Primary finishes early every Friday

[Cocothebear]

During Covid our school chose to finish early on Fridays (1.15) in order to clean/sanitise the school.

The school has since decided to make this standard so now every Friday we have pickup at 1.15 and there’s no after school club.

I don’t have a huge problem with this but quite a lot of the parents do which I can understand. I do feel like it’s a pointless day as it so short, past lunch my children say they don’t have time to do anything before collection.

The school say it’s worked best for you the well-being of their pupils and staff but I don’t understand how they can do this when almost every other school in the country does full hours.

So can any school choose to do this? I’m just curious how it works really.

Our school introduced this a couple of years before Covid and it is a pain. They proposed the early Friday finish on the basis of teachers needing PPA, it would benefit the kids who would have full time with their teachers instead of TAs and it would improve staff mental health.

At no point did they raise the argument of cost which is surprising as they are otherwise very vocal about having no money. There are endless Amazon wish lists for equipment and books. It is obviously cost related but I suspect they felt that would not be accepted by parents.

Parents pay £6 per child to have their kids in Friday club until the end of the school day. Pre-Covid there were some activities to make it more club like. Now, they just hang about until pick up.

Overall, it works out roughly that they lose 3 weeks over the course of the school year. No other schools in the area do this so it is unlucky in some respects.

It had a knock on effect for the standard after-school club which is on the school site but not run by the school. Many who could rearranged their working days to have Friday off or finish early. That meant less demand for after school club who then introduced reduced hours anyway as they can’t afford to stay open. Working from home has helped me in this respect as I can pop out to collect the kids while still officially working. Obviously this won’t last forever and doesn’t help those with kids younger than mine. There are few alternatives, I can’t find anyone at the moment willing to do a few hours childcare on a Friday afternoon.

The only way to improve this situation is to provide schools with more funding and that won’t happen with this government!

Most TAs aren’t paid to have the class alone - it’s even in their contract

Most likely the TAs work 4.5 days and aren’t paid for that afternoon and sent home.

Most classes don’t have a TA to cover either

But schools aren't childcare

She didn't say they were.

Schools are what prioritise and fund childcare to work around the times they are there.

And finding childcare for a whole afternoon, when you are working and usually use the after school club, is a big problem. And OP says there is no wraparound for that afternoon. That's really shit

School in Scotland have done this for over 30 years!

The thing I don't get is why the school doesn't offer an after school club - it would be paid for so presumably could actually turn a profit for the school if they are so short of cash.

I was a school governor previously and asked the head about this more generally and she said " oh our mums only have little jobs", yeah but that's cause and effect, I send my kids to a school with a great wraparound offer because I have a proper job!

My PPA gets covered by a rotating list of TAs and sometimes supply staff. Some are fab some are not (spelling issues, struggles with Y2 maths). I have to plan what they do in excruciating detail (2 page lesson plan) and it still doesn’t get the same results as if I did it. They won’t challenge my highers enough and sometimes will spoonfeed my lowers. So effectively my kids get 2hrs a week of lesser quality teaching a week. This is not uncommon. We don’t have the budget for specialist teachers. This early Friday finish sounds fab and would save money as well as ensuring your kids always gets taught by the teacher who knows them and their abilities best.

In our school, a TA also has an HLTA contract, so covers PPA 4 afternoons per week and 'normal' TA-ing in the morning. Salary difference is approx £2 per hour.

There would be uproar if we closed early permanently (we did during covid proper for cleaning).

Very common in Scotland. I like it because it's easier to get into away for long weekends or take the kids into nature for the afternoon, walks on the beach etc. Also my two are thoroughly exhausted by the week come Friday afternoon and they've really had enough by then. But then I don't work on Fridays.

And in Belgium for example, every Wednesday afternoon all schools are closed.

I think the school really ought to be providing a (paid for, not teacher staffed) childcare option on Friday afternoons because it is outside the normal school hours so parents usual options are restricted - e.g. childminders may not be able to pick up at that time due to younger children's naps etc.

I know the schools are not childcare brigade will take issue with it but it is simply not reasonable for a school to just do a totally different pattern and not consider the needs of working parents

@Classicblunder

The thing I don't get is why the school doesn't offer an after school club - it would be paid for so presumably could actually turn a profit for the school if they are so short of cash.

I was a school governor previously and asked the head about this more generally and she said " oh our mums only have little jobs", yeah but that's cause and effect, I send my kids to a school with a great wraparound offer because I have a proper job!

I wouldn't send my children to a school like this. How can they reconcile encouraging girls to meet their potential with attitudes like this?

People who have attitudes like 'school isn't childcare' are actively working against girls meeting their potential and achieving their professional ambitions. Because what happens when 'school as childcare' isn't available? Women exit the workforce and take a professional step backwards. The pandemic demonstrated this.

School budgets are so squeezed. It’s a government funding issue and you should be mad at the politicians and use your vote wisely, not cross with the school themselves

This from @NoSquirrels is spot on.

I’m in Edinburgh and we’ve always had a half day on Friday used to be a Wednesday, kids here start at 850 or earlier for high school and finish between 12,12.10 and 12.20

Another teacher parent here. Yes, it’s yet another indicator of the Conservative party’s lack of investment in public services and I completely understand why schools are finding it their only option, but without an afterschool club what on earth are parents meant to do? The local childminders must be completely full on a Friday afternoon. The school can’t seriously expect every family to reduce their working hours to accommodate this!
Also, Friday afternoon PPA is rubbish. Mid-week is the best! And I think if everyone else had PPA at the same time I’d end up wasting it chatting rather than getting on with my work

People who have attitudes like 'school isn't childcare' are actively working against girls meeting their potential and achieving their professional ambitions. Because what happens when 'school as childcare' isn't available? Women exit the workforce and take a professional step backwards. The pandemic demonstrated this.

I strongly agree.

Our small primary school gives all infants teachers ppa one afternoon and all the children spend an hour with a paid sports coach funded through the sports funding. Then they have an hour with either a TA or the head teacher delivering a half term of a specialism (language, computing, crafts etc)
Then same happens for the Juniors on a different day. So one class gets an hour with the sports coach, then the next class gets an hour with them.
We are lucky to have a very hands on head teacher.

@Dinoboymama

In scotland its common for secondary schools to close just after lunchtime on Fridays. Most councils do this.

is this true? none of the three large local authorities around me do this.

mumsnet loves a sweeping statement!

I’d really struggle if my child went to a primary school that did this, because I’m a teacher.

Good knows what we’d do. DH works from home so feasibly could stick him in front of an iPad for an hour or two but if DH was ever working away we really would be stuck. Awful.

@Missushbb it is where I am (Edinburgh) and in central, borders & fife where friends kids go and has been for about 30 years plus!

is this true? none of the three large local authorities around me do this.
Off the top of my head Edinburgh and the Borders do this, I'm sure there are others but couldn't say which - not just secondary but all schools. It's not the sort of thing individual schools decide it's a decision at local authority level so no, that particular statement wasn't true

It definitely hasn't been the case in the
Borders for 30 years though, they brought it i about 5 years ago

@Cocothebear my school does this but if your parents work then children stay until normal time completing activities with a TA. In terms of children it removes the need for them to spend an afternoon or morning being taught by someone else which can be very stressful for some children, often not very productive. In terms of the school for a 3 form entry school like ours it saves about 40,000 a year which we just don’t have.

@HairyScaryMonster I’d be interested to know who’s covering this, my reception class did this year (some of them genuinely take an hour to eat) and 45 minutes of it was covered by me because we only got a dinnerlady for 45 minutes

@liveforsummer sorry yes meant just Edinburgh in that statement! In fact when I was at school even longer ago it was a half day Wednesday!