to think this primary school security is lax?

[Woolleymammoth]

Long story short...
Dc primary school, parents encouraged to leave dc from 8.40 once thru school gates. Dc play outside til 8.50 when they are called in (exception of reception who are delivered straight to classroom).

School is large and has 4 gates, 2 on infant side, 2 on junior side.

Kids can get all round the school grounds.

Only one infant gate has staff directly next to it, the other infant gate has someone sort of near it. Junior side has one staff member somewhere in playground, maybe near one gate but not other.

I know for a fact of at least one junior child who was able to leave after drop off and before being called in.

What do you think? Is this normal security wise for schools?

Ok not very short sorry!!

It sounds lax to me. There are two gates to my children's primary school. The head is always at one gate for pick up and the deputy head at the other for drop off. Plus two teachers for each. They say hello to each child as they come in.

There is no way a child could leave unnoticed. Or an unauthorised person get in. Not least because the gates are electronically locked and you need a pass to open them.

I would hate the set up you describe, OP.

But something regarding your child's safety should be put to the school immediately and not just cos a few people on a forum agree with you.
Though a school in Scotland that had a shooting happen, the dunblane massacre now has all day security, cameras, people constantly been checked etc

YANBU, that sounds like inadequate supervision to me. Our school has only one gate, and parents are required to leave their children there to go into the supervised playground until the bell goes. The gate is manned to check that no children wander back out again. I'd think I'd be worried if there were other unmanned gates, not so much for juniors, but definitely for infants.

At our primary in the infant section parents stay on the yard until the bell goes and children line up. Leaving children unsupervised is not allowed, it does happen occasionally but the parents get called in if it is found out.
In the junior section the bell goes at 8:55 but staff are on the yard from 8:45. Not manning the gate though, just in the yard and at the school door. Parents are discouraged from gathering on the yard but they all do any way.
Any children unsupervised before 8:45 have to go to the free breakfast club.

I can see both sides of this. I do see that the chances of 'something bad' happening is extremely unlikely, but if that 'something bad' were to happen then the consequences for the child involved could be horrendous. So I do understand the feeling of 'any risk is too big a risk'.

But at the same time, from what I read on mumsnet, schools in England seem much much stricter than schools where I am regarding all sorts of things like eg children not being allowed to walk to or from school unsupervised, parents not being allowed to take photographs etc. It would be unheard of here for 8 year olds to be expected to be met at the school gate by a parent or carer. And yet as far as I am aware we do not have any bigger problems with child abduction/truancy/road accidents etc than in England, so the approach that is viewed by many here as lax doesn't actually seem to result in any poorer outcomes for the children.

Elf I have raised it with the head already - they have not acted....

Too many unmanned gates there. I'd say that some of them could remain locked.

One main entry route is all that is needed, and the duty member of staff near to it watching at pick up or drop off time.

Our local primary school only had one main gate. That was watched by staff at morning drop off, at lunchtime and at home time in the afternoon.

I liked it that way.

Why would people standing at the gates make any difference whatsoever?
Say you're on duty, what do you do? Ask every single adult who they are, what children they are with and what they are doing there? If not, then how do you propose stopping unauthorised people coming in?
And with so many people coming and going all at the same time, how are you going to spot unattended children? The ones running ahead from parents, playing, messing around, are you going to grab each one that isn't attached to a parental hand?

This is one of those "somebody should do something about my vague fears" but you don't know what they should do, how they should do it, or who indeed should be doing it. The only thing you know is its not your job, but you want it doing.

My DC's primary school doesn't even have fences round it, the front has brick wall which is easy to jump and the back is a open field.

thesecondviola, The members of staff on the gate know most of the families coming and going though. If children come to the gate by themselves, they ask them to wait for whoever is with them to go in. Ditto on the way out.

An unaccompanied child or adult without a child would be fairly easy to spot tbh.

I think OP is very reasonable for wanting the school to supervise children for the 10 mins that they've said that they will!

Far easier to suggest that parents supervise their own children until they go into school.
Or perhaps just teach them not to leave school alone (what 5 year old does that?)

treacle, I know exactly what you mean and if I lived in Germany I don't doubt that my children would be going to and from school by themselves.

Maybe a critical mass of children walking to and from school somehow makes it safer for everyone? ie unaccompanied children don't seem as vulnerable?

I agree that parents should supervise their children before school, but OP is saying that her school have explicitly asked parents to leave children from 8.40am said that they would supervise, and haven't.

There is a difference between a risk and a hazard. Children have to have independence to grow into mature adults. Eliminating all risk from children's lives reduces chances for children to excercise judgment.

There are lots of gun massacres in the US because they have stupid gun laws. A teacher standing at the gate would not stop a crazied gunman. Paedophile is unlikely to commit a crime in the school playground. Paedophiles are far more subtle than that. Children are often at more risk in the home than at school.

Do German children get kidnapped more than British children? It would be interesting to compare the child traffic accident statistics for germany and the UK.

At my kid's primary they have someone supervising the junior playground from 8.45. Infant's parents have to stay with them til doors open at 9. Legally parents are responsible for children til the start of the school day

YANBU IMO. DC1's primary school expect you to see the children to the classroom door - once the children are inside the gates are all locked. If they're actively encouraging you to leave them in the playground there absolutely should be appropriate supervision. Of course five year olds ought to know better than to wander off but they can hardly be relied upon - DS knows this but he sometimes gets really upset at drop-off time and I wouldn't trust him not to try to run after me if I had to leave him in the playground.

Reallytired, of course it's unrealistic to eliminate all risk from children's lives.

OP is talking about the school saying that they will provide supervision for 10 minutes, then not doing so.

That's creating unnecessary risk, not minimising the chances of it.

The thing is, the school would probably allow parents to deliver children to the classroom but they tgen get parents going in and harassing teachers

I don't think that's normal or desirable. We are inner city though.

Parents do stupid things too...

Thesecondviola
I would expect the person on the gate to prevent children leaving.

This isn't some vague fear, I encountered a distressed child running away from school at 9am last week.

Lots of food for thought.... Still haven't decided whether to make any more fuss than I already have....

Unless they installed turnstiles there would be no way to guarantee a child couldn't leave. For instance , If the member of staff on the gate has to deal with a child falling over and gets distracted, a child could slip out. Perhaps use the example of the escapee you encountered to ask the school to have only one gate open. That would be easier to control. Be aware that the head could simply withdraw the playground supervision and leave it to parents.

This isn't some vague fear, I encountered a distressed child running away from school at 9am last week.

And you helped them. takes a village and all that, no harm done.

There are no guarantees of zero risk of course but I'm surprised that this isn't considered a safeguarding risk.

At both my children's primary and junior high schools - in a continental culture that typically affords kids much more freedom (it's common for 3 year olds to get the school bus alone) - there has always been an adult presence on any open gate. The problem of people coming and going is eliminated by allowing no parents through the gates without good reason. It's not impossible for kids to get out (I've seen a disturbed kid make a run for it, with a member of staff in hot pursuit) but it's not easy.

There were staff at all the gates of my children's primary school but I don't think that was the case when my eldest started. They tightened security for various reasons.