to think this school policy is really odd?

[Oakmaiden]

My daughter is 16. Her school have just implemented a new toilet policy. If you wish to go to the toilet you have to go in 2 minutes, and you have to be chaperoned to and from the toilet by a senior member of staff.

I just think this is really odd. From my daughter's point of view she has food intolerances and sometimes it can take her a fair while on the loo if her tummy is unsettled (just to add, as a general rule she will avoid going to the toilet at school at all, if she can possibly manage it). But even without that, as she has said, she doesn't want to have to go to and from the toilet with an adult, or to discuss her toileting needs with anyone.

I do get that toilets in secondary schools are an ENORMOUS problem, but this just seems a totally bizarre way of managing it.

Not to forget - you now have the headteacher accompanying children to the toilet. Surely she has better things to do?

I don't know - am I wrong to think this is a very strange, and not quite right, policy?

There is no set amount of toilets for secondary child and you tend to work off the one to 20 students guidance which is the same for staff.

Teachers are sacked all the time for allowing kids out of lessons ton go to toilet

Is there evidence for this statement please?

Children will ask to get out of lessons if they’re a bit bored. You have to make it intimidating and awkward or this happens a lot

And a lot of "children" (young women by definition) have periods and their health and wellbeing should come before discipline. I've seen this argument again and again. Kids being kids and being stupid from time to time does not justify making girls embarassed to go to the loo.

I look at this from a woman's perspective but I can imagine that if a boy needs to go, he needs to go too.

It should not be beyond the wit of professional teaching staff to come up with a solution. They're professionally trained and can access professional help. It's sheer laziness.

This is ridiculous. There were LOTS of things wrong with my private all girls school, but we had LOTS of toilets (one block of 30ish and one block of 10ish for 650 girls), one block opposite the PE office and one block opposite the music office, we were supervised but not policed and i genuinely never heard of any nonsense going on. I was bullied for years, but in the classroom, not the loos. This can't be a widespread issue, surely? My husband teaches at a coed comp (has taught at several) and has never heard of anything like this. Teenagers are all the same inherently regardless of fees paid for education, or am i being hopelessly naive?

The problem is poor parenting. If parents brought up their kids to respect others this policy wouldn't be needed

Oh that old chestnut again. Because kids always do exactly what their parents (and elders and betters generally) tell them - all the time.

cabbage

Think op ( or someone did) said there were 4 toilets but not all allowed to be used so even assuming 4 toilets were left open at break. In a school of say 1500 half girls that leaves 750 kids per 4 toilets. So that's what 187.5 kids per toilet. Even if they all took a minute that's still more time than there physically is in breaks... one wonders wtf kids are meant to di.

There must be toilets elsewhere in the school that are open and available.

Kids often make things more dramatic.

There were one set that were apparently not always open that you could use but as they were off site you couldnt get back in until end if break so useless for anyone with lunch clubs etc

Unfortunately, I think this is the kind of thing that gives schools a bad name. Teachers, including SLT, tell us how over worked they are and here we have a SLT with enough time to accompany dc to the toilet? Is there really nothing better for these (Highly educated and highly paid) people to be doing with their time? (Please note, I do not think this is a worth while thing for lesser paid school support staff to be doing regularly in a high school either, but a head teacher should surely be managing the whole school, not spending hours of the day on toilet watch!).

SLT might not have enough time, SLT may just be doing a lot more work outside school hours

That isn’t to say that I don’t think it’s nuts...

Toilets, in secondary schools in particular, have always been problem areas for vandalism, skiving, bullying, meeting mates, smoking etc.

Always have been and always will be.

Architecture can help alleviate matters somewhat, single self contained cubicles off a corridor, no mass basin/washing area, decent surrounding etc.

Some schools choose to lessen problems by restricting access. Never really works and causes problems to those who genuinely need a toilet, upsets staff on the ground, pupils and parents. In this case why someone on £80k seems to think that part of their job is to be on bog patrol escapes me.

Some children restrict fluid intake during the day so that they don't need to go, others hold on because of the schools policy or what goes on in the toilets.
Some children prefer to go in lesson time because people who may bully them are less likely to be there compared to break time.

One solution is simple..... cctv in the toilets and on the door. (Obvoiusly not in the cubicles/stalls.) monitor in office. Any problems can be seen as and when it happens, anything missed can be watched later.

Occasionally my youngers and betters on the SMT flexed their muscles and said no one can go. I’d let the desperate boys and girls use our staff/disabled one on the quiet. (We were in a separate block). As a teacher, and parent, you know who needs it and who is trying it on.

CCTV in the children's toilets? Can you imagine the MN thread about that? 'My daughter won't go to the toilet because the school film them in there', 'they're entitled to privacy' - 'what sort of perv watches CCTV of children going to the toilet?'

sanitationfirst.org/blog/the-right-to-a-toilet/
Quote:
"In 2015, the United Nations General Assembly declared sanitation a universal human right. This means that everyone, everywhere, has the right to a toilet.
"Consider how different your day would have been today had you not had access to a toilet at home, at school, or at work."

At school.

Well, no need to exercise much imagination about that, is there?

Asking

You must really feel for teachers then.

and the government are scratching their head as why so many kids are being take out to home educate

schools are like mini prisons the last few years the system has gone so far down hill its crawled underground

Even with this policy in place children have more access to toilets than teachers.

As behaviour gets worse school regimes have to change accordingly.

What solution do you want here op? They have the policy in place for a reason, a good reason. I understand your daugher has a number of issues, but can you explain what you wish the school to do, or what you think uou can do to help her?

I wish those on here saying how ridiculous etc could suggest alternatives that would keep pupils safe and the toilets safe from vandalism.

Some suggestions of new remodelled toilets and CCTV require money - would you pay more tax for this? Because schools are on their knees with their budgets, sometimes in debt.

Imagine being the Headteacher at this school, where a serious incident has occurred, and it's your responsibility to prevent it reoccurring with no money in the pot for any solution and if the loos get broken you'll go into debt to fix it (repeatedly). The quickest low cost way is escorted toilet breaks.

I agree wholeheartedly that it's unacceptable, but what else would others suggest to fix the issue of behaviour in toilets?

(PS I work in a primary and we see behavioural incidents and vandalism there too - I have had to escort pupils to the loo as well. Do I want to? No! But if it means keeping pupils safe from physical abuse, and toilets in working order, then it's the lesser evil.)

@TAKESNOSHITSHIRLEY

schools are like mini prisons

Except, since 1996, even prisoners should have "genuine 24-hour access" to toilets and hand-washing facilities...

I wish those on here saying how ridiculous etc could suggest alternatives that would keep pupils safe and the toilets safe from vandalism.

This is literally the job of the headteacher and the SLT - it's what they're paid to do. None of us on here, including the OP, are privy to the full details of available toilet facilities, staffing arrangements, incidents that have led to this decision, budgetary considerations, timetabling arrangements, and a hundred other things that need to be considered in order to make an informed, practical decision about this policy.

The headteacher and SLT do have access to all of this, and should not be making a decision, presumably based on the behaviour of a minority of pupils, that disadvantages all pupils to such an extent that they do not have adequate access to toilet facilities, leading, in this case, to a 16-year-old soiling herself while in their care.

The basic wellbeing of students should come before all other considerations, whereas it doesn't seem to have been considered at all here.

Should teachers be allowed this freedom too?

Should teachers be allowed this freedom too?

Of course they should - but that's not the OP's issue, and it isn't this policy that is preventing it from happening.

Is your argument that, because it's difficult for teachers to find the time to go to the toilet throughout they day, it should made equally, if not more, difficult for children to do the same, by design? Because that's what it sounds like.

(And yes, I get the unique struggles of being a teacher. I'm from a big family of teachers, I've been in a relationship with one for 20 years. I get it.)

So teaches get to walk out of lessons and leave the room with no adult?

@ItsGoingTibiaK

But what would you do if you were Head? Everyone is very quick to jump on the policy (and I get it, because I wouldn't want this for my kids, or for the kids of the school I work in - but was at one time driven to it), but not much in the way of understanding that it may be the only quick available solution. It may be that SLT/Head will be revising this policy and coming up with something different in the near future, but this is the easiest and quickest way to keep pupils safe, and protect the school property.

But hey I'm all ears for another way, that satisfies all parties! I can then pass onto my SLT should I ever have to be on toilet duty again.