Aibu to ask educators, school management, Ofsted inspectors and attendance officers why some schools are SO bad at dealing with bullying?

[Baconyum]

I have several friends who are teachers, but none who are management or attendance officers.

Several threads I've read and/or posted on recently are on the issue of school bullying. I also have a friend who is currently using the local authority (a local lawyer has taken the case pro bono as this school is particularly bad) as her child ended up hospitalised with broken bones due to bullying and now has a school phobia and this was PRIMARY!

I was supposedly at school when (70'S/80'S) bullying was worse/less well handled yet as a military child the several schools I attended handled any incidents well. It just wasn't tolerated.

Why when things are supposed to be getting managed better is it apparently getting worse?

One of my teacher friends left a school she was working at because of their head in the sand approach 'there's no bullying at our school' yet it was rife.

What's going wrong? And why are schools bad for this getting 'outstanding' Ofsted ratings?

Well that's me told thanks acasualobserver disclaimed I'm in Scotland we don't have Ofsted.

As for bullying being overused I disagree, I suspect what's happening is the early signs of bullying. Surely better to resolve then than allow to escalate?

As for bullying being overused I disagree, I suspect what's happening is the early signs of bullying

It really isn't.
This I dealt with an angry parent whose child went home and said they were being bullied. having spent hours unpicking it turns out said child had a disagreement with another student in a lesson...... and that was it.
This happens CONSTANTLY.

I think whenever you have an institution, that institution has goals of its own, normally involving the success and survival of the institution itself, separate to what the institution was set up for (like educating children). Those goals take precedence in some cases - maintaining reputation vs admitting a problem, saving money vs providing the best education, getting the best test scores vs educating children properly not to the test, keeping order overall vs reacting to individual needs, etc. It's like in Yes Minister, the govt departments all vie for bigger budgets, more prestige etc, rather than doing the thing they're bloody meant to.

Yes yes to Social Media making things worse. Of ALL the bullying cases I have dealt with this academic year, not one has occurred on or near school premises but on social media and the pupil's own bedrooms.

It is much easier for young people to type dispicable things out than it is to say them face to face, therefore cyberbullying is extremely widespread.

It is a shame such a large proportion of parents have very little idea about this and don't monitor it at all at home but instead, happily hand out very powerful, portable computers (smartphones and tablets) to their sons and daughters with either very few or no checks at all 🙁

Baconyum
"I'd also be interested to know why children aren't able to give feedback to eg Ofsted on their schools?"

To add to acasualobserver's post, when ofsted came to my school they also picked the children and held several "panels" of pupils from different areas.

Parents are also encouraged to express there views to ofsted either directly or through a weblink.

I suspect it is like everything else - now that we have the internet we are far more aware of things that were otherwise invisible to us. I don't think they have got worse necessarily.

I am going to try and keep this as anonymous as possible. I have had to remove one of my dc from school in year 10 due to bullying, including two physical attacks. After the second one dc had bald patches where hair had been pulled out and extensive bruising including a black eye. Pictures were taken without dc's consent and posted on Facebook with awful titles and comments, a group was set up with 'anyone who wishes my dc's name would die' as its title, school did nothing despite my friend's dc taking screen shots as evidence.

The day of the second attack (dc's last ever day at school), I was called and told there had been a slight "non serious accident" but should pick up early as dc was refusing to return to class and I should have words to emphasise the importance of not missing classes. The school absolutely denied any bullying despite a core group of bullies constantly picking on my dc.

we involved the police but school denied all knowledge and the bullies all stuck together and despite dc's injuries there was 'no evidence'. We felt completely let down by the school and police. Dc had a complete breakdown and attempted suicide, a year later is still having psychiatric treatment and apart from those appointments never leaves the house.

We were told by an anti bullying charity that having bullying on record can affect OFSTED ratings so schools are reluctant to acknowledge it. There are a few good organisations that offer help to bullied children including bullying uk and red balloon. They have both given us help, I recommend them to anyone else going through the same hell we have.

Well, for me It's often a combination.

1. The children are only in school for a certain amount of hours. There is little that can be done to counter act social and economic factors.
2. It is difficult to prove.
3. The people who can make decisions are more often concerned with attainment data, progress and exclusions.
4. Pex (exclude) paperwork is lengthy and relies on all sorts of different factors.
5. Weak leadership/ management. Many managers and leaders in schools were teachers. Not trained managers. Their skill set can often be poor.

IthinkIamsinking, when you say I have a range of strategies/tricks up my sleeve to deal with it do you mind sharing what some of these strategies are? I don't work in education but many of the children I work with are the victims of serious bullying (to the extent that they might experience PTSD symptoms or have had suicidal thoughts) and some of the schools involved seem at a complete loss as to how to deal with the perpetrators or say they are "dealing with it" but are reluctant to elaborate. When I raise concerns they tend to say things along the lines of "well, they've been spoken to about it" but that's all the information I get. It would be interesting to know what techniques eductors who ARE committed to tackling bullying proactively have found to be effective.

As a teacher l have seen over the years that sometimes teachers are complicit with the bullies. They see a weakness in a child and sometimes deep in their belly they believe that child deserves to be bullied. This is especially true of boys. Teachers think they need to toughen up and they have an adverse reaction themselves to boys who are not your regular sport mad "masculine" type. I have run into this on numerous occasions and have had to fight tooth and nail for something to be done to support a child being isolated or strongly rejected by the group. I'm sorry to say this but it is true lm afraid.

junebirthdaygirl

Although I agree that teachers can be complicit.

I have also seen the opposite, the less sporty boys being supported by teachers because as they are weaker they must be telling the truth, when sometimes it is them bullying the larger child.

Generalisations do no one any good. there is not one type of child that is a bully, it is a range of children with a range of bullying styles.

Random question: what has the attendance officer got to do with it? Or ultimately, OFSTED, who come in, make judgements based on a few lessons then bugger off again?

Good to know boney.

But boney and acasualobserver, if that is the case how are schools that are NOT addressing bullying/not providing good pastoral care getting 'outstanding' on their reports? Surely that's misleading?

"We were told by an anti bullying charity that having bullying on record can affect OFSTED ratings so schools are reluctant to acknowledge it."

Then surely ofsted (HMIE in Scotland don't know what Wales and northern Ireland have) have a duty to ensure they ARE acknowledging it AND dealing with it and if they're told a school isn't that should be investigated? Fwiwi this is one reason (and my teacher friends would kill me for this) why I think inspections should be unannounced! It's the only way to get the truth.

JBG I'll go you one better, my daughter was bullied BY a teacher! This teacher lost her job the year after dd left for striking a child. Yet I and several other parents had been telling the school what a nightmare she was.

I have nothing to do with schools but I wonder if it's a mixture of

children who's parents dont back up the teachers and/or can't control their children themselves.

teachers who have tried hard but what else are they suppose to do

children who are SEN who's actions may not be managed and this is perceived as bullying and quite rightly feels like bullying to the victim but then isn't as easy to resolve because of the child's extra needs

schools seem to be reluctant to expel children - maybe a misplaced blame culture (seen as teacher failure perhaps)

The paragraph regarding sen children is inappropriate to say the least.

I agree part of the problem is parents who think their little darlings can do no wrong. But senior teachers should really be able to handle this.

Teachers who have tried hard etc? Cop out!

Schools reluctant to expel children. I agree they may well be, perhaps due to negative press, the reactions of the parents of the child being expelled, but then expulsion is a bit of a cop out too. The bullies are children too, they're entitled to an education, an I think expulsion is passing the buck.

There was a programme called 'Mr Drew's boys' that was dealing with how to handle more challenging children. The teachers were more experienced and were not particularly disciplinarian and largely iirc helped the children and their families.

As I said upthread, perhaps the schools NOT handling this issue well have much to learn from those that do?

I would like to know too. I remember in the 90s, a boy in the year above picked on me after school and once picked up a branch as I was walking home and hit me in the back of the head. It fucking hurt. Mum went to the school and they said it was "out of their hands" because it was out of school hours and off school grounds.

2 weeks later my (numpty at the time) older brother and his friends trampled on flower beds at a local hotel and were reported by a member of the public. They all got 2 weeks after school detention because they were wearing their school uniforms at the time.

This was a rather posh grammar school in a rather posh town that wanted to keep its rather posh reputation, and facing the fact that there were bullies in the school risked this, therefore wasn't something they were prepared to challenge

"I would like to know too. I remember in the 90s, a boy in the year above picked on me after school and once picked up a branch as I was walking home and hit me in the back of the head. It fucking hurt. Mum went to the school and they said it was "out of their hands" because it was out of school hours and off school grounds."

Hmmm Interesting. So if a kid from the same school was spotted in the same uniform smoking a spliff or vandalizing property the school would say it was "out of their hands because it was out of school hours and off school grounds? Really?!!!! Would they FUCK!

You can bet a penny to a pinch of shit the school would change these rules + move the goalposts drag the kid concerned across the coals punish them and lecture them about dragging the school into disrepute.

But bully some kid by hitting them with a branch (Pinky this actually happened to me too) nope out of school hours and nothing to do with us.

Schools need to be consistent instead of trying to have it both ways!

Oh i missed this bit of your post Pinky.

2 weeks later my (numpty at the time) older brother and his friends trampled on flower beds at a local hotel and were reported by a member of the public. They all got 2 weeks after school detention because they were wearing their school uniforms at the time

Proves the point beautifully!

i'm just a mom, but I would suspect the consequences of being a bully must not discourage the behavior.

expulsion from main stream schooling would reach a bottle neck as I suspect specialist schools for children with behavioral issues would be limited.
at the core I speculate is a very unhappy child (the bully) who really doesn't want to be at school either, is bullying worse in the UK than other countries? i'm just wondering if the constant stress of needing to prove your performance level could be making matters worse?

Out2pasture are you American? If so I'm struggling to understand why you'd think the stress of proving performance is any worse here than there?

I'm very close to someone who worked at a school where 'there is no bullying here'. Because that's what the well regarded and apparently inspirational head would say, at almost any and every opportunity (like in group talks to new parents, end of term assembly, parents evenings etc).

It was a load of balls, obviously. He (perhaps) meant well- he indeed wanted there to be no bullying. He wanted the school to be one where no bullying ever happened. The problem was it was a larger than average and very ordinary school. The chances of the big population never having any bullies was zero.

He should have not made a big thing about 'no bullying here'. But he did, continually. And it happened often, and was not dealt with adequately. If he'd have said, 'like any school, we do have some issues with bullying, and we deal with them', and did actually deal with them, the victims and parents of victims would have respected him more. But the image of the bullying free school was something he made a big thing of. Hugely problematic.

It seemed to have a trickle down effect to the staff and indeed the pupils, that bullying was to be brushed under the carpet and minimised. As long as the end of term show/ carol concert/ SATs results were good, great. Bullied kids were continually side lined and ignored. The 'no bullying' script was trotted out to any complainers.

Does this happen a lot I wonder? My friend certainly thinks it does. Image is everything to some people.

i'm Canadian (grand daughter in the UK). much more relaxed attitude to schooling here (age when they start school, attendance, grades all very flexible).
like you bacon I've seen several posts on MN recently involving bullying just wondering if it is more prevalent in the UK?

Firstly and most unacceptably that some schools won't admit it happens because the they have to deal with it. I think it's actually unusual. Beware the school that says they have no bullying.

But after that there's a number of reasons.
Victim's often won't tell for fear of it getting worse.
It can be very difficult to spot for a teacher. Is the fact Janey's sitting on her own at lunch because she's being excluded or because she's refusing to play until everyone does what she wants.
It often comes down to he said she said.
Other kids will often back the bully because they're afraid of ending up as another victim.
Often the things done are sly. Who's able to prove that Mike's book had been hidden rather than it just slid there by accident? Happens a lot? Is Mike careless or being bullied?

And I do agree that children learn that saying he's bullying me is emotive. I've heard it from mine, I've heard it from others, when what actually happened was a single incident, or even an accident or an occasion when it's been pretty mutual

I'll tell you dds story. It's long sorry.

Dd was bullied by a group of children. It was xenophobic, physical and verbal. She was spat at and once had a pair of scissors thrown at her.

I made several complaints to the school. Finally she came home and told me that one of the boys had grabbed her by the hair and restrained her when she tried to get away from him. I called the school the next morning and requested an appointment and told them Dd wouldn't be attending until I spoke to them. I had another child at home, who was going to my mums at lunch so requested a meeting around or after that time. The teachers response was 'if you don't bring her in immediately, it will be unauthorised absence and you can be fined'. No concern for Dd. I didn't back down and told her she could do what she wanted as I was going to complain to LA as well.

The meeting took place at lunchtime. Where the teacher and head teacher denied I had ever made a complaint and would only admit 'it sounds like it could turn into bullying' they agreed a plan and spoke to Dd, who agreed she wanted to go back to class.

During the meeting I told them I was thinking of taking her out of the school. Again I was threaten with a fine for unauthorised absence. I produced a de registration letter from my bag, told them I have the right to home educate my daughter and they could try all they wanted to fine me.

That afternoon she was smacked round the face, again. We de registered her and home schooled her until we found a suitable school.

Dd loved her new school. It was fab. We trusted the head teacher completely. 6 months later, the head teacher asked us to come in and told us that a boy from her older school was being moved to the new school on a managed move. It was the main bully. They told us we couldn't do anything. That turned out to be a lie. A managed move had been discussed but his mother took him out and moved him before the managed move took place.

He started in the September (year 6) by January he had assaulted Dd twice. The head teacher left in the December. In this time we had many meetings about issue with him bullying Dd again. The police were called and he was charged with assault.

This time I had logged every meeting, dates, what was said etc. The new head could find no record of anything. The previous head had not recorded a thing. The new head just kept saying this boy had a right to an education and they would take the steps they had been doing. Even though these steps had not protected Dd.

The head teacher did all she could to block us being able to do anything. She tried to stop us speaking to the governors, the LA and ofsted.

In the end there was a meeting with the head of the govenors, the new head, the police and the head brought in her Union rep. Who all handed the head teacher her arse. The boy was given a 1-2-1 and supervised at all times as a result of that meeting. It all stopped.

Until they went to secondary last September. Where the boy threatened her. I spoke to the head of year. The school police officer and. Head of year spoke to the boy immediately and told him he if he did anything to her again, he would be charged with harassment. They made clear they would not accept it or let it slide like primary had.

This boy has left her alone. But has attacked so many other students he is now taught in seclusion as a last resort. Other work is going on with him but I don't know the details. Is it fair on him he isn't being taught with other pupils, can't have lunch with them etc? I don't know and don't care to be honest. My daughter is safe, that's what I care about.

His mother only cares about his right to an education and doesn't think him assaulting other pupils isn't a reason to for him to be punished. I only care about my dds safety.

I suspect schools don't want bullying recorded anywhere for ofsted reports. We do fill In a questionnaire before before inspection but I suspect the arent handed over if they are negative and so I recorded it with ofsted directly.

Baconyum

"But boney and acasualobserver, if that is the case how are schools that are NOT addressing bullying/not providing good pastoral care getting 'outstanding' on their reports? Surely that's misleading?"

The honest answer is that some schools are good with paperwork and can fiddle the books (so to speak), There are quite a few schools that, when listening to reports from parents (that have come to us), that have nobody in place to deal with the issues.

Poor pastoral care etc. but they seem to be able to blag their way to an outstanding grade.