School Detention - Fair?

It must be well over by now and will soon be forgotten. School is like that sometimes, unfortunately.

Collective punishments are specifically prohibited under the Geneva Convention.
Subsequently, it's literally a human rights breach.

I would never support a whole class detention unless literally every child had done something worthy of a detention.

Peripheral ...not original. 😁

This isn't a new thing though. We were given detentions/litter duty when I was at school 30 years ago for forgetting books. I once forgot my hymn book and got a break time litter duty. I'd never forgotten before in 3 years. And never did again. It was genuinely an accident. So yes maybe they could have let me off, but the issue is is that it wasn't students like me that caused the rule in the first place. I'm sure the school don't really mind if a generally good student forgets a hymn book or a diary or whatever. The problem is the type of student who NEVER remembers them. We had boys like it at school. "Can't write the homework down sir I don't have a pen/ my diary". Teacher gives them pen and bit of paper. Next day "lost the bit of paper sir so haven't done the homework". And this on repeat almost every day. And you can't only give the "bad" students detention and let off the "good" students. It has to be the same punishment.
We also had collective class detentions for talking. Again, I never was the one talking. Did I think it was unfair? Yes. Did I complain to my parents? Yes. They kindly agreed that it was unfair but unfortunately sometimes things aren't fair and while annoying it was only missing a break time occasionally so i was pretty much told to suck it up. I'm now in my 40s and survived the odd collective class punishment without too many scars!

Does your school do whole class detentions?
I didn't know schools did that any more.

Retired teacher here. Whole class punishments are awful. The well behaved kids have already had their lesson spoilt/disrupted because of the behaviour of a few others.in my experience this type of sanction is often used when the teacher has lost control of the class, says something like 'you are all staying in' and doesn't reassess when he/she has calmed down
I would tell your son you are going to complain to the teacher because he wasn't in any way involved. Watch his reaction..if he says that's good or similar he probably wasn't involved. If he says just leave it that's more problematical. Could be he was more involved than he's saying ...not main trouble maker but on the original ...or he might just not want you going in to complain. If you do go in I would ask in what way your son was involved because he doesn't believe he was involved at all ...rather than staying categorically he was not involved..You weren't there and that way it doesn't look like you have made up your mind before talking to her. Take your son with you. Tell him you are going to listen to her view as well. 💐

If the culprits are known, unfair.

I'm a retired teacher, and I'm really surprised that whole class detentions are still given. I thought that kind of thinking had died out long ago.

There was collective punishment when I was at school, (50s and 60s) but I thought they’d stopped them now.

No, it’s not fair, but it’s only a lunchtime detention - probably not the battle hill to choose to die on.

OP I'd personally be calling the school to say that he wasn't going to be attending the lunch time detention and that you want to see a copy of the behaviour policy that includes whole class punishments.

Very stupid indeed.

Oops tapped wrong option
YANBU but unfortunately this is the way a lot of schools are going.
My DF was a teacher, when we got similar while class detentions at our school he called and complained fir exactly the same reasons.
The lunchtime hall detention sounds awful! Effectively denying a child a free break....that should not be allowed IMHO

Unfortunately rather than deal with individuals who cause issues schools would rather punish the whole class or focus on minor indiscretion of the students that generally do behave.

I trust my kids school implicitly, so if my child got a detention, I'd not be questioning it's fairness.

Depends how much you trust the school tbh.

Unfortunately your child is being punished for not going to the detention. Having 2 kids in year 8 and 1 in year 10 I’m surprised he could have innocently forgotten about it. I’m sure most of the other kids in his class/form would have been moaning about missing lunch time due to detention on the morning of it.

Seriously if this school is giving out detentions for forgetting stuff like a diary then i’d be escalating that further. No wonder MH is crap and kids don’t want to go to school. I wouldn’t be punished at work for forgetting my work pass for example so why are kids being treated like shit?

None of can say whether the original detention was fair.
The punishment for missing detention is fair.

However those lunch time detentions sound awful. At least at DDs school they are in a classroom and do work...

Interesting that you know he did nothing wrong but the adult who was there at the time was unaware of this.

Perhaps ask for further clarification of the incident and your child's involvement from the teacher involved before deciding on your next step. I agree collective punishments are unfair but often the child's version of events differs quite drastically from the teachers.

If you punish kids when you are not sure they have done anything wrong, then you are a first class CF and a bully.

I totally get what you mean. My son was in a class and the usual couple of kids were being cheeky. Teacher lost it shouting, a group of kids started crying at shock of how angry teacher was. Teacher then asked my son to get help outside (was obviously viewed as the sensible one to help in this scenario). Son went round school, explained to teacher and got help. Well then there was a whole class detention including him!!! So thanks for absolutely nothing!

I would also love to ask a teacher why they do this? Why would you punish the good kids because of the naughty ones? Ive heard the saying it's to make the naughty ones feel guilty!! When will the teachers realise it doesn't!!!
It just says lazy teacher to me! It's a very unfair lazy way to deal with the naughty kids.

I would write to the school, and point out that your son was not involved at all in the behaviour that caused the first detention; that he genuinely forgot 4 days later (as he is not used to being in detention - not in his radar); that he owned up and apologised and was then punished twice, once by being put in lunchtime detention and once for missing football. I would say you consider the sanction utterly disproportionate - either another break time detention, or at most a lunchtime detention on a non-football day would have been more than sufficient. Say that this is affecting your son’s attitude to school and you feel that not only was the punishment hugely disproportionate, but that you are worried because he is still brooding about it, and you feel it is souring his relationship with school, which as a parent you naturally find worrying.