School says I have "No right to take my child out of school during term time"

[Easy]

Okay, first I understand that school is important, and I don't necessarily intend to take my ds on holiday during term time but .....

We have just received the bumf from school regarding ds's first term next Sept.

In amongst it is a section on absences which says "You do not have the automatic right to take children on holidays during term time. The school must agree to this beforehand"

Now I feel that the school does not have a "right" to tell me when I can have access to my own child, I find the wording somewhat heavy handed, to say the least.

I'm not disagreeing with the principle involved, I just feel that the way it's being done is wrong. Is it just me who feels the 'Nanny state' interfering here.

I'll be honest, I don't know. But presumeably it could eventually end up with parents being prosecuted in the same way as a persistent truant's parents if you did it regularly? I just think that schools have enough on their plates at the moment without having to worry about how things like this are worded (and no I'm not a teacher).

Actually Easy you don't have the right to keep your child off school if he/she is being bullied. What you do have the right to do (assuming they are not as special school) is write a letter informing the head that you are deregistering your child and then you are legally entitled to home educate. however YOU are legally obliged to ensure your child receieved an education. So you either home educate or you pass the responsibility over to the school0 - if you pas it to the school then you are obliged to ensure they attend.

If you keep your child off for bullying you can be done for trunacy.

I took my son out of school to attend a BIBIC assessment- filledin the forms etc then was told I din;t need to do that at all and it wouldn't be counted as holiday. I think the school have been reasonable when parents have taken holidays in term time- I've never heard if it being a problem. Now MY secondary shcool used to go ape!

Not read whole thread Easy so probably repeating stuff, sorry.

Firstly, I am afraid that what the letter says is true legally. You do have to send your child to school (or provide alternative arrangments - hom ed, etc.) and all holidays must be agreed to by the HT in advance. Otherwise this is recorded an an unauthorised absense on both the whole school's record and on your DS's school record.

Inset days are not days off for teachers. They are in -service training and the have always existed. When I was at school they used to be tagged onto holidays - hence the summer holiday was always 6.5 weeks long for pupils. Teachers had to go in for time at start and/end of the holidays, and tagged to other school holidays. there are mo additional INSET days. than there were. They are now simply at a more appropriate time for schools and teachers. At a time when maybe exams or coursework are ready for moderating, or a particular school issue is coming up. INSET days are normally published well in advance by the LEA - they are on the Doncaster LEA website now and have been there for a number of weeks now. They should not come as a shock to anyone.

I am very suprised that a school would allow its staff to take time off within the school year. IME this is a very rae thing and I ahve only known of one occurnece of it. It was a teacher who was getting married abroad and there holiday dates were changed by the travel company and it meant that her flight left 2 days before the end f term. The rest of the staff agreed to cover her lessons for her and she was then able to take unpaid leave in this time. I have known of no other reason or case of a teacher being given extra holiday time.

And I think codswallop had a point earlier. If teaching is so easy, why is there such a massive shortage. Over 1/3 of the staff in mym current school are leaving this year - a significant number are leaving teaching full stop

Also it isn't that expensive to become a teacher either. You get paid thousands to train to be a teacher nowadays. Just look at the website. You get PAID to get the qualification, you can work in schools to do it or do it FT at college, it isn't exam based normally - portfolio evidence, and then you get paid a bonus for teaching in the state sector for first two years. Wonder why there are still so many shortages???

And finally, whilst on a rant

Hear hear Hulababy. I think the wording from the school was completely reasonable, and simply a statement of the law as it stands. I feel far more uncomfortable with the idea of parents having absolute rights over their children to be honest.

Re the costs of training, I'm new to teaching. You get £6000 grant which is not means tested. You can be eligable for an extra £5000 or so, which is means tested and can get more than that again if you are training to teach a shortage subject.

If you already have a degree and want to train on the job you can go the GTP route where you work and get paid on the unqualified regester.....I think you get £10,000 a year for that, not big bucks I grat you but it is only for a year. Starting salery for an NQT is £17,500 (outside London). Again not big bucks, but not bad.

And rememebr the NQT teaching your child is earning that and has to take holidays during the most expensive time of the year. And many of us also have the same probelms getting dh's holiday during the kids holidays. My dh is in the RAF and they don't come much more inflexable than that. When he returned from the Gulf War I didn't bother asking for time off, as I knew it would be turned down, and I hadn't seen him for 6 months. Note, this is not a whinge, I love my job and have chosen to do it, jsut a statement of fact.

Hula, you and I are friends, don't want to upset anyone. I just don't like the confrontational wording of the document re hoidays.

And I understand what inset days are, and why they are valuable. No-one has ever justified to me, however why they are held in Term-time, not taken as 5 or six days during the normal school down-time.

As a technical trainer, I have always had to fit my on-going training AROUND the time when my clients need me. So why not school teachers?

This is not an attack, it's just a straightforward question.

Hulababy - That only applies to England by the way..... there are NO jobs up here in Scotland for Teachers!

Probably would cost the Governemnt money to do that, as it would be changing the contract to extend the work of teachers by a week. They would have to re-negotiate the terms and conditions of all the staff. And I doubt that people would be keen to do it without extra money.

And the INSET days at my school are always at the start and end of term, so cause little inconvenience for working parents, they have to arrange Monday-Friday instead of Monday to Thursday.

While I worked in industry I was never expected to attend training days in my holiday time. It was always part of my regular work.

F*cking nora batty! thread of fire or what...fwiw, i have two teachers in my family and reckon that after parenting it is one of the hardest and least valued jobs in the world...people think teachers have an easy time becuase of hols, bollox! they spend eves, most weekends and loads of the hols marking, doing parents eves reports extra curricular stuff etc etc.

as far as taking childred out of school i think the most sensible thing that has been said by far is frogs post of 12.06...says it all really imo

but hmb you got far fewer holidays in industry!

Hi Easy Not argueing (honest) but just trying to clarify some points, that's all.

I agree Easy that the wording could be better, but maybe the school have had problems with people not following the rules in the past? So I guess the HT may just be trying to point it out clearly to those people. Mind you, knowing some HT ....

In many schools INSET days are often tagged on to the start of holidays. But there are the odd one which are mid term - at our school usually a Monday - that are timetabled (published months in advance) to fit in with other school issues . That may occur because of coursework moderation time, anticipation of/feedback from a pre-aaranged school insection, etc.

I can understand why they can be a pain for parents, as most holidays must be, but they are generally issued way in advance.

They will not occure within the school holidays as this would mean a big change to the teacher's pay and conditions. We are actually only paid for a set number of teaching hours/weeks and this is then divided and spread over the full year. So, teacher's aren't actually paid for school holidays IYSWIM. If INSET was to be done in that time teacher's conditions and a pay rise would have to occur - I just can't see the Government doing that, can you?

And I KNOW teaching is a hard job, I never disputed that.

Got to go and teach now - bell just about to go. Bottom sdet, Y8 - actually my fave group!

I always thought teaching was incredibly difficult.... that was until my best friend became a Geography Teacher! Honestly she is in the pub every other night! She has NEVER stayed in of a weekend to mark things except during the Prelim exams. She laughs all the time about her lifestyle.... she does work hard... but not excessively and nothing to warrant THAT much time off (her words, not mine so don't shout at me)!

She is dating the Principle Maths Teacher (28yrs old and gorrrrrgeous!).... he's always in the pub with her! Go figures eh?

I'm sorry - I still don't understand the problem with the "wording" of the document to be honest.

As I said, mine is more or less identical - it doesn't bother me in the slightest and I know it's not directed at me or other people who don't abuse the system.

On a daily basis, I see the type of person it's directed at - the ones (and we have a couple in DD1s year group) who teach their kids to tell the teachers to f off, treat school as some sort of free "child-care", encourage their kids to fight and bully others - basically breed a generation of little s*!!!

They're the ones it's directed at - and for the likes of them to understand it needs to be in a "bullying" form - having said that, they don't really give a s*. Have to say though, both me and DD1 love it when they're out of school - saves the teacher having to waste time sorting them (sorry - going off on a rant there )

You do realise that you are about to be jumped on by all the teachers? I reckon it would be a v hard job, dealing with rude little sods who have not been taught any manners who ruin lessons. God I sound about 86.

Not you, toothy

But toothache, all those cheeky kids to deal with during the day.

I know I couldn't do secondary teaching, just because of the complete lack of discipline and respect. As a disabled person, in the average comp I'd be dead meat.

But slinky, they won't read the document anyway.

Easy - Have you read any of my threads recently about the guys I have to share a portacabin with????? Cheeky brats sound like a breeze compared to these smelly, disgusting, animals!

Spot on Easy! Part of the reason I went for this job. I also got paid a damn site more! And I also didn't get to spend evenings working as I do now......emphaticaly not a moan, I chose this job as it is something I have always wanted to do and it fits in with my life with the kids. However I can tell you that the work does not stop at 3.00. It lets me go to pick up my two and I play with them till they go to bed, and then I spend the night playing catch up on marking. A fair trade in my mind, but not an easy ride.

But my contract is for set days of teaching for a set sum of money. I'd do INSET in school holidays but only if my contract was re-negotiated to give me more money. I'm a teacher not a saint!

What do you think of the scenario of a child being beaten at home and a teacher refusing the parent access to take the child home at the end of the day until SS have been.

I know it s a long shot and nothing to do with holidays but I feel that schools and teachers have a responsibility to us to not only educate our children but to keep them safe and I think we should actually afford them a little respectin this and try to make their jobs easier not harder by being deliberatly difficult over such small things as holidays.

DD is at a nursery 2.5 hours a day at the school where she will stat in January - she is not allowed to take time out during term time without consent of the head of the nursery unit - which i think is right!!

And do you realise what a bloody good job schools do on a whole - they don't get much help from lots of parents these days or bodies set up to make them teach violent unruly children or the bloody PC police and I think everythnig I can do in supporting them to give my daughter a great education is actually to mine and her benefit.