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Primary education

Join our Primary Education forum to discuss starting school and helping your child get the most out of it.

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Original poster

What prompts a school to close 3 days earlier than any other?

43 replies

Webuyanyname · 05/12/2016 11:36

Dd's school finishes 3 days earlier than all other schools in the borough (but started the term no earlier and had the same number of INSET days).

Just wondered what the thought process was....did they decide they were more efficient at teaching children the curriculum than any other school?
Perhaps the children absorbed knowledge slightly quicker than at other schools?
Or maybe they've run out of pens and paper (and energy)?

Seems bizarre to randomly decide to offer less teaching than other schools.

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SoupDragon · 05/12/2016 11:39

They won't be offering less teaching over the year. I think there is a set number of days they have to be in, assuming it is a state school.

PurpleMcPants · 05/12/2016 11:41

Yes that seems odd if it's a state school and they are not INSET days.
Our school closed early last year but that was to try and halt the spread of norovirus so it was a very last minute decision!

Wolfiefan · 05/12/2016 11:44

Only time I've ever had extra days off as a teacher was when moving into a new school. (Packing and moving and prepping new space.)
Look at the whole year. The number of days should be standard.
Ask the school if you can't work it out but maybe lose the sarcasm about "running out" of energy or being "more efficient" at teaching.

Aliveinwanderland · 05/12/2016 11:47

Schools have to provide 195 days of education a year. The 3 days will be made up somewhere else in the year.

SuburbanRhonda · 05/12/2016 11:47

You could check term dates on the school website then count the number of school days yourself. There should be 190.

ElizaSchuyler · 05/12/2016 11:48

They will probably end later in the summer etc.

Many schools round here have chosen to finish for Xmas on Friday 16th rather than the middle of the following week due to how Xmas falls this year. They will finish later in the summer ir have a day or two less at Easter.

SuburbanRhonda · 05/12/2016 11:48

Oh is it 195? I thought it was 190.

idontlikealdi · 05/12/2016 11:48

Dhs school has twilight inset so they can break up a couple of days earlier.

Original poster

Webuyanyname · 05/12/2016 11:48

Yes its a state school and no they're not INSET days. Will look at the other term dates and see if they're longer (though reception started a few days later than most other schools too). Just seemed odd to do it with no explanation.

Wolfie - there's a reason I posted this on MN and not in an email to the headmaster. I'll do my best to 'lose the sarcasm'

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Iwantacampervan · 05/12/2016 11:49

Schools have to provide 195 days of education a year. The 3 days will be made up somewhere else in the year.

It's 190 days for the children - teachers have 195 days (5 x INSET). The number of days should be the same over the school year (not per term) - they may have had the same number of INSET days to date but there are still 2 terms to go.

ElizaSchuyler · 05/12/2016 11:50

Children attend school for 190 days per year.

Teachers attend for 195 days per year.

Original poster

Webuyanyname · 05/12/2016 11:51

idon't - love the term 'twilight inset'. Makes its sound like a vampire training day..

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Original poster

Webuyanyname · 05/12/2016 12:07

Well this is interesting, I've just checked the school term dates against the Council term dates (the latter add up to 195 according to the Council website).
The school has 4 inset days and ends one term 3 days earlier. All other days are the same. Does that make 188 days or have I added up wrong?

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bojorojo · 05/12/2016 12:25

They have yet to choose one Inset day then. That will make 5. It is perfectly OK to choose one a bit later but poor if they do not inform parents in good time.

You are correct about 188 days. I would ask the LA about this. It does not appear to be 190 days of teaching for the children. I would try and clarify if they are, in fact, making up the other dates later on in the year and the published days are a mistake. I would ask the Head for an explanation if the school closure dates are not permissible. They have a duty to explain why there are 2 additional closure days and they are not teaching the legally required number of days. They cannot close early due to after school teaching commitments, eg clubs, sport etc. It is possible they are trying to give time off in lieu. Has the Governing Body agreed to this? You can ask this question of the Chairman of Governors and also ask themto explain the decision.

With my very cynical hat on - are the school trying to close the school early to get Christmas shopping days in for teachers? Their children, presumably, are taught on these days?

jamdonut · 05/12/2016 18:27

Our finishing date is Friday 16th December, along with the rest of the schools in the area, primary and secondary.
We are having some twilight training evenings in January, so that we don't finish on an odd day in July ( a Friday instead of the Monday of the following week.) Other schools will probably do similar, because it is ridiculous to have a one day week!

jennielou75 · 05/12/2016 18:37

We are breaking up on Friday 16th and using 3 inset days.

GraceGrape · 05/12/2016 18:41

Is it an academy? I might be wrong but I think academies can set their own term dates and I'm not sure how compliant they have to be with the 195 days. DH teaches in an academy and he had exactly the same term dates as me last year except for the summer term when he finished 3 days earlier.

YoullNeverWeeAlone · 05/12/2016 18:45

The private schools here which converted to academies still seem to keep the shorter terms of the independent sector. So there must be some leeway for academies to deliver less than 195 days (or there are several schools cheating!).

TalkinPeace · 05/12/2016 19:33

They may well have slightly longer days .....

the underlying requirement is for the number of teaching hours per year
something that has not changed for decades
and is pretty much identical between any type of school you can think of
and for that matter most countries are pretty similar in the number of teaching hours

if their lunch break is 10 minutes shorter than average every day, that would add up to the extra days over the years

Original poster

Webuyanyname · 06/12/2016 09:10

Ahhh maybe its because its an academy (had no idea they could set their own teaching days!).

Talkin - the start and finish times are very similar to other schools but maybe the lunch break is shorter, I don't know.

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rollonthesummer · 06/12/2016 09:24

Academies can do all sorts of odd things!

Our local one has just 'removed' 5 teaching days for next year by shortening the lunch hour every day by x minutes giving them two weeks off at October half term instead of one.

It also has all 5 insets in a row in May (teachers train in twilights) so the children have two weeks off at may half term.

storynanny · 06/12/2016 09:33

The previous poster was absolutely correct, it is all about the number of hours of teaching. If school A finishes at 3.00pm and school B ( with same aged children) finishes at 3.10pm that is an extra 50 minutes per week, so a lot more hours over a whole term. Likewise, some infant schools do not have afternoon breaks and some do.
I also agree that it would be better to standardise, particularly in the area, but often schools try to stagger start and finish times to allow parents to move between say, the infants and the juniors to pick up their children.
To give an example of differing number of hours in my supply schools, one infant school starts at 8.40, lunch 12-1, finishes at 3.20. A neighbouring infant school starts at 8.55, lunch 12-1, finishes at 3. So a considerable difference in minutes there.

Feenie · 06/12/2016 10:34

Is it an academy? I might be wrong but I think academies can set their own term dates

Actually, all schools can set their own term dates. They tend to keep them the same though - having wildly different term dates to the secondary down the road doesn't help with attendance if there are siblings there.

BigWeald · 06/12/2016 11:33

Can I ask: I have learned from this thread that schools are required to provide a certain number of hours/year of teaching time; are they permitted to provide MORE than that?

I'm thinking of a RC school that purportedly must teach 2h of RE per week (2.5h in KS2 I think) in order to maintain it's status with the RC authorities. So do they take that out of regular teaching time, or can they go for longer school days? I'm assuming they cannot add more school days on top of the 190/195 mentioned.

The local faith school has long school days (35 minutes more than other local schools, per day; so that would add up to 2h55 minutes extra/week) but no extra days off, could this be why? Do they accommodate the extra RE lessons by teaching more hours per year in total? I mean, can they do that?

GraceGrape · 06/12/2016 12:28

When I taught in a RC school, we had to do 2.5 hours if RE in the same amount of time that I had to teach in non-RC schools, where I only taught 1 hour of RE. So yes, some things did get squeezed into shorter amounts of time.

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