Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. Protection built in.

Meet the Other Phone.
Protection built in.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

Afterschool Detention Wrongly given?

132 replies

cazbate · 05/03/2015 17:55

yesterday my son was supposed to give in a homework that had to be done on a computer. my printer has no ink and the library was closed and others were broke.hes doing his GCSEs had he didn't have time to run about trying to print it of. he did not have the teacher that day and he had to give it in in his own time. he went in the morning and she wasn't there. at the end of the day she sent a student to collect them. someone gave it in and he told the teacher his just needed to be printed. he was off on the day it was given so he had to Wednesday as it was supposed to b for Tuesday. if it wasn't in for Tuesday it was a lunch time detention. not in for the nextr day it was an afterschool. he even reminded her twice that his was for Wednesday. in the letter she sent it said the deadline was Tuesday. the others didn't give it on Tuesday so they wud get an after school but Wednesday was my deadline. today he got told I have an afterschool detention. but he had it. the teacher said where was his and showed her the USB stick and said he just needed to print it off. she wrote that down and the student left. why is he getting an afterschool detention. he could not get it printed of. what was he supposed to do. he does have other much more important subjects to deal with (the homework was for journalism and he missed a bit of maths and biology to deal with this.)

OP posts:
fairylightsbackintheloft · 05/03/2015 20:44

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

Olivo · 05/03/2015 20:45

You/ he could have contacted the teacher via the school website or phone number to leave a message. Parents are quick enough to do this when they want to complain ??

By this age, students are expected to overcome unexpected hurdles like this; it is part of independent thinking and a valuable life skill. Tell him to suck it up and move on.

mayfridaycomequickly · 05/03/2015 20:54

Oh - and marking is easier when done in chunks (so monday night I marked all my GCSE algebra assessments in one go so that I only had to drag one file / mark scheme / tracker home. Tuesday I marked all of the Level one functional skills mocks...)

I find it hard to get back into the mindset of marking something when the deadline has passed and it impacts on whatever else I'm marking.

Tell your boy to bloody well hand it in on time so that the teacher can mark it in the time she's allocated herself ao that she can spend time doing something else teaching her own kids to meet deadlines

Camolips · 05/03/2015 21:10

I think you're right Evans, twice op has said 'I' instead of 'he'. Grin

ThereIsACarInTheKitchen · 05/03/2015 21:46

Going by the way the OP types I think it's safe to assume that he's actually the teen with the detention.

MidniteScribbler · 05/03/2015 22:04

OP, if you believe all of those excuses, I have a bridge I'd like to sell you.

Topseyt · 05/03/2015 22:43

Detention is totally correct. The deadline was missed, that is the consequence.

If there was a GCSE for making up a string of excuses then you would get an A*.

Whenever one of mine has had to take some sort of sanction at school (rare, thankfully) my only response has been "well you must have deserved it, so just get on with it". I am such an empathetic mother, me!! WinkGrin

I agree that this may well be a reverse AIBU.

Nata1ia79 · 05/03/2015 22:44

Simply contact the school and inform them that you do not believe that the detention is warranted and therefore your son will not be attending. If they continue to try and place your son in detention/isolation over this matter then make an official complaint with the governors immediately expressing how much this 'injustice' is upsetting your son, and disrupting his education. Also make sure the role that their poor IT/Computer facilities played in the deadline being missed is emphasised.

In my experience with there being no serious behavioral issues that contributed to the issuing of the detention, and as your kid normally hands his work in on time etc the school will most likely drop it as soon as you start kicking up a fuss. Grin

ilovesooty · 05/03/2015 22:55

Nata1ia79
un - fucking - believable.

Iliveinalighthousewiththeghost · 06/03/2015 00:05

A lot of closed minded judgmental comments on here. OP has explained why her ds did not do his home work. Is it her or her sons doing that the library was shut. What do you propose he should have done, burst in there to do his printing. Also OP said she ran out of ink how do you know she had the funds to buy more.
One comment. He's doing his GCSEs stop babying him, but he is her baby. Too many people can't see further that or have their little child goggles on.
Children don't stop being precious to you, you know when they get older.

noblegiraffe · 06/03/2015 00:10

Schools don't need a parent's permission to put a kid in detention.

ilovesooty · 06/03/2015 00:12

At the age when he's doing GCSEs he needs to take some responsibility and his mother needs to support the school. Is she going to baby him through further education? In his employment if he fails to meet deadlines? There's no evidence that the homework was an impossible task if other pupils managed to complete it.

SwirlyThingAlert · 06/03/2015 00:31

There must have been SOME way of printing it off. I have a high school ds, and our printer is knackered at the moment.
There's the school library computer banks to print stuff off of if need be for students.
If for some random reason all the printers in school decided to all go put all at once, there's still the local council library in town.
Or another family member or friend.
All options won't be out of action all at once. What I'm saying is there's always an option somewhere to print it off.

Summerisle1 · 06/03/2015 00:38
  1. Let's hope he doesn't plan a career in journalism. It doesn't matter if a pack of ravening wolves ate your copy, you still have to meet deadlines.
  1. It is only a sodding detention. Stop being so over-involved.
  1. Buy some printer ink.
Unexpected · 06/03/2015 00:43

Did I understand in the middle of all this that your son had another detention at this school for getting 8 out of 10 in a spelling test???? They are giving spelling tests to GCSE students?! I am finding this whole thing difficult to follow, not least because you don't seem to believe in capital letters at the beginning of sentences or much in the way of punctuation. It's also frankly unbelievable that your son has reached Year 11 without knowing this teachers email address. He has been in the school for 5 years and all teacher emails will follow the same pattern. You are being fed a load of BS by your son.

IreneA78 · 06/03/2015 02:02

obviously the school isn't a prison and cannot physically detain your DC against his wishes or if you turn up there and march him out on the day of the detention. refusal of detention will just escalate things to a suspension though.

Topseyt · 06/03/2015 02:11

Nata1lia79, what a load of complete and utter bollocks!!!!

Actions (or lack of them) have consequences. The detention is the consequence of him failing to print and hand in his homework, which could well have been just the latest in a long line of incidents.

Anyway, if his spelling, punctuation and grammar are anything like those in the OP and subsequent posts then there is probably very little danger of him getting into journalism.

pilates · 06/03/2015 07:32

Nata1ia79, really???

Op, please do not take this advice, you wouldn't be doing your child any favours at all.

Your son needs to suck it up and move on.

IreneA78 · 06/03/2015 07:50

the punishment was perhaps unfair, but it isn't a public flogging. you need to pick your battles and move on

mayfridaycomequickly · 06/03/2015 08:07

I genuinely assumed that Nata1ia79 was being sarcastic.

MinceSpy · 06/03/2015 08:08

OP hopefully you've bought some ink and your son's homework has been handed in?

DrankSangriaInThePark · 06/03/2015 08:19

Kid leaves stuff till last minute and discovers printer isn't working etc.

Happens to us all.

We learn from it.

Next time, it gets done.

If you really are the mother, are you this involved in every little bit of his schoolwork?

Poor kid.

marcopront · 06/03/2015 08:40

OP at 19:03:08 you said "when I mean by attachments not working is they have a special email thing for emails within the school when he clicks the attach button nothing happens."

and then at 19:14:46 you said "he requires her username e.g. ngiraffe145. he didn't know it. he asked other teachers but they doesn't know it."

Has he also be trying to email work to another teacher?

I am amazed that no other teachers knew the journalism teachers username. I can tell you the email address of every teacher, member of the admin staff etc at my school because the email programme has them all.

HSMMaCM · 06/03/2015 09:04

DD missed a piece of homework, because we didn't have the correct software at home. She told me she couldn't do it at school and got a detention. On the surface it appears she had no way to do this homework, but of course she did - at a friends, at the library, in the school computer suite at lunch time, etc. She's never missed another piece since then.

I agree with emailing the office if you don't have a direct contact. Ours always passes emails on to the teachers. Also ... showing the teacher a USB stick is not the same as handing the USB stick in as proof of homework.

Higheredserf · 06/03/2015 09:15

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.