Nearly 18,000 responses have been received from people sharing their views on when school holidays in Ashby and Leicestershire should fall.

In eight-week consultations held by Leicestershire County Council this summer, the majority said they did not want big changes to the existing term time patterns.

When it meets next week, Leicestershire County Council's ruling cabinet will be advised to opt to preserve Leicestershire's 'July Fortnight', an earlier October half term and a longer autumn term.

The city council will also look to adopt the same option next week following feedback from city residents.

The consultations ran separately, but at the same time with the same proposed patterns, and presented a number of options, which included bringing the city and county in line with national holidays.

Councillor Deborah Taylor, county council cabinet member for children and families, said: "Firstly, we would like to say a huge thank you to everyone who took time to voice their views in our consultation.

"We had nearly 12,500 responses in the county, which reflects the strength of feeling and importance this has to many.

"Every few years we stop and ask people for their views on school term dates rather than just automatically keep setting them.

"We do this to make sure that the dates we have in place are continuing to work in the best way possible for the majority of our young people and their families who live in, work in, or attend school in the local area."

Councillor Elly Cutkelvin, assistant city mayor for education, said: "The city council received more than 5,500 responses to our consultation and the majority – 65.8 per cent - wanted to keep the existing pattern.

"It's good news that the majority of both city and county respondents have chosen to keep the same pattern, as this will help families who live in the city but work in county schools or whose children choose to attend county schools.

"It's also clear that local people in the city and county find it an advantage to have some of their holiday periods slightly out of step with other schools nationally. Thank you to everyone who took part in the consultation."

Around 69 per cent of respondents in the county wanted to keep the traditional holiday pattern.

Popular reasons included the opportunity to have less busy, affordable, quality family holidays.

And if agreed by both authorities next week, the city and county's term time dates will be aligned going forward for the next five years from autumn 2022 through to summer 2027.

After the county council's Cabinet meeting on Friday, September 17, the agreed dates will be published on its school admissions web pages: HERE.

Some academies might be following a different term-time pattern to their local authorities.