re school exclusion

[mummy207]

I posted a while back about my DS being inappropriate at school, he asked a teacher to add him on snapchat and was isolated for it. The reactions on here were split between whether this was an overreaction by the school or acceptable. I accepted it and sanctioned him at home and fully supported the school after reading all of your helpful responses. Lots of teachers responded.

Unfortunately today there has been a follow up and I have been told my son needs to be excluded tomorrow and stay at home. I totally agree he is being absolutely unacceptable , he apparently lifted his top up and asked the teacher whether she liked his abs. I know it's fucking insane, don't get me started.

They have said because this is his second "Sexually inappropriate offense" (question whether the snapchat thing was sexually inappropriate!!) , he needs an external exclusion which will go on his record. Although I agree he is in the wrong, this again to me seems really ridiculous. What is making him sit at home all day going to achieve? He will be on xbox! Also some of his peers have had several fights, bullying, etc and not been excluded. Exclusions are really rare. I am absolutely devastated. Is there anything I can do about this? It says on the paperwork I can challenge the exclusion?

Women with “fucking” in her username who claims to be upset by “fucking disingenuous” is almost a dictionary definition of being fucking disingenuous.

It's also really overstepping the boundaries to ask a teacher to connect with him on social media

No, it would be really overstepping the boundaries for a teacher to agree to the request. Teens do silly things, it's up to the adults to behave properly. I am a child welfare officer and all the training I have done makes clear you do not connect on social media. None of that training has said that a request to connect from a child is a red flag. However, that training hasn't mentioned Snapchat, it was more in the context of twitter or Facebook.

I wasn't offended by the word "fucking"!! You assume too much.

So much of this involves too much assuming.

No it doesn't. For some unknown reason you seem to be going out of your way to excuse his behaviour.

His behaviour is wrong. The end.

I think the op firstly needs to educate herself on Sexual Harassment as she seems to be very much of the camp of lads being lads. She cannot help her son until she educates herself.

Second, she seems to need to stand up as a parents. I honestly cannot believe that she this this exclusion is not warranted and that she was going to allow him sit on his xbox. This sending him to his room bacause she cannot look at him is a cop out not to parent as is getting Daddy to talk to him on Skype.

You need to check his phone, and his X box history. I would also be checking his room for steriod vials.

You need to meet with the school and see his behaviour logs and tell they have your total support in this matter. Also yout husband would want to lose his flippant attitude. I had to laugh at him telling you to get off Mumsnett considering the people on here gave you the incredible insight to take the xbox and the phone off.

Are there parenting classes available nearby?

I posted a while back about my DS being inappropriate at school, he asked a teacher to add him on snapchat and was isolated for it.

See, even that statement is minimising the first issue because he didn't just ask the teacher to add him to Snapchat did he? He asked, according to you, for the teacher to add him on Snapchat, so that she could see what he was going to get up to that weekend. He wanted to invite her to see what he got up to in his own time, being the issue here. That coupled with exposing himself to the same teacher in only a matter of days later, (bar the two week Xmas break) with a request to "check out his abs and what did she think?", means that the school has done the correct thing.

What is not the correct thing is just sending your 15 year old to his room, which you need yesterday. Even without his phone or xbox, that is getting off very lightly.

Obviously, his exclusion is today. Hopefully, when you get back from work, you have a few more tools at your disposal to discipline him and teach him correct behaviour and going forward, do regular on - the - spot checks on his smartphone, consider how you can get his father to be a more positive role model (rather than an far-away role model) to him and make sure that his gym trips are not exacerbating the situation.

To the poster who asked aren't Year 11s doing mocks now, all the schools in my borough did their mocks last term, so could be the same here.

I do wonder if the situation had been reversed, if the female teacher asked the son to add her on snap chat so she could share pics of what she was doing at the weekend and the lad could do th same, then lifted her shirt and asked him how he liked her abs, or her cleavage, if the op would have been thinking to have the teachers suspension or dismissal reversed.

And if it had been a Male teacher on a 15 year old girl, or a 15 year old girl to the Male teacher, if again she would think it all just silly.

And if her reactions would have been different with role and gender Eve reversals, why she thinks it's all a bit silly for her son to sexually harass his teacher.

Sometimes I think parents minimise behaviour like this as they see a 15 year old boy as still just a child who is still very young, rather than a 15 year old child who is nearly a man.
Time wise, it is not long before he goes to college and then work.

To those talking about 15 year olds not understanding "subtle" social rules - if a 15 year old does not understand what is sexually inappropriate behaviour and sexual harassment, then you have let them down big time.

I bet he's already been talking about this on social media and looking at his phone will show that he and his mates are having a good old laugh about this.

Your description of him as laddish and his father's attitude indicate that he needs dealing with robustly.

I find it quite disturbing if this was my DS acting like this .
He sounds like a fiend in the making .
He’s deliberately tried to embarrass his teacher and make her feel uncomfortable and that’s just outrageous for a start let alone the underlying sexual element .
Sounds like he needs to speak to someone so he can nip this in the bud before he does something far worse .
This can’t be minimised

My DH is a manager of a team of mostly male engineers and technicians. On several occasions he has had to deal with a complaint of inappropriate conduct made against one of them, and it’s always a man in the 20-30 years old age bracket being complained about. It’s not always sexual misconduct, sometimes it’s bullying or inappropriate social media use, but each complaint has ended in either a verbal warning or a written warning, both of which are a black mark towards future promotion or jobs, and too many would mean dismissal. If these young men had learnt at school that banter, having a laugh, just joking or whatever they want to call it is not acceptable behaviour in an official environment then maybe they wouldn’t be getting into trouble at work now.

When the op’s son is older and at work his mum won’t be able to march up to the employer and complain about her boy getting punished.

I totally agree he needs to learn this stuff, and sharpish. Just don't know if he should be hung out to dry before he has.

How is he being hung out to dry? He has not been sent to prison for this. Just given a one day exclusion.

Snapchat is often used to send nudes, he probably phrased the question suggestively.

Teach your 15 year old to stop trying to make teachers uncomfortable by being sexually suggestive to them. It's disgusting and shows he has a really shit opinion of women.

He has been excluded for being a little twat, as he should be.

My god, this thread.

Asking a female teacher if she likes your body is not appropriate, especially given this boy’s recent suspension for asking if his teacher would like to add him on snapchat. What’s next, ‘will you give me a blowjob miss?’ Whether he’s intentionally sexually harassing this woman or not, it looks from the outside like he is, and if he’s being punished for it then you can bet your bottom dollar that she and the school thinks he is.

So now we’re into the teratory of ‘I didn’t believe I was sexually harrassing her though, I was just being friendly/it was just bants,’ which I’m sure every sex pest up and down the land would say. So where does this leave us, oh well that’s fine then, carry on? No, I don’t think so either.

The best way to avoid people thinking you’re not sexually harassing them is not to do anything that looks like sexual harassment. Maybe the OP should be teaching that to her son, rather than teaching him that ‘yeah it’s fine, she’s just being silly.’

Fucksake, rocket science it is not, unless you’re a misogynistic arse that is.

I may have meant strung up!!

The best way to avoid looking like you’re sexually harassing someone*

Kid's being a total shit and needs to realise it. When he's home, remove all privileges. Probably achieve bugger all, but he can fail his own grades and become a bum like everyone else. Make your bed; lie in it.

And yes, it is threatening behaviour. Not in a traditional way, but he is trying to embarrass her and take power away from her.
It's threatening and intimidation done in such a way that he can say he didn't mean that, it was just a joke, I didn't know it came across like that

All excuses which men have used for decades to get with inappropriate bullshit.

I used to work in a boy’s school. Teenage boys en masse can be very intimidating particularly for young female teachers. Add into that a fit, buff 15 year old coming on to you in front of his mates and it is also disrespectful and demeaning. If he treats an older woman in a position of authority like that how is he going to treat girls of his own age?

Your son has serious boundary issues IMO and a temporary exclusion seems entirely appropriate.

You could appeal to the governors if you feel strongly enough. It would give you an opportunity to explain your position. But it does sound as though your son is not taking the earlier sanction seriously, it is only a few days into the new term.

And claiming bad behaviour was 'a joke' is a common claim from people behaving in a way that is clearly wrong.

I agree any behaviour with nasty sexual undertones needs to be dealt with seriously . He’s old enough to know better .

sidenote, actually text DH to tell him to get his arse back to england because our son is becoming a sexual predator, and he replied "get the fuck off mumsnet"

But sexual harassment (which your son's actions clearly were) IS predatory. He was targeting this teacher in a way that was designed to make her feel, at best, uncomfortable.

I'm alarmed that his father felt that a flippant approach to behaviour that would be a disciplinary matter in any workplace was appropriate, and this makes me wonder if he's getting the right sort of messages at home.