To what extent are the school responsible for (Reception aged) kids belongings?

[Crunchymum]

It's all kicked off on my parents group as one of the kids has lost an expensive (think Nike or similar jumper). A few parents are saying it needs to be reported to the office whereas another mum helpfully said "this is why I never send them in with anything valuable or expensive".

One parent in particular has taken umbrage to this and has demanded we all start to log any lost items with the school office (copying in the headteacher!). This particular parent's child has lost at least 3 expensive items this term.

Of course it's now kicked off as another parents has helpfully pointed out that if the child keeps on losing expensive things maybe they should stop being sent in with expensive things (I haven't replied and won't but I'm definitely more on the side with this parent!)

What do we think? Should the school take some level of responsibility or are the parents asking for trouble sending in things they don't want lost? 🤔

Everything should be named and don’t send anything expensive. The school cannot spend its time managing this shit.

This

There's nothing more to it.

Complaining parent is a half wit.

The school is responsible for fostering an atmosphere of respect and independence, but nothing beyond that.

I’d say make sure name and class are clearly written inside but accept things can get lost. Also if there’s no school uniform I wouldn’t be sending in expensive stuff as I would hope at that age their education means likelihood of getting dirty/painty etc. I think I’d rather the school focused on other stuff than chasing up lost property (other than having some sort of system where lost property is put in a box for parents/kids to search themselves). I’m not really sure what more school could do, to be honest.

This. Don’t schools have anything better do?! For clarity yes they do

School need to be responsible for providing somewhere for children to put jumpers when they take them off and it is easy enough to get the children to check everyone has the right jumper at the end of the day and have a quick look around.

Really??

A teacher is supposed to do that?

Names should be written on everything, in more than one place. It’s crazy to send a child in expensive stuff. It is not the school’s responsibility.

I'm an LSA in KS1, I have 26 children in my class.

Every child has a peg outside the classroom where they hang their coat and PE bag. Inside the classroom they each have a tray with their name on where they store their book bags, glasses, various bits.

If they take their jumper off the expectation is that it goes on the back of their chair or in their drawer. If I notice a jumper on the floor or on a table I will ask who it belongs to and I remind them where to put it.

Where do you think we have the time to individually check each child to make sure they have the right jumper or that their removed jumper has been put in the right place?

Don't send expensive or valuable items to school.

Not sure what you’re imagining, but a basket for jumpers to go in, making sure it is empty at home time and asking children to check if they have the right jumper doesn’t take lots of time. They’re 4 and need support and guidance to become independent.

The school is not responsible for this nonsense.

Stop sending kids in with expensive things if the kid is not responsible enough to manage them.

I suggest you visit your nearest infant school in the run up to home time, specifically those last 5-10 minutes where everyone is getting ready to leave, and see for yourself how ridiculous that suggestion is.

It would be very difficult for a bunch of four-year-olds to sort out 30 identical school jumpers. It would take ages.

So your school do provide a system/expectations. Asking additionally for children to check they’ve got the right jumper (not you personally checking it) is not a huge extra amount. I’m a teacher (20 years plus) and find that less goes missing the further into the year as their independence grows and it is easiest in summer term when there are no jumpers to lose!

A jumper basket for children to access themselves and saying, ‘everyone check your label’ is really common. I don’t need to visit a school; I’ve taught for more than 20 years and am a governor in another. I completely champion teachers and understand unreasonable requests etc but this is not difficult.

Maybe their postings on the group chat are really about demonstrating theiir wrath about missing jumper in an attempt to scare whichever parent has it into magically 'finding it'.

If they really think school should be keeping track of the 15+ things that each of 30 children bring into school every day, multiplied by however many classes... well they sound a sandwich short of a picnic. That said, sending small child in in fancy clothes to school is an odd move in the first place. The paint etc that doesn't come out is almost as bad as losing it when it's expensive.

We ask and 26 voices will ask back....

"Miss, will you look at mine for me?"

"Miss, he/she has my jumper" (they don't, they have theirs)

"Miss, I can't find mine!" (search commences, turns out child didn't bring a jumper with them that day)

"Miss, I have two jumpers" (neither of them their own)

"Miss, let me tell you this long and convoluted story about jumpers which will end in me telling you that I've lost my jumper"

"Miss, I need help putting my jumper back on"

"Miss, I need help taking my jumper off so I can check it"

There are reasons why it's not done and the super simple solution is for parents to use their commonsense and not send expensive items in the first place.

Small children lose things, they spill things, they get messy, they get dirty, they slop their dinner. Don't put fancy clothes on them when they're in a setting where they'll be expected to be as independent as possible, keep for them for outside of school where the parents can give them all the 1:1 support they like to keep clean and to not lose items.

Same for me in September but part of the EYFS is about teaching skills for exactly this sort of thing. It isn’t so tricky as the year progresses.

The school is not responsible AT ALL for the child's belongings.

The child should be responsible for looking after their own possessions, even in reception. However, sometimes that goes wrong as they are little and therefore it is the responsibility of the parent to ensure that

• no valuable items are sent to school
• minimise non essential items being taken to school
• all items are clearly named
• on collecting the child, check that they have all expected items with them. If they don't, it is up to the parent and child to look for the missing items, check lost property, or ask around (e.g. class WhatsAp) for the missing items.
• if discovering that the child has someone else's item to return the missing item to the other child/parent or message them to arrange handover.

I’d hope a bit of both though, we got weekly reminders about kids having to be in logo’ed school uniform in the end & I got specific reminders but DD lost multiple clearly named jumpers and water bottles and as a low income single mum I wasn’t about to fork out £30 for a jumper every few weeks. We stuck with generic supermarket jumpers. I would have liked to know the school was doing something, even just reminding the kids to hang their jumpers on pegs or even relaxing the uniform rules! Rather than them haranguing me over logo jumpers that keep going missing in their building.

If parents saw how things were treated in school - because there's always something more urgent to do/find/sort out they'd be buying the cheapest clothes they could get away with
A bit of common sense is needed here, the person kicking off is a loon

Everything should have resilient name tags or be marked with magic marker.

Teachers will throw any abandoned items in the list property bin, and it's up to children(or irritated parents) to check the bins whenever they need to.

School Responsibility ends there.It's not their problem.

We also have a class WhatsApp group for lost kit, gained (unlabelled) kit etc.

Don’t send anything in valable.

label everything that goes in. That way if something is lost it has a lot more chance of being reunited with its owner. Ds is in year 8 and I still stick a sticker with his name into everything.

That would be a disaster of an idea. Why on Earth would the school encourage 15/20/25 of the same jumpers to be piled together?

Every single one would have to be looked at, in the multiple places that people out names.

Jumpers on back of chairs if they come off means one or two fall down. Not shit tonnes needing sorted at the busiest point of the day

I worked in schools for 20 years and never once worked in one that had a jumper basket.

Back of chair or on pegs always.