Serious school meeting to be held about year 6

[Liglig]

I have just received this message from the school head and it has made me very afraid if what could possibly of happened. Has anyone ever had a message like this from a school? What could it be? Many thanks.

Dear Parents, due to a serious incident I am holding an emergency meeting in the school hall for Year 6 Parents on Friday 10/2/23 at 3.30pm. I expect all parents to attend.

Crikey! Years ago I had a job where Friday was by far my busiest day. If I'd re-arranged everything at extremely short notice to go to the school to be lectured about other people's children swearing online and not going to bed on time, I'd have been making a formal complaint.

What a bloody overreaction! An email would have sufficed, wouldn’t it? I would also be angry if I’d rearranged work for this!

Goodness. For that sort of summons I would have expected at least online bullying, children being groomed, access to porn or something similar. Three kids messing around using bad language online really doesn't justify that reaction.

This head is in severe danger of being seen to be someone who cries wolf. If she ever needs to summon parents for something that is genuinely mega serious and urgent, no-one is going to pay much attention after this.

So the rumour about it being so severe that it warranted police action seems completely off 🤔
If it was demanded that I attend that along with DH (remember all parents were to attend), I be absolutely livid 😡
Talk about blowing things well out of proportion!

Wonder what the bad language was???

I think OP you should contact the school, the Head and the Chair of Governors. Make it clear that the communication was poor, as it did not indicate that children could remain elsewhere in school whilst this meeting happened, and that it could make things difficult for some parents with their employer. The danger of what could be seen as crying wolf. Set a deadline for a response, say by half-term.

If the response is not an acknowledgment of failure of communication at the very least then I think you could raise the matter with Ofsted on the grounds you are not 100% satisfied of their safeguarding approach.

Be supportive of the action of suspending the children concerned though.

I’d be making a complaint too. Absolutely ridiculous.

Jesus I could have held 10 of those meetings with what my last class of pupils were like with each other. 🙄

Me too. I agree it was a total overreaction.

For all the comments slating the HT for arguably not brilliant comms, can’t see a single one wondering why 10-11 year olds have unfiltered access to a phone/iPad such they’ve been able to post things online ‘bad enough to be sent home and possibly involve the police’. Says a lot doesn’t it

Does it? It isn't any of our own children. My son is older now but he didn't have devices in bed at that age.

I wonder if they got hold of a school email address and sent a stupid email saying something rude and offensive to a teacher or posted on a social media site? Otherwise I can't really see why the school would have been involved at all.

Yes I agree I think the meeting was totally not needed and certainly didn't seem urgent. An email would've been good enough and maybe a meeting just for the 3 kids involved would have been enough.

The children regularly have lessons about online safety and it is always mentioned in their regular newsletters to parents. So basically nothing new learned really, stuff we all ready know. I came away basically feeling like a naughty girl after an all class telling off lol for something someone else did! Rather patronizing!

Totally over the top.
Using language like emergency meeting and serious incident to whip up anxiety is well out of order. Then it turned out to be something which could have been dealt with in a different way - an email, a letter or a meeting at a later date, or a zoom meeting

Way OTT, another meeting that could have been an email. Extreme overreaction for what unfortunately is fairly common and something most parents do actually monitor, esp children that age. I don't think people have minimised unsupervised access to devises etc, that wasn't the point of the post really. Just seems really random to have called an urgent meeting. I wouldn't have been happy to have had to take time off work for that.

A letter/email with maybe a follow up meeting after half term with a suitable external person who provides training/info on Internet safety issues for parents. Our school have run similar evenings for Internet safety and also drug talks etc.

Jesus. That is definitely a HT that thinks they’re in charge of the parents as well.

Massively OTT.

are they new-ish to the school @Liglig ?

God knows what he’ll do if there is an actual emergency requiring a parents meeting - he’ll have to be more detailed now as people won’t change plans in future after that.

Massive overkill.
meeting itself is fine I think you need to complain about language used in the previous communication. Some parents could have been in a flap trying to get time off work/organising childcare. All of that could have been conveyed in a letter for those not able to attend

They have been head teacher for about a year, definitely not as professional as the previous head!

I don’t think it’s dramatic, I work in secondary and it’s awful with online bullying, inappropriate images, irresponsible social media! Nipping it in the bud by being so firm it’s a good thing.

Wow!! I was being supportive of the school upthread as I thought it must have been a very serious situation to result in such a (poorly thought out) bit of communication. I take it back. Total overreaction for a bit of swearing!!

I'd be furious to have been dragged in for nothing more than a generic online safety talk.
In your situation I'd probably consider putting in a complaint to governors to be honest as there's a real risk should a genuinely urgent situation arise that parents will think it's the boy who cried wolf

I would be furious if I'd taken a half day of annual leave for that lecture. Could all have been done by e mail.

You really think that warranted emergency AL for every parent in the year? Christ.

When did schools start to punish the innocent majority for the actions of a few people? Its one thing to send out an informative email but so annoying when they tar everyone with the same brush. Being falsely lumped in with trouble makers just makes most people bolshy.

So you would be allowed to miss work for this for your own child at 24hours’ notice? Bollocks you would. Schools are so hypocritical about this stuff- won’t let teachers miss work even for important events but expect parents to be able drop everything.

Sounds like there might have been more to it if the police where involved. My DD y8 school recently had police in due to a child taking photographs using an app on phone in the changing room. She had other students in shoot getting changed the photo was instantly uploaded online.

Nipping it in the bud??? What, it won't make a blind bit of difference summoning parents to a meeting with 24 hours notice.