The first letter in this series was written in frustration — in response to a school communication that seemed to confuse the effects of heat with the effects of relaxed uniform. This one comes from a different place.
During the same spell of extreme weather, another school made the difficult decision to cancel an outdoor trip and postpone a community event during a red heat-health alert. For one parent, it stood out as an example of calm, child-centred leadership under pressure.
What follows is a lightly anonymised version of the note they wrote in response.
Dear Headteacher,
I just wanted to write a quick note to say thank you for the message you sent to families this week, and to recognise the decision you made to cancel an outdoor school trip during the red heat-health alert, along with the separate decision by your PTA to postpone the school’s community event later that week.
I know from my own experience as a teacher, and from the many trips I have run over the years, that it wouldn’t have been an easy call. Children would have been excited. Staff would have put a huge amount of work into it. There would have been logistical and financial implications, and probably quite a bit of disappointment as well. So I don’t think decisions like that should pass without being properly acknowledged.
From where I’m standing, it felt like a really clear example of children’s safety and wellbeing being put first. And I think that kind of decision-making matters, particularly now, and particularly given the work many of us are doing around climate change, pupil wellbeing and safeguarding in schools.
I happened to be at the event site itself that day, and it was uncomfortably hot even in a covered indoor space. Most of the children I saw were visibly flushed. Staff were doing their absolute best – making sure children had hats, had water, had whatever they could to keep them cool. Some had fans. I also saw children receiving medical attention for heat-related symptoms, and heard of further cases elsewhere on site. So, reading your message, I have to say I felt relieved. Not because anyone wants cancellations. Of course not. But because there was a seriousness in your response that matched the reality of the conditions. And I just felt that shouldn’t be taken for granted.
One of the loveliest parts of the day, incidentally, was hearing from my own child about the alternative activities you put on instead. Apparently, getting to sit with feet in a tray of water was a particular highlight, which made us smile. It sounds like one of those small, thoughtful moments of care that children remember. At the same time, it also rather captures where schools are at the moment: finding inventive, short-term ways of helping children cope in conditions that are becoming less unusual than they used to be. That, I think, is the bigger point.
A red heat-health alert, with language about risk to life even for healthy individuals, is not something most of us would have expected to be factoring into school decision-making in quite this way even a few years ago. And yet now it is shaping choices about trips, outdoor provision, transport, enrichment events and the practical rhythms of the school day. So when a school responds well to such a significant shift – calmly, proportionately, and with children’s wellbeing clearly at the centre – I think it’s worth saying so.
I also think moments like this remind us why climate action planning in schools matters. Not in an abstract sense, and not simply as a policy requirement, but in a very practical, lived sense. Because this is what climate adaptation looks like on the ground: difficult calls, operational judgement, safeguarding decisions, communication with families, and trying to balance children’s experiences with the realities of increasingly extreme conditions.
I know many schools already have climate and sustainability work underway, often led by committed and capable individuals. That is hugely valuable. But I think weeks like this also show why that work can’t sit too narrowly with one person, or one small cluster of people, however excellent they are.
Because the implications are whole-school by their nature. They reach into trips and visits. Into buildings and grounds. Into routines, timetables and contingency plans. Into communication, governance and pastoral care. And they point, quite strongly, towards the need for adaptation that is not only reactive, but increasingly proactive too.
That might mean increasing shaded areas. Planting for future canopy cover. Thinking more deliberately about how outdoor and indoor spaces heat up, and how they might stay cooler. Looking at where children gather, wait, eat and play during hot weather.
While short-term responses are essential, and they tell us a great deal about a school’s instincts and values, trays of water for tired feet, lovely though they are, are not a long-term adaptation strategy. And I suspect most school leaders know that already.
What feels encouraging here is that the foundations seem to be in place. The decision itself suggested a school that is capable of joining the dots between public health guidance, safeguarding, pupil wellbeing and practical leadership. That is no small thing. The task now, perhaps, is to keep building on that foundation in a way that is shared across staff, leadership and governors – so that as these conditions become more common, the burden of decision-making becomes lighter rather than heavier, because the thinking has already begun.
I just wanted to say all of that, partly because good decisions deserve to be recognised, and partly because I’ve seen, over the past week, responses elsewhere that have left me disappointed at best and seriously concerned at worst.
With best wishes, A parent
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