Harsh Times at Yarmouth High. New Head introduces new rules including sick buckets in classrooms.

[HelenaDove]

Posted this on another thread but i think it deserves a thread of its own.

HelenaDove Mon 11-Sep-17 21:06:41
www.edp24.co.uk/news/education/phones-confiscated-for-weeks-and-sick-buckets-in-the-classroom-tough-new-rules-at-norfolk-school-1-5188326
Add message | Report | Message poster HelenaDove Mon 11-Sep-17 21:08:44
“You never lie and make excuses like, ‘I just wanted to put something in the bin’. We all know children say things like that to get out of work. You never pretend to be ill to get out of work because we expect you to work through it. If you feel sick we will give you a bucket. If you vomit - no problem! You’ve got your bucket. That’s probably all your body wanted - to vomit. If you are really ill we will make sure you get all the attention you need."

JESUS WEPT.

A long article here about ultra-strict schools. Author is very much against so not objective

disidealist.wordpress.com/

I think things will be difficult because it's not a new school. Michaela parents know what they're signing up to. I'd be pretty upset if DD's school introduced something so extreme without warning.

The author of that blog has been throwing around comparisons to Nazis on social media. Highly inappropriate, in my opinion.

It is essential that education involves respect for those doing the educating

Absolutely agree. We are losing good teachers in droves, and one of the reasons is the abuse, sometimes physical, they are expected to put up with from pupils.

It sounds like most posters have never been in a low-achieving school, and know nothing about Great Yarmouth. Sadly Gt Yarmouth is now a very deprived area. It's not London: it's daft when posters compare a south London comp filled with a variety of pupils - some tough, but many others dcs of ambitious immigrants - with a place which has huge unemployment and mostly seasonal work, an insular community and great poverty of expectation.

the OP trumpets that it's because of money and investment that the school is failing and lack of good teachers. Poppycock. Good teachers don't want to teach in Gt Yarmouth, especially not Maths, Science and MFL teachers. You could be paying £100k a year and few teachers would want to be doing crowd control.

This is clearly a school with a severe pupil behaviour problem and why not try a new approach? The sick bucket thing is obviously only directed at malingerers. My friend who teaches in the Bronx has the same policy. and they have armed guards outside the classrooms too.

It's the kind of spin that sounds very good in the press, but I'm not convinced it always works equally well on the ground.

As I said, the main result with the tough-talking, don't-trust-anyone spin of ds' new head was that all the best and most popular teachers left because they decided they didn't want to work in such an environment. The effect on results and behaviour was catastrophic.

Pupils may not be able to up and leave in any great numbers, but teachers can. And they did.

This school could be the best thing to happen to Great Yarmouth in a long time. It is a grotty town with ridiculously poor academic attainment. Poverty, crime neglect and abuse are all higher than average.

The Michaela School in London runs very similarly (I believe this new head was the co-founder) and is renowned for its high academic achievements in one of the countries poorest boroughs.

This is good news IMHO. The children will learn respect, acquire a strong work ethic and achieve their full academic potential.

As the head as already said, if a child is genuinely ill they will receive the attention they need. If they're whining about it being able to work because they 'feel sick' they'll get a bucket. I wonder how many are taken actually sick?!

Some parents will be glad that their children will finally receive a decent education. Others will be worried about their snowflakes actually having to take responsibility for their own actions.

It's fine. In a year's time when results are better and the school is over subscribed this will be forgotten.
They obviously have a big issue with kids skiving off because they are `ill'

This should be a link to the Ofsted report on Michaela -as you'd expect from the Outstanding verdict it's very good

reports.ofsted.gov.uk/inspection-reports/find-inspection-report/provider/ELS/140862

What's interesting though is that while the school is famous for its behaviour policies the Ofsted report focuses much more on the teaching.

I think its a good idea to try this. Its a failing school. Some pupils don't give a toss and neither do some of the parents.

I fucking hate academies. I also fucking hate academy heads who seem to resent the existence of kids and parents

Can someone please explain in simple but factual terms what an academy is, why they came about and why they're controversial? We have several in my city but I always thought they were just rebranded comprehensives. Are they selective now? Part private financed? I should probably know, but don't.

It also says in the article: There’s also instructions for pupils out of school, including “as soon as you finish school you go straight home”, a 9.30pm bedtime and a 6.30am alarm.

That has absolutely nothing to do with the school. What kids do after they leave school is up to the kids and the parents -- after school activities? Seeing friends? I almost never went straight home after school, neither did any of the other kids I knew, and we turned out ok. Bedtimes/morning wake up is also up to the parents and kids. Ridiculous rules.

They are basically 'privatised'. They are owned by private bodies (usually a Trust) but are funded by the state. So from the outside it looks as though they operate just as non-academies but internally all management is internal, they don't answer to the local authority.

I think that's the general idea.

I have no idea why they came about. And they are controversial because land is sometimes (always?!) just handed over to these Trusts for free. And I guess sometimes they don't do a very good job.

However, I suspect the poster you quoted would fucking hate any school or teacher. I'm sure their DCs are utter darlings.

It's not "ridiculous rules" when the only after school activities on offer are going down to the beach to have underage sex and take drugs.

I don't live a million miles away from this school and have visited it for work purposes, unless you have been there and have seen how utterly awful it is, I don't think anyone can judge.

It was awful, I felt v unsafe, and as visitors, we were put in a thing called 'the cage' to keep us safe. There were children running riot everywhere, pupils running out of class, starting physical fights whilst doing the activity we had set out for them etc.

These poor kids are brought up in an incredibly deprived area and some had never been outside of the town, they had parents that clearly didn't give a shit about them or there futures and it was incredibly sad.

Crime and young offending is rife, they NEED the discipline this new headmaster will hopefully instill.

Re the sick bucket thing, I'm sure if a child is actually, involuntarily they would be sent home.

It's really very, very sad. Most of you haven't the faintest idea of what kind of life these kids are living.

Thanks NotTooTough, so they're basically Private Finance Initiatives? I think there are three in my city and they were all rebuilt on old school grounds (one of which was my old school!) Two of the three are in the higher echelons of the LEA's performance tables for the city and one of those is in an inner city location with fairly deprived areas within its carchment, so it's somewhat surprising it's doing so well academically. So I wondered if academies usually operate a tougher selection criteria that disadvantages certain pupils?

No I don't believe any are academically selective. It's just about having the right management team in place to do the job. 20 years ago all schools were managed centrally by the Local Education Authority. Now there is (in theory) more autonomy for more schools and (in theory) more choice for parents.

The main issue I have with Academies (& we have no chide where I live every single secondary school within 30 miles is an academy) is that they have total autonomy. So they can impose ridiculously expensive uniforms from a sole supplier, have policies that deter certain families from applying etc etc.

Ah ok Alexander so they're not explicitly selective but could be perceived as tacitly so through their management structure and policies.

As far as the op goes, I'd be interested to see whether the ultra strict or ultra supportive schools have a better record in terms of outcomes for failing schools. I always watch the 'Educating x' series on TV and think the teachers and head teachers do an amazing job with some very troubled pupils. Their approach is very supportive and seems to get through...

Bedtimes/morning wake up is also up to the parents and kids. Ridiculous rules.

I used to be a governor in a primary school in a very deprived area. We had an enormous problem with young children whose parents allowed them to stay up until 2am or 3am on a school night. These children would come to school the next day practically ill from lack of sleep. We are talking about 7 and 8 year olds here.

One of the problems with dealing with these issues is that a lot of measures are criticised by people who have no idea just how chaotic some children's lives are. I would suggest everyone on mn feeds their children or, at least, tries to. You wash your children's clothes etc. That is normal for you; it goes without saying.

But it can be very different in other households. I've known children sent to school in trousers with encrusted faeces in the seams and no underpants. I've known parents that scream at teachers for trying to teach their child to read because "I can't read and it's never done me any harm, you snobby bitch" (said to one of my colleagues).

People really do not realise just how bad things can be. And it's the children who suffer.

Regardless whether they have a SEND policy, their rules state ad nauseam that all rules will be followed by all pupils all the time with no exceptions at all.

Academies can and do refuse to accept pupils with additional needs. The admission policy of the school doesn't mention that it will accept children who have it named on an ECHP, and they further state that they don't always accept previous schools' decisions about SEND.

I presume therefore that they would simply exclude children with ASD and others who are unable to maintain S.L.A.N.T. then. Or suggest they're malingering, or that parents aren't being supportive enough.

I went to a school with good solid discipline, we stood when a teacher entered the room and all that jazz but my DS simply would not have been able to cope with this, no matter how much I cheer leaded for the school.