To think if children do not go back (to school) until. September, thats a lot of very vulnerable children who have been completely off the radar for 6 months??

[calpolatdawn]

Its one of my main concerns really. By this i dont mean that are vulnerable because they are poor with disabled, unable to work, or hardworking parents. I mean at risk of domestic abuse, other forms of abuse or maybe poverty, job losses, stress as a result of that,But too proud to access help. aibu in wondering what might come out after this is over, 4 children in this country have died already in DV murders 😔, i get very worried,.

Nevertwerk- but that's always the case even when school happens normally. We can't know everything. It's impossible. But we can be vigilant and monitor. It's all we can ever do. But our senco and learning mentor welfare checks have been happening from day one, as has our general monitoring of all.
Whilst we haven't called every child weekly we have monitored and anyone 'not seen' in any other communication method were contacted. Every child has had at least one call and will have at least one more before summer.

Have a child with severe learning difficulties, last contact with social worker was an email saying if I needed anything get in touch early April. Last spoke to school was before half term. They have phoned and left one message a week saying they will try again it a withheld number and school reception closed. He is non verbal so no one has physically seen or heard him since March other than neighbours and people in the woods. I am concerned with parents that mask they are in crisis or are good at portraying a normal home life.

How are schools reaching families who don’t speak English at home?

Also worth saying , yes - abuse can be under the radar. Which is why the whole community has a responsibility to safeguard children. If you have a concern about a child, you can ask for help for them. Contact the safeguarding team at your school. if child goes to a different school, look on their website for details of who their team is.

Our local authority gives us support with translators.

"Every child has had at least one call and will have at least one more before summer"
Do you know that to be a fact? Our Head emailed parents saying the same, but we havent had direct contact. Form tutor messaged all kids in form just saying hello, and a couple replied. I suspect she told her head "oh yeah, I've contacted them all".

I work in 2 schools. The primary has had more vulnerable kids in than key worker right through since lockdown started. There is a spreadsheet of contact and some "at risk" kids who are shielding or not in school are being phoned every day. The teachers/TAs are talking to the actual kid, not just their parent. Those at lower risk are being contacted weekly. At the secondary I share a tutor group. I personally contact every kid weekly electronically. A couple have had difficulties at home and as a result are coming into school every day. As a tutor team, we meet weekly (only fortnightly when we are in school normally). Both schools have urged parents to apply for FSM if their circumstances have changed. This is repeated weekly on parent newsletters.

As someone else has said, I too spend more time on pastoral care that I do on planning and posting lessons. Perhaps if certain posters had considered vulnerable children last December when voting, things might be a bit different.

I am not saying that the OP is teacher-bashing but I find the complete lack of respect from some on MN baffling. They chose to have children. They have helped to keep in power successive governments that have starved education of cash. Now they are screaming and shouting because the schools are not giving Tarquin and Clarissa brand new laptops and printers to complete their personalised differentiated work, or access a full day of lessons on Zoom, Hangouts or Teams. My internet connection is dire. I can't teach online because it simply keels over. Oh yes, this marvellous governing party promised super-duper-mega-speedy internet connections for all. Well I'm still waiting. It took over an hour to upload a presentation I prepared for one of my GCSE classes, during which time I couldn't do anything else.

TabbyMunz - As a school we have monitoring and feedback sheets for all communication made, whether by email, telephone, via home learning, etc.

Unless the teachers are lying about their telephone calls, as far as I am aware as of yesterday, all children have been called. I think by Friday morning one wasn't available the first couple of times but had now been spoken too. Obviously there may be one or two more who have only had brief contact as the time wasn't suitable - but these are on the ring back early next week list. Our more vulnerable families have been spoken with several times.

I believe this is a concern and teachers, social workers and even politicians have voiced these concerns. It is a real worry. In Scotland there are constant ads on social media advising to look out for children and report if concerned.

Those already identified as at risk will be checked on. Concern is the ones who have not yet been noticed as they won't be noticed until August at a minimum. Unfortunately I can't see a solution. Even the children I normally see very regularly in our street have not been around due to lockdown so I couldn't notice any problems even if I am vigilant.

You are not wrong OP. Problem is no baseline for who is actually supposed to be checking them. A lot of people I know including ourselves have not had a single contact with a child in the last 13 weeks. Parents can say they're fine but it worries me so much. Little boy killed this week in Solihull and his parents have been arrested. He will be one of many who have fallen under the radar because no one is actually sure what their responsibility is.

SheWrangles - same as normal. Lea translators can help plus some staff in school who do speak the home language, etc. Website and email contact is translatable, and I know one family uses an online translation thing to translate the home learning instructions for their child. Foot step visits sometimes hell with those too. Its harder but not impossible.

Most of my students aren't back until September. However, each staff has a list of students to call every week. If they don't get through then it gets flagged up and in some cases referred to social services.

These threads generally all go the same way, teachers and school staff let us know what is being done, parents will tell their experience and the truth will be somewhere in between. Children will be scarred mentally and physically it’s just how many and the how many will never really be known.

You are right to be worried. For every school that has been pro active, one will not. It’s my job at our school to check in with the home learners and it’s a busy job. My child’s school, no work, no contact, no nothing. They are vulnerable because they have an EHCP and a disability. Shocking really.

@homeishere

Of course there will be kids who slip through the cracks and the cracks are widening due to Covid.

Rather than fretting about it, what are you doing to help?

Hear hear.

This pearl clutching virtue signalling is so tiresome.

I work in a primary with much higher than average SEN and vulnerable children. We have had more vulnerable children in than key workers too, and staff have been calling, inviting others in, gently persisting when parents are reluctant to bring their children in. We have a food bank, and both care packages and work are delivered to some families.

I have been with various key worker groups since lockdown, and now I’m with one of 2 year 2 bubbles - still lots of vulnerable children, we are trying our best to make room for them when key worker children don’t come in.

It is terrible that we such vulnerable children in our society, but it does not seem fair that everything is on schools. What about social services? School used to be a place where you went to learn the 3 Rbs, and now it seems to have to cover mental health, social services, food bank, sex Ed, citizenship, morals/ ethics... and anything else. No wonder teachers are leaving the profession in droves.

And March - September = 6 months is headline grabbing. But I think it’s more like 23-24 weeks. Of which 2 weeks were Easter holidays, one was June half term and 6 weeks will be the summer holidays. 9 weeks is roughly 2 months.

So hopefully, all our children will be back in school from September and it’s terrible that they will have missed 4 months of being at school, this is an unprecedented situation, and we all just have to do the best we can.

My older sons school have phoned once ,whilst he's not vulnerable he has a disabled brother so disadvantaged to some extent,my younger child's special school ,didn't contact us at all for about 5/6 weeks which I was surprised about ,but they are now phoning once a week and we had a door step visi t last week they visited all the children ,again he's not vulnerable to abuse ,only due to his disabilities.

I work as a children’s nurse and we have seen more admissions of child protection cases, teenagers self harming/camhs in the last few weeks than normal. The patients are reporting that camhs aren’t providing any support. I have a teacher friend who is saying the vulnerable children are being brought to school even less than normal. Who’s seeing these children?

@Aragog I know that. Only too well sadly. But the point is that if schools are only checking on those they seem vulnerable, rather than checking on all children, then there will be a lot of children slipping through the net. And judging by the sneering comments about "Clarissa and Tarquin" there seems to be an ongoing assumption that middle class children aren't at risk of abuse. Abuse happens across the classes, again as I know only too well.

And if you are a child who is being abused, having other adults in your life who check in on you, even if you never disclose what is happening, can really help. Having teachers and other adults reminding you that you are part of a bigger community that just the awful bubble in your home can help. Again, as I know only too well.

Of course it’s a worry but they haven’t been “completely off the radar” - I work in a college and the pastoral staff have proactively chased up students who aren’t engaging every single week. As a teacher I’ve spent more time dealing with engagement, lack of motivation, mental health issues than anything else

That's great you've done that. My school have never called, and we only started submitting anything last week and then only by email. They have literally NO idea how things are going for us, or for many others.

Even if they did call, I could be looming over, or take the call myself, or just not pick up. It's not the same as having a child in school.

Of course it's not the same as being in school, no one is pretending it is. But that is very different to not doing anything at all. The majority of schools will be doing the best they can. Social services will be doing the best they can.

It's very concerning. There's households I know of that can't be bothered with education and the kids have very poor attendance records - the school worked very hard to get kids to appreciate school and boost them to give them a chance of passing exams, one particular situation they are in year 10. The families are quite low income but do have internet, just no laptops (but PlayStation, Xbox yes). My friend is the senco and she thinks she has a dozen kids at risk of not returning to school which could be the difference between benefits/warehouse packing/fast food type life to going to higher education etc - they have managed to get kids from similar households to university before but it's hard, however it breaks the cycle of deprivation so worth it

These threads generally all go the same way, teachers and school staff let us know what is being done, parents will tell their experience and the truth will be somewhere in between. Children will be scarred mentally and physically it’s just how many and the how many will never really be known.

Yes to this. Any thread which questions anything about schools immediately gets piled on by two camps: The teachers who are affronted that anyone should ever dare question their effectiveness, and the parents who believe that all teachers have spent lockdown doing nothing.

The truth is, that there will be a considerable number of vulnerable children who won't get any support, and will fly under the radar. I work in social services and this happens outside of a global pandemic so anyone who thinks it isn't happening more now is hopelessly naive.

It's no more schools responsibility than it is the rest of societies.
Schools are there to educate the children, not cure all of societies ills.
Vulnerable children, because of feckless or shit parents, will always be at risk.
And that is not the teachers fault. It is the parents fault. Every. Single. Damn. Time.
You want to know what's being done? Contact your mp, or volunteer for child line...

I think and hope school are more tuned in than you might realise

I do share your concerns around the hidden and abusive house holds in plain sight

But that’s not on the schools

That’s on society and history

Male abuse is not a problem for schools to solve

No one has checked on any of our children even once. No one has checked on any of my sisters's children even once. And it's a story so many parents are telling.

I think some schools are correctly checking on all children

But other schools seem to have made the grave error that they already know which children are vulnerable and so are focusing on those at the exclusion of all others. Well I can tell you now that those schools are failing children. You simply don't know which children are vulnerable.

And the school community was their break from abuse and their safety net. So to just not even check in with them (as some schools, not all schools have done) was an astonishing decision.