School Holiday Fines

Happier_Me

Not sure if this has been posted, haven't spotted it but wanted to clarify the point at which a fine could be issued!

My understanding is the children have to be away from school for 10 or more consecutive school sessions (both am and pm sessions). Does anyone know if this is correct or not please?

We take our big holidays in the school holiday although we have found ways to do this as a cheap as possible (for instance, ferry + shared farmhouse in France for 10 nights costs us around £540 for a family of four in August).

However we do take the children out for occasional weekends away (Friday and Monday absence) and we have never been fined. We have also taken them out of school for 4 days without a fine.

Pennywise

phillw wrote: »

With so many technical resources now there should be no reason why there can't be a limited form of flexi-time at certain points in the year. The classes can be recorded etc. It's not like when you had to be in the room and quickly copy down what was on the black board, before it got erased to be replaced with the next lot.

Sensible "optional" schooling days can easily be arranged without technical solutions. There are already many parts of the school year which are pretty pointless and where little or no real teaching is done.

The obvious one is after the year end test/exams, particularly the last two weeks of the school year in early July. Because of school trips and other activities, etc., lots of teachers and pupils are absent from lessons anyway. The few teachers remaining are de-mob happy and aren't doing any teaching. For the last two years, my son hasn't written a single thing in any of his exercise books in July - he tells me they've been watching videos, doing quizzes, etc., and some teachers openly let them just play on their phones for full lessons. Absolutely no harm in allowing holiday time off if they know that no actual teaching is planned for those two weeks.

Another good one is the return week after Easter. This year, my son has done virtually nothing and barely had any of his own teachers. The official return was last Tuesday, but there were at least 3 foreign school trips involving his year, so there were less than half the pupils in most of his lessons, so the teachers (several of whom were supply as the proper teachers were on the trips), did no teaching. In history, for example, they watched Blackadder videos in all lessons!

These periods are known to the teachers in advance, there's absolutely no reason on earth why that knowledge couldn't be passed onto parents to give them the option of time out in the knowledge that the kids wouldn't miss any important teaching. Once you give an option for "allowed absence" for, say, a couple of weeks per school year, the school can then really come down hard on others who do take unauthorised time off at prime teaching periods.

You could almost have a traffic light system on the calendar. Red weeks where time off isn't allowed because there is active intensive teaching, amber weeks where time off is allowed with good reason and some kind of "payback", i.e. agreement to attend after school homework club to catch up, or green weeks where time off is granted automatically for say just 1 or 2 weeks per year.

Control it and facilitate it at the right parts of the school year is surely the way rather than arbitrary fines.

gaz126

Please sign this petition. Cannot post a link so please copy and paste. Story below

Back in 2013 the government changed the law on taking your children out of school in term time so that now you receive a penalty fine of £60 per child per parent. This can increase . The law prevents families from taking term time holidays forcing families to pay extra during school holidays.

Myself and my wife received a fine for our two eldest children (two fines each parent) for taking our children on holiday for 5 days in term time which was the only week free from surgery and radiotherapy (school knew of cancer diagnosis) This apparently is not an exceptional circumstance. The council quote is S.444 A or 1 of the Education act 1996 which in its own term indicates truancy and not a one off family holiday. Councils are too ready to fine and wont consider exceptional circumstances

https:// petition.parliament.uk/petitions/129698

please delete the spaces before petition.

gaz126

Its now surely time to address the disgraceful situation of fining both parents for the action of the other parent taking the children out of school.

Tigsteroonie

gaz126 wrote: »

Its now surely time to address the disgraceful situation of fining both parents for the action of the other parent taking the children out of school.

Whilst I don't agree with the current fine/penalty arrangement, I do agree with your post. When one parent can take a child out of school without the agreement or sometimes even knowledge of the other parent, it is unfair to fine the second parent.

sheramber

Father wins with high court ruling over fines for taking child on holiday duting term time.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-36277940

gilpur

The £60 is not a fine - it is a fixed penalty notice - only a Magistrate can issue to fine - I think you need to define the difference.

Guest101

gilpur wrote: »

The £60 is not a fine - it is a fixed penalty notice - only a Magistrate can issue to fine - I think you need to define the difference.

It's not just magistrates court who can fine people - since you insist on being pedantic

daska

Guest101 wrote: »

It's not just magistrates court who can fine people - since you insist on being pedantic

I think in this instance it's worth being pedantic. If people realised that what the Local Authority issues is effectively an offer to settle they might feel less intimidated by them. People don't usually get appropriate advice until after they've paid up. Some then kick themselves when they realise that if only they had checked the register were correctly marked and the guidance correctly followed they would have had a statutory defence against prosecution. (It's not unknown for schools to mark an absence as unauthorised instead of illness or medical.)

aragornlegolasbunny

Ok, my son is in year 4 and mad about computers, lego, minecraft et al... so I hear about a great course being run at a local private school for a week where he can indulge his passion. Only trouble is the only week suitable for him is the last week of his school term.
Obviously this delicious week is aimed at the lucky private school kids who have broken up before then. I am prepared to shell out for the course but I am going to fall foul of his school for taking him out - even though it's abundantly clear this is not a holiday it is educational....
Any one else had any experience of this and how to get around it so everyone is happy?