AIBU about school imposing new sanctions?

[BumbleBeef30]

Today DC came home and said they had assemblies today in which they were told about new sanctions for issues such as having your shirt untucked or missing equipment, e.g. a purple pen.

I don’t mind it when a school has a sudden outbreak of enforcing uniform issues or ensuring all children have the right equipment using the original sanctions because, no matter how silly I may think it is to give a child a detention at break for a missing pen, those are the rules which were on the home-school agreement and I signed up to it.

I didn’t sign up to these new sanctions, which seem overly harsh and likely to punish only those children whose parents can not afford to replace items which break or go missing unexpectedly.

An occurrence of missing a pen now gets you sent to detention for three lessons; two occurrences get you isolation for three lessons; three occurrences get you sent to isolation for a whole day; and four occurrences earn you a fixed term exclusion. Theoretically a child could go to school on Monday without a pen and be excluded by Wednesday.

Before anyone says, I know pens are cheap and fairly easy to replace, but some people are forced to live hand to mouth at the moment, and the same new sanctions apply if you don’t have exactly the right type of shoes. Whereas before it might be a phone call to parents reminding them that shoes need to be lace-up, now it’s an immediate detention followed by isolation.

What’s more is that the school hasn’t sent home any information to parents, apart from an email containing the letter they give all new Year 7s about the standards they expect. No mention of sanctions at all - just a basic “we want every child to succeed and because of this we expect skirts to be knee length, all students to have the correct equipment, etc”.

AIBU to wonder what the fuck is going on at that school? Can schools just change sanctions whenever they feel like it? And should they be introducing these new, much harsher sanctions without letting parents know about them?

Why do we have such low expectations of our most disadvantaged children?

Knowing that the most disadvantaged children aren’t necessarily going to have the exact right equipment isn’t low expectations. It’s reality.

Then reasonable sanctions should follow. The issue in the OP is that the school have already gone down the line of detentions and isolation for basics.

At the high school mine go to you get three chances in terms of cheering teachers. You get a warning, then you get a yellow card then a red card and a red card is a lunchtime detention.

Two lunchtime detentions in a week brings a chat with your guidance teacher. One more after that gives an after school detention or no access to after lunch or school activities for a week (pupils choice).

Three afterschool detentions in a four week period can be a day in isolation (although they don’t have booths, you are just isolated from your class) or a meeting with parents/guidance teachers.

They also have a relaxed approach to uniform and it has made a huge difference to the mornings as there’s not that instant hassle of checking uniform. And amusingly now that blazers aren’t compulsory they are much more popular

lyralalala

It’s not precisely the system I would operate but sounds reasonable enough. You will note - and I must have said this about fifteen times - I am not agreeing with detentions for the lack of a purple pen.

MsMaisel

I am glad we agree.

And that may partly be my fault, as I do think bringing a pen is a perfectly reasonable expectation for the vast majority, and I would sanction a student not having one except in the case of a small minority. But not with an instant detention. They would get chances.

MsMaisel

Quite alright!

The problem is though that if kids and parents are not supposed to challenge the school at all then they can’t challenge detentions for purple pens when actually they should be challenged for that because it’s nonsense.

The problem is though that if kids and parents are not supposed to challenge the school at all then they can’t challenge detentions for purple pens when actually they should be challenged for that because it’s nonsense.

But the problem is that everyone thinks they know what is nonsense.

There are some situations where I would challenge the school. Sexism, racism, homophobic comments, aggression, ooor discipline, inconsistency etc.

Pens wouldn’t be up there. I’d just buy them.

No the expectation is that they look after the pen they have been provided with and bring it to every lesson. Are you saying that poorer children cannot be expected to do this? If the issue is not having the funds to obtain a pen in the first place then the school/teacher will help (in my experience) I have given out hundreds of my own pens over the years only to have them broken and thrown on the floor at the end of a lesson because some students cannot be bothered to carry a bag/pencil case and others enjoy actively disrupting the start of every lesson by not having a pen.

If you knew how frustrating it was to have this same conversation with the same students every day for their entire school career you would understand. Of course there will be some diligent pupils who get in trouble because of the one time they forgot but the bigger picture is that lessons are much improved by expecting all students to be prepared to learn every lesson.

My school introduced a policy similar to the OP and after years of the same students not wearing correct uniform and never having equipment the problem is fixed in a matter of weeks.

SEND students are a different matter.

Pens wouldn’t be up there. I’d just buy them.

That’s the basic issue though. You could just buy them. I could just buy them.

For the sake of the kid I was when I was 7 (& my siblings high school age) I will challenge anything other than “a pen” because there are kids who are in the same position I was.

Also, in my experience school management teams who can’t see the issues in simple things like the difference between “a pen” and “a pen of a specific unusual colour” tend not to see the other issues that kids for whom that pen is a problem have because they are too focussed on the colour of pens

The constant linking of the kids who can’t bring a specific pen with the kids who trash teachers pens is part of the problem imo, but that’s a whole other debate.

For the sake of the kid I was when I was 7 (& my siblings high school age) I will challenge anything other than “a pen” because there are kids who are in the same position I was.

Which is why we have chaos. We have every second parent calling the school challenging everything the HT is doing. Too much homework. Too little. Uniform. No uniform. Green pens. Purple pens. Trainers. No trainers. Isolation. No isolation.

At some point, professionals have to start drawing a line. They cannot do their jobs like this.

In the schools I’ve worked in the ones that don’t have daft rules have far less problems with parents complaining.

Plus the complaints are then much easier to deal with because if the rules are all reasonable there’s no debate.

Like I said before, the best school I worked in discipline wise had a very basic uniform policy, a basic equipment policy, a workable mobile phones policy and a culture of respect between staff and pupils.

The HT was popular with staff, pupils and parents and the school got damn good results.

What it doesn’t have is an excellent Ofsted. It has a decent one overall but they get a lot of stick for various things, but when you read into the report you realise it’s because they only do minimal box ticking. Their pupil morale, safeguarding and results are great but the HT is hated by Ofsted.

Plus the complaints are then much easier to deal with because if the rules are all reasonable there’s no debate.

But... What one parent considers reasonable will be the exact opposite of what fifty other parents consider reasonable. I would be furious if my child never had any homework set. Other parents are infuriated by homework.

I don’t blame HTs for one moment for battening down the hatches - within reason - and saying, “No. We are doing X.” They have to. It’s paralysis otherwise.

Stupid rules make battening down the hatches harder though.

You are always in schools going to get complaints because you deal with people.

So for example in DDs school they changed the lunch to a staggered lunch. It means the day finishes earlier once a week and also means the swimming pool, theatre etc are available for an extra hour a day for lessons. Simple and easy. However, they decided to always have the older kids on the late lunch which meant that most days they had no choices for lunch as they just had what is left.

Had the school been smart and timetabled better any complaints of “x always gets y for lunch and there was none left” would have been easy solved by a reply of “all the kids have a turn on first lunch and second lunch” end of. Instead they got into the realms of having Endless complaints as they couldn’t re timetable mid term.

If you keep it simple and clear then you get less complaints, and less complaints that need any time spent on them. Leaving more time for the fair and understandable issues

Stupid rules make battening down the hatches harder though.

I don’t disagree. I’m not stupid and wouldn’t put in place stupid rules. But I wouldn’t engage with parents endlessly about every decision either. It would stop me and my staff doing our jobs.

I don’t disagree. I’m not stupid and wouldn’t put in place stupid rules. But I wouldn’t engage with parents endlessly about every decision either. It would stop me and my staff doing our jobs.*

But that’s the whole point of the thread - the stupid rules the OP’s school is bringing in...

the stupid rules the OP’s school is bringing in...

Which, on some level, the HT must think are necessary. My point isn’t that they are necessary. My point is that I completely understand why the HT - and any HT - might not bend to parental pressure on the issue, believing that this is what he or she needs to do to raise standards. I also understand why they want the students bringing core equipment.

Hercule, your problem is too much 'respect for authority'. Given the cataclysmic lack of respect the authorities (at government level) have for the general public the sooner kids learn which regulations are reasonable and the best ways of resisting stupid ones, the better.
As you don't seem to know the difference, I'll give you a little primer.
Does the new rule serve any practical purpose? (Children should have a writing implement: yes. Children should have a very specific, more expensive and difficut to obtain writing implement: No.)
Does breaching the rule do anyone any harm? (Children should not call each other unpleasant names in the corridor: Yes. Children should not speak at all in the corridors: No.)
Got the picture yet. Rules for the sake of rules are the preserve of fuckwits and bullies who love the idea of having power over other people (especially people who they think can't do anything to them or resist in any way because they are smaller, weaker, less articulate etc.)

Got the picture yet. Rules for the sake of rules are the preserve of fuckwits and bullies who love the idea of having power over other people (especially people who they think can't do anything to them or resist in any way because they are smaller, weaker, less articulate etc.)

I’m not sure I am the one adopting a billing tone here.

*bullying

Hercule, your problem is too much 'respect for authority'. Given the cataclysmic lack of respect the authorities (at government level) have for the general public the sooner kids learn which regulations are reasonable and the best ways of resisting stupid ones, the better.

But frankly, I don’t think you should be sending your kids to school at all with an attitude like that.

You will note - and I must have said this about fifteen times - I am not agreeing with detentions for the lack of a purple pen.

No, you’re arguing that if the school decides to isolate or exclude kids for not bringing a purple pen, parents should just get on with it and not challenge the ridiculous rule and the disproportionate sanction.