DD school coat found with another DC name !!

[Highfivemum]

So my DD came home from school last year without her school coat. It was three weeks old and had her name on the inside of the coat and also I put her name in the pocket on a label. So two name tags. Went into school regularly spoke to teachers and the coat never was found. She had worn it twice so like new. Fast forward to yesterday and my DD mislaid her jumper. I went to lost property and collected her jumper and saw a school coat in he box. Very worn and dirty with a ripped sleeve. As I always do I looked in the coat and there was another child’s name written in the back but underneath in pale ink you could see my DD name that had been written over. I then checked the pocket and there was my DD name clearly still on a tag. The name of the DC was a boy in the same year as her ( the coats are unisex). I spoke to her teacher and she said oh never mind at least she has her coat back !! I was flabbergasted to be honest. This other mum whose child has been in the same year group since nursery at the school wrote over my DD name and gave her DS the coat to wear. Then left it now as it is ripped and badly worn and I am meant to be pleased. AIBU to feel like she has stolen it. ? I am not sure how to handle this.

This teacher is gutless. They needed to call the parent/s, explain the situation, calmly state the fact that the coat cost X amount from Y shop and the easiest way to resolve it is for them to purchase a replacement.

Oooh op this reminds me of the time I accidentally stole a coat still feel guilty, obviously this isn't the case here because you say the other mum knows your dd, but I was an unintentional thief!
I found a brilliant nearly new coat in a charity shop. When I got home I crossed out the previous owners name and put in DS name.
Roll on several months and a school reminder to check all clothing is named. See a name on the coat, think to myself 'uh must have forgotten to put ds name in his coat' cross out the other boys name and write DS name. Roll on end of summer term, and all 'lost' named clothing is handed back.
Get home, go to hang coat up to find identical one on hook. Then realise what I've done, but have no idea which was the charity shop coat and which belong to fellow school pupil.
So take the better of the two coats. Cross out Ds name with permanent marker to remove all trace of Ds. Come beginning of September and when hanging up ds coat, hang other coat up on the same school hook....then slink away feeling very bad! I hope the coat got reunited with its owner, but to this day I have no idea which coat was which!

I agree with the pp who said reclaim it and tell/show the biggest gossip at the gates. That parents name will be mud by Tuesday.

This is a good idea

People are desperate to make ends meet, maybe the child needed it 🤷🏻‍♀️ not saying she was right to take it and keep it but maybe she didn't have another choice and she thought you wouldn't notice.

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Who's to say the OP isn't struggling and couldn't afford to fork out for a second coat?

But…

When a school gets rid of lost property, they do so at the end of summer term…

If the parent had taken it from a school-wide lost property pile then it’s pretty damn unlikely that they’d end up with a coat of a kid in the exact same class…

It’s a bit of a coincidence that it was a brand new coat a couple of days old…

They TRIED TO ERASE THE NAME OF A CLASSMATE. If you have a classmate called Toby Stubbins, and you find a coat with a label in it that says Toby Stubbins, you don’t think to yourself ‘By golly what a coincidence’ - you message Toby’s mum and ask if they lost a coat recently.

THEFT. Exactly the same as stealing money from her wallet, just harder to get caught.

I wouldnt be pleased but maybe the mother is broke and couldn't afford to buy a coat for her son new or second hand and the only way was to steal. Even if not I wouldnt go around telling people what had happened. Its just not a very nice topic of discussion, it makes you look nuts, and it wont get your coat back or prevent future behaviour. It will cause a lot of hurt and upset to the mother and her child as the information will be heard by kids it could lead to him being excluded. None of this is a good idea, Im sorry but i think you should let it go. If the school wont do anything then you should find a better one if possible

I can understand your annoyance but there's no way you can be sure that the person who wrote over the name tag actually stole the coat or knew it was stolen.

Seriously. Being short of money means you can steal other people’s stuff.

ok.

Nursery. Dd a very tall child, other girl very small. Matching coats. Dds had her name in and I'd written her name in the back of a hi vis and stitched it to her coat.
Went to pick up to find dd in a too small, ripped, dirty coat and a very irate father trying to rip the high vis off the coat his daughter was wearing threatening to flatten whoever had stitched it to it.
He just couldn't grasp the too big pristine coat with my daughters name in it and her labelled hi vis stitched to it wasn't his daughters tatty coat.
He was removed by staff eventually.

She knows she stole the coat. She needs to know op knows too. and everyone else

Nobody who has the balls to pass off another child's coat as their own will give two shits about a passive aggressive WhatsApp message. They just won't. Just let it go.

How did they imagine it materialised without them actually buying it for their child, do you think?

Oh come on

But this happened months ago!! There’s no way of being able to PROVE who owned the coat ‘first’. School cannot accuse a parent of stealing without cast iron proof. They just can’t.
The whole thing is bloody annoying and, yes, it’s theft etc etc. But it’s too late to be able to do anything about it.

This times 100!

I would be very annoyed but wouldn't bring it up. The kind of person who would do this in the first place is unlikely to respond well.

This is appalling, and the teacher is pathetic. I would put on the class WhatsApp. Any decent thinking person would agree it's terrible.

As for the notion that maybe the mum was poor, bollocks. There's no excuse for theft. Coats can be bought cheaply from supermarkets or charity shops, in fact they are often given away free on our local FB pages. No one needs to steal.

It's far more likely the parent is an opportunist thief. I've seen people do this, their DC loses their coat or other clothing...they just pick another one hanging up (typically the best one, not anything too tatty) and half inch it, or kids are told to. I know of children who were told not to come home without A coat. So if they couldn't find theirs...just take any!

When I was at primary school a child stole an item of mine and refused to give it back. The useless teacher refused to get involved even though the item had my name on, until my mum came to the school and insisted it was returned.

My DS got in trouble-around age 7 or 8- for not having his games kit-which he did have except another boy took it, ripped his nametag off (found on changing room floor) and wore it

The other boy-only one wearing unnamed kit did not get in trouble at all.
And he had previous history for this sort of thing-the teachers just wanted an easy life. So my poor DS took a bollocking and missed his Games lesson in disgrace.
He took it very hard-the unfairness was galling and obvious...

If a child is so desperate to steal a coat to have a coat then you have to wonder why.
Doesn't stop your frustration of course but what good will shaming the parent do?

I had similar when my D's in primary school. I bought him 2 identical coats as he got them grubby so I washed every few days. He took coat to school one day but did not bring it back. I went in to look for it but it was not there. I told his class teacher and she said was no to her child may have taken it by mistake and it turn up following week. Next Monday in I sent him in with other coat. Both were labelled with sew in label and a dew in label on inside of left sleeve. A few weeks later I saw a child with same coat as my son. I went into school and asked class teacher if I could look in sleeve. She agreed. I saw my child label in left sleeve. I showed teacher who spoke to head. I was told by head there are 2 coats so both children can have one. The only reason I did not make a fuss was because the child who had taken it wore very scruffy clothes and it was winter and he did not seem to have a coat of his own.

This would royally piss me off and the younger version of me would want to confront the parent that took the coat. It was theft, plain and simple. However as I get older I realize that there wouldn't be a point to it. You can't make them pay for it and I doubt they would voluntarily since they stole it. Best to let it roll of your back and move on. (But it would still irk me for a while lol)

Did you check lost property originally ? When coats have been in for a while and not claimed they are often repurposed to children who need second hand coats. Or do you they a coat recycling scheme it may have ended up in ? The teacher can't do anything but I'd be furious too! She shouldn't have said you should be pleased but what on earth is she supposed to say ? I'd be so shocked if it happened to a child in my class that I would probably say something silly too, without really meaning it. You could probably email the current teacher to make them aware ? They won't be able to do anything though.

School staff are stretched so thin. I had children in my room at 8:20 -3:30 and a parent meeting after that. I don't have a ta and my class often come in from break needing help to resolve problems that have started on the playground which I can't always help with as we've got so much curriculum to cover. I wish we had more time for the pastoral stuff, never mind the admin of sorting out lost property. The teacher probably brushed it off because it's so far down her/his list of priorities. Not gutless or pathetic like some posters have said, just busy working, you know, teaching your children to read and write.