To find it increasingly annoying, that parents send clearly ill children into school

[Howarewealldoing]

As the title states really, why do parents continue to send clearly ill children into school . When they should
A. Be at home resting and recovering
B. Stop spreading their illness on to everyone else
It’s not fair on the child and everyone else , and I find it incredibly selfish

My DD is currently off school messaged this morning to let them know . Just received a message back saying I hope she feels better soon. Hopefully she will be back in by the end of the week . Depending on how she is feeling. With Xmas plays and everyone crammed in to school hall . People are bond to get sick .

My children’s have said if your child is ill you must send them anyway and if we think they are too ill to be in school we will ask you to collect them!!

Schools definitely do have an issue with genuinely ill absences.. even when children are sent home I'll from school they call every day demanding to know when they'll be back in. Happened with my DD l. She has also came home and told me theyve had assemblies about going to school every day even if they don't feel well.
My DN (different county) had a bad case of chickenpox recently.. the school phoned her ever day..

3 reasons

• Have to work
• Can't be assed to look after child
• School letters regarding absence make them worried to let their child have too much time off

I agree with you. Selfish. No concern for others

I have a child with a medical condition and if he’s off I get letters sent - so yes they do! I have never taken my kids out for a day trip or holiday ever. The government stance is tough on absence.

It depends on what the illness is - coughs/colds would be ridiculous to keep them home every time if they are well in themselves as alot of children catch those all through winter. Both our primary and secondary have made it clear that they are fine to come to school with coughs and colds if they are ok to learn. I work in the NHS and unless symptoms are severe, you come to work with coughs, colds, Covid and put on a mask (not suggesting children wear masks but adults have to just get on with these things too).

Stomach bug/sickness goes without saying to keep them off as that can really bring down the whole class.

Both my kids generally have 1-2 sick days a year and I find going back to school is better than lounging around. In our house, if you’re well enough to play video games, your well enough for school.

Illnesses develop though, the “clearly ill” later in the day could have been a “sniffle” in the morning. My child is absolutely more important than my job but if it looks like a minor illness, the impact it has for me to be off for a day is so great that I do have to take that risk. I have been wrong from time to time and had to collect a poorly child later. There are far more times I’ve been right and if I’d taken the day off for every one of those I’d have caused significant issues at work.

I once had a teacher say to me in a pissed off way at pick up “whatever you gave to him this morning has worn off and he’s got a temperature now” I hadn’t given him anything! He had mild cold symptoms in the morning and developed a temperature later in the day. I don’t have a crystal ball 🤷‍♀️ I also know plenty of parents who keep their child off at the first sign of any illness and always have them off for the whole week. I expect they get letters.

Yes. They are.

The employer probably won’t make it obvious that that is why they’ve been fired but they will absolutely be managed out.

Very unusual to be able to work around each other specifically to cover illness. I’d say the majority of the population either work normal full time hours or one parent working school hours to do school runs. How many days sick does your child have a year? Obviously if they have long-term health conditions, it would be understandable to try and find jobs you can do that. For most people, its a couple of days a year (usually abit worse in the younger years nursery etc). I dont think mine have ever exceeded 2-3 days a year.

I've said YABU but I suppose YANBU if you are talking about children in school with serious illnesses or vomiting.

Children (and adults too for that matter) don't need a day off for every sniffle and coughs and colds are needed to build the immune system.

Absolutely this. The presenteeism culture we have in this country, that says people should still show up even if they have an infectious disease, does way more harm than good. And the schools' finger-wagging over attendance ensures the brainwashing starts very early in life.

We got a shitty attendance letter off the school a couple of weeks after DC missed 5 days of school with chicken pox. They had been nothing but lovely on the phone each time I called to say DC wasn't better yet.

I'll still keep mine off when ill but it's definitely sending mixed messages.

Completely agree - mine have very strong immune systems and never kept them off for a sniffle. If they are feeling very ill and theres absolutely no chance of concentrating on work, then ofcourse they would be able to stay home but I dont think they have ever exceeded a day or two and that would be a very bad cough/cold.

Sickness bugs are another thing all together.

I have a disabled child who is off more and I can tell you that yes they absolutely do have an issue with it when children are ill. Or at hospital appointments.

Kept my daughter off today - she is not so unwell she can't go to school but it's end of term, she needs rest, and I don't want her spreading it around... if we ALL thought like that then we wouldn't have such an awful flu season.

Our school has told parents that coughs and colds are a good enough reason to be absent............

The general advice is that if a child feels well enough to be in school then they should be in school, unless it’s something like chickenpox, d&v and similar for which schools will have exclusion policies. There will be loads of children who are clearly snottery, sneezing and coughing but don’t have a temperature and feel otherwise well, who will be in school. Spreading it all around yeah, but not ill enough to be off. If we always kept children off with things that are contagious but don’t cause serious illness, the schools would be up in arms. Keep them off for a common cold why not keep them off for headlice and cold sores?
If your child is well but contagious, it can be hard to justify having time off work. You aren’t ill yourself so what sort of leave do you take? Parental leave? Limited in many workplaces. Self certification? Yeah, but hit the trigger for this (which you could easily do over the course of a winter) you face absence management procedures. Annual leave? Difficult when it’s often stretched thinly enough as it is covering all the holidays they get.
Don’t get me wrong if my child is actually too ill to be in school I’m keeping her off and always have, but there are a lot grey areas meaning its a hard judgement call to make sometimes and not necessarily just about being selfish.

@Howarewealldoing “Parents have to work but if children are ill they need to come first . The same.way an adult would have time off if clearly sick . School don’t have an issue children having time of if ill . They have an issue with parents lying and taking kids on holiday”

do you live in cuckoo land?
I, and many friends, are unfortunate enough to have employers that would rather you at deaths door but working than take any time off AND require any childcare days to be either unpaid or time paid back.

So if my child/ren are well enough to hold a conversation, eat reasonably normally and function within reason, I am not keeping them off school.

And yes, I do take my kids out of school for holidays because 1. We cannot afford it in school holiday time and 2. Myself and husband cannot get a full week off together during the holidays.

what a bloody blessed life you live

Not if its just a sniffle, but I do think the schools are the problem. We've all had the flu (and it was flu not a cold) last week and still not completely over it, so my daughter had a week off. I got a shitty phone call from the school pretty much demanding she went in today. She's a tough little cookie, but she's had one thing after another this year and it has worn her out. She did go in today as seems better, but if she starts to feel crap again I will pull her back out.

Yes they do they are now asking for medical evidence for a cold and fining parents !! Educate yourself

Haha yes they do. Dd had flu last year so was off for 4 days (then ill over half term). They sent a letter because % was high as they’d only been in school 6 weeks! She wasn’t allowed further time off sick without a doctor’s note. 3 weeks later she vomited. I called school as she felt fine the next morning and they said she needed to be in school. I felt bad but followed the rules. I imagine she spread the germs.

I'm not sure if you are naive or ignorant? You have no idea whatsoever of the hardships that others endure. Your school was fine taking time off and therefore every school will be and you couldn't possibly imagine getting sacked for high levels of leave for your sick kids.

YABU (very much so) - if a single mum cant work and gets sacked for keeping taking time off, she will be reliant on the state and then people moan about it. If the same single mum sends her kids to school with a cold as she needs to work to put food on the table she is selfish and neglectful.

Schools are asking for this - there are posters in my school saying if they have a cough, cold etc. then they'll be expected to attend school. I don't make the rules, argue for better provision for working parents and ask the DfE to change their policies.

I am lucky that I have a very flexible employer and that my kids were always ill during nursery years so i'm pretty sure they are immune to everything so havent needed time off but I'm not devoid of emotional intelligence to work out why some parents send their children to school when poorly.

Because what one parent thinks is too ill for a child to function is what another parent thinks is perfectly reasonable for them to carry on. Other factors like working also come into it. Just because you don’t like it doesn’t mean it’s wrong.

Depends what you mean by ill. If they have a cough but still relatively well then I expect them to be in school. Unfortunate it will spread kid to kid but that’s life.

Our schools are always quick to send them home so anyone deemed unwell to the school isn’t there.

Not about school attendance but sick children not being kept at home rant.

Im a childminder and bring my mindee to the local church playgroups. Every week the volunteers read out the rules with " do not attend if your child is unwell or if there sibling at home is unwell as not all the younger children are fully vaccinated ". Every week this is repeated.

Last week one of the parents brought her son who clearly looked unwell and was questioned by the volunteers. She said the rash on his face was because she used different baby wipes.

Turns out her son has Hand ,Foot and Mouth but she didn't want to miss group as her son loves it, he is 1. Last week of group this week with a party and to be honest I'm thinking of skipping it as I know there will be sick kids there because their parents won't want them to miss the party.

Two years I came down with laryngitis, bronchitis and a chest infection on the 23rd December. Our whole Christmas was ruined thanks to selfish people bringing their sick kids to events.