DS Expelled - drugs

I wonder how he got on in the end. Would be lovely to know @tapasgirl just in case.

I am sorry, I know this isn't a helpful response but I do wonder if drugs were really involved why is it that the school didn't contact the police?

Oblomov19 I’m so sorry

This is a really old thread - it may be best to start your own.

Reading.
I have similar problems atm.

When a Head permanently excludes (or does a fixed term exclusion while an investigation takes place) they must give robust evidence to the Governor's committee who must review a PE. The Head decides to PE but the governors must be sure there is evidence to back up the decision . It is not a court though so the level of proof is lower. The fact that the school has not followed procedures is worrying. That this young man told a fellow pupil he was selling him dope is enough for a school to exclude. He intended to sell something which was possibly drugs but it could be seen as extracting money by fraud. Clearly an investigation should establish if the substance was herbs or not. The school is clearly not brilliant here but to say the school should do nothing if it turns out to be herbs is wrong. He told a child he was selling drugs to them and was prepared to do a fraudulent transaction if it was not. If the buyer was younger then that compounds the issue. Without knowing what has been unearthed by the investigation we cannot really be sure what should happen but the school is right to consider PE for what we know so far.

There is no proof that it was herbs so we unable to do anything there. Also when under pressure DS said it was weed - so who knows. The pupil who he sold them to is also in trouble but she has told DS that she will tell the Head that it was Herbs. This won't hold any weight though.

So what has happened with the 'herbs'? Do the school have them? Have they destroyed them?

I don't think you should just roll over, how did the school allow a child to believe they could get away with dealing? This school has a big problem and it is not your son.

Yes he has done wrong, yes he has been stupid but then so have the school.

If they believed it was drugs why didn't they call the police? If they knew it wasn't then why do they want him to leave?

Who was there to advise your son when he was being questioned about this? What investigation have they had?

As mums with children who have travelled either route, we don't come onto MN to be berated for the bad choices our children have made. What we are looking for is informed advice, positive experiences/outcomes and a hand to hold during a very dark time.

I don't think anyone was berating the other mother, but plenty of people advised her that by minimising what her DS had done she wasn't helping him, and said that her best chance in her meeting with the school was to show how seriously she took what he'd done, and demonstrated how she was going to work with them to try to stop it happening again. She repeatedly said she wasn't that bothered by the drugs and she'd consulted lawyers about technical loopholes - it was pointed out that this would be unlikely to get the school onside.

My two are adults now, but there were some serious wobbles in their teenage years, so I do understand what it's like when kids do really stupid stuff that could compromise their futures. I don't have anything to add over and above the other good advice that's been given on this thread, but I wish all the best to you and your son, and to the mother and son on the other thread. I hope that there are good outcomes all round, lessons are learned, and that both young people will be back on track soon.

Contact bye??? Continue to!!!!

The OPs in these two situations 'seem' very different and maybe because of this one child will learn their lesson more quickly than the other - regardless of what school do, I can imagine this OP will/has responded to the behaviour appropriately. The other OP will contact bye to think their kid is 'bunny' and blame everyone else.
Kids do stupid, stupid things and we all pray that ours won't!

I agree Rosie, but often schools will take selling as the more serious "crime". However, the stories of the children have similarities, regardless of the parental reaction being different. There are lots of references, in the other thread, to schools following a hardline approach, zero tolerance of drugs on school premises being a good thing, that no-one wants their children being educated with children who are involved with dope and that the other child deserves to be permanently excluded. Most of the comments reflect upon the stupidity of the child, but of course the comments may be punishing the Mum for having the wrong attitude.

It is hard when children are not as we want them to be. As someone who used to work for an LA and spent a lot of time trying to find new schools for excluded children, I am very much aware of the upset caused whether the parent came across as contrite, or not. Both of these children have lessons to learn - very quickly.

Bojo, i think the difference in the tone of the responses may very well be due to the OP on the other thread totally minimising what her son had done

IT is very interesting to see the tone of comments on here about a child attempting to sell "weed" and the other post about a child smoking it where the comments are significantly more judgemental.

Hope 2017 is good to you and your son. ☘️

However much you don't want your son to return to the school do not withdraw him.
I have known students get: LA funded home ed courses, and free entry to GCSE exams- finding an exam centre can be a real problem otherwise (and even trickier for: science, languages, DT and Art subjects).

God this is something I worry about regularly with my ds, he is so impressionable and likely to do what he is told and not understand the consequences and it frequently scares me. (Also has some SN and on the long cafcass list)

I don't have advice but just wanted to say that I know children who have been in similar situations who have got their place at college and thrived in a different environment. Good luck op.

You do need to make sure that you record every telephone call etc about this and if at all possible get what is said in writing or confirm in writing your understanding of the situation to whoever you had the conversation with. Believe me that written evidence is so important in these cases when so much is he said / she said.
What oddboots has said is essentially correct, though from reading between the lines on all your posts about the school and the head teacher, I would have real reservations that the governing body would do what oddboots is saying, they will in my opinion just nod and follow the lead of the head teacher in confirming the permanent exclusion.
The fact that the school have failed to PE your son in writing, a week after the event is a serious failing and confirms to me that the head teacher has failed to look at the regs around exclusions. If he does not confirm before 9th Jan when the governors meeting is scheduled for, then there has been no permanent exclusion and the governors meeting should not take place.
By now he should have informed the LA and the first thing they will do is ask where the PE letter is, so I suspect he has not done that either. He is just leaving you and your son dangling, hoping that you will withdraw your son, which is the worst thing you could do.

I was a teaching assistant in a high school. We would support the sen children in their exam and I know that there would be students who were not at school who would come in and take exams. But I also know that there we're students who took exams who didn't do very well just because of the way the exams we're taken. The same students went on to do their college courses and would take their basic exams English, Maths and IT again and would pass with flying colours. Saying that I'm wondering if there was a college that would take him in early or a taster course he could go on. It might be that the more relaxed lessons might suit him better.

Just a few thoughts that may or may not be helpful, I am just a school governor so not a professional but I have sat on far too many exclusion panels.

Does the school have published drugs policy? (it might be on their website). The [[https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/270169/drug_advice_for_schools.pdf DfE and ACPO drug
advice for schools]] says on page 7: "Exclusion should not be the automatic response to a drug incident and permanent exclusion should only be used in serious cases. More detail on excluding pupils can be found in the DfE Exclusion Guidance."

Even if the school have a drugs policy that states permanent exclusion for selling then paragraph 10 of Exclusion from maintained schools, Academies and pupil referral units in England states "Provisions within the Equality Act allow schools to take positive action to deal with particular disadvantages affecting one group, where this can be shown to be a proportionate way of dealing with such issues"

You talk of having Ed Psych reports in the past, have these been shared with the school? If you have and given your meetings with the SENCO then it is reasonable to believe the school are ware that he meets the Equality Act definition of disability ("You’re disabled under the Equality Act 2010 if you have a physical or mental impairment that has a ‘substantial’ and ‘long-term’ negative effect on your ability to do normal daily activities."). Even if they didn't acknowledge this prior to the incident paragraph 17 of the above exclusion guidance allows them to take account of it after the incident.

In the meeting with the governing body you would be within your rights to highlight to them they they are expressly allowed not to exclude your ds for something they would exclude a child without a report saying "may be on the Aspergers or ADHD spectrum and also talks about him not understanding the consequences of his actions"

The governing body need to decide if allowing your ds to remain in school would seriously harm the education or welfare of the pupil or others in the school (paragraph 15) and if in with respect to the school's legal duties (including the Equality Act and the SEND Code of Practice) if the decision to permanently exclude your DS is "rational; reasonable; fair and proportionate" (paragraph 5) and "lawful, reasonable and procedurally fair" (paragraph 67).

If the governors on the panel know their stuff they will know that they must consider your representations (not just rubber stamp!!) (paragraph 61) and that with this background you would be able to lodge a claim of discrimination to the First-tier tribunal (which has the power to reinstate your ds if they uphold) as well as the normal appeal process.

All of this is my interpretation of the documents I have referred to, it isn't in any way professional advice but it might give you something to think about. If you want more advice you could try to contact the Coram Children's Legal Centre www.childrenslegalcentre.com/ and/or The National Autistic Society School Exclusion Service www.autism.org.uk/services/helplines/school-exclusions.aspx

I am not sure I would trust anything a HT said about what my child would or would not survive. Imo not all HTs know as much as they think they know and they may well have a conscious or subconscious agenda. In this case, it is easy to see that your withdrawing your ds would save the school a lot of money and an awful lot of trouble: all the costs, in money and time, of getting his exams sorted and turning him round would be borne by you.

The Ed Psych report was at age 7. I think you said - so not remotely useful for an EHIC now. Very doubtful it would be of use at appeal. However, up to date info on his SEN would be and the info on the plans the school had for helping with SEN which have not been actioned. I think you would need to find reliable evidence to prove this though because no school will say it does not provide for SEN! I think schools will get concerned about behaviour and will be linking this to SEN, hence the talk at your meetings. It seems to be a recurring pattern as you said it happened in the private school. Do get a SEN specialist to attend if you can but whether they will have in depth knowledge of this school (is it fairly new?) is open to question. Does it have an Ofsted report which covers Sen provision there?

Regarding home ed. We used to organise this for school refusers and some excluded children in my LA. Not sure if there is a budget now but some subjects have to be dropped, usually. Sciences can be difficult. Usually about 4/5 subjects can be managed but it very much will depend on what tutors are available.

The other gamble is the exam boards being used in another school and the syllabus. Presumably the Events Management syllabus will go out of the window.

I can't see how any school can say that they don't have provision for learning difficulties. Was the Ed Psych report from a previous school then? I don't think the school has done any favours for your son, if they haven't taken account of his needs, including the ASD.

I agree that giving up your job would be a mistake. Apart from anything else, when this is over, you don't want to have burned your boats job wise and you need something for you too. I reckon the PRU and a college place would be your best option, but be prepared for the exams to be compromised.