School wrap-around - what do we do ?

[Oneanddone88]

Hi,
DD (4) just started reception. I chose the school based on local reputation plus the availability of breakfast club and after school club to facilitate us still working. The school explained to us in a meeting that the after school club runs daily.
Fast forward to a week before term in September and the club (who are a private company hired by the school), says they aren't running due to a lack of staff.
Panic stations as we have no local family and not huge flexibility with our jobs. Partner WFH twice a week so collects then and I work 4 days. So we needed after school club for two afternoons.
The schools response was 'that's a shame but nothing we do'.
We've had to juggle it with another local parent who collects on the two days we needed and we take her DS to school every day. Workable in the very short term but not long term as she is having to leave work super early those days and meet important meetings.
I've emailed the school a few times asking for updates and it's all very 'no nothing sorry '.

I'm at the point where I'm wondering do we move schools to one where they have nursery wraparound.
Also one childminder serves the school we chose, and she's full with a waiting list.

What has also annoyed me is that when we went to info afternoon with the school where they told us the club runs daily , that it wasn't even true. The after-school club told us they ran for two days a week last academic year , and not even the days we needed.

Has anyone else experienced similar before? I feel very stressed. I changed my job of 12 years due to DD starting school and wonder now why I bothered as we're in a worse logistical situation thanks to this.

There's nothing from the club or school about when this is going to be resolved.

This is what happens when the government/society builds an economy around both parents needing working full time just to get by - kids needing to be out the equivalent of an adults working day and parents desperately scrabbling to find good quality, affordable places for them to go.

I feel for you OP, especially as it's happened so last minute. I think from your posts that maybe moving school might be your only practical option but I understand you're reluctance as it's an upheaval for your child. I hope you manage to sort something soon.

But Local Government budgets are being slashed by this Conservative Government. My LA has to save £5.5million on Children’s Services alone, again this year.
LA’s are struggling to meet their statutory requirements ( safeguarding children, school transport, provision for children and young people with SEND and vulnerable children) due to funding cuts.

Look at how many LA’s are having facing ‘bankruptcy’ and having the right to manage their own finances removed by central government. Decision making taken away.

We have had redundancies reducing from 120 staff to 15 in just one of our Children’s Service’s department, supporting schools.

With not enough money to pay for statutory services, there is no money to support/subsidise non statutory services such as after school care.

Where I live, it's not a lack of TA's/teachers as much as schools being unable to afford them. I work as an agency TA, currently at a woefully understaffed school that was forced to make redundancies. Many of my fellow supplies tell me there just aren't permanent positions for them beyond a year. There's been some talk in the news about schools in some places going down to four days a week to save staff costs, heating and lighting.
It's all very well to say schools 'should' provide this and that, but who will pay for it? The government doesn't have a magic money tree, it claws money from other services or it increases taxes targeting an already stretched population.
To get the 'free' or subsidised childcare needed, what will we have to lose? The NHS is in crisis already. Services are cut to the bone.
The government can insist schools provide wraparound care all it likes. Fat lot of good if, to do that, they have to charge parents an arm an a leg to provide it.
The top and bottom of it is, it's a catch-22. Both parents need to work. People working in childcare need to live on that wage. Schools need funds to provide care for parents who can't afford it. Workplaces need to be more flexible for parents to collect their kids from school, but not all jobs can operate like that.
In reality, it's not childcare, or lack thereof, it's not lack of workplace flexibility, it not lack of wages, it's all the above and more. Unfortunately, put simply, the modern way we have to live is unsustainable and unaffordable and it's crashing down around our ears.

I feel for OP, and everyone else struggling, but there isn't an easy answer. No wonder fewer and fewer of us are having kids. It's just not viable in a society where both parents not only have to, but are expected to work full time, when even if you have family close by, they can't help because most grandparents are both needing to be in full time employment just to make ends meet.
Chucking money at it won't work. There isn't the money to chuck without robbing Peter to pay Paul, whatever government is in.

This!

That is true but we teachers also need wraparound!

As a teacher I see budget cuts.

As a parent, I need to work and so do other parents so I can teach their children!

I think rather than expecting schools to offer wraparound care for 2 pupils, the government funding childminders adequately so that it becomes a viable job is probably a better idea. Whilst wraparound care can work in some schools in some areas, it isn’t necessarily the best option for everywhere.

I think the thing about demand is that there is an element of it being a bit circular. If you don't have wraparound, you won't have many children of working parents at your school. If you have an established wraparound, you'll attract them. But of course it doesn't happen overnight, it takes time for word to get around and then it might change year on year.

Don't forget the cost of the caretaker. And the insurance. And the additional bank account. And the Parentpay commission. And the staff who raise the invoices and chase non paying parents for money.

Our school is oversubscribed-we don’t particularly need to encourage a certain ‘type’ of parent.

Once upon a time there was a Labour government, elected in 1997 with a huge majority and on a wave of enthusiasm for improving public services.

This government spent countless millions setting up Sure Start, including children's centres, and establishing the free entitlement to funded nursery hours. Part of this funding went towards an 'Extended Schools' strategy, which was about schools offering provision beyond the school day to support families. Pilot programmes were generously funded, in order to set up the infrastructure. This was partly because you needed separate Ofsted registration to set up services outside the core school day. This strategy also provided for staff at local authority level to oversee, promote and support these fledgling services.

However, the people who had conceived these ideas - and they were good ideas - were in love with other ideas too. Even though these politicians came from the left, the ideas they thirsted after were those around the benefits of competition in public services, market-based mechanisms and a mix of private and public providers. Also known as neoliberalism. So everything was set up from the point of view of making it easy for new providers to enter the 'market', rather than handing money to extend or expand existing public services. Service providers emerged from the private sector and, although they were interested in a providing a public service with public money, they also wanted to make a profit. Private nursery chains flourished, many of whom made significant profits on the back of delivering government funded hours plus additional hours to working parents. Schools were not legally required to provide extended care themselves (such as after school clubs or summer play schemes), as of course that would have concentrated provision and funding in the hands of the public sector, but only to work with and 'signpost' to local providers. Quality was variable, but services were available and almost everyone was happy.

Time passed and a new government came into being. Economic crisis meant a new wind of austerity blew through the land. Sure Start disappeared, children's centres began to close, local authority staff were made redundant and the extended schools strategy dwindled into dust. Funding was no longer available and the after-school clubs which survived did so because there was a genuine demand for their services. Cutbacks to the welfare state meant that many people (often women) who had happily worked in low paid but socially-useful roles began to look for better paid work elsewhere.

Families were left with a patchwork of provision that works well where demand is high but is almost unviable where there are fewer working parents.

I live in the Netherlands and my DD goes to an extended school. It's brilliant!! Holidays and inset days are included so I never have to worry about childcare.

Parents in Britain should demand the same.

That’s interesting-what does it look like in practice?

Do all schools offer the extended hours or only some? What’s the cost? Who runs the clubs and what’s the pay like?

So not all schools are an extended school, but schools by law have to have a contract with an after school care provider. The school my daughter goes to also has a nursery on the same premise, so super handy with younger siblings.

There's different organisations that do this, the one my daughter goes to is a non-profit originally started by the council. The staff for breakfast club and afternoon club are also TAs or they run the preschool, so there's enough hours for them.

Downsides: it is not cheap. I pay 7.50 an hour and it's an entire afternoon or nothing. Luckily I can get a lot back via tax subsidies, the amount I pay with subsidies included is 350 euros a month. That is for 3 afternoons a week, 3 whole days in holidays and inset days.

If extended school covers afternoons, what are normal school hours?

@spanieleyes 8.20 til 14.00. After school club is until 18.30. I always pay for 4,5 hours.

@CuteOrangeElephant 18.30! 350 Euro a month!! That would make such a difference to our lives... getting back for 17.30 is sometimes impossible. And the costs are leading to debt.

Thanks @Fivebyfive2

While there’s not a legal requirement for schools to provide wraparound care, the Chancellor did make some commitment to all primaries providing wraparound in the spring budget. I think there was a previous government target to this effect too.

I think you’ve had a bit of a hard time here OP. It’s all very well saying that schools are not childcare but society is set up so that parents have to work longer than school hours and a lot of these parents are doing things which are essential to society/ the economy. Practically speaking it’s very hard / impossible to source childcare for these hours if it’s not available at school.

I’m likely going to send my children to prep school partly for this reason (appreciate that’s not helpful OP). But the prep school is the only school near us that can guarantee care being available every day of the year except Christmas Day 7.30-6 even if you contact them on the day. Local state school seems nice but has 20 after school places until 5.30 for 200 kids, has a weird booking system where you can only book one week in advance first come first served and could easily stop running at any time.

Two of them in prep school including the holiday and after school care I need will cost c.£22k per year. A nanny for wraparound and holidays would be more than that (if I could find someone to do it) and probably less reliable. There are very few childminders where I live.

I don’t think being a single parent and having a professional career is compatible with state school where I live.

Do those using wrap-around care receive invoices? I send the money each month and have never received a receipt nor an invoice.
I’d be interested to see if this is common practice.
For background- hours are the same each week but we don’t have to pay on training days or bank hols and it’s term time only so amount is different every time.

@MrsScone ours doesn't. It is paid via direct debit. I think it is something that they should do thought but at the same time I think it's would be an admin cost for no real benefit.

We had to do a school appeal in a similar situation when it became clear that the waiting list for an after school place was 3 years for a Monday, a year for Tues-Thurs but we could have a place on Fridays. We used taxis to transport DS1 to other after school clubs until we found a place.

We get an invoice - sort of, it's not formally labelled as such but an email that sets out what we owe.

No receipt though

Probably a silly question but why do you want one?

We don’t, just load money onto the school account and use it to pay for individual ASC sessions, same as we do for trips and lunches etc. You can’t book if you run out of money.

Where did I say the schools need to produce the staff?
It is, however, an attractive post for a parent of a child at the school or a TA who needs more hours.
It's funny how school, term-time jobs are like hens' teeth but at the same time no school-age childcare setting can possibly recruit parents who want a job that fits in with childcare.

My DD's school wraparound is run by a social interest company - so it makes a small profit but is generally there to provide stimulating out of school care for the children. They are of course eligible for grants, and for free places for vulnerable children in some holidays which our LA funds. I imagine if they were a commercial organisation they wouldn't be eligible for grants.

If a company is expecting to make a commercial sized profit out of after school clubs, then no, they won't be able to do that, it is unrealistic.
Either the school can be the umbrella organisation (providing payroll but not putting in funds beyond that, with an organiser who does the recruitment and rotas etc.) or a non-profit/social enterprise company can run it.

If numbers are low they don't need to have many staff - presumably 1:8 for early years but two staff could then cover 8 Reception age children and any number of others.

We looked at one school with a high number of families out of work and they had a very small after school club but they still ran one, as I say I think with about 20 children in total and two staff.