My kids go to a school you cannot communicate with by e-mail, at all. Zero. I am not speaking about having e-mail addresses of teachers, but of some kind of zero electronic communication policy. If I have changed address or need to ask something about school lunches, etc. I have to go to the office in the morning or at pick up time.
I work full time and this is really inconvenient. But this is not the point. Is this normal? Are schools (the places where ICT and 'creativity and innovation' are meant to be delivered) normally like this?
I am a lecturer at University and I cannot imagine a world where I would refuse to communicate with my (over a hundred) students by e-mail. I am not British and I have no idea whether this is normal or not at primary school level. So can someone let me know?
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School has no e-mail address. Is this normal?
camaleon · 07/01/2013 16:16
Until very recently my DCs' school made staff e-mail addresses to parents which I found incredibly useful as both DH and I are teachers and rarely manage to pop into the office of the DCs' school. These days the website has a sentence that explains how the e-mails addresses are structured... which is fine if you know the teacher's first initial and have the correct spelling of their surname - there is no staff list anywhere online so it's far from helpful 
. As a working parent of young children I appreciate being able to contact the school by e-mail, particularly for things such as finding out when clubs are starting etc. (letters are rarely sent home, we're just meant to know).
As a primary teacher I am quite happy for parents to contact me via e-mail. In return they will receive an automated message that explains that my e-mail is only checked after school and that I will try to reply within a few working days of receiving it. Usually the e-mails I receive are to let me know that someone different is collecting the child that day, to apologise for losing a letter and asking if a replacement one could be provided or to volunteer to help on a trip. Occasionally it's something else but I know I've found it helpful being able to e-mail parents, especially those who don't collect their children, to let them know about things (positive, not so positive and admin-related).
My school e-mail is logged in all day - it's expected of all the teachers in my school. Although we can't read the e-mails whilst teaching, I read mine before and after school and sometimes at lunchtime. Replies are usually short but I find it preferable to going up and down 6 flights of stairs to find a telephone to call a parent!
Camaleon many London schools will structure their e-mail addresses in the same way: [email protected] e.g. [email protected]
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