Term Time Holiday

MarilynMonroe_2

jellyhead wrote: »

Could you save, and go every 5 years instead of annually?

Also, I go on a 3 or 4 night caravan holiday or Butlins, etc. most years in school holidays and have never paid more than around £125 which is the cost of a Sun holiday.

The Sun holidays always have half terms, easter holidays and either the first or last week of the long summer holiday available. I think the Breakfree holidays do too, although I haven't been on one of those.

So she gets 2 holidays in all her school years? Hardly sounds like much of a childhood to me.

Couldnt get to a Butlins or the like. Only option to us is a caravan park, the prices are like 4-5 more as soon as the school holidays start.

What damage would a week off cause any way? None in the grand scheme of things. I could understand it if everyone in the class would be off but in all the years I was at school that never happened and the teachers never had a problem with anyone having a holiday (70's mid 80's) Now they want to keep you there from the age of 4 till 18 then into work till you drop dead ... Hmmm seems to me if this life then something is a miss.

Spendless

Found it! Copied and pasted from my LA's letter sent to all my town's schools.

Where it is company/organisational policy for an employee to take leave at a specific time in the year and there is no opportunity for a family holiday in school holidays. This must be evidenced by production of the policy document of the organisation.

Service personnel returning from/scheduled to embark upon a tour of duty abroad.

Where a holiday is recommended as part of a parent or child’s rehabilitation from a medical or emotional issue. Evidence must be provided.

Where there are other factors which the headteacher may consider to be exceptional circumstances this may be referred to the Local Authority for advice.



ETA- I don't know if all areas will have the same interpretation.

Marker_2

jellyhead wrote: »

Could you save, and go every 5 years instead of annually?

There is a whole lot of world to see and your not going to see a fraction of it if you holiday every 5 years. I holiday annually anyway and that is still not enough for me. There is so much to see and explore.

Marker_2

Spendless wrote: »

Found it! Copied and pasted from my LA's letter sent to all my town's schools.

Where it is company/organisational policy for an employee to take leave at a specific time in the year and there is no opportunity for a family holiday in school holidays. This must be evidenced by production of the policy document of the organisation.

Service personnel returning from/scheduled to embark upon a tour of duty abroad.

Haha let me tell you a story. Which is more detailed than a previous post.

My holiday to mexico taking 5 days out of DD's school. School kicked up a stink. Bare in mind this was a school that was 95% made up of service children. At the time of this holiday was the Olympics as well as many people of tour to Afghan.

My reasons to the school for going into 5 days of her new term were: Husband is on a leave ban and they are the only dates as close to school holidays we could get. We hadn't holidayed for 3 years because of husbands previous deployments. And I was pregnant and if we didn't go now then it would be a long time again until we went on holiday.

I had a meeting with the head teacher, and she said some bizarre things to me. Bare in mind headmistress of a service school. She said no parent in the forces should go to war during school holidays, they should only go away during term times. She also stated (because of the leave ban because of the Olympics) that they should only have single soldiers working the Olympics so that the families can go away on holiday.

MarilynMonroe_2

I had a meeting with the head teacher, and she said some bizarre things to me. Bare in mind headmistress of a service school. She said no parent in the forces should go to war during school holidays, they should only go away during term times. She also stated (because of the leave ban because of the Olympics) that they should only have single soldiers working the Olympics so that the families can go away on holiday.

Lmao! she sounds such a jobsworth.

But seriously, the more I read about school the more home ed sounds appealing, at least maybe untill senior school.

notanewuser

Marker wrote: »

There is a whole lot of world to see and your not going to see a fraction of it if you holiday every 5 years. I holiday annually anyway and that is still not enough for me. There is so much to see and explore.

MM is talking about a week in a caravan, not a safari in the Serengeti!!!

notanewuser

MarilynMonroe wrote: »

Lmao! she sounds such a jobsworth.

But seriously, the more I read about school the more home ed sounds appealing, at least maybe untill senior school.

Homeschooling is great - if you're committed to it for reasons other than being able to go on holiday when you like.

If the intention is for them to go to secondary school you also have to prepare the child to integrate in a school of 1000+ pupils at age 11.

thegirlintheattic

MarilynMonroe wrote: »

So she gets 2 holidays in all her school years? Hardly sounds like much of a childhood to me.

Couldnt get to a Butlins or the like. Only option to us is a caravan park, the prices are like 4-5 more as soon as the school holidays start.
.

I am of the opinion that the extra costs of holidays are something you need to budget for when you have kids. If you can't afford a caravan park, then try camping or do short weekend breaks.

daisiegg

As a teacher, I generally don't think it is much of my business if parents decide to take their children out of school. What we do have more trouble with, though, is if parents or children become very demanding and want special treatment as a result of their choice to miss lessons. Of course I will always help and support my students as much as possible but if I am going to spend extra time with a student I want it to be the one who tries and tries and still struggles, not the one who was lying on a beach when we did the lesson.

However, just to respond to the comments of 'what harm can it do?'....a little anecdote. I had a student in my Year 11 class this year who missed two weeks in October for a holiday. This was actually authorised by the school, as her parents had jobs that meant they were not allowed to take any time off in the summer due to the Olympics. The holiday was planned and authorised nearly two years in advance.

This student missed so much during this time that she struggled to catch up for the rest of the year, and never really felt she had properly caught up. I had her mother crying to me on parents' evening saying she wished they had never had the holiday as missing so much school had had such a huge negative impact on her daughter. This sounds dramatic but I am just stating what happened. To be honest I can't see how the student missed so much in my subject that she wouldn't have been able to properly catch up given some time and effort (though she did miss 8 lessons which is not insignificant) but I suppose it was the cumulative effect of having missed that amount of all her 11 or 12 subjects. It really did leave her struggling for the rest of the year and she often got very upset and stressed. Personally I wouldn't risk putting my child through that for the sake of a cheaper holiday (and trust me, I know the expense of travelling in the school holidays! And yes, of course, I chose to be a teacher. But really that is no different from people choosing to have children and to send them to mainstream state school...!)

Spendless

Taking a yr11 pupil out for a fortnight's holiday is pretty dopey though and I've nothing against people taking term-time holidays. I don't think you can compare that to say a Reception child being taken out a week before half term.