To think DD should be allowed to go on DofE expedition?

[Passthedamncoffee]

DD is currently in year 10 and is doing her DofE silver award. She has been having some issues with anxiety and depression, and recently had to go to hospital because of self harm.

Yesterday the school said that she’d be fine to participate in the expedition, however today they have said they would strongly recommend she doesn’t participate. This has been rather upsetting to my DD as she has been looking forward to the expedition (next week) and has been working hard to ensure she could complete the award.

FWIW, all medication etc wouldn’t be on her (instead with the leaders), DD had a practice expedition in March, and while she did struggle a bit overall she had a good time, and wants to go again. AIBU to think DD should be allowed to go on the expedition?

I wouldnt want to take a child on an expedition that had self harmed. I wouldnt want that responsibility

It is very disappointing for your daughter but I can see the schools POV. DofE expeditions are meant to be challenging so I would also be concerned that your daughter might be overwhelmed by it. They might also be concerned that having your DD on the trip might be too much responsibility for the other participants.

That being said, you know her and her capabilities better than they do so if you decide to ignore their recommendation and allow her to go, that’s your choice to make.

@MT2017
But how do the kids that don't turn the correct age (14/15/16) until the end if the school year get to take part in Bronze/Silver/Gold?

For example, some of your students would still only be 13 in June of Year 9?

I wouldnt want to take a child on an expedition that had self harmed. I wouldnt want that responsibility you’re right, far too defective to bother with. You know what will REALLY help? Let’s bar anyone with additional needs from normal life and then all the “normals” can have a much more carefree existence. Every so often let’s talk about how the defectives isolate themselves and just need to get on with joining in.

OP if she still wants to go, phone them and see what can be done to make it happen. If not write a scathing letter to the HT, and LA about their behaviour and how it has impacted an already disadvantaged child in their care.

But how do the kids that don't turn the correct age (14/15/16) until the end if the school year get to take part in Bronze/Silver/Gold?

For Bronze and Silver, students can begin in the school year in which they will turn 14 or 15. So even if your school begins Bronze in September and your DC isn't 14 until the following August, they can still sign up. They have to be 16 for the Gold though.

The minimum age requirement for Gold is fixed because of the greater demands of the expedition (wild country) and the residential section.

OP if she still wants to go, phone them and see what can be done to make it happen. If not write a scathing letter to the HT, and LA about their behaviour and how it has impacted an already disadvantaged child in their care.

This is terrible advice - please ignore it, OP.

You will have no idea what has informed their decision. Going in all guns blazing, as suggested here, will likely remove any possibility of a calm and reasoned discussion with the school.

Sorry I haven’t read all the thread, but surely no adults are present to carry her meds? That’s a lot of responsibility on the shoulders of her group to ensure she is safe. I can understand why the teachers aren’t keen for her to go.

Maybe she would be better going with next years group, when she is feeling stronger.

@Itwouldtakemuchmorethanthis
I assume you don't work in education...

As a teacher who self harms (tho not for a year now) and helps with D of E i think I might be more qualified to comment.

Do not send your daughter on the expedition. It has nothing to do with isolating her or 'allowing the normals to have an easy life' (such a ridiculously stupid thing to say @Itwouldtakemuchmorethanthis ). It is about keeping ALL students safe, including the student with such severe MH needs that they resort to self harm.

There have been times in the past when judgement is clouded by my Bipolar and BPD, I have some wonderful, supportive colleagues who step in and help me make the correct decisions about what I should do.
I have even withdrawn from an expedition myself because I knew I was starting to spiral and needed to pull my head together at home not looking after 70-80 kids .
It has nothing to do with exclusion and all to do with safety. Why not try to work with the school on a plan to allow to do the expedition in a few months. Stop being so defensive and acknowledge the school's duty of care to more than just your child.

itwouldtake: you can get as angry as you like - no HT or LA would do a risk assessment then ignore it and decide that one child’s desire to participate in something, and that of their parent, is more important than the safety of both that child and the group.

It a child was recovering from a leg injury and it was decided that it wouldn’t be possible to take that child, then you would have to accept that.

A mental illness is no different to any other.

Have you actually thought what the impact might be on this child’s mental health if they had to drop out in the middle of the expedition. That would be even more devastating than not going.

As a parent I would want my child 100% fit for a trip like this. It’s not a day trip to the zoo, FGS!

At silver the only third party provider I can think of would be the campsite owner

All school d of e programs I know of are run by a 3rd party provider. I would imagine it will be there risk assessment which has decided the OP daughter can’t attend.

DS did his bronze last weekend (13, year 9) and as he has an epipen and takes medicine for severe allergies all his group had to be trained and a friend carried a spare epi pen for him just in case. This is as others have said that they are unsupervised for much of the trip.

I genuinely don't know how you would train the rest of DDs group to care for her should she deteriorate. I expect that the sword harm would make risk assessing problematic seeing as they are carrying knives and other sharp implements.

I honestly think only her hcps can make this call, the problem is it may be too much responsibility for the teachers to take hence asking her to but participate, if you can agree to take that responsibility it may help? How do the rest of her group feel about her taking part and helping her?

Sorry for typos!

I've been involved (as teaching staff) on a number of residential trips. If you've never done this, please accept that as a teacher it is one of the most stressful things you will ever do, and you don't relax until the last child has been collected or dropped off.

I've been at trips with self harming pupils and the responsibility that accompanies that is massive - often it requires teachers taking shifts on duty overnight for example, to allow the child to participate. And we willing did this to include the child. I've also set alarms for the middle of the night to administer medication. But these trips took place in cities with good access to medical facilities should god forbid they were needed.

DofE is a whole level of risk and responsibility above that. Please don't put these leaders in an even more difficult situation than they are in already, any teacher I know who does DofE has moved heaven and earth to try to be inclusive at some point so this will not have been an easy decision. The nature of the trip is the issue - the young people are meant to show they can do this independently. Having a teacher there also impacts on the experience for the others involved. It isn't great for anyone but if they can't guarantee your daughter's safety and well being possibly 2 hours or more from proper medical support then they have to be allowed to make that call.

I've got to echo what others have said; I wouldn't take a child away for this period of time with an issue that can impact like this. I've taken students with allergies, long term conditions etc as I'm a first aider (and also biomedical subjectwise) so I am confident in my ability to deal with potential problems and illness. I have no mental health training. My risk assessment for a student with mental issues, especially such recent ones, would be very difficult to make safe, for her and others. This level of responsibility is totally above me, and one of the reasons I didn't do medicine! I'm also not sure where insurance would lie; this could have been a reason for a change in permission if they contracted the insurance and they just gave a blanket "no".

I volunteer my time for activities with my students and I will do everything I can to facilitate it. If something happened to your daughter and I couldn't control it, not only am I risking my career but also my own mental health. I've had a student commit suicide, one I was close to. Nothing even happened actually at school, but the effect on the students and staff was profound. I would have to protect my other students from the risk of this.

This really isn't a case of pushing those with poor mental health to the side, it really is what is practical in out of the ordinary circumstances.

If her mental health is delicate I imagination they don't want responsibility if something happens to her on the trip. Maybe it's to do with insurance clause or something?

I agree with the school too. If as others have said the participants are to a greater degree unsupervised then that is putting a huge ask on the other members of the group, who are there to challenge themselves, not have to take responsibility for your child if she has a meltdown/anxiety attack /self harms during the expedition. Obviously if there was an unforeseen accident other group members would support, but when there is a known strong possibility that your DD will find the challenge too much then she should not be expecting others in the group to take up the slack. They are children/young adults, it's not fair on them to expect it.

I understand her argument that she has prepared for the event and wants to complete it, but if her present mental state is frail ( you say her self harm was bad enough for hospitalisation recently) she needs to understand that it is not the right time for her.

Op It is very important to frame it in such a way that the decision has been made with her best interests at heart, because they care about her and want her to do the trip when she is feeling strong.

Ensure you can enforce the positivity by doing something together that is both fun and enjoyable for her, make light of it that evening and remind her whilst you are having fun the others are trudging for miles.

You the way you manage this will make all the difference to how she feels about it. Complaining about the school/unfairness will simply make your dd feel even worse op. You have a big role to play in turning this into a positive.

OP if she still wants to go, phone them and see what can be done to make it happen. If not write a scathing letter to the HT, and LA about their behaviour and how it has impacted an already disadvantaged child in their care.

Worst advice ever.

If you did this to me (teacher) I would cancel/postpone the trip.
For everyone.

I could potentially lose my job if your child came to harm. As this DoE typically involves several days/nights without direct supervision, it would be negligent to allow her to go without organising an adult chaperone.
No 1:1 chaperone available= No trip.

I think its very unfair to expect other people to deal with your daughter while she is in a vulnerable state. Wait until she is better.

OP if she still wants to go, phone them and see what can be done to make it happen. If not write a scathing letter to the HT, and LA about their behaviour and how it has impacted an already disadvantaged child in their care.
Echoing pp who say please don't do this! It's not the staff being cruel or isolating her from the 'normals' (nice btw..) it's about a risk assessment.

I can understand why they have taken this stance, the level of responsibility involved with keeping your daughter safe, at the moment, far outweighs the duty of care a teacher could normally be expected to deliver.

Wait until she is better.

Things do go wrong on DofE trips, my son was taken v ill literally in the middle of nowhere, no phone signal, no vehicle access. The other kids had to climb for 45 mins to get to the top of a hill to phone teachers to help, the leaders and local doc eventually reached the kids by tractor/walking and he was airlifted to hospital at 3am. He was fine but it had a massive impact on his friends who were with him, not least because they got no sleep that night and had to take camp down for helicopter to land :(

i think some of the later posters are getting confused between the D of E expedition, and a school trip.

The D of E is unsupervised, except for a staff member checking in a couple of times a day for 5 minutes. Staff aren't "taking the children away on a trip", the kids are taking themselves away.

If qualified teachers are expressing reservations about taking self-harming students away on a supervised, school trip, surely it's obvious that the risks of allowing a self-harming teen loose on their own without ANY adult supervision is 100 times riskier?

you’re right, far too defective to bother with. You know what will REALLY help? Let’s bar anyone with additional needs from normal life and then all the “normals” can have a much more carefree existence. Every so often let’s talk about how the defectives isolate themselves and just need to get on with joining in.

That is not what was said and your comment is frankly ridiculous. In fact it's ridiculous overreactions that make it harder for kids with ASN and parents of kids with ASN to be heard.

Reasonable adjustments are required in order to allow a child with a disablity to participate in things. As PP have said, the children will be unsupervised for long periods of time (the nature of the expedition) and it would be her peers who would be first on scene if an incident occurred.

Reasonable adjustments, not just chucking people in at any cost without risk assessment.

And before you start screeching at me I have 3 children with ASD and I work with young adults with ASN.

So I've no idea what prompted that reaction, but you need to rein it in. Quickly.