COUNCIL chiefs have been asked to review the February school holiday in Argyll and Bute, after concerns were raised that it comes too soon after Christmas.

A calendar of school holidays for the next three academic years, from 2023/24 to 2025/26, was agreed by the council’s community services committee.

But it could be reviewed within a year after a former teacher and a current councillor remarked on the timing of the February holiday.

In 2023/24, pupils will start their week’s holiday from Monday, February 12 and return on Tuesday, February 20. Monday, February 19 will be a teacher in-service day.

The start of that holiday is only five and a half weeks after schools resume after Christmas.

The discussion took place, and the calendar of holidays was agreed, at a meeting of the committee on Thursday, August 25.

Former teacher Margaret Anderson said: “I accept that this has been consulted on and discussed, but for future consultations, we should consider the February holiday.

“I note that in the three years, the February holiday starts five weeks after the pupils come back after Christmas, which seems a very short time.

“When I started teaching in the area in 1977, and retired in 2012, the February holiday was two days long. What is the rationale behind an eight-day holiday?

“It is in a cold part of the year and most families will not be able to take their kids away on holiday. They are better off having holidays when they can be out playing and joining clubs.

'A very strange time'

“It seems a very strange time to have children off school for eight days.”
Wendy Brownlie, one of the council’s heads of education, said: “The establishment of a February holiday was part of the consultation process carried out three years ago for the last three years.”

Councillor Math Campbell-Sturgess (SNP, Helensburgh and Lomond) then said: “I was going to comment in a similar vein about having kids off school for a whole week in February.

“We are staring down the barrel of a horrendous situation for energy and heating. During the holiday, parents not only have to look after their kids, but they are in the house using energy and heating.

“There has been a conversation about moving to a longer summer holiday – is that something that would be seriously looked into?”

Chief education officer Jennifer Crocket responded: “When the results came back to us in May, the people responding possibly did not know where we were going to be at this stage.”

Councillor Gordon Blair (SNP, Cowal) asked: “Could we maybe review this in a year’s time, given the changing goalposts in the economy?”

Ms Crocket responded: “That is something we can look at, although a three-year setting of holidays has been a statutory process.”