, the Christmas and Easter holidays? If not why are you banging on about being uncontactable for 13 weeks?

One of my children has SEN and I have received messages throughout the year (often sent very late at night).

The real issue is that you've left this issue until now and are panicking - leave it to the start of term and make an appointment.

Wow! I wonder if she likes you as much as you like her!

Don’t be mean to the OP, she is uncontactable at this time as she is busy elsewhere. If you would like to justify whether that’s reasonable or not you will have to request a copy of her contract...

Who the fuck does the OP think she is? How dare you try and contact someone when they are on holiday.

@EloiseMinch
I will say that it does not sound, from your many, repetitive posts that your issue has been dealt with appropriately during term time. Having no knowledge of the ins and outs of this, I can't comment on how it has been dealt with or not dealt with as he case may be. As a parent and a school leader, I can appreciate frustration when things are not going how you wish them to. At the end of the day, you are your DC's advocate and should be doing what you feel you can to keep him safe and well.

What I have taken extreme umbrage to is the sweeping generalisation that because your HT has dealt poorly with a situation, that all leaders within a school should meekly give in to a change in terms and conditions to would allow us to be at parents' beck and call indefinitely!!

You, my dear, do not have a clue and are extremely deserving of my very first .

Is she not entitled to a holiday? Are you contactable on holiday? Would you expect retail staff to be contacted on annual leave? As for salary in comparison to what those in the private sector earn and what responsibility they have they do not earn an amazing amount.

Let's all PM her, and if she she doesn't reply let's just keep doing it until she starts completely ignoring us?