School staff and school holidays

[salondon]

During holidays, if the staff isn't on vacation are they contactable?
d
That is, do they check emails/are they expected to? Are they around if I call the office and ask them for an appointment will I get one?

I need to know who is supporting my daughter from September

[chocisonabikinidiet]

Is far as I am aware re Dd's school it is all closed over the summer hols. I think this is common.

[lougle]

No. Teachers are contracted for 1265 hours per year of 'directed time', most of which are spread over 190 school days and 5 inset days. The remainder will be taken up by staff meetings, parents evenings, etc. They're not paid/contracted to work in the holidays (although they are paid in 1/12th instalments, they don't get paid for the holidays other than the 5.6 weeks that all employees are entitled to).

so, in short, they aren't contracted to be in school during the holidays and if they are in they are attending on their own time, so they won't be required to hold meetings/calls/emails with parents.

[salondon]

I suspected that would be the case. What about the HT or the SENCO?

[NoRunAround]

The HT at ds' last primary regularly checked emails and responded. It's worth having a go, IMO.

[KOKOagainandagain]

DS2 does not have a school place from sept as we are moving and he can't just rock up on the first day of term as he has just been statemented.

Admissions said that schools have 15 working days to respond and seemed to think it would be the same in the holidays. Given they prefer snail mail or fax and there are no staff at the village primary over summer I don't see how this can be the case.

[lougle]

I don't think summer holidays can be counted, keep, because they are not school days.

[BackforGood]

salondon If you have an e-mail address for the person you are trying to contact, then it won't harm to ask the question, but, as others have said, they are not contractually obliged to do any work.
Some staff prefer to start in September with an empty inbox, and may look, but that might not necessarily be a query they can answer, and, of course, they may decide not to read them whilst on holiday.

KeepOn - I agree with Lougle - it's 15 working days which school holidays aren't, for schools.

[eatyourveg]

I've had an email from one of my FE students who is now thinking of dropping out. We broke up at the end of June but I check my work emails regularly. We have arranged to meet in college next week. Don't mind at all.

ds3's head of year (Y11) sent home a letter saying she was contactable throughout the holidays for anyone with queries about their future ie staying on for 6th form or going to college.

Think if I was told I had to check and respond to messages contractually, I would be wanting to get paid for it. As it stands, its on my terms

If I were senco however, I would want to be contactable for new parents, not sure if the OP is a new or existing parent but it would be helpful to know who the support was going to be to prepare the dc and if need be meet up before the start of term. (ds2 did this last summer when he moved from ss to ms college) I have sometimes gone into college over the summer to give new aen students an orientation tour when its much quieter and to give them photos of staff they are likely to encounter. One summer I went in for a student who had real problems with the lack of routine so we just met at college once a week either for coffee or to go through texts for the following year. The routine of getting up and catching the bus to college helped him hugely.

However if your school is like our college OP, they may not yet have decided who the support is going to be so any email/phone call could be fruitless

[salondon]

I have their email ids and the HT has in the past emailed us back in evenings and weekends(when we were negotiating the statement)

Will email them and see. Thanks

[salondon]

Why can't they set their out of office reply I wonder

[salondon]

To update: I emailed the HT and the SENCO. The HT replied within an hour saying they are waiting for references to clear and will update the tutors of the outcome once that is done.

Some progress

[NoRunAround]

Progress indeed, fingers crossed for you