This petition was submitted during the 2019-2024 parliament
Rejected petition Change the academic year to run from January in light of covid-19 pandemic
This would enable all schools and pupils to have what would have been the ordinary summer term of the 2019-2020 academic year from September - December; ensuring that no children miss out on essential aspects of the curriculum for their current year group. Leaving them at a disadvantage.
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This would also mean that all children can finish their school year properly. Many childre finished with no opportunity to say goodbye to friends - knowing that they would return to their peer groups would surely lessen some of the anxiety.
This would also ensure that transitions between years, between nursery& school, between primary& secondary,& from secondary to further education can be properly planned - hopefully lessening anxieties for children, young people, their parents and teachers.
This petition was rejected
Why was this petition rejected?
It’s about something that the UK Government or Parliament is not directly responsible for.
Setting term dates is the responsibility of local authorities in most cases, and school governing bodies in others. For more information see: https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/sn07148/.
You may therefore wish to submit a petition to your local authority, which we can see is Birmingham City Council, calling for this to happen: https://www.birmingham.gov.uk/info/20146/consultation_and_engagement/702/petitions.
Given your concern about the impact of closures on the school year, you may also wish to sign one or both of these related petitions:
https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/305213
https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/305525.
You can find out more about coronavirus and how you can protect yourself and others here:
www.gov.uk/coronavirus
https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/coronavirus-covid-19/
You can read NHS tips to help if you are worried about coronavirus here: https://www.nhs.uk/oneyou/every-mind-matters/coronavirus-covid-19-anxiety-tips
You can read impartial analysis of the Government response to coronavirus and policy developments here: https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/coronavirus/
You may also be interested to know that because of the large number of petitions that have been started in relation to coronavirus, the Petitions Committee has been questioning the Government about its response to the coronavirus outbreak.
Find out more and watch the Committee put questions suggested by petitioners to Government Ministers and the Deputy Chief Medical Officer: https://committees.parliament.uk/committee/326/petitions-committee/news/145767/committee-question-deputy-chief-medical-officer-and-ministers-on-coronavirus-response/
Read letters asking further questions of Government Ministers: https://committees.parliament.uk/committee/326/petitions-committee/publications/3/correspondence/
We only reject petitions that don’t meet the petition standards.