Parents who shamelessly steal school uniform and coats

[lottieandmia]

How widespread is this really? I'm in the midlands btw.

My children have been to a number of different schools and when my 13 year old dd started at a very expensive girls school (on a scholarship and bursary) where the parents are many of them rich (and I mean really rich), suddenly her stuff all started to go missing. She had her new pullover stolen and therefore didn't have one to wear because they were £30 each and I could only afford to buy one. Her new PE trousers lifted out of her kit bag as well as other pieces of kit that are all very expensive.

I got really sick of it as she would turn her back for half a minute and something would be gone. The children in her class would help themselves to her stationary without asking. And then a brand new very nice water bottle went missing. I emailed her teacher and asked if an email could be sent out to all the girls in her year and also parents to say that we would like it returned. Sure enough it turned up on a shelf, left no doubt by the anonymous thief who had been guilted into returning it. Dd2 is no longer at this school and the constant stealing (and it wasn't just us it happened to) was one reason why. She is now at a state school with far more students and so far nothing has been taken and no student touches her stuff.

Dd3 is starting a new school next week and I am now paranoid about stuff going missing. Hopefully my experience with above school is a one off but I have heard a lot on MN about uniform thieves who help themselves to stuff from lost property.

Sorry to go on about this but it is my pet hate. What makes people think this is an acceptable way to behave? If I write names with sharpie I feel as though I appear paranoid or mistrustful. I feel as though I shouldn't have to do this and a name label should suffice. Sad isn't it?

We aren't talking about solitary gloves though.

It seems to be singular items that can actually he made use if like jumpers or coats. Or pencil cases.

And funny how it's just the hockey boots or the trainers when pe kits are generally kept in a bag all together...

I mean if a jumper is found then wouldn't it just he put on a peg or hung on a fence or put in the lost property box?

If it's vanished into thin air it's probably been nicked.

If it's found down the side of a filing cabinet in the yr 6 class room.when the kids a yr 4 and never goes there then someone's done that on purpose.

Lottie

If we thought that throwing pe kit on to a roof was usual, the parent would have had to pay out so much for replacements.

It was an extreme example of what happens in schools and how far some children will go to not do something they don't want to do.

In the school were I work (1500 children) lost property is almost a full time job, and as a form tutor its interesting to see that it is the same children's stuff being returned over and over again.

When my son was in Year 1 his labeled and Sharpied school sweatshirt was taken on the first day. He'd taken it off as it was warm and the teacher had told him to put it on his coat peg in the corridor. It was never seen again but a small, out of shape and washed out unlabeled one was left there for some weeks afterwards before school stuck it in the lost property box.

He went to Year 6 camp with everything well labeled. Jeans, joggers, t shirts etc. They'd shared a tent and there were also shared drying facilities and he managed to come home without some of his clothing but with three items which weren't his. I stuck them in the wash with everything else over the weekend and returned them to school on the Monday. Everything was labeled so it was easy to find the owner.
However, none of his missing clothing was ever returned despite it being labeled and quite likely unlike anything already owned (as it wasn't uniform).

thanks for info re stamps - now ordered!

Those stamps look good. Does the ink stay on?

We have the stamptastic and it is great, labelled them all in September and still showing clearly now.

I would still like to know who has dc1s brand new ten pound pe socks. Ours went missing and were replaced a week later with a left behind absolutely battered old set, there is no way a parent washing has not noticed. Ours were brand new and these are manky and are not even the same size!

My daughters school jumper which had her name clearly sharpied on the label went missing before they broke up for summer and by chance we came across it recently while looking for another lost jumper in lost property with her name crossed out and another child's name sharpied in! We were lucky they lost it so we could reclaim it. All the kids school stuff is sharpied in several places so no mistaking who it belongs to and it still goes missing despite searching all over the school. Luckily most returns eventually.

Secondary school teacher and head of year here. The students are told relentlessly to put certain items in their lockers at all times. These include P.E. Kit and coats, which they're not allowed to bring into classrooms. Those students who ignore the rules and reminders leave their stuff in the covered walkway leading up to the student entrance, and it gets stolen. But they put their phones, laptops, etc. in their lockers because they care about those, and so those things never get stolen.

It's the same students every time, as is the lost property. If I'm on outside duty and find a blazer chucked on the ground, I can bet good money that it belongs to one of 5 students out of the 2,000 in the school.

Yes there are thieves in any school but once the students are of secondary age they can take responsibility for their possessions.

P.s. Naming everything and getting the children to check lost property regularly in the 48 hours/ week after something went missing really helps. I've lost count of the number of students who assure their parents they've checked lost property and then when I take them there myself the items been hanging on the rail for a fortnight (the secretary in charge of L.P. date stamps each item).

• item's (autocorrect!)

Yes, ink stays on. My DD had her Year 6 residential trip in November and everything got stamped: pants, socks, even her toothbrush. Not so much because I was worried about things being stolen but just for ease of return when she loses things.

I haven't yet found a surface that the ink doesn't stay on (even water bottles). It's great for stationery items that they are required to have at school (highlighters, glue sticks, that sort of thing) and, as well as on the label of clothing items, you can also stamp actually on the fabric of the item (like inside the collar of shirts). Unlike stickers, you can't just peel it off if you do want to steal an item.

I honestly can't recommend it enough. DD's school shirts (the most regularly washed items) need re-stamping maybe once a term and I just do it when I'm ironing.

Bloody genius little thing.

Locked - I agree with you that at secondary they should be more responsible. However, I think you should be able to put your jumper on the back of a chair without fear of it being taken during a lesson. In primary schools the children don't have lockers, anyway. Also my dd's new academy school doesn't have lockers so anything valuable has to be signed into student services during the day. But none of her uniform has been stolen.

Ds1's secondary school changed school uniform including a new logo jumper at £17 a pop, plus postage. It was a stretch to cover the cost.

Lots of parents refused to buy the new uniform esp the jumper. When the cold weather started 3 out of 4 of ds' named jumpers were nicked over a period of 2 weeks. Can't afford to replace them.

lottieandmia Sorry, I re-read my post and it came across as heartless. There will always be thieves in school as in other areas of life, but in my experience it's always the same few students whose stuff goes astray and more often than not it's because they leave it lying around. For example, from only my own experience, I find it hard to believe that a jumper was taken from the back of a chair during a lesson, but very easy to believe that it disappeared if left behind. If the replacements have to be funded out of pocket money, children tend to become more responsible about their possessions.

My child is not a liar - she's a very responsible girl. It definitely was taken in the way she described. Then it turned up about a month later with a hole in it. The person had obviously ruined it and no longer wanted it.

See, whilst I accept and totally agree that children need to be responsible for their own belongings, when you say you don't believe that something could be taken during a lesson then you become an enabler of the people at school who steal and the problem is not dealt with.

I also use stamptastic and nothing that's been stamped has ever been 'misplaced'.

But 2 years ago I made DS a winter hat. It was a hand crocheted minecraft creeper design that I designed myself. I lined it with stretchy polar fleece in a complementary colour. It was his pride and joy. I ironed a label onto the fleece and sharpied his name across the fleece for good measure.

It was really popular with the kids and several mums approached me to ask if I would make them for their kids. I only charged cost of materials, which worked out to £4.96, so I charged a flat £5.

After half a term, DS hat went missing. We searched lost property every day for the rest of the term, and periodially through year. DS searched everywhere he had been. It was never found.

There was a particular boy DS was having issues with and I think he took it through jealousy. It's highly likely he threw it away or hid it from his parents. At least he had the sense not to wear it at school.

I did offer to make DS another, but he was totally demoralised and said it was better to just have a shop one like everyone else because then he didn't stand out as much. 2 years on and neither of his shop bought ones have gone missing - or if they have its only because he left it in the cloakroom and they've turned up within 48 hours.

Lottie and Rhoda

You are falling in to a mind set where something 'must have happened' In rhoda's this boy took it, in Lottie's case it 'must have been stolen'. but we don't know.

As someone that teaches a practical subject I know that Lottie's case is as probable as Rhoda's but we (teachers) cannot go around accusing pupils of stealing.

We can monitor and we can look at cameras (if we have them) but we can't just say this has been stolen.

I'm not 'falling into a mindset'. Is that what you would say to someone who had their wallet stolen? I've already said that I've only come across it at this one school. At other schools when dd2 was little things would sometimes get mixed up but would always be returned eventually. But it has made me mistrustful of people which is a shame.

How do you explain money raised for the girl in a third world country which disappeared from a tin? That was covered up. I realise you can't openly accuse people of stealing. If people are having their bags opened and contents removed though, there should be a group talk, which I remember happening at my girls school. The stealing stopped at that point. You can also send out an email which sometimes shames the thief into returning the item.

My dd2 goes to a special school for pupils with severe and profound disabilities. There is no way her peers are stealing her stuff. Over the years, quite a lot has gone awol which to some extent I can understand as DD is not able to keep track of it herself, but most recently her entire labelled swimming kit went missing - apparently sent home in error to another unknown family, but never returned. This included adult size swimming continence pants costing £20 on their own let alone the rest of it.

The thing is, everything else that has been genuinely misplaced or lost by DS has turned up again. The one thing that was custom made disappeared and despite searching daily for 6 weeks and periodically for the rest of term it never turned up. We even went to the end of year lost property amnesty, where every item is spread out on the hall floor individually. It's been 2 years and it's never been found on the field, down the back of something, in the lost property - like the other stuff has.

It was extremely distinctive and everyone knew it was his - really what other conclusion am I supposed to come to? If it didn't leave school property then why has it never turned up? DS was being badly bullied at the time - the same child intentionally stamped on his foot enough to leave a shoe print shaped bruise. When the school sorted it the child admitted he had a vendetta against DS. It's hard not to come to a particular conclusion from that. Also, nothing else went missing after the bullying was sorted out.

As I said on the first page, I was a victim of a sustained campaign of stealing. Some stuff was found weeks and months later, some never was. I wasn't careless, I was bullied and like what happened with me, the teachers wrote off what was happening to my DS until I ad photographic evidence.

2 sides. My dnephew had his coat blatently stolen by another mum. His name has been written over. My dsis had asked teacher to help but they hadnt. She walked up to child in the playground and said " you seem to have the wrong coat on. Please can i have a look?". She had written dnephews name all along the inside of the arms.

On a different note, i was looking through our coats a few months ago ( there are 5 of us) and under several others was my daughters john lewis coat. Except she had left the house that morning in hers. This one was a size smaller. I sent it into school with a note. It did have a name biroed on it but not one that i recognised. No doubt their parents rightly assumed it had been stolen.

june

One of your sons was being bullied and the other wasn't. The one who was being bullied was the one who constantly "lost" his things. Amazed you didn't pick up on this.

My DD spent the last six months adamant telling me I'd bought her PE trainers home. I spent the same six months telling her it's not possible as even I couldn't miss them. They're orange. Last day of term. The teacher finds one trainer in the box where she (my DD not the teacher) obviously hadn't looked further than the end of her nose very far.

Kids do lose things though and it can be easy to go home in the wrong things. DS once had an exact same coat as someone else in his class. In an honest mistake the other kid picked up DSs and I had no idea until the Mum approached me. I remember looking once thinking his coat had got considerably longer on him but it didn't even occur to me.

I did get mightily pissed off at DDs old school though when her brand new, name written on school issued cardigan went 'missing' from her tray and I refused to replace it. She hadn't even had it 24hours. I'm a single parent on a low income and don't have the money to keep replacing items that most definitely weren't 'lost'.

I can't remember who it was OP and I think it was on Mumsnet. But someone recommended aswell as writing the names in stuff, to sew a different coloured thread into a label or some power of their clothes so you can point out when you know it's yours.

Sorry but I have to pick up on this:
"How do you think rich people get rich. In my experience the richer people are the more mean, greedy and grabby and underhand they are. Wealth does something nasty to a lot of people."

I'm sorry you've had that experience mothertrucker but that's one bastard of a generalisation right there!