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majorbloodnock

After school clubs

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I'm on the scrounge for a bit of brain-picking again, I'm afraid.

 

I live in a fairly small Surrey village, and whilst there is an Infant school, the local nursery is stopping their after school care and concentrating purely on babes and preschool children. Given the almost complete lack of alternative childcare facilities for school children, this makes things intensely difficult for working parents of kids using the local school.

 

I recently learned that the Government a few years back pledged that all primary schools would eventually provide wrap-around care to cover the working day. However, this was under the Labour Government, and I've had conflicting messages about what are a school's current official responsibilities in this respect, and how/when those formal responsibilities will change in the near future. Particularly, I'd be grateful if anyone can point me to any official documentation.

 

Other important questions related to this are, of course, whether or not this pledge aimed at primary schools is relevant to infant schools too, whether the pledge formed an obligation or just an expectation of "best endeavours" and what, if any, factors might form a legitimate get-out clause for schools.

 

Anyone any ideas? From past performance, it seems that if anyone knows it'll be someone here.

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I had the same problem when my daughter was little and I recall some schools starting up after school clubs, but don't know the official policy on it. There are several child minders locally who operate a 'pick up from school' service, perhaps there is something like that near to you.

 

I really struggled with school holidays, but luckily our local sports centre did holiday clubs with swimming, sports and craft activities... they fed and exhausted your child for about £9 per day. :D

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I think the wrap around care was all organised around the children's centres (lots of them funded by SureStart money)and some local authorities seemed to have more of these than others. Now with the change of government, I don't think authorities now need to be as committed to their children's centres as they were and indeed many of them are closing down, or reverting to their original remit, which was to encourage participation for 'hard to reach families'.

 

This might help

http://www.direct.gov.uk/en/Parents/Preschooldevelopmentandlearning/NurseriesPlaygroupsReceptionClasses/DG_173054

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Hi Major

 

"Extended Services" - my understanding (could be a little out of date!) is that, if the school doesn't offer provision themselves (ie before and after school clubs to cover the working hours in a day), then they must direct you to a local provision. They do not have to offer all elements themselves nor on the school site (so it's possible that they can offer after school clubs but not before school and for any gaps they can direct your to your LA to find a registered childminder). You can get more info from your Local Authority’s Play & Childcare Development Officer/Co-ordinator and there's more here and possibly through the Family Information Service.

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@BarbaraJ, unfortunately not. There is only one childminder close enough to pick up from school, and she's offered to take on another assistant to increase her capacity to take on 6 new school age children. A quick straw poll I carried out to find out interest in advance of a meeting with the school demonstrated a fairly conservative estimate of a dozen kids needing after school care, so that's quite a shortfall. Moreover, the list of registered childcare providers in the area (as printed out by the county council) showed the nearest 8 childminders were all too far away, and none specified our school as one they'll pick up from; unsurprising, since they're all at least 8 miles away. This is just the reason we're all so keen to investigate setting up some kind of wrap around care in the village.

 

@Tutti Frutti, thanks for that. That's what my understanding was - that the school needn't offer a service that already exists elsewhere. However, you use the word "must", and that's exactly what I'm trying to find out. Is it a "must" or a "should"? If it is a "must", where is it written and is it enforceable?

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Following on from this, I must say "thank you" to Tutti frutti. I've now read through one of the documents she linked to, and that allowed me to find the original "Extended Schools" prospectus. Armed with that, I've gained easily enough specific information to send a direct question to the Department of Education, so I should have a definitive answer pretty soon. Basically, it all hinges on whether the current Government are honouring a pledge made by the last. We'll see.

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Your other option for after school childcare is to use the legislation to request flexible working. Employers don't necessarily like this but they have to consider the request seriously. My manager at the time was livid with me for asking under the legislation :evil: but he had other home workers so had to agree and he got over it once he realised I was no less productive. :roll:

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Your other option for after school childcare is to use the legislation to request flexible working. Employers don't necessarily like this but they have to consider the request seriously. My manager at the time was livid with me for asking under the legislation :evil: but he had other home workers so had to agree and he got over it once he realised I was no less productive. :roll:

 

From a purely selfish point of view, the company I work for is already happy for me to vary my start/finish times and to work from home, both as a routine and to cover exceptions (such as YET ANOTHER inset day :evil: ), so I'm pretty well set for that. However, that's neither efficient nor ideal use of my time, and the sheer percentage of parents at this school needing but unable to get after school care demonstrates an overwhelming need, and I appear to be in the best position to push the school to try to address that need. So far, they've adopted the ostrich position, but I need something tangible to force them out of it.

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Perhaps you could encourage a local company to set up a club?

 

I thought of this thread this morning when dog walking friend was complaining that his son's school have given them just 2 working days notice to find cover due to teachers on strike next week :roll: Apparently, the official minimum limit they need to give is 48 hours :shock: How on earth are working parents expected to manage with that? Honestly, some schools drive me mad... Rosie's primary school was one example with endless parent meetings at 2pm :roll: Methinks they need to get their act together regarding working parents... someone could start up a very profitable company for this... I hear that a local nursery sends out two of their staff to collect children from local primary schools near to them - they walk them back to the nursery in a crocodile, give them a snack and look after them until they can be collected.

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