Did anything really tragic happen at your school?

[TattiePants]

I’ve spent today thinking about a murder that happened when I was at school over 30 years ago. I think it’s on my mind partly because it happened when I was sitting my GCSEs and DS is doing his now but also it’s been in the local news that another loosely connected child murder may finally be solved.

A boy from year 3 went missing and he was found murdered in a nearby derelict house. In the year prior to that, two other children had been killed in tragic circumstances so it was a really horrible time for the school community. Things got worse when a year 5 boy was arrested for the murder and spent months in custody, missing all his GCSEs. Many of us then had to give witness statements as we knew the arrested boy well. It took over 20 years for the actual murderer to be convicted and unfortunately he’d gone on to murder more boys from my school by then.

In all the years my DCs and friend’s DCs have been at school, they’ve (thankfully) never had anything like this. There’s been fights, teenage pregnancies, minor drug offences etc but nothing on this scale. Did anyone else have something really tragic happen when they were at school.

@EarringsandLipstick i wasn’t going to come back to the thread as although it wasn’t my intention, it has upset some people. I reported my thread last night so I’m happy to leave it to MNHQ to decide what to do.

I wonder if that was the same incident that someone told me who is an athletics official. We have to do health and safety training now, but I still think the throws can cause danger when people aren't paying attention.

No tragic stories from my school days but a few from the local area now - two boys killed/badly injured in road accidents, two girls killed while out running by a drunk driver (based locally at the Army base in Aldershot), and one from the early 80s I didn't know about until recently - a girl murdered a few miles away when she out on her bike on the way to a music lesson - again by someone in the Army.

People don't have to read threads if they don't like their content. We don't need all this censorship. There is nothing offensive here.

I think I know which school you mean where the man ( ex pupil) got in and stabbed four people My daughters were at the school opposite at the time, it was during the 90’s. I Was working at a primary school (non teaching) and the head came through to tell us she’d received distressing news and anyone with children at the school and the one opposite could leave early to collect their children. The school where it took place was in lockdown and cordoned off but ours was open. They were letting the kids out gradually, class by class. When I got there the area was swarming with police, armed police, ambulances. The press, police and press helicopters flying over head.
The primary I worked at was one of the feeder schools to both secondaries so most of the kids at both knew each other.
It was awful. The girl who died was the same age as my eldest. I didn’t know her but I knew two of the others who’d been stabbed.

There was a huge climbing frame in the infants school and I think someone fell from that (stupid frame with rope) but I'm sure they were ok and the frame remained.

When one of DB's friends was 8 or 9 his DM and DF (not sure in what order) literally died a year or 18 months ago apart and he then lived with grandparents. They died of heart issues/cancer but it was quite shocking as he was an orphan.

I'm continuing to report & hope that MN will step up

It's really none of your business. If you don't want to read, don't read. You don't know any of the people either, so your "concern" is as irrelevant as the OP's concern, if you want to see it that way.

I'm sure there weren't murders but there were paedophiles around the area (we sort of knew them as strange men) but years later I was told but someone I know that one or two of them were beaten up by vigilantes due to interfering with children. I didn't know these children though. They could have been at my school but I had no idea though.

I don't think this is a bad thread and needs to be reported. These things happen, murders, abductions etc. Best there's awareness of these really if only to try to ensure they don't happen again (impossible).

Not be but when my mum was at school two boys in her class made a homemade raft and both drowned. A couple of years ago a girl in the same year as my friends son was hit by a car and killed on prom night.

We lost 3 boys in car crashes aged 17. There was a child who was hit by a car and killed aged 13.

I'm already terrified of my children learning to drive and that's a long way off.

A girl in my schools boyfriend couldn't deal with the fact she didn't want to be with him anymore and set her house alight. Her and her sister died. Horrible piece of shit. When the police nicked him, his back ground screen on his computer was off the house burning. This was around 10 years ago.

Recently my sons classmates was killed in a house fire after being left home alone, there other 2 brothers died also.

The school was brilliant. They held an assembly and brought in Counsellors for the school children and community. Really really sad but the school handled it great. Just wish they would sort out the house now as walking past it daily is horrific.

I don't think this is a bad thread and needs to be reported. These things happen, murders, abductions etc. Best there's awareness of these really if only to try to ensure they don't happen again (impossible)

i think sharing stories of things that have directly affected you can be therapeutic, but I do think it’s descended into “a friend of a friends dog’s brother” and speculation about local events, with a few urban myths thrown in.

a lot of “not me but”…

the school above, for example, if it’s the one at the school I went to, it wasn’t in the 80’s, and it wasn’t “a load” of kids.

The mum of 2 children in my primary school was murdered by their dad. I remember they left the school and went to live with their aunt. This was the first time I’d really had any real awareness of this kind of thing and it’s really stayed with me, just so sad. In secondary school there were driving related teen deaths. Also a girl in my year was knockdown by a car and died. I knew her, but was particularly close. However there wasn’t really any help for her close friends. They just had to get on with things. I’m now a teacher and I’m pleased there is now more support available for child.

We had a leukemia memorial garden for 5 primary school children in our village in Yorkshire. Several children (me one of them) had our houses monitored for radiation for 4 years to find out what was going on. It was an investigation into the fact that we were downwind from a radioactive smelting plant, which was subsequently shut down.

Sure it'll be the basis of an episode for Vera one day.

One of the boys in my year committed suicide just before we were leaving. I remember him not enjoying school before this, and obviously it was more than just not enjoying it. The school went out of its way to be noticed at the funeral - we were supposed to attend in uniform. Anyone who actually knew him refused. First school day after his funeral, there was no mention of him.

A teacher suffered life changing injuries when something in one of the workshops blew up. One of the students rescued him. We were given a talk on how the students actions were inappropriate and that the correct response would have been to go to the principals office to tell him. These two buildings were literally on opposite ends of the school. The emergency services said that if the student hadn't acted, the teacher wouldn't have survived.

My dc go to the same school now, but there's a different principal who prioritises mental health and well-being. He's amazing, genuinely cares about the students. He's brought in counsellors and mental health nurses so there's access for all. My ds had a small issue, not school related at all, and he called me, had a chat about it and asked what he could do to help resolve it. For me, it's heartening to see the difference and progress from when I went, to now that the dc are there.

No murderers or cancer, but one of our mates died in a car accident. I will never forget how quiet the school went for a few days after this happened. Everybody was lost for words.
Also, our other colleague's parents died in an accident in Spain. Both of them.

Yes. A group of friends in 6th form died in a car crash on their lunch break.

All part of life. Hiding it doesn't make it go away.

A girl in my class was raped, she never came back to school afterwards.

It was a rare violent random attack while walking her dog where she was dragged by a stranger into the woods then beaten unconcious and raped.

Apparently several other girls (not from my school) where raped in the same way over a two week period around the surround villages.

The police put a curfew in place and there where police patrol through the villages every night for a month and it just stopped as suddenly as it started.

That was wierd/memorable but I wouldnt say tramatising for me (Im sure it was horrific for the girl it happend to though).

One of the students on my course was murdered (well, manslaughter) in the first month I was at university, very nice quiet boy who I knew a little. He fell in with a group of toffs on the course and one of them made an altercation in a night club far worse than it might have been by being an arrogant twat and winding up an aggrieved soldier. He hit out at the victim for asking his girlfriend to dance and sadly it resulted in him being killed. The toff twat has had an illustrious career and it still makes me feel very sad thinking about poor J. who died.

In primary school a friend was knocked down and killed crossing a busy main road in the village. They played a particular song at her funeral and anytime I hear it I think of her. It’s actually one of my all time favourites so I often listen to it. She would have been 40
now.

Later in secondary school a boy in the year above me died from a fatal asthma attack. I think he would have been 15/16. Very, very sad.

I think about both of them often, think about their families. It has been 25/30 years since and I still remember it clearly.

In regards to the thread - I can understand why some people might not like it and think it is in bad taste. But being offended doesn’t automatically mean something IS offensive. It’s subjective and personal whether you find talking of tragic or upsetting circumstances offensive or just part of life.

I actually think it is not in bad taste, I think it is sharing stories of our human experience. No one is gossiping about the victims or families - I am not gossiping about my friend who died. I am sharing my experience, talking about something which happened In my childhood, which connects or resonates with others because these tragic and horrible, unjust things do happen, it’s not uncommon and there are no rules to say we cannot share experiences.

Finding something distasteful doesn’t automatically mean it is.

Nothing like anything you describe. But lots of sexually very unsettling things. A girl got pregnant aged 12 and was removed from her family. Her own father was the father.

A teacher at school flashed at a girl in a nearby park and she was told off by the head teachers fro making a fuss and that it just meant she was pretty and that was a compliment - did she really want him, a family man to lose his job? In those days (1970s) that really was the attitude. I remember feeling sorry for her but thinking she needed to toughen up as I'd been flashed at so many times on the way to school I'd lost count.

No one is gossiping about the victims or families

some of it is gossip though- as I said pp about the girl who died in a school stabbing, basic facts are wrong, so clearly it is hearsay and gossip for that poster.

For those of us who were there it was not “man who also came into the local senior school in the 80s and stabbed aload of kids one of the girls died”.
Assuming it’s the same event, but school stabbing are rare so I don’t see how it can’t be.

the “girl who died” has a name, and will be remembered as who she was, not as an anonymous victim.

Our head and deputy head were killed in a car crash. They were well respected by all of us and it was a sad time for the school.