AIBU to say that summer hols are a driver of inequality

[Teaandcrisps]

Myself and OH have had mixed personal fortune over the last 10 years - so from personal experience know the difference.

Summer holidays with no money is shit - especially when the weather is crap. If you can afford it however, it's great fun.

It's not just the obvious things - summer hols, trips, activities, camps, increase in food costs; it's also if you have the kind of job that can give you time off.

Given that food bank have launched the holiday hunger campaign, AIBU to say that summer holidays is an unequal construct and the 6-weeks off needs to go.

@fedup21 it is a great idea. It’s in its third year now and they’ve started doing things really logically as well.

For example this year for the first time our group and a church group in the next village were allowed to pick up packed lunches in the morning for registered kids entitled to them.

I know for a fact none of the people registered with us took up the scheme before (and one of them is someone who paid the £25 for our week in £1 and 50p coins).

The joined up thinking, and working together, really helps.

The fact people can pick up packed lunches in the morning also has made a massive difference. There seems much less stigma in that than going to school for lunch.

"People are trying to offer help and what do posters do? Make excuses."

If that is directed at me, then no my child can't do the vast majority of things that you suggested. Perhaps try thinking why.

Spreading out the holidays doesn't change the need for poorer families to access cheap/free childcare

It does though. If it moved to being more spread out then it would be much easier to save up gradually, to get family of friends to give some help, or to get leave from work.

AIBU to say that summer holidays is an unequal construct and the 6-weeks off needs to go.

YABU. People need to stop having kids they can't afford. Why should everyone else lose out?

spikeyball no it's aimed at all those poor parents who choose not to do things with their children. The point is in choose.
The majority of children can go and do stuff outside.
I'm fully aware some children can't.
But to take the piss out of parents for playing with their children and , wholly shit, make someone else's child a drink! 😯😯😯😯 there is no wonder at all that others don't offer to look after your kids if that's the attitude.

What does that even mean?

@youmadorwhat

@frenchknittingI’m guessing because there was a government change and they realized that the country couldn’t afford to keep it up! And because everyone also still needs and wants a free nhs, subsidized childcare, etc etc. “not sustainable” comes to mind.

I don't think that all children (and adults, for that matter) having access to a library and a council sports centre should be considered an unrealistic aim.

People can get themselves out of poverty it's all about the mindset.

Thanks for that @emmy1997. I'm amazed that hadn't occurred to me in 12 years of working with poor and disadvantaged families.

Perhaps you can now tell me how to straighten out Ms A, who has ptsd after years of domestic abuse and a child whose MH has been so irrevocably fucked he needs round the clock care, at least until CAMHS can get round to offering him some help; or the B family, none of whom can read or write and who all have MH issues, LDs and often both?

The school holidays in Ireland are ridiculously long. A week in october, 2 weeks at Christmas, a week in February, 2 in april. 2 months for summer for primary and 3 months for secondary schools. Not including a few extra days here and there for the likes of paddys day and any other excuse they can think of.

@lyralalala your camp run by volunteers sound amazing. There was similar in my DH's village but it fell away as more mums had to work and things became more regulated (minimum numbers etc.)

To the OP who said that this is society's issue to solve - I agree entirely with this. We do have parental leave but take-up is so low because employers frown on it and it is unpaid. The French have the right idea in shutting down many services for August so families can go on holidays.

Ds, 6 hasn't seen any of his school friends during the holidays, everyone is away either on holiday or being cared for by family members elsewhere or in a holiday club etc. Work, less spending power, less local provisions for kids, kids not being allowed to play out without adults etc. None of them help.

Spreading out the holidays doesn't change the need for poorer families to access cheap/free childcare

It does though. If it moved to being more spread out then it would be much easier to save up gradually, to get family of friends to give some help, or to get leave from work.

How is it easier to save up for a short time between holidays than it is to save gradually for a whole year for the long summer break (which is not a surprise)?

How is it easier to get leave from work? If you don't have enough to cover 6 weeks in the summer, you don't have enough to cover it if it were split mor evenly across the year. You still need exactly the same amount of childcare with exactly the same amount of annual leave available.

Ds, 6 hasn't seen any of his school friends

Same. My DC go to our local huge primary school (3 form entry). We haven't even bumped into anyone from their school despite going to the local park several times a week and the supermarket all the time. It's like 600+ kids are in hiding

www.google.co.uk/amp/s/www.bbntimes.com/en/global-economy/the-myth-behind-the-origins-of-summer-vacation/amp

This is interesting-about the history of school holidays/school year structure. It’s an American site but lots of sources seem to suggest that the school year originally being structured around harvest and the agricultural plans is untrue.

Schools would have varied immensely by area before the mid 19th century-depending on local issues. It would be interesting to see what the school year looked like in 1870, when the Education act was passed. Harvest would be September/October, so it seems likely that the July/August holidays were based around a general belief that a break from a hot stuffy classroom was beneficial for your well being, rather than because farmers needed children to help in fields.

This is a bit about why the school holidays were increased-:

2) School reformers often argued that students needed substantial vacation for their health. Horace Mann wrote that overtaxing students would lead to "a most pernicious influence on character and habits ... not infrequently is health itself destroyed by overstimulating the mind." This concern over health seemed to have two parts. One was that schoolhouses were unhealthy in the summer: education reformers of the time reminded teachers to keep windows open, to sprinkle floors with water, and to build schools with an eye to good air ventilation. Mann wrote that "the small size, ill arrangement, and foul air, of our schoolhouses, present serious obstacles to the health and growth of the bodies and minds of our children." The other concern over health was that overstudy would lead to ill-health, both mental and physical. An article in the Pennsylvania School Journal expressed concern that children "were growing up puny, lank, pallid, emaciated, round-shouldered, thin-breasted all because they were kept at study too long. Indeed, there was an entire medical literature of the time that "mental strain early in life" led to lifelong "impairment of medical and physical vigour."

@W0rriedMum

your camp run by volunteers sound amazing. There was similar in my DH's village but it fell away as more mums had to work and things became more regulated (minimum numbers etc.)

It is difficult with the regulations involved. Although they are more daunting on paper than they are in practise. The big issue is that groups used to be able to get lots of good advice from people - even our feedback day with the big funder used to be a day where you met other groups and swapped ideas, but it just doesn't work like that anymore.

Both parents working, and grandparents still working, is a big issue for smaller groups. College and uni students working all summer also has a impact. People just aren't as available as they used to be.

We used to have a great system where people helping for one week guaranteed three weeks places for the kids. So folks pitched in for a week then got two weeks peace!

And sadly the lack of places we can offer because of the lack of helpers has co-incided with a bigger need. Our registration days were so busy before the summer we had 48 kids on the waiting list. That was just the people who didn't give up on seeing the queue.

How about kids have one week off a month? Therefore 12wks a year.

Teachers half that, 6wks a, which would be comparable with other careers, using the time they are in but not the kids to lesson plan and all the others things they currently have to do in their 'own' time.

Teachers would never go for it, as most have never worked in jobs where you only get 4wks a yr off.

The whole system needs an overhaul if society expects both parents to work to afford a reasonable standard of living.

How about kids have one week off a month? Therefore 12wks a year.Teachers half that, 6wks a, which would be comparable with other careers, using the time they are in but not the kids to lesson plan and all the others things they currently have to do in their 'own' time.

How would the parents who want to take their children off in ‘their’ August week manage to take their annual leave for their summer holiday when every other bugger in the office/department/ward also wants to be off that week?

If you varied it so that different LEAs (though most schools are academies now so n/a) has different weeks off, then those with children in different LEAs/schools/trusts could never holiday all together.

The whole system needs an overhaul if society expects both parents to work to afford a reasonable standard of living.

Maybe it’s not the schools that need to change.

Mustshowdh - that'd lead to teachers leaving not only because they have suddenly lost 6 weeks of holiday (though the extra pay for those 6 weeks would come in handy) but because for the first time they would have 6 weeks of childcare to find. Take away the things that make teaching attractive to parents and what is there left.

Maybe it’s not the schools that need to change

I don’t think it is. Schools are there to educate children, they are not childcare. Children need down time from school and recent studies show how important this is.

People need to realise the expense and responsibilities that come with children rather than expect it all to be provided for them. Too easy to blame it on schools, government etc rather than look at the decisions made.

Life isn’t equal, it’s down to parents and parents alone to shape their children’s childhood.

How would the parents who want to take their children off in ‘their’ August week manage to take their annual leave for their summer holiday when every other bugger in the office/department/ward also wants to be off that week?

Well, they probably wouldn't be able to, so would have to choose a different month. Maybe July and August or August/Sept could be back to back weeks.

I used to dread my team putting their holiday requests in. 20+ staff with kids and only allowed 5 off at once, so I do understand the dilemma.

as most have never worked in jobs where you only get 4wks a yr off.

That’s because the legal minimum is 5.6 weeks.

Maybe July and August or August/Sept could be back to back weeks.

So some people wouldn’t be able to have time off for a holiday with their kids and teachers could never ever go away for more than a week.

Except of course those more children from more wealthy families in independent schools where they would still have 8 consecutive weeks off in the summer.

Inequality, you say?

That’s because the legal minimum is 5.6 weeks.

Which is around 4wk plus bank holidays isn't it?

Minimum holiday entitlement of this amount is a relatively new thing. (I'm only early 40's)

@MustShowDH

Then how would we schedule assessments or school events? Do you have the first clue about how complicated school calendars are?

Robbing children of their childhood for monetary purposes is bonkers. There are other less facile solutions.

Lastly, this is my annual September reminder to parents that the purpose of sending your child to school is EDUCATION. Not childcare. I don’t know how these two things have been confused but they are different.

What the country needs is to find a solution to childcare for working parents. Not to just dump all parental responsibility on to schools.

Imagine a generation that go to school 7.30-6 360 days a year. It sounds like pure drudgery but at least people wouldn’t have to pay for childcare and the state can bring them up and feed them for you.