School declined holidays and branded the kids truants

photome

Murphy_The_Cat wrote: »

ah come on photome, its not quite as rosy as that.

Away from Vegas, decent hotel prices are a (lot) more than £35 per nigh.
Food, whilst being cheaper than the UK, isn't the bargain it once was.
OK fuel is about a 1/2rd of the price of UK fuel, but you need to hire a car to put it into !

Customer service is generally very high (agreed), but in a 'budget' type hotel, how much service do people want, need or expect ?

As well as the flight, factor in currency exchange costs, car parking holiday insurance etc, etc. Once you add in ALL of your costs you get closer to a realistic comparison.

Maybe I was looking through rose tinted glasses! I stand by my claim that the difference in price isnt huge I also stand by my claim about food prices. Fuel is currently about £1.80 a gallon compared to about £5.40 a gallon here

I also went to Tenerife last year SC for a week £310 for 2 people inc flights and accom

My point is that you can have a hol abroad for less than or maybe a litle more than in this country with all the added benefits it brings

sunshinetours

There are clearly plenty of decent parents on here who have their overall child's wellbeing close at heart which is of course lovely to see

However the issue of ignoring the rules and taking time when ultimately it suits YOU (because of cost etc) is IMO the biggest lesson it teaches kids i.e don't worry about the rules, they don't apply to us in this case. It shows through in many of today's younger generation's lack of personal responsibility to situations. there is always someone else to blame afterall

As others have said the issue of the husband's potential absence from work against his contract is clearly more concerning and obvioulsy could have far further reaching consequences for the family as a whole. Why don't people make the connection between these events and the lessons it could teach. As others have also said learning is so much more than just text books.....

I don't think it ruins a childs education to have some time away from school but it certainly does disrupt class planning say towards end of terms when these sorts of absence seem popular. If half the class is missing then what useful lessons can the remaining class have that don;t then have to be repeated at a later stage. Again actions and consequences

I also think there are a huge number of parents (again not in this thread obviously ) who very much think its their little Jonny's God given right to have two weeks in Florida because he's obviously so special and so he absolutely should be able to go when "he" wants to. i don;t think there is susually a lot of thought past the parents desire for a holiday to show off to their friends with....

vodkachick68

sunshinetours wrote: »

There are clearly plenty of decent parents on here who have their overall child's wellbeing close at heart which is of course lovely to see

However the issue of ignoring the rules and taking time when ultimately it suits YOU (because of cost etc) is IMO the biggest lesson it teaches kids i.e don't worry about the rules, they don't apply to us in this case. It shows through in many of today's younger generation's lack of personal responsibility to situations. there is always someone else to blame afterall

As others have said the issue of the husband's potential absence from work against his contract is clearly more concerning and obvioulsy could have far further reaching consequences for the family as a whole. Why don't people make the connection between these events and the lessons it could teach. As others have also said learning is so much more than just text books.....

I don't think it ruins a childs education to have some time away from school but it certainly does disrupt class planning say towards end of terms when these sorts of absence seem popular. If half the class is missing then what useful lessons can the remaining class have that don;t then have to be repeated at a later stage. Again actions and consequences

I also think there are a huge number of parents (again not in this thread obviously ) who very much think its their little Jonny's God given right to have two weeks in Florida because he's obviously so special and so he absolutely should be able to go when "he" wants to. i don;t think there is susually a lot of thought past the parents desire for a holiday to show off to their friends with....

As i have said in a previous post i admit i used to take mine out of school purely for financial reasons. I didn't see why i should pay £1000 more to go in school holidays! I certainly did not take them out because of a desire to show off to my friends,infact alot of my friends have taken their kids out as well for the same reason. I also want to make the point that in the last week before my kids break up for holidays,all they do is sit in the hall or classroom watching dvds,or doing something trivial to kill time before the end of term.

holidaysforme

The cost of holidays in the uk is truely shocking in school holidays. We go on short breaks special offers/sun holidays etc in this country, but would never contemplate having our main holiday here. We always go abroad where we wont be ripped off, with not only the cost of the holiday, but petrol prices, food,- eating out etc..., not to mention having to suffer the unpredictable weather.
Sometimes we even take a week out in term time to go abroad,- shock horror.
A week out of school once a year is not going to do any damage to a childs education, when they are otherwise acedemically able to keep up. It's the children who are off every other week because they have a few sniffles, or a tummy ache that the schools sould be concentrating on and the lea targetting.:mad:

sunshinetours

vodkachick68 wrote: »

As i have said in a previous post i admit i used to take mine out of school purely for financial reasons. I didn't see why i should pay £1000 more to go in school holidays! I certainly did not take them out because of a desire to show off to my friends,infact alot of my friends have taken their kids out as well for the same reason. I also want to make the point that in the last week before my kids break up for holidays,all they do is sit in the hall or classroom watching dvds,or doing something trivial to kill time before the end of term.

You don't HAVE to but thank you for proving my points however. Not just picking on you but why do people think they have the right to do what they like and ignore the rules because the ends justifies the means in their eyes

Its such a poor life lesson to teach your kids it really is

malkie76

It's not £1000 more to go in school holidays, it's £1000 less to go outside of school holidays.

Call me old fashioned, but I detest parents taking children out of school to take them on holiday, citing financial reasons. Surely it's cheaper to leave them in school and not go on holiday?

I applaud the above user who saves and goes on holiday every other year! Why can't you all do that? Holidays are a luxury item, not a necessity!

easy

sunshinetours wrote: »

You don't HAVE to but thank you for proving my points however. Not just picking on you but why do people think they have the right to do what they like and ignore the rules because the ends justifies the means in their eyes

Its such a poor life lesson to teach your kids it really is

But it is OK to teach them to follow rules, no matter how pointless those rules are, or, as in this case, how stupidly those rules are being applied ??

I teach my son to abide by the laws of this country, because, in general those laws will make the our lives better & keep us safe.

However there are some laws (quite a number of which have been introduced in the last 12 years) which are either mis-guided or mis-applied. And this regulation, which is being used to prevent a parent taking their child out of school for a good reason is a case in point. The regulations were originally designed to try to deal with the repeat truants, the teenagers who would consistently not attend school, but hang around shopping centres or housing estates, committing petty crimes and causing a nuisance to the law-abiding public, whose parents didn't give a monkeys or would not put in any effort to stop that behaviour.

But caring parents, whose children have good attendance, do their homework, toe the line in every other respect, are an easy target for the school welfare officers who are trying to get their "punishment percentages" up.


And remember, most of those MPs who abused the expenses system over the last few years did it within the letter of the rules as they were written. They didn't apply the spirit of those rules tho'.

Murphy_The_Cat

mogadon wrote: »

No, the correct term is illegal. It's illegal to keep children off school for unauthorised leave. Parents cannot authorise an absence, only the school can. Parents can, and have, been prosecuted for it.

Would you take your child out of school if you knew they would have to reapply for a school place when they came back, and probably wouldn't get back into their old school?

No-one on here is telling the OP to stuff the employer's opinion, and take the holiday without her OH having authorisation. Because, he wouldn't have a job when he came back, and quite right too.

Schools deserve the same respect.

The facility is already there anyway, schools can remove a child from the roll/register after 4 weeks of unauthorised absence. I'd like to see that period shortened.

I'd have no more sympathy for a parent who lost a school place for taking an unauthorised holiday than I would for an employee who did the same.

Fortunatley my sons school is enlightened & realistic enough to allow reasonable, preplanned time off, when a reasonable notice period is given :beer:

I suspect that you and I are never going to agree on this subject, as we appear to be a looooooooonnnnnnngggg way apart. But I can live with that, as civilised, respectful disagreement is OK in my book.

I suppose that some of my opinion comes back to my principles and who I am --- who knows what is best for my family, me, or a column ticking buracrat, doggedly following 'policy' that has been passed by bigger penpushers, further up the greasy pole.

I would hope that with a change of Government, common sense for individual circumstances would be coming more and more to the fore, rather than slavishly following Dogma.

p.s
my son was out with his friends (& parents) with a shovel, icebreaker and bucket of grit in the Winter, trying to clear the icy path/road to school, so that they could get there to start the term. It was all to no avail though. The school stayed closed for 'access reasons', which was odd, as the children all live with walking distance of the school. Ho hum, never mind, that was a week of his education that he missed out on. Who, hang on a second, don't tell me -- that'll be different when the school does it

moneypooh

"The school stayed closed for 'access reasons', which was odd, as the children all live with walking distance of the school. Ho hum, never mind, that was a week of his education that he missed out on"

Our school posted work on the internet for the time they missed during January. 90% of the students managed some work, the others revised for exams that we also on at the same time.

sorry, a bit off topic, but some schools did keep some continuity going even though the school was officially closed.

thommy

easy- very much agree.
our schools system is deeply rooted in our military history. it's only relatively recently that schools are teaching through experience, rather than learning by rote and not being able to question anything. we are moving away from the 'do as i say' attitude tho, albeit slowly. children are becoming thinkers more. which is just as well - look how quickly things can change in these days of globalisation. thanks to the mess that financiers and bankers have got us into, due to largely operating within the rules, politicians and those self-same financiers are now desperately trying to think outside the box. firstly, to get us out of this mess. secondly to stop it happening again. now, there's a life lesson for us all....