Why is this half of term so short?

A couple of parents have asked me why this term seems short in relation to other terms, so I thought I would explain how this came about.

Let me start by saying that when we work on term dates I pay particular attention to surrounding independent schools; the problem is we like our school to have around 35 teaching weeks and most other independent schools work to around 33-34 weeks.

I realise the Easter break was a little longer than usual; normally its three and half weeks, whereas this year it was four weeks. The problem dates to our Autumn Term and starting date back in January. We like to pack us much of the 35 teaching week year into the first term because of the 11+ exam preparation (we teach for 7-10 days more than most schools in this term). We broke up quite late for Christmas and started back quite early – this accounted for around half a week which was then added to the Easter break. So basically the Autumn term was very long and the Spring term started early. For this term you will see we break up around a week later than most independent schools.

I hope this helps.