No prosecution for parents petition - any thoughts?

[sunseekin]

“We deem that absence related to the coronavirus pandemic would meet the grounds prescribed. As long as the school knows where a pupil is and why they aren’t attending, there should be no risk of the pupil losing their school place.”

This was part of the Government’s response to March’s petition (90,000 + signatures) re fines and prosecutions for not attending school due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Given that the pandemic is still very much in full swing does it still apply? Or has this (part of the Coronavirus Act 2020) been caveated or repealed since then??

I know that Gareth announced that school was compulsory and that fines would be a part of that. But it’s always compulsory, but there are still legal reasons why you might not attend.

Fines would obviously be reasonable for someone who was bothered about coronavirus on a Monday but not on a Tuesday, or on holiday because of coronavirus one week but back in school the next. Which is why Gareth may have said fines were a part of things, but the response surely suggests that reasons relating to the pandemic could still be valid legal reasons.

I am at the point where I am pretty confident that I won’t be sending by two school aged children back in September. For family reasons and because I think teachers and students who need to be their for a rest array of reasons (including mental health obviously) deserve to be as safe as possible.

A positive virus mutation or the disappearance of corona would be amazing, but it seems more likely that we have an autumn/winter to get through before things can get better.

I can cope with this, science and medicine (especially recent announcements re treatments) give me hope that better times are around the corner. I’m able to home teach, see it as a way of helping keep schools safer and am now trying to get the logistics clear in my head.

I don’t think it’s fair that we lose their places, I think we only really need to think about living with it when we have seen how it behaves in all the seasons and have a better understanding of longer term impacts.

Here is the link to the full government response.

petition.parliament.uk/petitions/300399

Big apologies if this duplicates or has been asked elsewhere, I’m trying to keep up - promise!

Also, for clarity, my child did go back before summer. But that was with SD in genuine bubbles.

Many children definitely need to go back and I fully support those parents.

My child doesn't need to go back, as not showing any issues. If they were, my thinking would presumably be different.

@labyrinthloafer Ok. I disagree with you and if you don't want to discuss the government response you'll see my post further down explains why, from a school point of view.

I can't even imagine the battle some schools are going to have getting parents to send after they were allowed to "homeschool" during lockdown. It will be so much worse for schools than it was before. I feel for them and the trouble they will face as ultimately they will have to explain why they aren't meeting targets for kids who aren't even showing up .

Clearly you don't work and have the luxury of taking such a stance

What are you teaching your kids? Surely not resilience in the face of difficult times better to hide at home when everyone else risks Covid to get the economy and life's back to some semblance of normality

For most people it's like having the flu for gods sake - and it's never going away

On all of these threads there at always posts from people who teach or have taught in deprived areas who give sound reasons for schools returning to normal and we are always completely ignored by posters who basically only interested in rules being made with more privileged kids in mind. It is so frustrating

[quote upthewolves]@labyrinthloafer Ok. I disagree with you and if you don't want to discuss the government response you'll see my post further down explains why, from a school point of view.

I can't even imagine the battle some schools are going to have getting parents to send after they were allowed to "homeschool" during lockdown. It will be so much worse for schools than it was before. I feel for them and the trouble they will face as ultimately they will have to explain why they aren't meeting targets for kids who aren't even showing up .[/quote]
That is a problem caused by the targets. In the midst of the biggest disruption our country has seen since ww2, those targets are idiotic.

It won't benefit our head, our local authority, any teacher, the other pupils/families, society generally to have conflict with parents like myself who normally have (basically) 100% attendance.

It won't benefit our head, our local authority, any teacher, the other pupils/families, society generally to have conflict with parents like myself

Totally agree.

@upthewolves

On all of these threads there at always posts from people who teach or have taught in deprived areas who give sound reasons for schools returning to normal and we are always completely ignored by posters who basically only interested in rules being made with more privileged kids in mind. It is so frustrating

Please remember you don't know anything about people's backgrounds, income or anything

Some people have a different view.

I see posts from people who claim to speak for 'deprived areas' but don't appear to live in them.

I think there’d be a massive ethical difficulty to keeping children on roll but not providing education when the curriculum is running as normal.

Who is responsible for the process of those children? For their safeguarding? Who decides which children are off because their parents have “valid” concerns and which because they are young carers/SEMH challenges/parents who don’t value education- and how do schools begin to unpick that in order to get the correct children into school? If parents can decide in, for example, October that they’re satisfied school is safe - who is responsible for making sure that child knows what learning has been missed?

I think we need to have a measured policy re return in September- I don’t think the current policy of sending everyone back pretty much as normal with no material modifications to exams is right. Let’s see what August 12th brings.

@ivfdreaming

Clearly you don't work and have the luxury of taking such a stance

What are you teaching your kids? Surely not resilience in the face of difficult times better to hide at home when everyone else risks Covid to get the economy and life's back to some semblance of normality

For most people it's like having the flu for gods sake - and it's never going away

You are making massive assumptions about my family.

People should, imo, focus on a) their own children and b) the children who are in difficulty now.

That is what I am doing.

But it's state education. We have to provide for everyone, with the most vulnerable members of society in mind. It's an extremely hard job. We can't have people picking and choosing and having rules that allow people to say "this is what's best for my kids". It doesn't work. There are always the options of private education and actual homeschooling.

@upthewolves

But it's state education. We have to provide for everyone, with the most vulnerable members of society in mind. It's an extremely hard job. We can't have people picking and choosing and having rules that allow people to say "this is what's best for my kids". It doesn't work. There are always the options of private education and actual homeschooling.

Wales are not enforcing straight away.

Why can they if we 'can't'? It is not true that we can't.

You may not want to. I do want all parents to have that choice during the initial period.

It’s a difficult one. I see both sides. I wonder if there should be an option for parents to HS for a year, while maintaining the place.

However, they have to commit to the whole year, no chopping and changing. And meet whatever criteria is in place already for fitness to homeschool.

I'm not saying we can't, I'm saying we shouldn't. I'm glad I'm not teaching in Wales.

I’m interested to know how Wales are addressing the issues I’ve outlined lab. Do you know?

Laurie I wonder how you would then take that into account in terms of the results a child gets at GCSE? I don’t particularly agree with govt targets, but they’re how schools are measured - if 30% miss a further year, are the school still accountable for the progress of those children? What if the child is in Y11? Are they allowed to commit to a year out? It’s all just so messy. :(

Nope. 6 months out of school is long enough. The kids need to go back.

My DGM's education was affected during the war. She always talks about how it affected her. I don't understand why people who aren't especially vulnerable to this virus are prepared to damage their children's education like this. Obviously it's different for shielding families and I have more sympathy, but for people who are just worried about the virus I don't agree at all.

It would be lovely to have a situation where no fines and making school non compulsory meant that those with good intentions could keep their children at home. Unfortunately society is not in that place yet. If there were no fines and education became non compulsory, the most vulnerable would not attend. Our return rate to school for y10 was about 65%. The students we wanted to see the most didn't come in.

I agree with Smile, there's a massive ethics question about who is responsible for the education and safeguarding of those not in school but not officially off roll. It's too big a role for schools to play.

Heads will be lenient in the first term. Most have said so, at least to their teams internally. Some have said outwardly.

@sirfredfredgeorge

Our head recently sent out a discipline policy to all parents, which has never happened before

Maintained schools are required to send it out to all students and parents once a year, so it's rather strange they've ignored their obligations until now, are you sure you didn't just miss it?

No, they aren't. The guidance (which does not have legal force) simply states that they should publicise the policy to parents once a year.

@upthewolves

To be fair, your post clearly said 'we can't'

Whether people like it or not, there will be plenty of parents who are concerned. We will, imo, get further without force.

I am probably more resistant because I disagree in principle with England's approach. I don't know what I will do in September, or October, or November... I have explained to the head.

@labyrinthloafer Lol, fair spot. When I said that though, I didn't mean it literally wasn't possible I just meant.... We can't because it will be a bloody nightmare!

Kind of like when I tell my son he can't play football in the lounge 😁

And meet whatever criteria is in place already for fitness to homeschool.

In reality very little is in place. The LA can ask for a statement of intent/values but few do.

I think there are major problems in terms of consistency. On another thread, a parents has been told that time slots for arriving at school will be allocated and that, if a child misses their time slot, they will be turned away for the rest of the day - even if it is for something like a vital medical appointment. I've also come across cases of children with SEN being heavily discouraged from attending for fairly ridiculous reasons; e.g. because their funded and allocated 1:1 TA is supporting another class bubble, or because they need to be reminded to wash their hands.

All of that is clearly illegal, but when schools are signalling that it's fine with them for children to miss out on education it would be hypocritical in the extreme to prosecute parents who keep their children out.

Anyway, I agree to disagree. We are coming at it from different perspectives. You are a good parent, you aren't the actual problem. Unfortunately it's just so hard to have grey areas and to ascertain the good parents and the ones who are struggling/ not bothering/ actually neglecting their kids. It's too hard and it's a huge emotional burden for some teachers/ heads. And because I have worked in such circumstances I am sensitive to it. And it may be you think some people throw the "deprived" word around, but I've experienced siblings coming on different days because they shared shoes. And ive experienced kids not on class and then discovered to be in the pub round the corner with their parents. Another kid often didn't come in because his mum was never up until noon so he got away with it. These problems exist in large numbers. It's already enough to deal with.

Hmm I admit to have not thought the implications of GCSE/A level through. You’d have to hope that parents/children in exam years would think very carefully before leaping into a year of homeschooling, but who knows.

Shelving government targets for the year might help. I don’t know if that’s possible. Ni, I know have shelved transfer tests for next year (in some areas at least).

Regardless of what you all think should happen, the government have said school is compulsary from september. That is unlikely to change between now and then unless for some reason we are overwhelmed by cases. There is no use in hypothetical scenarios. Its school or homeschool!

I do think parents should be given the choice. But they shouldn't then expect the teachers to do additional work to send home to their children. If you want to keep them off you need to take the responsibility of schooling them yourself.

My DS needs to be back at school in September for a variety of reasons. The less children there are, the less likely it will be that school will have to keep shutting if a pupil tests positive.