Banning brick phones on journeys from school

Yes, poor Mum would have been worried. And scary for you too no doubt. But you got through it and made your way home in the dark with your friends. Your mum could then stop worrying. You learned you could cope. You probably had a good story with your mates. You still remember it now. You have that narrative in your mind of how it all turned out fine, and that taught you something at the time.

If you'd had a phone yes your mum wouldn't have worried and you wouldn't have been scared or confused. But worry, being scared or confused doesn't actually harm us. It teaches us. Its how we are supposed to live. Next time a bus was late or didn't show you'd be better equipped to deal with the situation than you previously were.

And there are more weirdos around than there used to be too. Its crazy that people on a misson can be putting kids into very vulnerable situations.

One of the most nurturing comments I've heard from a secondary, in not the most affluent area "We don't mind about blazers, We appreciate many children will only have one coat / jacket we'd rather it was warm and waterproof"

The past was the past.

Kids used to go to school without shoes.

Just because it happened doesn't mean it has to stay that way.

I’ve just looked up bus deregulation and it was month after I started secondary school so I’d only have been 11. My poor mum.

Yes definitely. If we could have called or messaged it would have stopped all that worry (obviously this predates mobiles and there wasn’t a payphone nearby)
We probably should have walked back to school and tried to see if anyone still there but we kept thinking a bus would turn up.

www.lancashiretelegraph.co.uk/news/19506455.darwen-station-bomb-scare-man-made-comments-9-11-chopping-people/

The first time my dd got train to Manchester alone she was 15. It’s just over an hour one direct train. She later messaged me to say can you pick me up at a random station.

She’d been on train and a man was making threats and had a device. They stopped on train and guard told them to jump down onto tracks and run and hide in bushes. I arrived to a full police cordon and bomb squad carrying out controlled explosions.

(no one was injured and the man was attested)

I always think about it when people say what can go wrong/why would they need to contact you!

Any mum would be worried if their kid was hours late home.

It was all local though. Suburbs. Not far to walk at all. No problem with buses or trains. Lots of kids about.

I do think there needs to be some way of children having a phone on journey to and from school. Some have quite long journeys.
I can remember on day of bus deregulation our bus didn’t turn up and we just waited at stop. We thought a bus would come eventually and didn’t set off walking.
No bus came and all the mums were worrying there’d been a serious accident.
I think I eventually walked and got home several hours later when it was going dark. My mum wasn’t helicopter mum but I know she was worried.

Dark coats no logo. It's only the light of the screen that make kids visible these days!

There were no payphones on my route home from secondary.

I'd been walking home alone for at least 4 years before I started though. (Latch key kid)

Exactly this. Seems nuts to me for a legitimate safety aid to be withheld from kids when alternative means of communication are so much more scant than they used to be.

Yup my older child is a ridged rule follower. My youngest is the one who'd fill a yonder pouch with junk. And have the actual phone in the bag or blazer pocket.

Ok, so there is one train per hour IF things go according to plan, no shelter, no public phones at the tiny stations.
If stuff goes wrong (and it does at least once a month), it usually takes multiple hours to get the next train (rural lines are not a priority). If you would be happy for your 11 year old to be stuck for 2-5 hours at a place without phones, shelter, food, toilets in the dark - just do that. I’m sure they’ll appreciate it when they make it home at 9pm frozen and wet.
I would like to at least know where mine is, and one if the parents collects a car load full.
30 years ago we had corporal punishment as well. just because something once was ok it doesn’t mean it was a good idea.

Welcome to the wonderful world of multi-academy trusts, where a millionaire businessman gets to decide whether your daughter can wear earrings or what colour her hair should be.

Thats it exactly, engage brain people.

They’re not thinking. These rules are handed down by people who drive to work in an air-conditioned car and spend the day sitting in a comfortable office.

The issue with shorting school holidays is everyone wants time with their kids, but lots of employers will only allow 1 out of 3 or 1 in 4 off at the same time.

So everyone will fight over the same weeks.
Holiday places will end up with a really short season and ramp prices.

Its also expensive to entertain kids when its old and wet your paying out for softplays and cinema trips.
Decent day in summer and its s picnic in the park

Well that’s okay then. Non issue.

That’s your DD. My DS would refuse to do that. He’s obsessive about following rules.

Isn't that the point? A blanket ban doesn't only apply to "typical school kids". It has to be workable for every school kid.

If the proposed rule will cause serious problems for a minority of kids and practical solutions are available that don't undermine the intent behind the rule then they should be adopted.

Glad they saw sense, but the dark coats thing drives me nuts. Its up there with the blazers they can't take off.

WTF are they thinking?

Parents can use their own brains though. Who is going to know that a child has a phone in their bag, switched off to use on the way home? No one.

My dd takes her phone. She’s not daft. She knows that if she gets caught with it, it will get confiscated. She keeps it switched off and in an inner pocket of her bag. All of her friends do.