Stupid school Admin

jembie

My yr 9 son has gone off on a day trip to France today. It is the first time that he has been on a long trip with school. The first time we have been able to afford such luxury.

I was there at 2am waving him off with the coachload of 50 other children and 4 teachers.

So imagine my surprise when I was woken at about 9am by the school secretary asking why my son isn't in school!!! :mad:
When I explained he was on the France trip she knew nothing about it and then realised that must be why she has such a long list of absent children today...:rolleyes:

Sarahjovi

You couldn't make it up!

LOL:rolleyes:

Sarah:D

Strapped

jembie wrote: »

My yr 9 son has gone off on a day trip to France today. It is the first time that he has been on a long trip with school. The first time we have been able to afford such luxury.

I was there at 2am waving him off with the coachload of 50 other children and 4 teachers.

So imagine my surprise when I was woken at about 9am by the school secretary asking why my son isn't in school!!! :mad:
When I explained he was on the France trip she knew nothing about it and then realised that must be why she has such a long list of absent children today...:rolleyes:

:eek: :rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl:

jillie1974

how did aschool secretary not know bout a school trip??
dont they organise the things or sent/type letters for it???
i wonder how many other parents she had rang???

mountainofdebt

The same thing happened to me - my son was away, with a teacher and 3 other pupils, representing the school on some occasion and I got a text telling me he wasn't in school - d'uh!

jembie

jillie1974 wrote: »

how did aschool secretary not know bout a school trip??
dont they organise the things or sent/type letters for it???
i wonder how many other parents she had rang???

Yep we have had no end of letters and forms about it and a big meeting at school last week to hand in the passports and health insurance cards.
Apparently I was the first phone call on the list so lucky me!!!

Actually this is the second time it has happened when they have called me and he was on a school trip. Another time they called because neither of my children were in school and I had sent a letter to say we were going to my Grandad's funeral.

debs66_2

we had a call asking why our teen daughter wasn't in school, but my partner had dropped her off with her elder sister and watched them walk up to school together.

by god we panicked. had she been snatched? where could she be?

15 minutes they found her - in her usual lesson. she'd been there all along. the teacher hadn't bothered checking....

bestpud

This happens all the time at my dds school but in fairness it is because the main admin staff don't communicate with the attendance officer. I don't know why as the registers etc are all computerised and there must be a way of adapting it when there are schools trips.

The other thing they do is ring if they are late getting to school. The pupils have to sign the book outside the Attendance Officers door and then an electronic register is taken at the beginning of every lesson so it should be very easy to see who was late and who is not there at all. You'd think!!!

But she rings up, worries the parents by making them think their child isn't in school and when they question it she checks and says, oh yes, I can see they've signed the book and I can see they have turned up for their first lesson!!!

Madness!!!

littlemissmoney

My school once phoned my parents to say I hadn't turned up for one of my GCSEs. It worried them silly because they knew I wouldn't miss it unless something really, really serious had happened. The school phoned back 10 min later to say they had found me... I was sitting at my exam desk taking my exam the whole time :rolleyes:

squashy

Saying nothing...I work in a school office and the first year was a VERY steep learning curve! Must have made no end of useless phone calls as above (although it is quite often down to the class teacher as there is a notebook in the register for them to put in anyone they know is off for an appointment or other routine thing, sometimes it's never written in for the full year!!)

However I would think that SOMEONE in the office would know!

MattB_4

Most of the time you'd say better than the reverse (i.e. your child isn't there and they haven't called), but you would think with such a long list alarm bells would be ringing! Mind you I'm sure many of us are still warming our brains up at 9am!