Petition to change summer school holidays

[Kellykt]

Please read and see the sense of the petition.

https://www.change.org/p/reduce-summer-holidays-for-schools/sfs/copy/1386960292?recruiter=1386960292&recruited_by_id=4678b200-876f-11f0-a60a-cdc055e4640a&utm_source=share_petition&utm_campaign=petition_dashboard_share_modal&utm_medium=copylink

No

This is a bad idea.

We already have a staff recruitment problem, and summer is the most popular time to travel. We can't afford to make significant terms and conditions changes in case it gets even worse.

It's also easier to entertain kids for free than it is at colder times of the year, thanks to the weather. And they're much less likely to be in cold homes in July and August than in the cooler months, so it's the time when heating poverty is least likely to be a problem.

I know of some schools that do a 5.5 week summer holiday and 2 week October half term, which seems to work ok, but wouldn't go beyond that.

when you have kids you do so with the knowledge they will go to school and also the knowledge of how long school holidays are so you have plenty of time to plan accordingly don't wait untill they start school and claim you didn't know and it doesn't suit you so turn all Karen in wanting things your own way

No, sorry.

6 weeks isn't even that long.
I'm in Austria and they have 9 weeks.
They need the time to rest and recharge.
They have 1 week in October, 2 weeks at Christmas, 1 week in February, a week at Easter and a couple of long weekends for holydays.

I'd like the holidays to be all of July and August. The school system is so pressured that a longer break is definitely needed. Private schools in England and Wales and schools in Northern Ireland and Scotland all have longer than 6 weeks. That's before even considering other countries in Europe and elsewhere.

The whole school system is not fit for purpose - there is a lot of wasted time, and energy being put into less important things like uniform transgressions, both on a day to day basis but also in the longer term overview. The summer holidays are really not part of the problem imo.

I have signed. When my children were younger I always wished we didn't have the long summer holidays, mine have grown up now but I still think this weird thing we have where everything shuts down halfway through the calendar year isn't helpful.

Shorter holidays spread through the school year would help children's learning, working parents/childcare issues etc., it would bring much better continuity, it would help those (including teachers) who would like to book holidays without paying a 'summer holiday' premium and so on. Loads of advantages.

Just think about 4 weeks off over Christmas. Going to Australia-brilliant. Still being on holiday towards the middle of January with chilly temperatures and little daylight? Having to heat homes all day? Imho, it's a big no.

I think Americans rely on summer camps which aren't much of a thing here - and are pretty expensive, not sure how US ones compare.

When my children were in primary, it did feel like a juggle with a mixture of leave, holiday clubs, working from home, play days and a bit of help from grandmothers.

Now they're at secondary, I wouldn't change it.
I also am interested to know whether there is any data for what you claim in the petition @Kellykt?

Noooo! I loved the summer holidays as a child and I don’t want to deny my children that lovely feeling of having so many weeks off.

I think better access to various childcare, more leave options/flexible working arrangements for adults etc are needed to help parents, as I understand they can be stressful.

I actually think they should be longer. I grew up in a country where the school summer holiday was about 10 weeks and it was fantastic!

As someone who already struggles with school holidays having kids in 2 different counties - with different holidays (we are within 2 miles of the county boundary) i cannot imagine how this would work.

Unless they mandated

• all schools country wide has the same holidays, and
• all employers were required to allow all parents (& grandparents/extended families?) 2 weeks leave during that shortened summer, and
• caps on holiday prices for those 4? Weeks in the summer kids were allowed

.... otherwise the majority of kids would loose that protected holiday time with their parents and working parents would probably not get 2 weeks leave together (which is also shown by research to be good for productivity and mental health) as they'd be bitting around trying to cover school holidays even more - or the kids end up in different childcare provision all the time - neither of which is good for the kids mental health either.

I do think holiday care / clubs / camps etc need reforming to give a system functionally capable for primary aged / younger secondary aged kids... which for most and especially SEND kids it isn't currently I agree

This^

Who is the petition for?

Academies and local authorities can already set their own holidays so it isn't a government matter.

You can speak to your own school if they are an academy.

The practical issues are things like a primary school choosing one set of dates and a secondary choosing other dates. Then you end up with double the holidays and no one time for families to spend together.

Or primaries will have holidays spanning across the year and it will be too expensive for businesses to run holiday clubs because they will only be half full.

I also disagree. We have one of the shortest summer holidays in Europe.

The summer holidays we have are the shorter than most countries.
It’s time for children to be able to develop and learn in a different way.
For them to relax and explore and absorb different knowledge and at a different pace.
If people are worried about dip in maths and English then get them reading and doing maths worksheets or an online programme.
If summer holidays were such an obstacle to learning, how do kids everywhere get to universities and become professionals?
The longer break is needed.

Yes, it's telling that neither OP nor any of the posters agreeing with her have bothered to address the heating issue. We know that some families struggle to afford to heat their homes properly. If you take holidays away from the warmest time of year and move them to colder months, you're increasing the amount of time some children spend in cold houses, with the attendant problems this creates.

I'm surprised by everyone disagreeing. All you hear on social media is everyone hating on the holidays!

My two are older so I have no skin in the game, but they both struggled with the lack of routine and long stretch of unplanned time ahead of them, and didn't enjoy being off for so long.

I found in the summer holiday in reception id disrupt learning slightly, so we just made the decision to do some maths and reading over the summer break with all three of my children until year 4/5.

I definitely do NOT want them to have a shorter summer break, who wants a longer holiday when the weather is bad?

I also disagree. As much as I've struggled this last fortnight due to been heavily pregnant and suffering from severe 3rd trimester sickness I've generally enjoyed our holiday and usually love the school holidays and my own DD benefits from the chance to rest and relax. I do work very part time term time only in our family business so granted I'm not battling for AL or the limited provision for holiday childcare.

As PP have pointed out, we do have some of the shortest holidays in the world.

I do however think more needs to be done in regards to affordable and suitable school holiday childcare provision and I think campaigns should be targeted there. Round us, most child care schemes have ran 2 or 3 days a week 10-2.30 or 3 at the latest which is useless for many working parents. The one provision that offers 8-5 is massively oversubscribed with 20 places for a town with 8 2 form primary schools. There is also the issue of affordability. Most of the rest of the world seem able to set up decent child care schemes for the holidays (without using the schools or school staff). There are plenty of buildings (leisure centres, village halls, church halls, town halls) that can be used for childcare schemes.

I'm in Scotland so I'm not sure how long the English holidays are. We used to have 7 weeks in summer but a week was taken off summer and moved to Oct hols (now 2 weeks). I definitely prefer it that way. I wouldn't want to make any more changes.

Yes, getting kids outside becomes much more difficult and days are so short. I do think the heating is a big issue too.

Nope. And I would like to see the evidence that countries with shorter holidays do better - the UK actually has quite short summer holidays already, many countries have 2 or even 3 months.

It doesn't need to be all or nothing. The half terms could be two weeks instead of one, spread it out a little. Even better, areas all stagger holidays so travel companies can stop profiteering.

I want more holidays not fewer! Especially a longer summer

op and others agreeing cant cope with six weeks over the summer they are never going to cope with four weeks over Xmas come on there will be another petition within days to scrap this one