NEARLY 18,000 responses have been received from people sharing their views on when school holidays in Leicester and Leicestershire should fall.
In eight-week consultations held by Leicestershire County and Leicester City councils this summer, the majority said they didn’t want big changes to the existing term time patterns.
When it meets this week, Leicestershire County Council’s ruling cabinet will be advised to opt to preserve Leicestershire’s ‘July Fortnight’, an earlier October half term and a longer autumn term.
The city council will also be following the same pattern, after the majority of consultation responses favoured the existing term dates.
The consultations ran separately, but at the same time with the same proposed patterns, and presented a number of options, which included bringing the city and county in line with national holidays.
Councillor Deborah Taylor, county council cabinet member for children and families, said: “Firstly, we would like to say a huge thank you to everyone who took time to voice their views in our consultation.
“We had nearly 12,500 responses in the county, which reflects the strength of feeling and importance this has to many.
“Every few years we stop and ask people for their views on school term dates rather than just automatically keep setting them.
“We do this to make sure that the dates we have in place are continuing to work in the best way possible for the majority of our young people and their families who live in, work in, or attend school in the local area.”
Councillor Elly Cutkelvin, assistant city mayor for education, said: “The city council received more than 5,500 responses to our consultation and the majority – 65.8% - wanted to keep the existing pattern.
“It’s good news that the majority of both city and county respondents have chosen to keep the same pattern, as this will help families who live in the city but work in county schools or whose children choose to attend county schools.
“It’s also clear that local people in the city and county find it an advantage to have some of their holiday periods slightly out of step with other schools nationally. Thank you to everyone who took part in the consultation.”
Around 69% of respondents in the county wanted to keep the traditional holiday pattern. Popular reasons included the opportunity to have less busy, affordable, quality family holidays.
Retaining the current term date pattern will mean that the city and county’s term time dates will continue to be aligned going forward for the next five years from autumn 2022 through to summer 2027.
After the county council’s Cabinet meeting on Friday, September 17, the agreed dates will be published on its school admissions web pages: www.leicestershire.gov.uk/education-and-children/schools-colleges-and-academies/school-admissions
The city council dates will be published on the city’ council’s website at: www.leicester.gov.uk/schools-and-learning/school-and-colleges/term-dates/
Some academies might be following a different term-time pattern to their local authority’s. If your child’s school is an academy, and you are unsure of their future term dates, please check their website or contact them directly.
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