Petition - Allow 10 days term time leave without punishment

[Natbat87]

Please sign & share the petition 🙏https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/700047

This is to oppose the current punitive legislation around term time leave. Families need leave for a variety of reasons. Please join us on the FB group - Protest to fight school fines & on tiktok.

While mine are in first school I will take them out term time but there is no way this petition will come to anything.

Again?
Absolutely no way would I sign this and hopefully not many other people will too.
If every child in a class of 30 took 10 days off a year there would never be a full class, how do you think that could impact learning?
Bloody ridiculous

No I won't sign this. Permission is given when there are actual valid reasons for absence anyway

Sorry but no. Absences in school impact the whole class. Classes would never full so teachers would forever be playing catch-up.

Thanks for this OP. I think 10 days is more than necessary but I do think the current punitive system needs talking about in parliament because it's absolutely awful that some people are getting penalised for having sick kids, so I've signed. I've no faith in the system at all and kept DS's hospital bands last week in case we needed "proof" of why he'd been off.

I've seen so many sad stories on MN this year of people with genuinely ill children who aren't being authorised because of the pressure schools are under with this new zero tolerance approach. The old approach was fine, the piss takers will always be twats, we need to legislate for everyone else and trust parents to know when their kids need time off instead of making everyone feel like criminals.

No - it would fall on teachers to provide catch up lessons as topics are covered quickly and not necessarily repeated. Parents would have to take on the responsibility of sourcing the lesson materials and ensure they covered the topics - which they won’t.

No I won't sign. It's not fair to teachers who are already massively overworked. There are plenty of school holidays to take kids on holiday.

Why don't you petition the holiday companies to set fairer prices?

10 days would be a two week school absence - thats a lot to catch up on for both child and teacher. Imagine the chaos if every child out of 30 did this!
I get holidays are expensive, but thats the deal when you start a family.

Nope. 5 days if there are non financial reasons families couldn't have a break together in the holidays but even that seems unfair as it would exclude actual teachers.

30 days absence out of 190 school days is an awful lot unless you mean 10 days in a year. It's still a lot, on top of unplanned days off.

This is already the case in Wales, where if attendance is otherwise good, schools can authorise up to ten days holidays.

No - teachers are hard-pressed enough as it is without having to repeat every lesson for the kids who were on holiday.

You have 13 weeks of holiday time a year to take kids away.

It's the holiday companies you should be focusing on as it's the high costs that are driving this issue.

Don’t agree so won’t sign. Massively disruptive if all children took 10 days off a year. Holidays restricted to school holiday times is not unreasonable for 13 years, or longer depending on multiple children and age gaps. In our case 18 years. It is what it is. We did a staycation one year (literally stayed home and did day trips) and have mostly holidayed self catering in the uk so I’m waking the talk. It’s not an insurmountable sacrifice for their education.

Not this again. A holiday is a privilege not a right.
Some people are very entitled.

Why don't you petition the holiday companies to set fairer prices?

Do you understand how supply and demand work?

parents who take their dc out of school for holidays, I hope you don't complain if dc aren't chosen for a team, or a leading role in the play, or anything that involves representing the school? Schools want people who will reliably be there for training, matches, rehearsals, performances etc.

Hell, no..

The current system does not place any limits on the number of days of absence for sickness, so this petition is about absence for other reasons which cannot currently be authorised, such as termtime holidays.
I realise that some schools are putting pressure on when children are sick, and demanding evidence of illness, but that is a separate issue about how the current rules are applied.

We don't do that - if a parent takes their child out for a holiday, then that's on them.

In practical terms, though, you have to bring them up to speed. You can't let them lag behind.

I strongly disagree with this petition.

Why - that’s the parents role if they take them out of lessons.

"I've seen so many sad stories on MN this year of people with genuinely ill children who aren't being authorised because of the pressure schools are under with this new zero tolerance approach."

There are no fines for illness. Such absences are coded "I" on the register, which is different from an unauthorised absence.

Nope I'm not catching your kid up with 2 weeks work because you fancied a cheap holiday.