School lateness punishments, neurodiversity and the law

Your poor daughter.

My asd son's school made a couple of very minor adjustments so that he thrived there and didn't find attending so awful that he had to hide in bed every night to cope. He lives in the real world too by the way.

One of my children has AuDHD. The ADHD diagnosis is for Inattentive ADHD. When they was assessed the results were the most Inattentive the Ed Psych had ever seen. This was more of a problem day to day in secondary than Autism but it's the Autism that got them the EHCP and extra support.
Their Inattentive issues meant they were late for everything even if they had a head start, missed important info, would totally zone out or be in a dream state, took too long to do anything, put themselves in tricky situations by just not being attentive.
They've left school now and life is much easier but it feels like ADHD isn't treated as a disability (particularly evident in some of these posts)

Or maybe, if the child is supported with sensible and reasonable strategies on school to help them complete their education and gain the qualifications they need for the world of work, they’ll then have both the quals needed and the confidence to be able to find a career that suits them and their individual needs?
I’m a highly educated and experienced professional. There are a whole myriad of jobs that would lead me to crash and burn. Indeed, I have left jobs previously because they were not for me and I burnt out. It took me time to find my niche, which I did and I am very good at at what I do. Just because I don’t have the executive skills to be able to cope with working in any environment doesnt mean that I can’t be brilliant in the ones that suit me. And though there is no shame in claiming PIP, I have never needed to do so. I have, however, made excellent use of the government run “Access to Work” scheme.

And yes, I am well known for being late to social events. So shoot me.

@Bringing “That’s what parenting a child like mine is all about.”

Precisely. And your child may not be like all other ASD / ADHD children. And your school environment may be less / more chaotic than the OPs. And you also may have had more practice developing strategies and supports for your DS.

Some kids appear NT until secondary and it is then a scramble for parents to work out how to support them when “the wheels come off the bus” in a chaotic high school environment.

I really feel for the OP, who is trying to think of strategies and supports to get her DD to class on time. She is not suggesting she be able to do whatever she wants. She is not suggesting she shouldn’t be attending on time. She is trying to develop strategies to deal specifically with overwhelm in the hallways which is causing her daughter to hide in a quiet place and then making her late to class. This all feels like a pile-on of her parenting / her daughter’s behaviour which is just not right.

Yes -and then again no. There are plenty of places of education and work which do not or would not require an overwhelmed child to walk through the bedlam of school corridors to access an education or to do a job.

OP the school are acting illegally. I suggest you get angry, get some advice and start fighting for your dd. You shouldn't have to, of course, but this is where you are.

The OP has explained that her DD is struggling with moving between lessons as she gets overwhelmed in a school that is loud and has 1800 students. The school have refused sensible strategies (early exit pass, loop earbuds). I’m not sure what this has to do with getting to a doctors appointment on time?

If PIP payments continue to be as generous as they are at present, added to UC, then it looks very much to me as if we are creating a generation of mildly° affected SEN children who will live life on benefits instead of being taught that if you want to support yourself as an independent adult you need to work out how to get to places on time.

This. One of the biggest issues we are facing with the current cohort of young people, is that they have been given:

• a far higher level of financial support through EHCPs, DLA, disabled child element
• a far greater level of adjustments in education (one to one & small group support, extra time, movement breaks, accomodations for all sorts of stuff

Yet this has not improved outcomes relative to previous cohorts who had less support.

It has not improved attainment in school, it has not improved the level at which the SEN proportion access employment relative to the wider cohort. It has not reduced the levels of EBSA. It has not reduced the levels of poor mental health or self harm in this cohort.

It is very to justify continuing this level of expense (to the detriment of spending on other areas) when it does not appear to be helping at all.

It seems, however, that you, an adult, are still not capable of reading a post before commenting. Perhaps you need to learn a strategy.

If they let her leave class a couple minutes earlier she wouldn't need the 5 minutes later. My ds left early and so did others with no issues.so schools do allow this.

These people making endless excuses for their ND child don’t want to live in the real world, do they? I send my ASD / ADHD child to bed at 8 as she has been masking all day and needs decompression time. She’s asleep by 9. I help her with strategies for organising her life (I don’t do it for her) so she’s got what she needs and is where she needs to be. That’s what parenting a child like mine is all about. We make a point of not doing things like pop concerts or football matches because that would be too overwhelming but come up with strategies for coping in things like assemblies and corridors that she can’t avoid.

If your daughter can’t get to school on time how’s she going to get a job? Get to exams? Doctors appointments? We need to stop making excuses for people and help them with strategies for coping with real life.

That’s where her mum comes in, hence, I am offering suggestions that she can implement herself without the school being involved. The answer can’t be that she is just allowed to be late, that’s not helping her in the slightest.

i haven’t read the responses but i guess it’s the usual unempathetic stuff. I have this issue too and I feel for you!

Wow. Is it your reading comprehension that's the problem or do you have a disability I should be aware of?

The issue is not getting the school on time.

It's moving between lessons.

DD could get up at 4am every day and it would make zero difference to how quickly she can move between classes.

THIS

Schools can not give students carte blanche to just rock up when they want . It would be pandemonium.

My DD was like this and I am suggesting she pursues the ADHD RTC assessment .

I think you need to work with her on some organisation /coping strategies whilst waiting for a diagnosis / medication .

If she already has 5 minutes grace, why does that not work? Does she forget time while she is outside? If so I would suggest to set timers for when she has to go back in. Set them to 2 minutes before the lesson starts, then corridors will be empty but she won't be late.

So hard not to rise to the challenge to make this part of wider culture wars but where exactly would you draw the line between ‘normal’ and ‘not normal’ so your presumably normal kids weren’t impacted?

My kid has no intellectual disability whatsoever but needs to slip out of class a few minutes early to avoid sensory overload in crowded halls where he’s been hit and shoved repeatedly making school feel impossible to him. I’d argue your normal kid’s learning is far more impacted by neurotypical kids (like the ones repeatedly pushing and hitting in crowded hallways) acting up than by my timid son quietly leaving classes early.

History shows that cultures swing right-wing in times of difficulty and want as it is human to want to protect our own and people can easily feel accommodating those who are different will take away in some way from what we have ourselves. Some vested interests make loads of money peddling this idea. But humans are a social species and I genuinely believe we thrive more in unity than division.

Of course some kids do need special schools. But there are also common sense accommodations made in schools and workplaces that remove barriers for many people for different reasons and they are not a threat to people not requiring those accommodations. We will all need help of some sort at some time in life and a functional society provides that support when it can.

This.

Even if/when you get a diagnosis, there’s no easy fix. Working on coping strategies is the most helpful thing to prepare for adult life. There is so much information freely available out there these days. Even suggestions on this thread like trying loop earplugs, fidget toys, pairing up with a buddy etc. Talking through the aspects of school that she struggles with and looking at cognitive behaviour strategies that might help.

I am late diagnosed neurodivergent with a diagnosed neurodivergent child. I find the school is far more receptive when you go in and say we’ve tried this, this is what works, this doesn’t work, this is what would help as an adjustment, rather than just going in and expecting them to adapt to your child. Being repeatedly five minutes late disrupts the learning for everyone in the class and that’s not fair.

I think what really helped me was understanding what was making me feel overwhelmed and anxious (noise, crowds) in certain situations and then practicing different techniques to help calm myself, a big one for me is I am very easily distracted and overwhelmed by noise and crowds, so I wear headphones with relaxing music on a lot, even at work where possible, and that helps massively and I practice breathing techniques.

Finding a career that works well with ADHD was a huge thing for me as well, I changed careers in my late 20s as my previous role was just completely unsuitable for someone with ADHD, and as such I was making a lot of mistakes and underperforming.

I am very forgetful so I set reminders and alarms constantly on my phone and with my emails etc, and I have developed very strong routines which help me stay on time, if my routine is disrupted I can run into problems. I also start getting ready much earlier than I need to for things, because I lose track of time (and also massively overestimate how much I can do in a certain amount of time) so end up late if not.

I also give myself little rewards for doing things ahead of time as well, because I would always leave things until the last minute (because I am motivated by fear of consequences) which caused a lot of stress and anxiety. Just something simple like if I do half an hour of ironing I get 5 minutes on TikTok, sounds silly but it works.

Once I put these strategies in place it literally changed my life, I feel so much less anxious now and have more confidence than ever and have achieved a lot academically and career wise, so I’m a huge advocate for developing your own coping strategies.

It’s not just the timekeeping. They’re not even allowing her to use things like Loop earplugs according to one of OP’s posts.

As I said before, home school her then 🤷🏻‍♀️

Everyone saying the school isn’t being flexible - did you miss the bit where OP said they already allow up to 5 min lateness to class but it’s after that time is up that punishments are handed down? How much more time should her DD be given?

Exactly this. And all the posters saying about needing to function at work / in real life - she’d be able to have access to the suggestions made here, plus other things she may find helpful in specific environments. And as an adult there is a lot more choice about what you do - I’ve certainly never worked anywhere as inflexible as this school seems to be.

I think a lot of posters just want to stick the boot in for no reason,

School should be able to allow your dd to leave class a couple of minutes early. My ds had an early pass although it was because he was in a foot cast so needed to avoid the rush but the same principle should apply. And it didnt disrupt any learning as they're usually packing up at the end of the lesson.
I'd speak to the pastoral staff and head of year and insist on this.
Surely they'd rather let her leave a few minutes early rather than having all the detentions and missing classes anyway.

These suggestions are so sensible and reasonable and are exactly what need to be tried. The OP has said she has suggested all of these to the school and they have refused. It’s absolutely ridiculous.
Yet despite the OP explaining this, the majority of posters have basically said thar the OP and her daughter need to suck up and “just do better”That right there is the issue. And I makes me so bloody mad.

Welcome to the real world.