UK school scraps term time, opens for 11 months a year in bid to attract parents

The school says families can go on holiday at any point during term time. Photo / 123rf

A preparatory school has scrapped term times and now opens for 11 months a year in an attempt to attract parents.

Shrewsbury Prepatoria, a small school in Shropshire for children aged four to seven, is opening for 48 weeks a year and says families can go on holiday at any point during term time.

The school said that the three term structure "is no longer necessary" and "doesn't fit in with family life".

They said that teaching will take place at a slower pace, and subjects will be revisited at various points during the year so that if children are on holiday they do not miss out on important topics, the Daily Telegraph reports.

"Family holidays, taken outside of school terms are expensive, so we've arranged for our families to take up to 9 weeks annual leave, without penalty, at anytime of the year," the school says on its website, adding: "Imagine the savings you could make".

Shrewsbury Prepatoria goes on to say that parents "can forget about the need for expensive holiday clubs", adding that school fees of £6,540 a year will save parents thousands of pounds in childcare fees.

Taking term time holidays is illegal at state schools, and parents can be fined by local authorities for their children's "unauthorised" absences.

However, families with children at private schools can go on holiday during term time without fear of being fined.

"Who realistically (except for teachers) actually receives 13 weeks holiday per year? Certainly not our parents. We knew that there were strong levels of parental demand for an alternative approach to schooling in the local area," Jane Smalley, the school's founder and head teacher, told The Times.

"What parents coming to us have so strongly embraced is a combination of the educational philosophy that we offer, the family-centric ethos of the school, the quality of our teaching and, of course, the flexibility to holiday as a family at a time to suit them."