If you work in education, what do you think is causing the current attendance issues?

[NeedAnUpgrade]

I’ve read quite a lot on this recently. DD1 is 10, she’s always been reluctant to go to school. She had a spate of UTIs, stomach aches, headaches etc. She’s had a bit of time off sick but we only triggered the attendance letter recently as it went below a certain threshold. DH and I have always done our best to get her into school, being reassured that she’s ‘been fine all day’ by her teachers. It all came to a head this year (yr 5) after a complete meltdown, several anxiety attacks and refusal to leave the house. She’s now on a reduced timetable at school and on the waiting list for an ASD assessment.
Academically she’s ahead but just can’t seem to cope with the school environment.

I’m just wondering what those who work in education think the issues are. Am I just a terrible parent? Although I’m not sure what else I could do. I suspect a complete lack of funding in education has had the biggest impact on schools and students. Especially those with SEN.

For fucks sake, because we have names for conditions that have always existed, the conditions always existed but in the dark ages we'd call it having an oddball, a hyper kid, an anti social kid, a miserable kid.

Whats so hard to accept that?

The future is bright because we can identify these things and treat them, or shall we do what the Nazis proposed and scrap everyone who isn't perfect onto the scrap heap. Christ!!

I haven't read the whole thread, but thought I would add anyway. This is happening in lots of places not just the UK. We are expats. We live in Germany. Our DD has ASD+ PDA. School has always been difficult for her for many reasons but Covid just ruined her.

Here home schooling is illegal, something our DD knew prior to Covid. When Covid hit, school invaded our home, home schooling was mandatory, she could not understand why this had changed, when there are lots of reasons/cases where home schooling should be approved. She was now being told what she can and can't do in her own home. She was being told to be present for video calls (something she has never done, not even to talk to family) she had teachers coming to the front door. It was such a fundemental change in life she has never really recovered from.

During the home schooling time, she attended 2 schools. She eventually went to a special needs school. All of the allowances and 'extra' things that defined them as a special needs school were suspended, the message our DD was getting was that help for being different is a luxury, it took 2 years for the extra stuff to come back. That was 2 years of struggle, confusion, and rules constantly changing she could not cope with.

She is now at a senior school, there were still some restrictions when she started, and there was confusion about what services/activities were available. Schools were/are still playing catch up with work. These days she is even worse with school, she has a 2 reduced timetables but still misses 2/3 days per week. She just cannot cope with it. A couple of years ago you could severely punished for touching people but now no-one cares when she is beaten by 5 kids in the hallway, it just doesn't make sense to her.

Just because the lockdown ended doesn't mean the chaos and confusion has.

N

We didn’t have smacking but we had pretty much zero divergence or allowance for it anyway. Things haven’t got stricter but the opposite imo, much higher acknowledgment of differences

The range is big now but my dc respond better to clear instructions, challenge through school work and are sociable

They’d find it harder if those things were removed. So for us school works but I can see others might not cope

Also I think shutting schools for so long is rebounding as a few thought it would

The issues have always been there, as any number of people who had bad experiences because of undiagnosed issues and is now an adult will testify.

Late-diagnosed autistic, socially inept and hence vulnerable, sexually assaulted for the first time at age eight, battered at school for years before that. I ended up with dissociative episodes as a consequence. My parents supported me in gaining a place at an all-girl secondary school when I told them that I would run away from home and never come back if they sent me to a school that had boys in. Otherwise I honestly would have run away and when I was dragged back I would have been a school refuser.

The issues, aka SEND kids struggling and getting the brunt of bullying have always been there, we just care enough to notice now and that's a good thing.

I've been thinking about this recently, and the consensus (coming from professionals that have delivered the 3 lots of training I've had recently) is just that the pressures on schools and staff nowadays mean schools can feel sort of like a machine and there's no time for the individual (although, in my opinion, institutions are still clinging to the buzz words and language around valuing the individual even though largely, due to poor resourcing, they're doing a poor job if that). There are problems with behaviour which are largely dealt with in punitive ways which ironically seem only to make the average kid anxious and the ones who the measures are aimed at, couldn't give two hoots and it sends them in the opposite direction to conformity. I'm so anxious about sending my child to secondary school. It's not all roses in primary either (where I'm based) but certainly not as impersonal as the massive secondary schools these days. I don't think I'd have coped. We had 100 in our year and that was enough!

I do fine and agree school can be a nightmare if your face doesn't fit.

I was never "seriously" bullied, but group dynamics, status jockeying, people being over-competitive, can be horrendous.

I got 4 As at A level and a first class degree (preens but no-one gives a fuck ;'-) ) and tbh could have done the work at home part time or remotely.

All I got was feeling slightly awkward, no-one I stay in touch with as an adult, and feeling quite emotionally claustrophobic and that something was wrong with me.

For sixth form, I was pressurised into a fairly "high-achieving" sixth form at a single-sex school and my mental health struggled NOT because of the work but because of the low-level sense of menace, teachers who would randomly target one person unreasonably and write spiteful reports, that kind of thing.

My "group" was a few very neurotic types who were very competitive, which just exacerbated my sense of loneliness.

It felt like I was there as it "looked good" - the teachers weren't that kind or emotionally mature, tried to collect us "top set" types into a group, and insisted if I was socialising with anyone else I was "rebelling".

But this group really was very passive-aggressive and competitive...there was no sense of camaraderie.

I totally agree school can be a great (or at least neutral) experience for people, but I'd say for significant proportion it can be negative.

The thing is, I'm not a hugely "alternative" type either (whatever that means). I am and was a fairly standard, low-key human being.

I didn't want to be alpha female or Head Girl, just have an OK social experience with nicish people I got on with. But this didn't happen.

So all those arguments about school being "good for socialising" just aren't true.

I have made peace with my past, but if I could travel back in time, I wish I'd gone for a more relaxed environment for A-levels (an adult FE college or registered as an independent student) and worked or set up a business the rest of the time.

My bank account would have thanked me too!

Are you alright love? Not sure what you're basing your assumptions on. Are you one of those people? Maybe you should actually go back to bed and get out the right side :)

There were kids like this at my primary school too. "The desk in the corridor outside the HT's office" was used as a threat before and after corporal punishment was outlawed.

I think a lot of posters have mistaken "beaten into staying quiet" for "actually learning".

Many parents have realised that school is optional. Yes every child has to have an education but that doesn't have to be in school. Home education is default as school is opt in hence having to apply.
They disagree with what is being taught in schools and the way teachers are going about it. School is no longer the place that children feel safe. Home ed is the best way. Kids can learn at their pace and learn the things they want to learn.

Then you have the issue that this Victorian institution suits parents especially primary because they have to work. The sulks I have had because I rung parents to pick up because child has thrown up…which is a mandatory sending home in case of noro.

The problem with education is not it’s essential Victorian nature, but this doesn’t really suit boys full stop, but it’s lack of money. The fact every school now needs an ARP essentially and permanent resource teachers. Mental health support times with capacity and time. That it is an overstuffed system, that in primary at least, does little well apart from maths and English. Watertight rules that drive you up the wall in secondary. I was done in my secondary at 16 because the infantilisation got to me. I stayed but in retrospect should have gone to a college.

You think all this is bad it’s exactly the same of the teachers. Infantilised within an inch of their life while coping with children who need support and an environment where we just cannot provide it.

It is my career but I have recognised its bleeding out in an emergency room and once one bleed is steamed another appears and it is dying but blood and guts and tears are still being pumped in. I decided this year I too was bleeding out and needed to stop it. I reduced my hours to make it a full time job rather then an unmanageable one, for less pay I may add. I go in, do my job, boundary up against parents and powers that be and leave it there. I’ve stopped spending my own money on my class. They certainly have a less involved teacher but maybe a better more reflective one.

Less government interference, a curriculum run by people in the know but more updated with research rather than overhauled, smaller class sized, more support with smaller classes in deprived areas, resource in all schools or dual enrollment with children being proved with support in other schools as well for SALT issues, social and communication issues etc.

System is burning. Spheres of control and all that. I try to ensure my class have an alright time within the confines of the system and so be it. It isn’t sustainable though.

Are you and your daughter particularly close, @NeedAnUpgrade?
Your girl reminds me of me when I was little. I had severe separation anxiety when I had to leave my mum and go to school and it lasted for years.
I cried every single morning before school and 3/4 of the time at school once I got there. And I always had some sort of ailment or other.

I don't work in education but I would say it's the over burdening of teachers, which means they are unable to give much 1to1 attention. The big class sizes can be overwhelming with little adult support, it's hard for a lot of kids not just those those SEN. It's not your fault at all, it's society and our awful education system.

In our case it was the introduction of positive behavior modeling (or something). It means that with problem kids, the teachers ignore bad behavior and overly praise good behavior. So one kid would get punished for calling out in class whereas a problem kid would be allowed to get away with it. So the kids never really understood what would get them in trouble or not because discipline was inconsistent and therefore unpredictable. All it did was encourage the bullies and intimidate and confuse the good kids, who would get bullied in front of teachers who would ignore it

My grandson has 12 In his class. Essex village school. 90 kids from reception to year 6

Blimey a lot of the small village schools have closed around us and the kids have been bused to larger schools.

That's great for your grandson!

Hi there, if your daughter is ahead academically and is distressed about going to school - which at the end of the day is a very unnatural environment and more gruelling than most work environments (at least I found it to be and I joined the Navy after school!!) Then I think you've nothing to worry about. I would apply for part schooling/part home education so they get off your back about attendance. With my parents permission I skipped a heck of a lot of school and I can't say it affected my grades. I think I did better because I was given the space to study instead of all the time waiting of moving between classes and politics in the classroom/immature behaviour. If she doesn't like going to school why make her? I doubt it has much to do with social media etc. Because I was the same before all the online stuff kicked off. School is peer pressure led- it creates conformists and people living inside social boxes. If you're daughter is not happy in that kind of environment it probably means she will go on to do great things.

We made a positive choice to home educate. I know plenty of other home educators who are doing it out of choice. There are also many, many ex teachers who have chosen to withdraw from the system and home educate their children so you can take from that what you will. There are many home educators who, like you, have been forced into doing so because the school is unable to meet the needs of their DC, which is totally wrong. But there are also many others who simply consider the whole state school system to be utterly unfit for purpose for a multitude of reasons, many of which have been listed on this thread.

Do people really think school was that much better for our generation? I had the same issues that my kids have.

I didn't enjoy my 90s secondary - it was strict on petty things like uniform but behavior was good - at least in top and middle sets - and it was fully staffed with as strong SLT.

I know my DC school is worse. Behavior in lesson is terrible across the board and noise level way too high. Toilet access so restricted it's pretty much theoretical due to extensive and prolonged damage to facilities, having somewhere to sit and eat isn't there due to cleaning costs - access to libraries is restricted to Y11 at lunchtime - very limited lunchtime - staff retention is terrible leading to huge classes in GCSE years and teaching out of subject areas and entire terms where multiple classes have temporary teachers. SLT seem focused on uniform and seem to able to deal with assaults on teachers or other students and communication with students and parents is very poor - which seems to cause DD2 a lot of stress.

It's a much more stressful environment for everyone. I think a lot of kids like mine who would have easily coped in my 90s secondary are now really struggling.

@DreamTheMoors she has always had separation anxiety, it did improve as she got older but has come back since the extreme anxiety around school increased. DH does most of the drop offs. I suspect she does have ASD which is adding to the problem. In the right environment she’d do really well. The school are trying to help where they can, but it does feel like she’s just another statistic.

Do people really think school was that much better for our generation? I had the same issues that my kids have.

My school was hideous. What sticks in my memory was the crush to get in the building and through the first corridor, having to be outside in all weathers every lunch and break time and feeling bamboozled about where I was meant to be in the massive sprawling split site buildings. I don't know how I wasn't more overwhelmed by it all but I had a constant gnawing feeling in my stomach throughout.
I had imagined a lot had changed for the better so this thread has been an eye opener..

Toilets need to be closed because they need to man them because of behaviour in them. Secondaries are too big. Children on sight but missing from lessons, people can’t be expected to monitor what is going on a lot of the time. Breaking schools into 3 buildings: ks3, ks4 and sixth form would help. Keeping ks3 kids in their classrooms apart from classes that need resource would help.

I think teachers should be required to have a first, rather than second class degree. Getting a first means the person is dedicated, efficient and passionate about learning and this is what we need from teachers. I know some graduates who, having got a second class degree, enter teaching because it's a job they can get and the money isn't bad. I would say the bar for entering teaching is set too low. Also, everything that has been said here about reforming curriculum, less petty rules, plus returning teaching to the highly valued profession it should be.

@Sickoffamilydrama

Your list below described me at school to the letter. In particular, maps/ orientation and clocks (and yet being unsupplied with either is also terrifying - even now). I have dreams that revolve around these feelings 40 years later. I have been asked to go to a 'door 12' - last year - and have stood in front of it with 6, 8 etc labelled up, but no door number there, and been completely flummoxed and not able to think what to do in the moment.

It's always hard to some extent, but although these will never become top skills or without stress, keeping going at practicing them is never wasted and can help you get to functioning level, mostly. I also find that some other more innate things can develop incredibly alongside them (probably a memory thing).

The problems I noticed caused her issues:
Big busy and loud - so sensory overload.

Moving from one room to another and different timetable that switched between week 1&2, for DD she likes predictablity and finds maps/instructions on how to find somewhere hard.
Add in time pressure to get to the next room and next lesson.

She struggles with perceiving time and reading a clock so knowing what time she needed to get to the next lesson adds stress.

Then all the rules and worrying about breaking them.

The town I live in used to have four secondary schools (boys and girls, secondary modern and grammar). Now there's just one huge comprehensive, and it really is too big. I have friends who teach there, and they have all said that although it isn't a bad school, it just isn't possible to keep track of students. The only one who really likes it only teaches music to GCSE and above, so only ever meets about 5% of the school!

You might teach them one year then never see them again.

My secondary school was much smaller and you were taught by nearly every teacher. You knew every teacher by name and sight, and most of the pupils too.