To take my kids out of school 15 mins early once a week?

[AnabelleClarabelle]

I have primary age DC at separate schools (not through choice).

Dc1’s school finishes later on one day due to off site swimming and p.e. This means they need collecting 15 mins after other DC on that day and the schools are 20 mins apart (we are rural).

Younger DC school has no parent on site parking, just a staff car park. I have a 7-10 min walk from their school to my car.

I spoke to the office lady in the summer and she said she ‘couldn’t see a problem’ with me driving up to the staff car park one day a week to enable me to only be 5 mins late for DC1.

The school business manager has just come and told me the car park is no parking for parents etc. Explained situation and she huffily said she would check with office lady but that she ‘didn’t believe that to be the case’ - implying I’m lying?

I’m now feeling anxious about the whole thing.

I have no one who can collect Dc1 on that day so my only other option if I can’t park on site is to collect younger DC 15 mins early on that day so I can get to Dc1 on time.

So WIBU to say I will be collecting th early once a week if they will no longer let me park in the staff car park that day?

Has anyone explained why OP can't just pick DC1 up from the swimming baths yet? I get it's 25 mins in the opposite direction but you would still be picking them up earlier than your other DC finishes school hence giving you time to get back to the other school?

As another pp said, I'm sure it takes them a while to get back to the school from swimming so you'd cut out a massive chunk just going straight there for him and avoiding all the faffing about getting back to school with the rest of the class.

Wtaf . Did someone actually just write this . I am completely shocked. The OP has not written that she has any additional needs so where is the assumption coming from that she will need a man to speak on her behalf?!

tears
OP wrote herself I think an email may be better? I get so flustered in person. I think the poster was suggesting that DH might be better because he didn't get flustered, rather than because he was male!

And maybe tell the Business Manager to get back to managing the ‘money’ and leave the car parks alone.

You sound charming.

Eeeek this sounds like a nightmare, dh having to miss work every day to help with the school runs, you having to dash around to get everyone, now expecting two dc to also miss some school.

I would be stopping the swimming, I know you say it is NC but surely not if its outside normal school hours? I don't see how that can be compulsory? Also, isn't the rule about them all being able to swim a certain distance, can he do that? Because once they can, they don't need to keep going. I don't really think the younger dc should be missing 15 mins of school each week to allow their sibling to go swimming to be honest (just my opinion!).

Hopefully they will allow you to park in the carpark, but it sounds like you still need to sort something as surely DH can not continue to miss work for the next couple of years? I appreciate it might be a late lunch break, but surely there's times they need him there at that time? It sounds horribly stressful for you all.

I used to deliver items to schools. There are so many different set ups and yes, many rural schools with no safe place to wait etc or on roads where vehicles seem to totally ignore speed limits.

The junior school that my children went to no child was allowed to leave unless a responsible adult collected them. Two members of staff were on duty to supervise this. I personally thought it was ridiculous that I had to leave work and drive to collect my year 6 child (and two of her friends) and walk them literally round the corner to the dance school the attended (a 2-3 minute walk) but they were the rules. I even saw a child stopped from walking to where his parent was parked 30 seconds up the street. The parent had to leave the car and come to the gate.

OP I don't know what the answer is. I would talk to the school of the swimming child and explain that it is not physically possible for you to be in two places at once so what do they suggest.

Thewarrenerswife
You seem to be assuming that me mentioning governors means I've suggested going straight there. I haven't.

I said the difference between being "that parent" and reasonable is in the way things are approached and said that it's entirely possible to go to formal complaints and governors when required without being 'that parent' (because so often on here people seem to think that the options are kick off and inform school you're doing what you like or worship teachers).
This situation has nothing to do with the second school. They haven't extended their school day.

It's not about procedure and pomp. It's about taking the issue up with the correct school.

Since most of Mumsnetters have kids at school, yes we know how schools work, and life, and conflicts, we all have to juggle
Funnily enough having kids in school doesn't mean people automatically have a clue about how to resolve issues with schools.

On this thread we have people suggesting that the OP who inform the school they'll be removing children early, that they should be entitled to use the staff car park and generally insist that one school solves a situation created by a different school.

On other threads there's almost always people suggesting call Ofsted, go to the LEA, go to the head, demand a meeting with the head, write to governors over anything and everything without following the reasonable chain of people first.

When those of us who work in schools suggest dealing with issues with the correct person first we get accused of worshipping teachers or thinking teachers can do no wrong.
When certain behaviour and attitude is pointed out as being unreasonable and a bit 'that parent' the usual reply is "oh we should worship schools and nobody should complain" even though almost every time many posters have been talking about how to resolve things.
Point out (as I've done here) that someone can go to formal complaints when required whilst being entirely reasonable in their approach gets misrepresented because it suits.
Then there's regular frothing about not giving consent for detentions whilst ignoring what the law says.
Threads where people tell posters to misuse the word safeguarding as that will get them taken seriously.

In fact, there's lots of terrible advice given on education threads that decreases the likelihood of resolutions.

lolasmiles

And don’t forget that on every thread where someone has safeguarding concerns involving a child, there’s always someone who suggests contacting the LADO

FamilyOfAliens
Any safeguarding thread gets filled with some terrible advice. I always hope the OPs on those threads find the helpful advice.

I still can't believe that my view that the senior leadership of School A should take responsibility for a situation their actions have created is so controversial.
I can't see why staff and leaders at School B should even be involved.
If School A wish to extend their day then they should have some flexibility to support parents who have had their school runs disrupted because of it.
For example, what if it wasn't two primary schools. What if a parent had another child at a special school? What if the parent had to collect their child from secondary school?
As far as I'm concerned that's something for the school who've changed their pick up time to resolve with the parents who need some flexibility.

Would any parents really care or notice that the OP will park there for 6 weeks?

Obviously I have no idea about the OP's school but a similar thing happened when my DC was at primary and believe me everyone waiting outside the school noticed when one parent persistently parked where we'd been told to leave clear. It did end up going to the HT and she told the parent in no uncertain terms not to park there.

Ime one person setting themselves above the rules is usually noticed by others, and they do care.

Would any parents really care or notice that the OP will park there for 6 weeks?

Definitely. We had to install electronic gates because some parents believed the rule that applied to everyone else didn’t apply to them.

Ime one person setting themselves above the rules is usually noticed by others, and they do care
One of my former schools had a problem with parents parking in the bus bays. Apparently with 1500 sets of parents managing just fine (and we had arrangements for families where the student had SEND requirements) some parents decided they absolutely must park in the bus areas.

We had the area coned off by caretakers and they'd there before the duty staff got out, move them, and park up. Some had the nerve to complain to staff when they were blocked in by buses that didn't leave until 10/15 minutes after the bell because they had somewhere to be!

Our schools can't be helpful enough with parents who have to juggle multiple school runs - they hold back the start of morning play performances to make sure that parents running to the other school for drop offs can get back, they'll make sure to let kids out first if they know parents have to get to the other school for pick ups as well, and I just had to tell school this morning that we're going to be late dropping one off tomorrow because the other school has a school trip so want their kids in early and we can't be in two places at once... fine, no problem, might have to come in by the office but we'll make sure they're on the lunch numbers.

I'd just ask to pick up early and miss assembly if your kids aren't going to be bothered by that (hell would break loose if mine had to miss singing assembly as they love it!)

LolaSmiles - Are you or are you not suggesting OP approach the LEA over this? If not, why are you ranting on about it?

At no point has OP assumed anything? She spoke to a secretary, who said she didn’t see it would be a problem. She didn’t say, you’ll need to contact X, and she certainly didn’t say she would need to contact the LEA, because only an insane person would suggest that.

Now OP has been told by someone else she will check with the person who said it would be okay, because she wasn’t aware of the situation. Except she wasn’t so polite... an anally retentive kindred spirit perhaps?

So at what point has OP just assumed she can park anywhere she pleases?

lolaSmiles - Are you or are you not suggesting OP approach the LEA over this?
If not, why are you ranting on about it?
You jumped on my explanation about the difference between being "that parent" Vs a reasonable parent who, WHEN NEEDED, would be more than reasonable following right through to governors.

Not once have I said the OP should go to the LEA.
What I have (repeatedly!) said is this situation is caused by the older child's school (school A) should be raised with the older child's school repeatedly if required because they have a senior leadership team who have signed off on this change to home time and really it's for that school to work with the OP if required.

School B has nothing to do with the issues caused by School A. There's absolutely no need to expecting them to change parking policies, or for children to be removed early. It has nothing to do with that school.

We have a lot of families with various issues at our school and we're more than happy to work with them to find workable solutions to things. It really doesn't matter who's at fault. Our responsibility is the welfare of the child in our care. And if that means a child sitting in the office for half an hour once a week for a while, then that's what we'll do. We also have free after school clubs, I may have missed if that was an option for the OP. So all this about taking it up with the school at fault is fine if there is something they can change. But we'd help if it was something they couldn't.

I would have thought the best bet is to approach the school with the swimming lessons, and explain to them that the late finish means you cannot collect on time, so please could they make arrangements for your child to wait in school until you get there. If they're messing around with the timings of the school day, they need to understand that that has a knock-on effect for families. I'm sure most schools can find somewhere for a child to sit where someone can keep an eye on them.

lanthanum I 100% agree.
Plus, they also need to be aware of the impact it has on some families otherwise they'll keep assuming that it's totally fine for everyone and keep with that arrangement.

We also have free after school clubs

I’ve never heard of this in a maintained school or academy. Who pays the staff and for the premises they use for the club? Our after school club is privately run - we rent the premises to the owners of the club but they charge the parents. Your school must have a huge budget to provide all of this for free!

*If you get flustered, maybe your Dh could do the talking on your behalf."

Wtaf . Did someone actually just write this . I am completely shocked. The OP has not written that she has any additional needs so where is the assumption coming from that she will need a man to speak on her behalf?! *

Sorry. Have been at work all day so only just seen this. I didn't mean to imply that the OP needed a man to speak on her behalf and phrased that very badly.

Given that the OP says she gets flustered when trying to talk to headteachers etc I thought that as her Dh is the father of the children and is also likely to be inconvenienced if one or other school didn't come up with a solution to the problem that he could be involved and support his partner? They're his kids too!

@velocitykate as if you had to explain your post - my god there are some defensive people about - It was obvious what you meant when you suggested her DH as he's her life partner and so far the OP seems to be dealing with the school on her own.

Not a huge budget at all. Most of the clubs are run by staff, one is by a teacher from a local private school who comes to us as part of their charity requirements and there are a couple of outside providers. I was stunned at first, I pay a fortune to my kids' school for their clubs.

Rockbird
That sounds like enrichment clubs, not after school wraparound provision.

After school clubs are usually free, ran on a small budget and done by staff, usually in an area that interests them. They aren't childcare for late pickups and can be cancelled at short notice.

rockbird

As lolasmiles said, we’re talking about an after-school club that is childcare. Ours is open from 3-6pm after school. A snack tea is provided and children are picked up from another school by walking bus.

We also run free activity clubs after school (cooking, sewing, football, coding), most of them for an hour or so and run by staff volunteering their own time. We have a couple of outside providers (dance, judo) where parents pay for a place.