Curious: Why do private schools have such long holidays?

[Erebus]

Genuine question- I mean, I know why state schools hols are what they are, more or less (helping with harvests... etc) but why the 8 or 9 weeks, for example, in private? How did that come about? There must be an historic reason seeing as they all pretty much do the same thing, with 17 weeks holiday a year.

Good question - I was just asking DH the same thing this weekend and he didn't know the answer...I shall wait with baited breath

Boarding schools have long holidays for obvious reasons.

Generally, however, independent school tend to have longer days and can get through the required work at a faster pace.

It's so we can all go to our country estates in Scotland or to the Cote d'Azur for the summer season, daaarling.

Actually joking aside, that may actually BE the reason, and also the fact that so many parents would have been overseas in the Vict/Edwardian era, and it took a while to get to India and back.

I think it's a combination of longer school days meaning that they get through the curriculum and that historically many were boarding so long holidays means you get extra time with parents... particularly if you have to travel somewhere exotic to where your parents are...

x-posted!

I think it is to do with the longer working hours and Saturday school. Our friends get less holidays than us as they don't have Saturday school, the amount of Saturdays mine do is pretty much the extra couple of weeks we get to their school with the longer working day.

AS I said on another thread
they have to do so many hours of teaching a year
so if they do till 4.30 (as against a State school's 3.30) and Saturday it turns into longer holidays

also, the parents are not paying to have to share the beach with the proles in mid July

Aha, the Passage to India thing!

TalkinPeace- re HSC, I know a parent who huffily transferred all her many DCs there as the state primary they attended finally said no to yet another request for additional weeks off as they have a holiday house in an expensive and warm island an 8 hour flight away.

Q: DO private schools have to provide a given number of hours teaching a year like state schools do? Aren't independents- well, independent of those rules?

I believe (but am willing to be corrected) that ISIS insists and Charity Law insist that they provide at least as much tuition as state schools

Holidays - an old school friend's dad gave her one of the Bahama islands (only a little one mind) for her 21st - and she flew 50 people out there for the party. Sadly I was in California at the time

Coulda been worse- you could've been in say Dagenham! So don't say 'sadly' you were in California!

8 or 9? Huh! We had 12 weeks for summer once. Dad used to get a bit arsey about it I think - 'what am I paying for?' sort of thing Good thing mum was a SAHM or it would have been impossible.

I think it's to save money . Lower heating and food bills and they can rent out the buildings for conferences and summer school etc. Maybe that was just my school....

12 weeks ! Was that in the UK?

God, my DS2 would have had to restart his education from scratch every September if that were the case!

Yes, in the UK.

Have to admit it was longer than usual that year because of building work but even so I don't think the summer hols were ever shorter than 10 weeks. Back in the late 70s/early 80s though.

I don't buy that they have to provide the same hours as state schools.

We visited 5 local private schools and all of them had the same hours as our local state - 8:45 til 3:30 and no Sat school - no boarding either. Yet they all have 8/9 weeks summer holidays, 1 additional week's holiday at Christmas & Easter (May, Feb & Oct the same).

So they have 4 or 5 weeks' less tution overall and people do complain about it, but I don't understand why it doesn't change.

That would have to be unusual, wouldn't it? I always thought that an attraction of private was that there were lower CC costs (not wanting to start an argument about 'Rich people use private school for child care cos they don't want the bother of looking after their DCs themselves'- that's not what I mean at all- I wish my DCs schools provided homework clubs etc til 4.30pm for secondary school at least!). And the other attraction would/should (?) be longer days, more concentrated learning.

I believe one local private bangs the hours up from 3.15 or .30 to 4.15 in Y3- I heard mums at swimming discussing having to change their DC's swimming lesson times as a result.

The advantage of being older than most of you youngster parents is I have a much longer memory. I can recall state schools in the 1960's and early 1970's having long summer holidays too - exactly the same as the independent schools.

I cannot though for the life of me recall when it changed but I have a gut reaction that this was in the mid 1980's - around the time of LMS and Baker's first National Curriculum implimentations.

But lets face it dearies, all you want is a school to babysit your kids for you ( harsh but true) because you have work committments. Thats why holidays have got shorter in state schools. Indeed with that and breakfast clubs and after school mentoring and holiday revision classes etc ( summer school) most state schools seem to be open much longer than independents.

This is not to do with education. All those bright ideas of independent schools giving longer hours tend to be false. In fact a standard school day in an independent is much shorter - what you see are the extra hours provided in additional activities . That has always been the case. Yes we had Saturday morning schools but that was offset by a mid week afternoon off.

Educational reformers of the Victorian period believed that children needed long holidays to be with families and to get over the stress and pressure of education. Working class pupils had to work as well as attend school so they needed the extra holidays to help with finances at the most crucial emploability times.

Orignally I think most school terms revolved around the Church year ( and that also explains why the holidays are where they are, the terms are called what they are and why they are long. Churches were the first providers of education). The church calander, with its holy days and farming needs are most probable - so all hands - including those of land owners could get on deck and sow and plough and harvest and time was given to reflection and worship when the task was over.

I also recall as a lad having additional autemn half term holidays ( my current school retains this) for both potato picking and hop picking. It was an important source of income to working people and important to the farmers too who needed the labour.

My school ( state school) holidays were long. One of the reasons I have taken my DS out of school is because I think the holidays and the pressures are stupid and have nothing to do with education. When you are an older parent , and have lived a bit, you realise these things.

I'm 48.

So I started state school in the UK in 1966.

I absolutely don't recall those long, halcyon summers nor digging in the tattie fields! I'm not saying they didn't happen, but I feel we would have rebelled when the whole thing ended!

We used to have 'blackberry week' - no not the mobile phone but time off for blackberry picking.

Well not us, it was historically called that but up until the 70s it was referred to as such. Think it was just half term though.

In Lancashire they have wake weeks - time off for the fair........something to do with historically factories all closing down for a period so they could all go on holls.

Because that's what you get in private sector, you get DIFFERENT. They don't have to follow state dictats; around here some of private schools are owned by the head-mistress/master, so they can set terms to suit them (apparently DC1's head-mistress lives on a farm).

With much smaller class sizes they should be able to do as much work as state sector in much less time.
DC1 (private school) is in school slightly shorter hours than DC2-3 at local state school. AND DC1 has much less homework. Is far less stretched than he was at local state school.

I went to the local comp. and we had 6 weeks for the summer holiday (in the '60s and '70s) - but I do remember that at Primary school, the Whit bank holiday half term was 2 weeks long. Other local schools were the same.

BUT my father worked in a boarding school. He had longer holidays at Christmas, Easter and in the summer - but didn't get half term. They worked on Saturday mornings, but Wednesday afternoon was games/other activities, not lessons.

Meant to add that at Secondary school, the summer half term was only 1 week long because the exams started then.

It means that we can go on holiday for two thirds the price either mid-july or early sept. It also means the holiday is quieter and far more enjoyable.
I'm not trying to avoid anyone in particular just crowds in general. It is a huge bonus for me.

I am 10 years older than you erebus. I was in senior school when you were a tacker. I do remember very long summer holidays - started first week of July and ended around 5th September. A good six weeks going into 7 or 8 if the days fell correctly.

Of course there were fewer exam pressures then. Exams were all over before the end of June ( public ones). School exams were usually no more than a week long and no one was really that worried by them.

The October half term was a week and a half and Easter always included Holy Week as standard. Usually at least three weeks.

Now I work in an independent and I finished at the end of June. Some schools finished earlier than I did. Some a week later.
I have four weeks at christmas and four weeks at Easter and a week and a half for October half term and a week for each of the others. Thats how it should be and always was for all schools ( state and private- state schools being modelled after the 1944 act on Independent ones and the old fee paying grammar schools who always had those holidays.

You must've found a holiday company or two who haven't nailed that market! We've often taken a week off in that last couple of weeks (to avoid the crowds!) but I can't say the prices are '2/3' of peak!

To provoke in their state school friends and siblings.