AIBU to think school closures ignore parents' work commitments?

[OhNoItsThePinkyPonk]

AIBU to think that the school doesn’t take much account of parents’ need to work? Primary school have just announced they won’t be opening for the rest of the week, but it’s OK because they’ll be sending us online work for us to do with the children, and whilst they are sorry they have had to cancel sports day we shouldn’t be too upset because they’ve have rescheduled it for a couple of weeks time. Like, I totally get they have to put the safety of the children first and if it’s too hot it’s too hot, but what do they think I’m
doing when the kids are at school, preparing beautiful dinners, ensuring the craft box is topped up, pining wistfully for the moment they come home? FFS, my job obviously comes second to my children and of course I’ll cancel planned surgeries and clinics where I need to. It’s not the emergency that bothers me, it’s the blasé way in which it’s communicated as though it’s a
minor inconvenience, not a major major f’ing headache with serious second and third order effects.

phew, that’s better. Now to go and get the little darlings…

This. We waited for the local authority announcement with gritted teeth, not knowing what would be worse; staying open or closing. Closing the school means all sorts of safeguarding considerations and monitoring, supplying meals-on-wheels lunches for pupils entitled to free school meals, setting online learning, informing contractors such as cleaners etc. Staying open puts teachers and children in far-too-hot spaces for long periods -my classroom was 37°C on Wednesday midday, pupils' hands were too sweaty to hold their pencils. The playground offers little solace -we're in the city with little shade or cooling greenery. If we had trees and a breeze, I'd move the children outside with clipboards to complete their work. None is ideal.

Where did I say anything about offices or office jobs? I’m talking about chikdren home from school in hot flats. I’m pretty sure you know that and are just being argumentative.

Schools should absolutely be closed. It’s 35°C here and I’ve been sent home after fainting in front of 130 pupils! Injured my shoulder on the way down too.

Another member of staff had to leave due to a heat-triggered migraine. All because some parents and the Trust insist on staying open for the sake of… childcare?

The kids did not learn anything.

Yesterday the school phoned my DIL. Come collect your son he's very unwell in the heat. She did. They have a mobile air con unit in the bedroom so he went for a nap there. In the evening he played in the paddling pool.

She didn't send him in today. Phone rang, why isn't your child in school? She explained that the school had sent him home yesterday. Today it is hotter so she kept him off after a bad night.

Schools response unauthorised absence you will be fined.

FFS the school was half empty yesterday before grandson keeled over.

DIL lives opposite the school cars park outside and all the way down the road. Not today, between the parking and her WhatsApp groups half the school are missing.

She's said is this just a money making exercise? Will the school get the fine money or will it be lost within the education authority

What happens when a school says you can luck them up at lunchtime if you want?

Is it less work then open or shut?

The school didn’t say ‘unauthorised absence you will be fined’ because nobody is fined for one day. Plus schools don’t decide on fines anyway - they pass on details of those reaching the threshold to the LA who decide. And no. Schools dont get the money. Nobody is fining absent kids as a money making exercise.

Pp should say pick them up

OH were you eavesdropping? Haven't seen your username for a bit. But here you are defending Welsh education, without a spit of knowledge or evidence. So predictable.

Eh? Eavesdropping? I didn’t mention Welsh education once, but if I did I have 26 years of experience of it as a teacher including 12 as a parent as well, and a further 10 in England.
I know the school didn’t say that because fines don’t work like that. You don’t get fined for a single day absence, and even if the absence was long enough the school could only say you ‘might’ get fined, as they don’t make the decision.

Labour lost, plaid triumphed. You're the past. Things are different now.

Do you mean when a school has said to parents that they can pick them up at midday or leave them at school to attend for the full day? I've not come across this -in our local authority, closure is directed and schools can't decide individually what to do. The same goes for academies, they decide, trust-wide, whether to open or close, as far as I know.
Closing, even for the afternoon, which is what has happened locally still means we need to supply lunches etc.

That's even more complicated. You have to know which kids are staying on site. You likely have to collapse classes and decide who will cover them. How many staff should stay? Who looks after their children?
With secondary, a sprawling site, children going home alone you have a huge job working out who should be where.
You probably end up with an unwieldy group of disparate ages and abilities and it's hard to dream up activities that suit all of them.
Literally too hot and tired from wrangling exhausted 13 yr olds to elaborate.

eh? I’m really confused. I voted Plaid, for a start. Not sure of the relevance to the conversation where you claim a school said someone would get fined for one unauthorised absence though.

And I've also seen much more balanced responses from parents in real life. My school has stayed open but many parents have decided to keep their children off anyway. My children's schools are optional half days and collecting at lunchtime (I don't work full time), it seems there has been a massive exodus from the school. Certainly not many children left. It's definitely not the case that all parents are struggling for time off and furious with schools for closing, as you might beging to imagine from MN.

Some schools are cooler than others! Do you genuinely not understand that?

Yes we have the option to pick them up at lunch. I’ve seen a few other posters in the same area (within London) say the same. It sounds like the optional route is open to schools here.

I’m not sure there’s anything in what I’ve said that suggests I don’t know that. What I’m saying is that in the vast majority of cases a child at home will fare better than a child in school when the temperature is the same. Yes, some schools will be coool. Some will have air con in some areas. Some h9mes will be very hot. But on average and taking into consideration mitigation which you can do at home but not at school (cool baths, cool drinks, a nap etc) children in extreme heat will be more comfortable (and probably safer) at home.

I’d say that would be possible/safe for primary where children would only be released to a parent than in secondary where it’s harder to keep track of who is where and who has permission to take themselves home alone.

Yes I can understand that. It might be more suited to primary which is the age of dc here. Secondary are doing work experience rn so not involved with dc there atm.

Why would a secondary school kid need " permission" to walk home alone ffs? w

They don’t. What I’m saying is the school would need to know the parents gave permission for the student to leave school at lunch time and be home alone. They would need to check that for every child who was absent, and chase up those whose parents hadn’t said they could miss school. It would be a logistical nightmare. Schools can’t just let students leave school when parents think that’s where they are. It’s a safeguarding/safety issue.

Lol I'd like to see them try and keep them there And how old do they have to be until they need permission to go home

Especially when the kids are half-crazed with the heat and there's a great big cool inviting river nearby.
Had some mad conversations today.
So you have blond hair and translucent skin and no sun lotion because why?
You are kind of falling over in the middle of the netball court saying you are too cold, and you don't want to go to the First Aider because why?
You are curled up sobbing under the fire escape, okay...

Watching Vanessa on channel 5 +1 A schoolgirl was sent home for refusing to wear tights in a heatwave and ended up missing a mock exam. Like i said the UK is fucked.

Well that’s why the school needs to know whose parents say they are ok to miss school. This isn’t about going home at the end of the school day. During the school day the school is responsible for them. They need to know which parents have effectively ‘taken their child out’ (even if the child has walked out alone as they would at the end of the day) so they know which ones the parents have picked up responsibility for. Those who are missing without that permission need their parents to be told, otherwise the school is allowing them to do those risky things without parental involvement. It’s not hard to see why that’s important.