Year 7 Parents Evening - Unavailable slots for core subjects

[User32243535]

Sorry, but this might turn into a bit of a rant.

DC (Y7) attends what is meant to be a well respected grammar school. But at the moment, I am struggling to comprehend how they have developed such a lousy system for arranging parents evening appointments.

DC is our eldest child so we were not acquainted with this system before and didn't see it coming. Basically, we received a report and then according to the report, we were advised (via dc taking a sheet around to their teachers and booking a time slot) to arrange a meeting with the necessary teachers.

DC is a scatter brain and this hasn't helped with making the arrangements but on eventually contacting their teachers for Maths and English. dc was informed that there were no available slots left. Sorry, but Maths and English are core subjects and we care about our dc's education, I am fuming that we are not able to discuss these subjects with the relevant teachers (parents evening is held on just one evening).

DC doesn't have huge difficulties in these areas but reading the report there are one or two areas for improvement and I think it is important to discuss these two subjects in particular.

Anyone else experienced similar? The system of arranging slots on a piece of paper seems outdated from the outset. I e-mailed the head teacher regarding my concerns about dc not securing appointments a few days ago and I haven't received a response and I'm not able to discuss with anyone as the school office is now closed (dc has just informed me of the situation, which I believed would be resolved today.) Quite frankly not impressed with the schools communication either right now in regard to replying to my e-mail. Grrrrh...just so frustrated!

No problem, Chameleon

Doesn't anyone else find it odd that the OP is still here, five hours after starting the thread, diligently responding to almost every point? What is his / her DC - the one they are so invested in - doing this evening? I'm getting a wee bit suspicious that this is a Daily Fail journalist doing research for a sad-face I couldn't get to see my child's teachers feature.

Our online system has 'RED' appointments these are ones the teacher. Oils for you IF they need to speak to you about your child - so it would still leave less appointment for kids doing OK

Shimmer, that wasn't the point I was making.
I didn't say that I taught 2+ sets in each year group. I was stating that I have 70 to see (impossible to do) on one parents' evening and some colleagues, for a particular parents' evening have 80+.
I am fully aware that seeing this amount of pupils at every parents' evening is impossible.
For this amount of pupils, it has to be on a first come first served basis with email contact / phone for others.

Queen...Oh dear what a negative view...merely trying to make suggestions on improving the current system...do you never evaluate the scope for change then?

Plus...presumably a teacher could jump on the system ahead of time and book any priority appointments in if they deemed it necessary (thereby overriding the system?)

I think OP, it is your apparent insistence that you know of a better way, even though you have only half experienced 1 parents evening in secondary and there are a number of teachers here who will have experienced 10s if not 100s of them, including working at different schools and seeing them run under different systems.

Yes, Green like you were saying with the RED appointments.

How could teachers book priority appointments without knowing the availability of parents ?

Teens...not necessarily a better way...but another way that is surely worthy of consideration.

Good point Ana...what are these RED appointments that Green talks of...perhaps a number of appointments could be held as priority type appointments for a certain period of time?

Parents' evenings are obsolete imo.

My students' parents email me if they need to talk to me. I email them if I need to talk to them.

If we can't sort out whatever it is by Email, we arrange a time for me to call them OR for them to come in for a proper meeting.

Parents' evening is a bun fight of 10 minute appointments - nice enough to put a face to the name, but if you actually have something to resolve, it's not an effective forum.

& I say that despite teaching in a private international school, where I have class sizes between 6 & 24, & we close the school for the day twice a year for each Key Stage, so I do actually have time to book everyone in!

Our system is online, & teachers get first access so I book my 'concern' students in before opening booking to parents.

Absolutely no chance of me seeing my own dc's teachers - they are pupils at my school. If I need to discuss anything, I arrange a stand alone meeting with the relevant person.

Parents' evenings are a relic of the days before t'internet & day to day communication. Not a good use of anyone's time.

www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2005/1437/regulation/6/made

Schools should be giving parents the chance to discuss their child's report once a year. Surely that doesn't mean put on an evening that by name infers every parent gets to discuss their child's subject reports but in reality only a few they pick do.

The school I worked out just operated a queueing system and didn't bother with appointments. So if you had 2 classes in a year group then the queue would be long and some people chose not to bother but everyone had the choice of waiting it out. It actually worked OK. Tbh the worst parents evenings were the ones where I had a single class once a week of the other subjects that I taught and no one bothered to come and see me. They felt twice as long as being busy.

But the online system still doesn't solve the fact there aren't enough appointments. So a different set of parents will miss out.

The only way we could make this 'fair to all' as Toomany says, would be to fund education better so that teachers could teach fewer hours and thus fewer pupils. In that way they would have the time to do parents' evenings and meet all parents without overloading them.

So OP, you should go into politics under the 'raise taxes to make parents evenings fair' banner.

The thing is teen many people me included would be quite happy with paying more tax for better funded education. Teachers are massively overloaded and underpaid, but it doesn't mean that parents should be grateful for the scraps that they are thrown.

Well when you open the system is states HOY has booked you an appointment at X time - please amend to a more convenient time or see you at X time

You then book other appointments round it

So yes teachers can mark them as priority if they want to see certain parents

SO 36 appointments could be narrowed down to 10 free spaces

Well I agree re funding shimmer .

But I don't think this is about being grateful for scraps. The OP wants to change to a system that is more expensive and will advantage her (or him), but at the same time will disadvantage other parents. Who if anything are likely to be more deserving, not less.

The OP is already in a grammar school which I believe tends to have the effect of disadvantaging some of the kids in the non-grammar schools. This threads reads to me very much like she/her family must have priority even within that system.

Campaigning for more funding for all would solve the parents evening problem properly.

Teens, that is really sweet of you to consider that I may have the potential of leading such a campaign...but really that's not my battle to fight. As a side issue my dh pays more than enough tax already so it would be lovely to see such a beneficial system as a reward for this...sadly, I don't think this is going to happen though...unless you, yourself Teens, feel ready to lead such a campaign...

Thanks all for your comments, checking out now...it's time to send that e-mail. I have enjoyed this lively debate...I might even say, it has caused me a chuckle this evening. But on a serious note...thanks to all of those who have made some really salient comments - you have assisted me in constructing a really worthy and well-worded e-mail. Have a good weekend everyone x

Parents' evenings are a relic of the days before t'internet & day to day communication. Not a good use of anyone's time.
I really need parents evening, as the school absolutely refuse to put any exam results except GCSE and A level, in writing, ever. So all I have is my DDs vague view on how its going, and school reports that say homework is better/worse and the last exam was encouraging/ disappointing. Target grades at specified, but for one subject that is 2 grades lower than the teacher says she's heading for (also says he has no idea where they come from, and to ignore!).
Parents evenings are the only time they will hint at what results they're actually getting.

No, I don't feel like leading a campaign. I think Education is underfunded, but it is free, and I think schools do very well with their limited funds, and our school at least prioritises parents evenings and pupil interventions etc well to get the most bang for their buck.

I feel very lucky to have accidentally ended up in Hants with our, on the whole, very good comps.

OP please post the response to your email, I'm sure many of us would love to see how it goes.

I have read the thread, but not sure if I missed - how soon is parents Eve after receiving reports? At DD's school ( also y7) the online booking opened jus taffeta reports had been sent (by email). When I had got home, read the report, decided who we might need to see, 1hr 20 mins after opening, some sessions were fully booked. However, the 3 areas where DD feels she struggles ( also reflected in the report) were avian le, albeit spread out.

At my school ,we have similar but days between the reports and the booking opening. I only wish that parents of students who have amazing reports didn't book to see me. There are only so many ways of reiterating how g rest they are plus the improvement strategy that was on the report anyway. We do 3.30 till 8pm, it is exhausting after a full day of lessons. Nothing is reserved for any student, but I do phone and encourage if I see those I really need t one hAvent booked.

Oh, and I plan very quiet lessons for the following day as I nearly always get a croaky voice!

Well, that is a bit crap @Xmas I agree! But if you then only have a potential 5-10 minutes to discuss it, still not helpful. Different issue.

Mistressiggi the answer to your question is, you could see all your pupil's parents for 3 minutes (the length of time our parents evening appointments were) in two three hour sessions (over two days perhaps). That doesn't sound ridiculously arduous to me (and as you say it's likely some wouldn't come anyway).

Our junior school teachers have parent appointments from 2.30 through to 7pm so not sure why our secondary school only offers 2 hours for the whole process.

This thread really needs a trigger warning for teachers

Must be end of half term exhaustion that has gotten me quite so annoyed reading it

I teach a core subject at a selective boys private school, I teach just over 70 yr7s.
Parents evening in this scenario is absolute hell. I start work at 7:20 having gotten up at 6am, I teach five hours of lessons plus tutor time on the day we usually have PEs on. I had a 15min break and then saw 36 sets of parents in 3hrs.
No chance of a wee, no drink of water, no respite and your body thinks it’s dinner time. Just three intensive hours of performing when already knackered. You run on pure adrenaline but you can’t afford to make a single gaffe or use the wrong name or appear not to be familiar with the progress and results of every single student.

Lots of people are being very patient with your busy bodying. In my opinion as someone who actually does these things I think you are asking for a moon on a stick.

Bonbon did you see where I wrote it would take 44 hours to see all the parents over the course of a year? Not sure how you work that out to be two evenings of three hours each!