Hi All

Have been reading this thread and I am not going to make any comments other than most of you already know how I feel about the subject of double standards within schools from other threads on HT. Those of you who don't know how I feel all I am going to say is I can't wait until we move to Tenerife in April when my son and I will no longer have any dealings with his current school.

Get me going again on this subject and you will all be here for a week just reading my post

Kind Regards
Jackie

Do people in Scotland get to pay the cheaper prices in the brochures being as they break up a few weeks earlier than England?
I'm guessing so!

From what I have read on here, the flight supplements on scottish holidays are so high anyway, i would imagine any marginal benefit from the brochure that is gained by breaking up a week early, is wipped out by the flight supplement.

Some one posted to say for their holiday it was better financially to fly to Gatwick at the end of the summer term and fly from there.

There is also an alternative solution. Take your holidays during the school holidays.

Just do not go abroad.

Before anyone jumps think about it.

If the TOs caught a bit of a cold because people would not pay then they would have to reconsider.

Will people do that? No they will just moan.

Vote with your wallet. Keep your money in it.

fwh

Isn't that cutting off your nose to spite your face?

I like to go abroad for our main summer holiday! You are virtually guaranteed nice weather and the sea is warm, etc!!!

As for the Scottish thing it's not just marginal! It seems as soon as the holiday starts at least 100 quid goes on the price! Now x that by 3 or 4 and it soon adds up!

You seem to think that school Governors actually have power. I was a Governor of my son's school for 9 years, 2 of those as Chair. We had no power at all. We could not even decide who emptied the school's bins. The LEAs have policies on everything, stray from those policies and they are all over you like a rash. Decide not to adopt a policy and then something happens and they hang you out to dry. Governors are unpaid volunteers but if they cock up then they can be made to pay (from their own pockets) so naturally they always adopt whatever the LEA suggest (unless they are really brave or extremely foolish).

Sorry this is off topic.

Schools are measured by OFSTED (spit) on many things. One of them is absence, Authorised and un-authorised. They are also checked on the actions they take about absence so if you are called in for a chat then that is because OFSTED (spit) will want to see the record of the interview. They will mark the school down if they don't think these things are being followed up. The Head probably regards these things as an even bigger drag than you do but he/she is the one being judged.

hi all,
i think they should allow you to take 10 days off so you can go on your holidays in school term time. i work at my sons school and for us to go away in the holidays is soooo expensive. thia year i have been very naughty and we are having time off in oct so the boys will be off for 2 weeks then 1 week of the school holidays ( i did try to work it so they would only have 1 week off but the holiday dates were not out so i tryed to work them out and got it wrong )

Yes Chivas, but my mention of marginal, is because I understand that flight supplements from Glasgow can be as much as 100 pounds per person. So that times 4 is 400 anyway. Sorry Mods I'm well. here.

To reply to the questions about those of us in Scotland: We holiday with Eurocamp/equivalent most years. They hike their prices after the last Thursday in June and the biggest early booking discounts only apply to holidays starting on or before that day. Our schools generally stop on the last Friday in June so we are still affected by price hikes but not to the same extent. This year we are leaving here on the Wednesday before school stops (our girls will miss 2.5 days) and I know a number of other families who are doing exactly the same to go on these holidays so as to get the cheaper prices. It costs us over £100 each way in petrol and overnight stays because we are so far from the Channel ports which adds a fair amount to the cost of the holiday.

I take it all back.. my son's school can be quite accomodating..

going back to the start of the thread, i think i said we were going to Malta on 22 May (about 2 days before the end of term) and was on about the school having double standards..i digress..

we found out last week ( after checking previously that there were no exams!) that Gav was now scheduled to have a GCSE IT exam on the day we fly!!!

I spoke to the exam officer at school who was not at all helpful and so i decided to speak to Gav's teacher directly. I finally managed to track him down this morning and he has said no problem, Gav can sit the exam in January and he hoped we had a nice holiday...so we are back on track and can have a family holiday after all.

Going back to the original subject of the thread...we had a letter from the school this week ( as did all parents) stating that the Government set target for pupil attendance was 95.3 % per pupil per school year and our school average was only 92. something % and was below the set target so they were going to introduce measures to raise this to meet Govt guidelines. They suggested no holidays in term time, parents being really strict and only allowing children time off school for illness if they were severely ill and said they would check every reported illness!
The school said it was parent's fault the school did not meet the Govt target ( technically yes) but they made no mention of the fact they are shut for 3 weeks (15 days) while they move to a new site and no mention of the fact that some pupils do not attend school due to being excluded (and there are quite a few at Gav's school) which all affects attendance statistics.

10 days off school = 95% attendance
15 days off = 92% attendance
20 days off = 89% attendance
30 days off = 84% attendance

could the Govt target of 95% attendance be one of the reasons why school will not allow more than 10 days holiday during term time?

I don't have children and can holiday any time, but it irritates me that those of you who do have to put up with this daylight robbery.

They keep saying the prices are high in school holidays because of demand and that it is all about the hotels. Well, considering Scottish schools break up some weeks before England and Wales that's a pile of rubbish. Brochures released in Scotland I believe have their prices hiked up at the start of their holidays, just as brochures in England do. So this is not about hotels passing on high prices because of high demand at all, otherwise they'd go up at exactly the same time in England and stay that way right through until September.

I don't know what is to be done about it, but I also can't understand the flight supplements system. Pay more for regional airports - why? Pay more to travel during the day - why? Pay more to travel at the weekend - why) (business travellers pay less to travel at the weekend!).

hi all, what gets me is that at my sons school, they are quite happy to take teacher days and take them on residentials and on day trips. these all come to more than 10 days a shool year. now we have never had any probs with taking him out, but he has very little time off sick, but even if they did introduce a fine it will still be cheaper to pay that then to go peak time. by the way you are legally allowed to take up to 10 days per year without any repercussions.

Not to mention closing the schools when there is a light dusting of snow. More about the teachers than the pupils from what I hear.

the school where i work and both my boys go to are very good about taking holidays, we are off for 2 weeks in oct then 1 week school holidays when we get back.
so no complaints from me. why cant the prices be the same all year round that we be alot easier then us parents would not have to take the kids out of school.
my holiday was £1400 dearer for 2 weeks later sorry but we cant afford prices like that.

A friend of ours works in the travel industry and she told me that as schools in different areas take half terms at different times, they stuck the prices up for an entire month just to cover the lot eg: Like half term now, our kids are off this week so prices will hike higher, but kids in Sheffield were off last week, so prices were higher..and they put the prices up a week either side of that. These holiday firms definitely have parents staring down a barrell...

I don't know what is to be done about it, but I also can't understand the flight supplements system. Pay more for regional airports - why? Pay more to travel during the day - why? Pay more to travel at the weekend - why) (business travellers pay less to travel at the weekend!).

Or put another way - willing to put up with the inconvenience of travelling to the major hub where our service costs per flight are less because we have so many more of them? Pay less! Willing to put up with a night flight and arriving in the early hours with over-tired whingy kids? Pay less! Willing to use up an extra day's annual leave by travelling Wednesday to Wednesday? Pay less! Willing to incur an extra day's hotel costs by delaying your return from that business trip until Saturday morning? Pay less! Want to spend Sunday with your kids instead of flying off early for that Monday morning meeting? Pay more!

The opposite of paying more for what suits you is to pay less for what suits the airline, TO, hotel etc. You pays your money and takes your choice with this as much as anything else.

I haven't read the whole thread sorry but I have to say this

Each class contains around 30 kids and one teacher.

Teachers have absolutely no choice about when they take their holidays. And contrary to some peoples opinions they do a lot of work during the school holidays preapring for the next term.

The only way a teacher can ensure that they get through the curriculum and give each child the time and assistance they need is by ALL CHILDREN
BEING IN CLASS AT THE SAME TIME. So they can ensure everyone is keeping up.

When one kid misses even a couple of days of term they will need significant help to catch up. I know this from experience - I was top of my class in maths, missed two days with illness and spent the rest of the term 2 lessons behind the rest of the class.

The time needed to help a child catch up could be spent teaching them something else or helping someone else.

If lots of kids miss classes over the year the teacher's job gets even harder.

It's really not comparible to one or more lessons being cancelled for the whole class.

I know one day over allocation at the end of term may seem like nothing but they have a policy which they are applying fairly. In my opinion there shouldn't be an allocation and with the exception of significant family events, educational or once in a lifetime trips you should always plan you holiday within the school hols, not so you come back just before them.

I bet most of you didn't know that most teachers are paid pro rata!
meaning they don't get 13 weeks a years paid holiday!!! They are paid every month but it's worked out pro rata for the year!

How do you work that one out then Chivas?

Teachers get paid an annual salary which is split up into 12 equal monthly payments - isn't that just like you and I?