Secondary Parents Evenings - how many per year group?

[321Go]

Hi

Our place are moving from 4 form entry to 5 form entry from September.
In the past we have had 1 parents evening per year group per year.
The evening would run from 4pm to 7pm and we would see most students/parents in that time (3 minute slots per subject per student)

With some teachers now teaching more groups within a particular year, SLT want to have 2 evenings per year group, but (roughly) half of the students attending on each evening, so that most/all parents will be able to continue seeing most/all teachers.

Obviously the teaching staff are not impressed!

How does it work at your place?
Do you see most of the parents, or just key ones?
This is a grammar school which might make a difference, as most students want to make appointments.

Thanks!

In theory, we see key parents (although generally it means you see the most organised ones). I think 3 mins is very short for an appointment. We do 5 mins. I am sure, however, that it'll eventually end up as 2 evenings (we have 6 form entry!)

We have two per year, per year group, and we see all parents each time. 5 min appointments.

4 form entry. 1 per year group per year with 5 min slots. 6th formers have 10 min slots, but classes are 15 pupils on average.

Ask SLT how they are going to manage double parents evenings while sticking to the directed time budget of 1265 hours. If they do this they'll have to significantly cut your hours elsewhere.

We've got 8 forms and 1 parents evening per year group, 3 hours with 5 minute appointments. If we can't see all the parents who want to see us, then a phone call or email is acceptable. Usually it's not a problem, we say if they've got outstandings on their report then they don't need to make an appointment.

In my last school we had 14 form entry and one Parents' Evening per year group.

The DC's school is 10 form entry.
They have a settling in evening in October which IIRC is just the form tutor.

Parents get a 5 min slot and change on a bell (like speed dating!) It's usually about 3 hours and you book the appointments online.

4 form entry, one parents evening per year group. I teach 3 sets of year 9 (so 50 students). We have 10 min slots, but some are quicker than that so in 3 hours I saw about half.

Sorry - teach 70 year 9s, so saw way less than half!

Thank you so much for your replies! We had a brainstorm in the office today to come up with solutions.

We'd thought of a 10 minute bell before the end of the evening, but not the speed dating idea. Will add that (really like it as time keeping (parents and teachers is dire).

Think they are on shakey ground with directed time already, need to sit down with a calculator and work it out, although being an academy might alter that.

We do the settling in form-tutor evening for years 7 and 12 too.

Sounds like plenty of other larger schools manage it.

One concern we had with saying outstanding students don't need appointments, is that some are outstanding across the board and so parents could have no appointments. Noblegiraffe is this an issue at yours?

Thanks again!!

It could be that some parents have no appointments but could get phone calls if they wanted, for the subjects that they care about which is better than dragging themselves out for the evening. But while some teachers, like RE and ICT teach loads of classes and can't possibly see all the kids, maths and English teach fewer classes more often and they are usually setted so the kids are more likely to get an appointment and outstanding kids who are in a top set are more likely to get an appointment than in mixed ability class because the teacher may only teach the top set in that year group.
I'm a maths teacher and I've never not been able to fit everyone in, although sometimes I've had to start half an hour earlier. Parents usually only really care about the core subjects so would probably be ok with not getting other appointments.

We do one per year group per year. We have 6 forms in yr 7, 4 in 8, 3 in 9, 4 in 10 & 5 in 11.

We do 4.30-7pm. Parents get 5 min slots. Anyone who doesn't get to see teachers and who wants to gets called/emailed. Attendance varies anyway - more parental involvement in Yrs 7 & 8 for a variety of reasons.

321Go, the bell sounds silly, but works really well!
We have a "settling-in" evening every year, and outstanding students definitely don't get told they don't need appointments though I wish they'd tell the parents whose DC are a PITA that they don't have to come

Our caretaker is a lovely man but he's very tall and a bit scary looking. If he's locking up after parents evening, he tends to tie it in with walking his dog. That also helps

Most teachers do a fine job,but I can't help feeling that a minority don't help themselves by moaning,whingeing and resisting anything that resembles change.

8 form entry, 1 night per year group.

9 form entry, 1 evening per year group in main school, ie y7-11
Nearly all students get to see all their teachers, the odd teacher may have lots of one year group and so have to only see some parents, written notes or phone calls can be made to those parents who want them. 3 hr evening sessions.
Caringdad it has nothing to do with resisting change but parents eves means an 11 or 12 hr working day, which will be followed by ordinary working days, and the evening are when teachers mark and plan ( not sit and watch TV!) so every really late night at work impacts on your teaching the following day.

Thanks for the new replies - I will go back to work next week armed with info and suggestions!
Rosie - you explained it perfectly. We're resigned to the increased class sizes (more marking, reports etc etc) but are going for damage limitation with this one.
Resisting change? New rules come in before we get a chance to implement the last lot! Spending half term (holiday?) getting my head around the new A-level.