More than 300 schools in England and Wales planned partial or full closures during the June 2026 heatwave, with temperatures exceeding 35 degrees Celsius. By early July that figure had risen to reports of over 1000 schools across the United Kingdom sending pupils home early or shutting for days.
Official government guidance is clear. Schools should remain open during hot weather and allow as many children to attend as possible where it is safe to do so. The advice stresses that attending school remains the best way for pupils to learn and reach their potential, and that high temperatures can usually be managed with straightforward measures.
Those measures include increasing opportunities for hydration, providing cooler areas, adjusting timetables while still maintaining teaching time, relaxing uniform rules and adapting activities. Only when conditions become genuinely unsafe should a school close temporarily, and even then it must communicate directly with parents on arrangements for remote learning.
The Department for Education does not normally advise closures during high temperatures. Instead it issues guidance on how to manage them. A prolonged spell of hot weather continued into July, with temperatures expected to reach the mid-30s and amber or yellow heat-health alerts in place. Yet the pattern of disruption repeated itself.
Commentary challenges closure decisions
A commentary published on 14 July argued that the heatwave should not be used as an excuse to close schools. It stressed that in nearly all cases children are safer in the classroom, according to The Telegraph.
This view aligns with the official position but sits in tension with the scale of closures seen in recent weeks. The decision by so many headteachers to shut their doors, even temporarily, raises questions about whether practical adjustments are being prioritised or whether the default response has shifted towards disruption.
