Opinions Required

[AustinB1980]

Hello,

We know of two people who have taken children out of school during term time with the purpose of putting them in a school system in another country for that period of time. Both times the heads of those schools approved the leave but now we have requested the same with our school it has been refused. I am following up with the school and have also contacted the Department of Education on this it does seem like schools have overall power to grant this leave under the "exceptional" circumstances category. This would be a wonderful opportunity for my daughter who is half japanese to experience another educational system for a couple of weeks and other schools have seen the benefits of this otherwise leave would not have not been granted

Just really seeing if anybody else has taken their children out of school during term time for this reason and if schools approved the requests to get a better picture of how common this is/issues people have encountered with their particular school etc. The DOE were pretty clueless on this saying it is down to the individual school to grant this leave but the school told us they would love to grant it but the DOE wont let them which seems a pretty half baked response

Thanks

Austin

My niece is a school child in Japan. As far as I am aware the vacations don't exactly overlap. Would it not be possible to go during the British school holidays?

Not personally but my children's school does a massive swap of pupils with a group from China. Wonderful experience not that mine were prepared to do it, silly them. The Chinese come here and learn at our school and some from the UK school go to China - I think for 3 weeks.

As said above though just go in school holidays in the UK, problem sorted perhaps.

Our school will grant a term or so for this sort of thing, but not a two week holiday.

As tiggytape says, you could lose your child's place in school.

This happened to friends of mine who, although they were warned by the school, went ahead with their plan only to lose their places. They took it to appeal but lost and are still bitter about it

Do most schools have waiting lists? Given avg class size is about 26, I imagine not.

good luck with your idea, OP. Sounds like a fantastic experience not to be missed!

Average class size around here is above 30! DCs primary has an average of 32 (some as big as 34), so if full there is little chance of appealing and getting in. The senior school is similar.

Where I live there are half of the schools are full with wait lists, and the other half have vacancies. So the average is probably 26-27. But places available in one of the full schools will be filled immediately if they come up.

Thanks for all the replies.....we have a further meeting with the head on Monday and will reluctantly have to accept the decision which seems unlikely will be reversed. It just seems crazy to me how there is no consistency between schools as the two schools that we know which authorized the same thing did it recently it wasnt something that happened years ago. The head told me via a letter that although the decision to authorize lies with them they have external bodies that they consult for advice in matters like this. Either the other school did not bother consulting and just approved or got a different answer to the same question. I understand a place would be at risk if you take a child out for a term but for 2 weeks i still don't see an issue our daughter has v good attendance and will be being educated during the time out. As for term dates yes they do vary slightly but not by that much and then you have to factor in jet lag etc we always usually go during summer during UK half term but my wife wanted to try this just this one time

Its very good to get more opinions on this and it does seem that this is quite a non-standard request from what i have read so can feel a bit better in knowing that it is not only our school not approving leave of absence in this circumstance

When I was at primary school many years ago my sister and I were given permission to leave a couple of weeks early to spend 8 weeks in my Mum's country - not to attend school! I think the problem nowadays is that so many people want to take extended holidays and spend months away visiting relations that they have really cracked down and there is little room for discretion.

Some people do lose their places and I have been on appeal panels where appellants have tried unsuccessfully to argue the educational advantages.

At my elder daughter's secondary school a girl was in year 9 was given exceptional permission for a 6 week holiday but it included a religious ceremony to do with the death of a grandparent and that was the reason it was granted. At my younger daughters school it is the opposite extreme and people who missed the last day/s of summer term were given detention on their return to "catch up" the missed work.

Mr Gove doesn't like people taking children out of school during term time. So the Education Department has got much stricted in its guidance recently (the last year). Also some schools/heads might indicate and do their best to readmit after a trip like this, but can't guarantee. However with the pressure on school places (at least in the SE) it is getting much more risky and harder for the schools to do.