What are your plans this February half term? Will you be skiing en famille in Val D’Isere, popping to Cape Town, jetting off to visit friends in Abu Dhabi? Or will you, like me, be trudging around in the rain, trying to convince your five-year old that a “holiday camp” at the school they already go to every day is a treat?
It’s my own fault, of course. I’ve chosen to live in one of London’s most bougie neighbourhoods where a half term automatically equates to a family holiday. If you overhear mums discussing the benefits of Ikos at the school gates, they’re talking about the hotel, not the yoghurt.
I’m lucky: at least my youngest goes to a nursery that is open year-round, and he won’t notice when some of his contemporaries are whipped out for a week, returning with jet lag and a tan. But the eldest realises. He comes home after each school holiday saying things like, “Harry met a lion!” and, “Mummy, what is a zipline?”
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The blocker is financial for most. Who wouldn’t want to escape to somewhere sunny for the most miserable month of the year? But have you seen the prices? A quick glance at the Centre Parcs website shows I would pay £1,899 for four nights over half term. There’s not even a flight involved and we’re already in territory that is totally out of the question.
The cost of exactly the same holiday the following week is £599. When you look at maths like that, the news that the number of term time school holiday fines hit a record last year is unsurprising.
It’s tempting, that’s for sure. The fine is £80 per child, not a patch on the huge amount you’ll save if you skive. And yes, they’ll miss some learning – but in the end, isn’t a family holiday an educational experience in itself? Our annual trip to my Dad’s native Turkey taught me so much about food (and food poisoning), language, geography and my own heritage. You don’t get that making pirate hats and eating a packed lunch in a half-empty school hall.
I’ve asked around and it seems there’s a general consensus around what is and isn’t acceptable when it comes to taking kids out of school. Most think a day here or there to save hundreds, is sort of fine if you’ll be priced out of going away at all otherwise. Even more so if your attendance is otherwise good.
But taking a week out in the middle of term, especially if you have the financial means to do otherwise, is taking the proverbial. I think I’m pretty much in the same camp.
Because if everyone broke the rules, and people were in and out of school whenever they fancied, where would we be? Ultimately, the burden of trying to catch everyone up would fall on the teachers. I have friends who are teachers and I really, really don’t think they deserve a bigger headache than they already have. These people are underpaid saints. And you don’t see them swanning off for some winter sun in the middle of January, do you?
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For me, it’s not the fine that will stop me, though – it’s the fear. I’m not a stickler for the rules in many areas of life, but anywhere near the school gates I’m gripped by a kind of childhood PTSD. If I’m even 30 seconds late to drop my son off in the morning, I am almost hysterical with panic. So the idea of getting into trouble with anyone – the headmistress! – puts the fear of God into me.
So I won’t be heading off to Centre Parcs the week after half term. But I have many, many years of school holidays ahead of me. If I don’t suddenly win the lottery, I might end up taking a day here or there, so that we can go and have the same sort of enriching travel experiences that I did growing up. Food poisoning and all.
Dominque Afacan is a travel and family journalist who writes a newsletter, Nesting.
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