Can my daughter be searched by a teacher?

[London19]

My daughter has attended the same secondary school from the start and is now in year 11 and at the time of applying it was one of the best schools in our area but by last year it had been placed into special measures by ofsted.

The head was then sacked and a new part time head was bought in and lots of teachers left and new ones started this September.

So far, all fine... there are lots of new rules, and one of them is a complete ban on mobile phones on in the school, which I agree with.

The only problem I have is apparently our children can be subjected to a search and and if they find a mobile on them then it will be confiscated for 6 weeks and if a parent were to go to the school to retrieve it before the 6 week time they have threatened to exclude the pupil.

My daughter walks to and from school on her own and she sends me a quick text just before going into school to say she is there safely and a quick text once out to say she is on her way home or she has forgotten her keys etc, my daughter is a complete worrier and is petrified a teacher is going to demand to search her and find her turned off phone in her bag.

They offer to take the phones in a box at the beginning of the day but hold no responsibility if the phones get damaged or lost in their care.. plus it's a huge queue at the end of the day to retrieve the phones so everyone just keeps their phone off on their bags.

I can't find anything regarding implementing this sort of rule when looking online and I'm wondering can my 15 year old daughter be searched by an adult and then have something that is in my name taken away for the random time of 6 weeks?

Thank you! I honestly hadn't thought of phones being used for bullying purposes and you're completely right.

I do support the ban, its not because she has an amazing phone or anything its mainly the threat of being searched and then threatened with exclusion if me or her dad dared to pipe up and get the phone back in our care.

The ban has actually made my daughter use her phone less at home too and she has deleted a lot of her social media as she says she just doesn't have the time for it all anymore..

I will just tell her to not worry about taking the phone at all as she can't even use it safely along the street as there are a lot of mugging in our area by kids on bikes so she has been told to keep it firmly out of sight anyway.

My children text me that they are on the bus or have arrived at school every day they remember. This is because sometimes the bus is so late it's quicker for them to walk back towards home and me go and get them to drive them to school. Sometimes the bus doesn't come at all. No problem with our choices. Think it's laughable that others have a problem with what a stranger does.

They can only destroy the item (or any data on it) if they believe it will be used with intent to commit or aid a crime, and there are further rules and statutory guidelines that MUST be followed. An individual teacher certainly couldn't just take a phone and destroy it, just because a child broke the school rules of having one with them.

It is not good practise to keep an item for a lengthy period of time and often not even overnight. There is no given time but when its been taken to lawyers, etc. this normally comes up. Partially as many phones don't belong to the child, but the parents - if under 18 and on a contract, many phone costs are included as part of the contract and therefore the phone actually belongs to the contract owner, not the child. Also children with lengthy journeys may have their phone as part of their safeguarding. And some children with medical needs have there meds-alert information held within them - as advised by many health organisations. So it can be tricky to withhold a child's phone knowing they may be at risk, even if only slight, if you do so. Not many teachers would want that on their conscience tbh.

What does surprise me to some extent if that a child can be searched and no record is needed of this. I imagine in some secondary schools this could cause issues and I can't see how it would be deemed good practise to not keep some form of record - incase a teacher is every accused of something more, then a decent record of a search showing more than one adult present would be a good thing to have.

I'm sure your dd would only be searched if they thought she was using her phone in school or up to no good with it. Your dd won't be so I'm sure they have better things to do than search her.

I do think it is ridiculously draconian but I'd be more concerned about loss of learning time.

Haven't read the comments so sorry if I'm repeating anything.
I COMPLETELY AGREE no phones to be used in school. It contributes to trouble and distraction, not learning!
I COMPLETELY AND UTTERLY DISAGREE that the school should be allowed to keep hold of a phone for 6 weeks if found!! Completely unnecessary.
If your daughter walks to and from school she needs to be able to contact you if she needs to, and you, her.
I would contact the school and make them aware of this, and tell them DD will be walking to school with phone, for this reason, will enter school and head straight to reception or the heads office to hand phone in for it to remain there for the duration of the school day, to be retrieved at the end of the day for her to walk home with.

When I was at school mobile phones were just becoming popular and in my final year a "new broom" introduced a similar rule. It was ridiculous because 50% of the pupils had to get a school bus that we'd miss if we had to queue up to retrieve phones and some lived very, very rurally. Mobile phones were a godsend for our parents who had previously had to drive around searching if the bus broke down/couldn't get up the farm tracks and dropped us off in random places.

They started searching bags and most of us girls took to keeping our phones turned off and in our bras . I have never thought too hard about what the boys did.

By age 15 I was making it to school by bus, all the way through school and then getting home and then going to a part-time job some evenings before parents got home from their commute. So maybe 15 hours or more without speaking to my parents.

Not sure how this thing of two or more texts to confirm locations has started or why.

I don't understand why some parents seem to think it's ok to break the school rules. I'm sure there are many children that walk to school alone, surely if a child didn't turn up the school would call the parent and ask where they are?

At my dd's school even the adults (teachers, TA's, dinner ladies) are not allowed to take in mobile phones due to safeguarding. My other dd's school are not allowed phones switched on during the day but can have them on them (if they get stollen or damaged the school has takes no responsibility). Each school has different rules and parents/students should respect that. 20 years ago many of us didn't have a mobile, we all survived without them.

If your daughter walks to and from school she needs to be able to contact you if she needs to, and you, her.

No she doesn't. Phones are not compulsory. She doesn't 'need' to be able to phone anyone.

Our local school confiscates all phones until July. That was fun for the person whose ds had borrowed their expensive contract one to take to school in September.

Presumably you wouldn't be spending most of the year in court.

I am pretty sure that is theft Witchend

Witchend oof!

What did they do? I think I'd have to ask nicely if I could have SIM card and get another phone.

I think I'd have called the police.

I am married to one of the above.

Believe me, they don't get respect!

Perhaps one of the reasons we don't have respect is because of petty rules like the above.

opheliacat - nothing like washing police time to try to get your own way...

They'd have told you it's a civil matter.

Shelley it isn't wasting police time. That phone is not the property of the school (whether belonging to a student or parent.) I would be supportive of only handing a phone back to parents but to refuse to hand it back is theft.

Pengggwyn my personal feeling is better to deal with the issues. Phones are part of life; pretending they don't exist is a pointless exercise.

I think no phones at all in lessons is totally reasonable. It's before school and in breaks and lunch times. No matter how draconian the rules, the kids get round them, then when bullying or theft does occur the kids don't want to tell in case they are in trouble for having the phone in the first place.

But the rules allow schools to retain phones. It isn't theft, it's a civil matter. In my school we don't keep phones for a set period but we don't just hand them back at the end of the day either. The parent has to make an appointment to collect. If they don't (and some choose not to) it gets handed back to the child at the end of the last day before the next school holiday. It's totally within the rules set by the government and as such definitely not theft.

Phones are surely convenient rather than necessary for 15 or 16 yr old.... Don't know how you got into requiring her to text when she got to school and left school..