Summer holidays - outdated

[Wednesdayafternoon]

So I was just scrolling through Facebook and I saw some pictures after school club/breakfast club to my sons school put up and it just got me thinking how crazy it is that schools just completely shut down for like 6-7 weeks.
They have all these facilities during term time to support working families because there is obviously a need to for it, but in the holidays... ahh f*ck it!
Obviously o know there's summer schemes but at a massive expense and also different hours and locations.
My sons school isn't offering one so he's attending some random school for 3 days over the summer mainly just so he's socialising!
I'm extremely lucky as my mum is a great help to me during the holidays. And obviously I'm very much looking forward to spending more time with my boys and no school run... hurry!!!
But I just find it crazy that schools close for such a significant period of time.
Obviously I know school isn't childcare but it school itself enables parents to work so it kind of is 🤷🏼‍♀️

Right so let's just look at the attractions of a teaching job minus the holidays.
60-70 hour week.
Unpaid half terms.
Earning equivalency to non degree professionals such as supermarket and retail managers.
Long hours incompatible with childcare.
Working with children.

The only plus left is working with children and many people, like me, have left teaching because we've realised we can still work with children without being subjected to the endless paperwork scrutiny and overwork of education.

Take the holidays and the rest will wise up.
Maybe it will become conscripted. Personally, I'd set a social media rule trawl and anyone making ridiculous assertions and demands of teachers like op and co would automatically qualify for a nice decade in a struggling secondary.

Only joking of course, I wouldn't want people who view children as an inconvenience to be palmed off on others anywhere near childcare.

Teachers are contracted to work in school on 195 days per year. It would need a mass overhaul of contracts (and equivalent pay) to reduce the holidays. The summer holidays are pretty much the only perk of the job (which already comes with a lower salary compared to professions that require similar levels of education which reflects the longer holidays).

The government is already failing to meet its teacher training targets. Teachers who are working parents in particular stick with a job that means they miss all term-time events with their children because of the pay-off of being able to spend time with them in the holidays. You won't keep teachers in the job if you cut the holidays and there already aren't enough of them.

Subsidised, widely-available holiday childcare is the answer for those parents who find the holidays inconvenient.

Comparing it to a nursing shortage is bonkers - you’re literally suggesting a policy to increase time in school but not bothered if the consequences are that there’s nobody available to teach during the increased time

I compared it to nursing because there IS a labour shortage in this country. It's not unique to teaching. Teachers aren't some divine beings, even if many on MN believe otherwise.

I'm sure with the suggested policy, some teachers will leave (into jobs with 20 days holidays and working over Christmas), some will stay and some people will still enter the profession. In other words, life goes on.

But why is there a labour shortage in the UK. We have so many people on benefits and relying on food banks.
Surely to goodness we can get some of the people who are currently in low paid jobs better trained and into the roles we need them in.
Which in turn opens up the lower paid jobs to those on benefits 🤔

But whatever a labour shortage isn't going to be helped by shortening school holidays or having kids spending an extra two weeks learning times tables.

You are aware without teachers there are no other professions. Without teachers how do you become educated enough to do the other professional jobs. Unfortunately too many view school as childcare which it absolutely is not. Too many believe because they had children the world should bend to meet their needs. Becoming a parent is a choice that many don’t get. It’s not easy nor is it convenient but it absolutely is not everyone else’s issue to solve.
Other countries have much longer summer holidays as they care about what is best for children and respect others. People are not just their job role. I was really hoping covid would wake people up to this but if anything it’s made people even more self centred.
The solution isn’t to cut summer holidays but to get better childcare provisions in place that are affordable.
Unfortunately because teachers are so good at sorting issues and have had their roles expanded to include being social workers, mental health professionals, nurses, etc it is now assumed they are now to be providers of free childcare to all but their own children.
May no point have this thread acknowledged how many teachers and educational staff are working parents too. That was also never considered much during covid l, I guess their kids aren’t as important as everyone else’s.

@Ylvamoon Nobody is advocating for worsening nurses' terms and conditions and handwaving any possible effects away, though, that's the difference. For some reason parents seem to believe that there'll always be teachers and therefore parents should be able to dictate whatever terms and conditions apply to them. As if there's some form of conscription. I'm just a lowly childless person so no skin in the game, but if I had kids I'd want teachers to get a remuneration package that encourages them to join and remain in the profession, but for some reason on MN parents think they're little above the help and deserve whatever scraps they can get. It's very weird.

But talking of nurses (and other hospital staff) they are one of the industries who often struggle to get time off when they want it.

Can people imagine how much more difficult it would be if a high percentage were trying to get two weeks off in the same month.
And often you'll get a couple who are both in the same position and struggle to get two weeks of at the same time.

The temptation would rise for taking kids out of school in term time.

It's a wider issue anyway not schools' and teacher's problem