To think my son should be allowed home at weekends

[Skyfullofstars76]

My son is in a residential college which shuts every other weekend. This means that the young people are expected to stay there for a weekend. My son doesn't wish to do this.

Placement in the long run if he can't get settled

Yes they do know about his mental health issues.

I don't know who talk to in the la post 16.

It's really early days.
Everyone is still getting to know each other.
The life skills at the weekend, whilst staff are getting to know students will be with high staff involvement.
It's amazing how many skills are exaggerated or not mentioned. So staff have to asses. Assessments generally take time.
Eventually staff assistance will be withdrawn although staff will be present to oversee.
Weekends will also be about doing fun stuff as well as any therapy etc.
Missing these things will affect
Him more as they will be talking about this stuff during the week.

The thing is he doesn't want to spend time with the people they expect him to

Can you go up and visit him or take him out for the day? i can understand the LA doesn't have the money to transport him around but can't you go up there instead? Otherwise it's maybe giving it more time as sometimes he'll have to do things he doesn't like and I presume there's a reason that place was chosen and you've not given it much of a chance yet.

No he doesn't get on with six students he lives with. He would spend his day with them.

In that case you need to talk with someone about it. Simply pulling him out isn't going to help.

Everybody else is right that he needs to have time to settle in and build relationships with those around him; it's an essential life skill which he'll need to learn sooner or later, mental health issues or not

As I've said, I've been in this situation and absolutely understand the anguish you feel for him, but if you arrange for him to come home every weekend you run the risk of unsettling him even more

Learning to adapt to new situations is exactly the sort of thing the college will help him with, and pulling him out isn't necessarily going to help. Unless anything really serious happens, personally I wouldn't do anything for 6 months - by then you'll probably see a huge and very positive change in him

At various points in his life he will meet people he doesn't like.
He cannot alway walk away from these situations. He has to develop the skills to deal with this.

You pull him out. Where do you stop with he doesn't like students, teachers, colleagues, neighbors?
We all have interactions with people we cannot stand. We deal with this using a variety of coping mechanisms.

Another point is that if there was anything seriously wrong, the college would let you know - it's simply the way these things are done, not least to protect themselves

Believe me they'll see this situation all the time - and because of that they have the strategies to help the students through it. If you keep bringing him home, all that happens is that you delay he eventual settling-down

Surely the thing to do is speak to them? Worried parents is another thing they'll see every year, and if you meet them half way and genuinely listen to what they have to say, they'll almost certainly be able to help you feel better about things

So he doesn't get on with every single one of six people? I don't believe that every one of these six people is horrible, do you? The reason he doesn't get on with them is because he has social and mental health difficulties, yes?

Presumably you have chosen this college or your son has been placed in a residential college because he needs the level of support they provide, not just educationally but in developing his social and independent living skills. Part of this will be supporting him in tolerating other people. It won't be easy for him and it will take time but if you pull him out after two weeks, he will never make any progress.

I know that it is really really hard to back off when your son is struggling but you need to work with the college on this. They are professionals, they have seen it all before, talk to them, express your concerns, listen to what they have to say and come up with a plan between you to support your son while he goes through this difficult transition.

If he is still unhappy after the first term you might need to think again but two weeks is far too soon to be giving up.

What Morganly says. You really need to talk to the college about this, not just assume that the answer is for your son to escape. The whole point about residential special colleges is that teaching goes on way beyond normal college hours, and what they do at the weekends in terms of learning socialisation, independence and self-help skills is extremely valuable. You may perceive that he gets more independence at home, but are you sure? I suspect you're only going on what he tells you, which may well be somewhat slanted. And it stands to reason that the staff will stay pretty close at hand in the early days when the college and the students are getting used to each other.