Through Social Schools, you can request leave of absence. The management can approve or reject your request, we use the guidelines for leave as indicated by Leerplicht Den Haag.
Should you not be granted a leave of absence but take a leave of absence, you may be fined from Leerplciht. This fine can be €100 per child per day.
Rules regarding leave and compulsory education can be found below!
Compulsory Education
The Compulsory Education Act applies to all students from the age of 5. This law provides that students can be exempted from compulsory education in certain cases. For up to 10 days per year, the school principal decides. Requests for longer exemptions will always be forwarded to the compulsory education officer of the municipality of The Hague for review. Parents make a request for exemption in a timely manner and in writing . You can get an application form for this at school. Leerplicht Den Haag maintains a generous 8-week notice period. An application for a marriage is, of course, slightly different in terms of deadline than an application for illness, serious circumstances or a funeral.
You will receive the form back with any approval or rejection. The school board is required to report leaves of absence (or absences) without permission to the compulsory education officer. The Hague Schools, under which our school falls administratively, has the following exemptions and guidelines under the Compulsory Education Act:
Age
Compulsory education exists from the age of 5. Children aged 5 may be exempted from school attendance for 5 hours per week (art. 41 WPO). Reliance on this exemption must be reported by parents to the principal. Normal teaching patterns should be disrupted as little as possible by the leave. Thus, the student is always in school for a full morning or afternoon.
Sickness
If the student is ill, he or she is entitled to an exemption.
Leave
Vacation
A request for vacation outside school vacations may be granted once a year for up to 10 days in very special circumstances. It may not be the first 2 weeks of the school year.
However, the legal criterion is that due to the specific nature of one parent’s occupation, the student cannot take a vacation with them/family within the school vacations. This means that, for example, a request for an extra day prior to or following a school vacation will be rejected.
There are only exceptional cases where an appeal cannot take 2 weeks of vacation in one of the school vacations. Hospitality or agricultural sectors are conceivable, but they must be insurmountable business problems. A request for 2 weeks of vacation outside the school vacations will therefore be rejected in principle.
Lifestyle
No later than 2 days before the event, parents may request exemption from an obligation due to religion or belief from the principal. Examples are Feast of Sacrifice, Feast of Sugar, and Yom Kippur.
For such festivals, 1 day of leave is given on the holiday itself. No leave will be given for holidays not generally known. The same applies to events related to an individual’s life beliefs (“We believe it is important that …”).
Weighty circumstances
You can think of a wedding, funeral or moving house. For a (12.5, 40 and 50-year) wedding, there is a restriction to family up to the second degree (parents, siblings, grandparents). When moving, 1 day is granted.
The school may request evidence from you for purposes of accountability for the application of the compulsory education law and required record keeping.