Closing schools for election days!

[Okanagan]

There is a secondary school literally just over the road from our primary which has a sports hall with an external entrance - so no need to even go into the school to get into the hall. Why not use that? It might mean that a few classes need to take place outside, or do something which needs a bit less space - but it would only be affecting a few classes for one lesson in the day, rather than needing to close a whole primary school.

[GetAhead]

Our local school was closed for polling - the only problem is that it is not even a polling station! I have no idea what their excuse is

[Okanagan]

Well I went over and voted - and on the whole sheet of names I was on there was only one other marked as having been in and voted. Looks like the number of votes cast at the school will be well under the number of children who've missed a day of education.

[Okanagan]

So having just had the Easter holiday (ours was a week earlier than most people had, so they've been back this week) we now have another day off for a teacher training day. It's not long until we have another Polling Day closure on Thursday 2nd May, followed by the bank holiday on Monday 6th. Why couldn't they have had their training day on polling day? Surely these scheduled election days are known about well in advance and it wouldn't be too difficult to make the training days coincide rather than shutting the school twice? Or perhaps they could have had it on the Friday the day after the election to make a 6 day break for the children?

[mike1880]

If we followed most other countries and held elections on Sundays it wouldn't matter whether schools were polling stations or not. There's no excuse for holding elections on a working day.

[WOTMum]

I worked as a Presiding Officer (person who runs the polling station with help of Poll Clerk(s)) for about 12 years. I know from the two local authorities I have worked for just how difficult it is to get enough suitable/accessible venues that can be used for elections, each one needing to be able to cope with potentially 3,000 voters on the day, and actually handling maybe 25% of these, but nearer 70% in a General Election. There needs to be a dedicated route in and out, so we can ensure we don't lose voters within the building (risk or people attempting to vote twice); usually good to have a reception/hallway out front for tellers (people who ask for your number as you depart) and it needs to be accessible or to be modified to allow access for wheelchairs of all types, including motorised ones. Many halls are privately run and availability/cost can be a big problem - I'm sure insurance would be an issue also. Hence why publicly owned halls, friendly Churches and schools nearly always end up being the venues used. LAs don't like to change venues any more than necessary either, or we have the problem of people not knowing where to go or turning up where they have always voted, having not looked at any revisions on their Notice of Poll card sent in the post. There are so many diffculties/vagaries of running a "pop up" office with several hundred visitors in someone else's building - hence the schools used are usually still LA controlled ones rather than academies etc, as they do not generally accept the disruption. Postal voting has been a godsend in recent years to busy or double stations, where people management can be really hard. One year I was in a church hall with 4 polling stations - access and queuing very difficult to manage...not sure if they managed to shift two out the next year to the local school or not..... I have not worked on Elections since 2011 now due to new work commitments but sure that postal and in-supermarket voting is the way to go.... though neither of my DC's schools now close their infant one did, and for eight years of Elections I had to get childcare myself so see both sides.

[mystery]

So there's the answer Okanagan - become an academy and say "NO!".

My work is currently flexible so from another perspective I would welcome our school becoming a polling station whenever there was any kind of election as it is, most years (but not every year), the case that a day at school is a lost learning opportunity.

[Okanagan]

I still don't see why, with the election dates known so far in advance, they can't run teacher training days to coincide with elections. It wouldn't be that hard to plan, surely?

[mystery]

No it wouldn't be difficult. Maybe they want the days off?

[Hera]

It is combined with a teacher training day at DC's primary.