Staggered start is illegal exclusion

[HapptobeTHATparent]

DD turns 5 on 2nd September. Just received her school starter paperwork and it's a staggered start, so won't actually start full time until 16th September. No home visits so no need for staggered start. 26 children already attend the school nursery full time.

AIBU to accuse the school of illegal exclusion by not allowing DD and the 25 others already attending school (nursery) full time (plus any new starters who wish to start full time straight away), to return to school on the 1st September like the rest of the school.

State maintained school (not academy).

Slightly tounge in cheek, but also hoping for some links to documents I can quote at the school.

The parents.

Yes I know it's tricky but it's like half terms and summer holidays.

But yes I agree it's a pain for working parents. Also I don't see why it should be any longer than a week.

What if a parent can't take time off work though? I can't find a childminder that will help nearby. Fortunately my daughter is only staggered for a week but I'm genuinely not sure what I'm meant to do with her, I can't take time off and I can't find someone to have her.

I requested full time for two of my children due to the work and it was fine. They had lunch with the Year 1 children.

OP is a teacher, so she can't take annual leave or flex her hours.
My DD starts school in September and one her of her friends is going to a different school with 3 weeks of staggered starts. Both her parents are secondary school teachers, they can't "just do it".

DS's infant school really wanted to keep the summer borne on half days for the first term. They used to do it before the rules changed prohibiting them from forcing it.

They did a staggered start - half days for 3 days, first group then goes full time, 2nd group half days for 3 days, then full time while summer born for 3 days half days. On day 3 of summer born DS2's 3rd half day they went around to all the summer born parents asking them if they wanted to pick their Dc up before lunch or after lunch the next school day. Everyone chose after lunch. When they got to me I said "oh, the end of the day thanks!". Cue gritted teeth and an unhappy "fine".

All the other parents were annoyed they hadn't thought of it themselves but they didn't manage to trick them again for the following day and the DC all went to full days straight after that.

“Look after them”? … primary education is not childcare.

I would really hope that a few inconvenient days for yourself is acceptable to ensure a happy and calm transition for your DC.

When they are 18 and starting University, you wont even remember this “inconvenience” and will hopefully just remember their happy little faces going in and out of school.

Perspective and patience people!!!

www.kent.gov.uk/education-and-children/schools/school-age if you scroll down to "When Children Start School" on this then it confirms that you are correct, legally you can send your child full time from the start of Reception, whatever the school's normal arrangements.

This is not a well known fact (schools often prefer not to share it!) and there is always a lot of misinformation on threads like this.

I wouldn't use the term "illegal exclusion though".

Thanks for sharing this

Our school has just got rid of staggered starts. All the reception children have been attending at least some preschool sessions, if not a full time setting, they don't need phased starts. It doesn't help anyone.

This year we have 50 dc all starting in full days from day 1 thanks to parents like you. We are all dreading it. Yes many of them have been in nursery but a nursery with it's free flow and open garden access is very different to a school class and they didn't all just start there at once. We are al dreading it - for the kids sake mainly as I imagine they are really going to struggle. It's going to be hard getting to know the individual dc and learn their individual needs this way.

“Look after them”? … primary education is not childcare.

Yes it is, which is why parents of school aged child are expected to work/look for work for at least 25 h a week for universal credit purposes.

So all those extolling the virtues of staggered starts, how do you account for the huge differences in duration which can be as little as 3 days and as much as 6 weeks? I wouldn’t disagree with the principle but surely 1 week is enough plus longer for those kids that need it.

I got in a battle with our school who wanted to delay my child’s first half day by an extra 3 days because we couldn’t make the home visit they had scheduled which had to come first. This would have made her first day 14th September! They initially doubled down and were extremely impolite about it. So some Googling led me to mumsnet and the right to 38 weeks education and so I put my foot down over the 3 days but sucked up the rest of the settling regime (3 more weeks of half days) because I didn’t like the idea of DD there on her own in the afternoons.

I did a quick straw poll with nursery / NCT mums etc to see what other local schools did and 50% were full time from day 1. And another interesting snippet was that all the headteachers of the settling schools were men…..

Doesn't sound tongue in cheek, sounds like you have your claws out. I'd raise it to them in a civilised manner, and possibly escalate to mentioning relevant documents/rules, but not go full Sparta at the start.

How disrespectful to the thousands of highly educated and poorly paid school staff across the country.

I used to be write emails like this but then, placed in a client facing role myself, learnt that actually client/customer requests with an antagonistic and authoritative tone are off-putting. They'll fob you off with the bare minimum. I would suggest starting on a more neutral note, and you can always escalate if unsuccessful.

"Parents like you"?!

Yes the OP's language is unnecessarily combative but she and the others have a legal right to do this!

What about all the people who have suffered indirectly when parents (let's face it, mostly mums) are running around for the whole of September and into October, behind on work, annoying their employer, presiding over a confused 4/5 year old and a patchwork of temporary childcare arrangements. It is not good for children to have all that uncertainty. It's awful for neurodiverse or anxious DC.

Some of those mums are secondary teachers, doctors. emergency services...

This issue has been settled legally. It is that simple.

I should have added "threatening tone". The implied threat of legal consequences is obviously the point of the email. It's possible to start civilly and then move to threats.

Or if you really want to start with implied threats right off the bat, at least soften it with some sandwiched acknowledgment of their circumstances.

That's more effective in getting what you want quickly.

Yes many of them have been in nursery but a nursery with it's free flow and open garden access is very different to a school class

It shouldn't be. Your reception setting is EYFS and at the start of the year your provision should be almost indistinguishable from a nursery setting - free flow etc. The point of the reception year is you transition gradually to a more school classroom environment. In our reception classroom at the start there are very few chairs and tables! They are added in gradually through the year as the volume of seated/ teacher led activity increases.

To add to that, a good nursery or preschool should be preparing their kids for starting school.

At no point along the way should there be a huge transition that children struggle with. This usually happens when settings leave it too late to prepare eg when preschools haven't adequately prepared children to start reception or more often, when EYFS has not prepared children to start y1.

It is a feminist issue like much of our outdated primary school admissions system.

What else in the admission system is a feminist issue? Are schools mandating that women must do drop offs and pick ups anyway?

OP just phone them and for the love of all that's green unless they give push back don't mention the research you've done. It'll probably be fine.

How disrespectful to the thousands of highly educated and poorly paid school staff across the country.

How disrespectful to the thousands of highly educated and poorly paid staff in the childcare sector across the country.

School is both childcare & education.

At infant school age, its generally much faster for a parent to teach them one on one - as many educated parents found, they could cover the educational requirements of eyfs/ks1 in an hour or 2 one on one at home. As a state, part of why we provide education to the youngest children is because it facilitates parents working. It is supremely naive to deny this.

Not every school has the resources for this. Yea

You need to plan childcare around your child's school, not expect school to pick up your admin. Probably not the school for you if you're not happy with their arrangements that are made to support the children transitioning into a structured learning environment.

A week of staggered starts may well be in the child's best interests. But 6 weeks as it said in the Guardian... probably in the school's best interests.
Different starts will suit different children.
There should be an option
Let's not forget many parents work full time now, schools need to move on