Missing school jumpers - to still be irrationally pissed off about this!

[RumblingOn]

Bought DS (Yr1 and still 5 so at young end) 2 new school jumpers after Easter hols named with permanent marker. One went missing on the 1st day he wore it, 2nd the following week. We are not allowed in classrooms so asked teacher to look out for them, still not turned up a few weeks later after re checking lost property so asked again. Teacher then gave me a jumper with no name in and which was obviously an older one, saying that I could have that instead to shut me up!

DS does take his jumper off most days (don't bother sending him in with one on warmer days) and I agree that he does forget to bring them out and I had no problem with this as he would normally bring a few home in one go a few days later but the new ones have never turned up. Teacher says it is his responsibility but my issue is that another child/ren has obviously taken them home and they have not been returned despite his name being in big letters on the label and written into the collar.

I am still steaming that they have been pretty much been nicked! His older well washed jumpers have always turned up, but not the nice fluffy obviously new ones.

Pissed off that I have essentially bought jumpers for another child, and financially we really struggle for money, so DS has been wearing old washed out ones!

AIBU to eye the other parents in DS's class with suspicion?

so not only has the school failed to return it to me despite it having his name on but a hard faced parent has just taken the jumper for their son and not bothered to return it despite it having my sons name on

It's quite possible that the school were never involved.
Your son takes off his jumper. The other boy takes off his. Later the other boy puts on your son's jumper by mistake. At the end of the day a nameless jumper is without an owner. No involvement from the school other than being left with yet another unnamed jumper.

our school does embroidered to order sweatshirts with logos, when we order we can fill in the box and get our dc's names included the logo.

ds still lost the occasional sweatshirt but it would show up eventually when he'd outgrown it

I picked it up and it had my sons name in it - so not only has the school failed to return it to me despite it having his name on

Teachers don't do a daily check to see if children match up with the labels on their jumpers. The only time they would look is if it were left laying around, in which case it would have found itself back with your child. Do you really think teachers have nothing better to do than check everyone's uniforms to make sure they are wearing their own items?

I work in a school and a class teacher and ta cannot look after 30 jumpers and 30 PE kits.....

Parents can come in to look through the lost property bin at pretty much any time, but often if they come in at the end of the day the item hasn't made its way there yet. We have a very good caretaker who checks behind and under things and at the far end of the field and usually finds anything that hasn't actually been taken home by someone else. We now have parent volunteers who come in at intervals to look through the lost property bin, identify named items and return to classes/pegs. The unlabelled stuff is laid out in the playground on tables at pickup time for inspection, any unlabelled stuff goes to charity at the end of term.
But there's not a lot that can be done about stuff taken by someone else and not returned.
The idea of having the child's name visible was suggested by a member of the parents forum, but other parents thought it a bad idea for safeguarding reasons (as we are a junior school, several of our children walk home without adults or go to meet parents in town or at the infant school)

Lymmmummy
so not only has the school failed to return it to me despite it having his name on

Last week we return 6 full pe kits bags from the roof where they where thrown by the children that owned them. (We saw them do it, if we hadn't they could still be there)

On the last day of term we pick up bags/coats/jumpers/shoes/trainers that have been left in the playground.

Every assembly we have the most recent stuff on stage for the children to collect, (the named stuff is announced).

we also return stuff at tutor time.

Yet the children still leave it.

Yes I accept the child could have accidentally just taken the jumper without staff having been aware - my main issue was with the mother of the child taking it for several moths despite it having s manufacturers label with my sons name on it - on our school you order the items and the label is printed by manufacturer with your child name and label was very clear to read

Like I say I am not irrationally pissed off as OP is - it is v minor in scheme of things - sure teachers have better things to do - but is annoying when in our school they make a big song and dance about labelling stuff then it still goes missing - my son is in reception year so still at the stage where perhaps a little assistance could have been given etc

Am not really bothered I just learnt not to send him in in any good stuff on days when they get changed for pe which seems to be the main day for things going missing

I've worked in a school and I've checked children's name labels in jumpers and PE kits when another child's stuff has gone missing. Yes it's time consuming but I always thought it was important.

Last year my youngest lost 3 polo shirts, a pair of trousers and a PE kit. All were named. The annoying thing is that as soon as I discover my child has brought home a (always nameless) garment that isn't his, I send it back to school. But the other parents must see my child's name in the clothes their child has brought back but they're never returned to me!

You will find some kids lose lots more stuff than others, I know plenty of kids who never lose stuff, including attractive, new jumpers. Those are the kids who stuff jumpers into their school bag immediately. Sadly, mine isn't one of them and leaves it somewhere.

School really can't do anything. Make sure your ds know you are angry about it and he is at fault. Yes, it is possible another child took it, but jumpers turn up in school garden sheds, behind pianos and over the school fence. He took it off and left it somewhere random, nobody wrestled it off his back. Send him wearing no jumper or make clear the new jumper comes out of the toy/ sweets budget.

3- Had a clear name label in but for children that had left the school but whose parents had passed the old uniform on to others, these 'new' owners never bothered to put their child's name onto the item.
This happens a lot at our school.

As a secondary teacher I cannot believe the number of expensive items (usually coats, but sometimes whole PE kits) left behind. I expect they'll be back for them the next day - they don't come. I look for anything to identify the owner - if there's e.g. a bus pass, I track down the student and return it. I leave it visible in my class so that they should say it the next day their class is back in. I pass it on to the office who will put it in lost property until the end of term, when it will be recycled/given to charity.
I assume the teenagers have told their parents they have "looked everywhere" etc but they haven't. A minute name writing with a sharpie would mean it was returned to them.

Your children seem remarkably careless to lose so many items of clothing: PE kits, coats, numerous jumpers. Instead of blaming the school, teach him to look after his possessions.
So-called Permanent marker does wash out; try embroidering his initials on the front of his jumper, as we had to do at school with DS and science overalls, and PE shirts, to prevent other people from borrowing them.

My ds has "looked everywhere" before. It was in the lunch hall, playground, school office, his classroom, the music room before and he hadn't looked anywhere at all.

His "I looked everywhere" translates as "just buy a new one, I cba". I send him back, went to school office for special permission for him to go back into all these rooms. He now knows not looking isn't a way out and got much better at not losing the stuff in the first place.

I feel your pain OP and it doesn't get any better as they get older.
DD (14) has lost 3 expensive school PE hoodies (£34 each!!) over the last 3 years despite having 2 sewn in name tags (one by the supplier and an additional Cash's label put in by me).
One hoodie was finally returned after 9 months, very faded (obviously washed many times) and minus its pull cord. I would love to know who these Mums are that can't read a name tag.
The last one was really annoying as she lost it in January and the school supplier couldn't send me a new one until April as they were having stock difficulties.
This time I have sewn in 3 labels (one hidden) plus embroidered her initials in white thread on the sleeve so that she can see if anyone else is wearing it.

It's sadly just a classic case of realizing that not everyone has the same standards as you and sadly there's pretty much nothing you can do about it. Some parents have no qualms about keeping uniform that's not their dc's but there's really bugger all you can do once that happens - other than frisking the collar of every child as they come out of school. Not likely to happen.
The best thing is, like others have said, and that's to get their name embroidered in the front of the jumpers. You'd need to be a pretty thick skinned parent to send your kid to school wearing a jumper with someone else's name on the front.

When my class go to PE, I tell them to put their jumper over their chair, as if the chair is "wearing" it. I tell the girls to button their cardigans over their chairs.
Ditto if they're just taking their jumpers/cardis off.
I tell them to put their clothes in their PE bag so that they don't get mixed up.
I don't usually let the class out till they've all got their jumpers/water bottles/pencil cases etc. Apart from anything else, I like to keep my classroom tidy.
If there is a jumper left, I'll come out to try and catch them at the front of the building, and will ask parents if it's their dc's.
I had a pupil once who deliberately hid other pupils' things. One jacket reappeared after a weekend of rain, it was found in a prominent place where it would have been seen in the Friday that it went missing, and it was bone dry.
A PE kit was found stuffed under a trolley in the cloakroom. It belonged to a very careful pupil who always had her PE kit with her, so I knew something was wrong when she suddenly didn't have it.
Got to a point where I couldn't let him out of the classroom unsupervised. He was 6.
When jumpers etc have gone missing or might have gone home on therefore person by mistake, I've checked labels etc. PITA but so is but not getting your own stuff back.
I'm good at reading faded writing as well
(It is astonishing though, how much stuff isn't labelled. We have a lost property and if it's labelled, it's returned ASAP. We send it round once a term and leave it out on parents' night etc. Still loads unclaimed. )

I'm another lost property helper. I'd say that around 2/3 of lost property has no name at all, maybe half the rest has a faded scribble, and a very small remainder has an ironed or sewn label.

Clear labels go straight back to the class at going home time.

Borderline labels get compared with a class list along with some judgement, eg a jumper in age 8-9 that says "Ben" might belong to any of the six Bens actually aged 7-10. And it's very confusing when an age 4 cardigan is labelled Sally when the only Sally is now 11 and 5'6".

Seriously, though, putting your child's first name in biro on the laundry label doesn't really count. Remember that it's most likely someone who isn't you that will be looking at the label, so although you'll recognise it if you see it, the unlucky TA/PTA volunteer won't know that it's your Ellie/Harry. Surnames, people!!

At the last lost property sort, the HT advertised that we'd be putting the unlabelled stuff out in the hall to be claimed. Do you want to know how many people came to look at it? NOT ONE. Piles and piles of in some cases brand new uniform, but also coats, hoodies etc from expensive brands, simply abandoned.

(Things in suitable sizes went to the WH Chernobyl project; smaller things went to Barnardo's; uniform went to the second-hand sale.)

My DC don't really lose things. I think that must be partly luck (as they're horrors for shedding clothing more generally) but also because I put proper Cash's name tapes on everything so they're easy to return.

I agree with labels on the outside though. One parent I know had awful trouble "losing" things until she started sewing the labels on the outside hem. Don't think she's lost anything since.

I had one child in my class who always had their name tape sewn on the outside of their jumper. It worked more that once as I saw the mum stopping a random child on the playground and getting a jumper back.

I had the same issues as the op about 3 years ago 2 brand new expensive school jumpers gone after 1 or 2 wears I then bought one of these kits

www.attachatag.com/prodtype.asp?strParents=113&CAT_ID=101&numRecordPosition=1
we haven't lost anything since I attach the little button on the outside, jumpers, polo shirts and shirts button goes on the bottom and trousers on the belt loops as you need the special tool to remove them or you need to cut them off including some of the fabric. They are tiny so someone meeting your child say after school in the park etc won't be able to read the name but visible enough for someone to be able to return your items.