Should a male teacher have done this?

[mycatisannoying]

During a residential school trip, enter a girls' shared dorm to wake them up?
To my mind it's a safeguarding issue, and there was also a female teacher on the trip who could have done it.
I wanted to seek others' opinions before raising it.
Thanks.

I wouldn't want an uninvited male to see me in my nightwear.

You do realise nightwear is clothing. Some people wear it to drop their DC to school or wear it to the shop.

It's hard to say whether what he did was appropriate based on what you said. All you say is that he entered the room to wake them up. Did he knock first, step in for 10 seconds just to make sure they were awake? Or did he go in and stand in the middle of the room for a few minutes watching whilst they all got up?

Obviously, the latter is problematic, the former is fine.

Did any of the other kids feel uncomfortable about what he did, or was it just your daughter, who as you've said also has other reasons to dislike him?

How do we know he didn't knock first? There are very few details in the OP's post about what he actually did.

This is what I thought too.

I agree it’s inappropriate. This happened when I was on a school trip with a male teacher entering a female dorm to wake us up. Several pupils were already up and getting changed. We complained to a female teacher at the time and a policy was introduced so that female teachers only would enter female dorms. I’d complain pointing out it made your daughter uncomfortable and he would have no way of knowing if any of the girls were already up / dressed etc. I’d make it clear you aren’t accusing him of intentionally making them uncomfortable though - just highlighting that they should have a policy that male teachers do not enter spaces where girls could reasonably expect privacy.

This x1000

If your problem with him is the phone/code word incident then complain about that

Do NOT try to make out he's a sexual predator ffs

On our school residentials, wake up is done by whichever teacher is on duty. Take it in turns.

The one thing I would query as unusual is the actual going into the dormitory, alone. Our teachers are encouraged not to, though there's no hard and fast rule about it (and the same applies whether male or female) in case of false accusations of impropriety. It's amazing how many kids try the "he hit me", "he swore at me", "he told me I was beautiful" line with teachers they perceive as having it in for them.

As far as the phone story goes, presumably you complained about this singling out of your daughter @mycatisannoying and coercing of other students- what was the outcome?

It was inappropriate of him to do this and I suspect he knows it.

Of course, he’ll get away with it because of these sorts of comments. Fantastic, isn’t it?

1. He shouldn't have entered the room. Banging loudly on the door telling them it's time to get up and breakfast starts in X minutes would have woken them up and got them up so there's have been no need to go in.

1. The phone code-word thing is not on. I can imagine him saying this as a semi-joke to be funny/cool, rather than a sort of military order, but it's not funny. Was the other teacher aware of this and if so what did she say/do?

Both of the incidents I think should be reported. I think they both suggest that his boundaries aren't quite where they should be. It may be he's just trying to be cool and there's nothing sinister but it actually doesn't matter. Neither are how he should be working with children.

The thing is none of us on this thread, including the OP, actually know what happened because we weren't there. It is all just speculation based on what a 13 year old girl said who obviously has a disliking to this teacher because of the phone thing. It could be anything from he just knocked on the door and let them answer, to him walking straight in when they were sleeping. There's a big difference. We also don't know the circumstances, maybe the female teacher was caught up in another incident or ill and so the male teacher had to do the wake ups. We just don't know. I'm pretty sure as a teacher myself that I have knocked on boy's dorms to wake them up, might put my head in to check everything's ok, but I wouldn't go in without a specific reason to boys or girls dorms.

Is this the same daughter OP, that you have mentioned on other recent threads? The one whose excessive phone use bothers you? Whose dad was taking her to buy a new iPhone?
If so, then she may have more than one phone still in use. You'd be surprised how many phones are confiscated at school during tests etc then the student is found to have more than one - the official one and the one they don't hand in.

Yes, I think there are complications here. One could argue that the teacher was making it clear to all the children that phone usage was unacceptable and that the ey should tell him.

Sounds like there’s a longer back story.

It’s a tricky one, though. On the one hand, we know the stats on male sex offences; on the other hand, we want to normalise men in caring roles.

Really surprised by how ok so many people are with this... In a dorm people are asleep and vulnerable or potentially partly undressed. No one of the opposite sex should be anywhere near the dorms of the other sex, teachers or students!
Partly to protect themselves from allegation of inappropriate behaviour but also not to make the students feel uncomfortable. The trip shouldn't run without correct ratios of teachers to students of both sexes.
Def not ok.

This wasn’t what you mentioned in the initial question! A male teacher with no previous odd behaviour.. entering girls room to wake up is no issue (not all men are paedos!) however someone with previous odd behavior, if you class that odd… maybe so.

I wouldn’t be happy about him going in the room. Okay if he just knocked on the door and shouted wake up.
I would be having a word personally with him about the phone issue. Sneaky and unprofessional.

Sorry @mycatisannoying I think yabu

You daughter has clearly got into trouble for something and is trying to worm her way out of it.

You are basing your entire outrage on the word of a 13 year old.

As for asking the other kids to let him know of your dd was on a phone and use a code word...I don't see the issue here. He clearly thought they would be worried about your dd's response and wanted a way for them to alert him without outing themselves.

I would be more concerned as to why he felt that was necessary. Does your daughter have form for bullying?

There is nothing wrong with a teacher (gender irrelevant) knocking and then opening a door to rouse sleeping kids.

As how do you know a female teacher wasn't close by waking a neibouring room who could see said male teacher at all times?

If you need answers I would do as suggested above and politely enquire as to your dds behaviour before you .are accusations that could cost someone their career

I can't believe this is even an issue. You clearly have a problem with this teacher that is unrelated to waking the girls up, so now you're looking for any excuse to complain about him.

Nothing wrong with him sticking his head round the door and telling the kids to wake up.

It’s interesting to see the lack of vigilance on this thread. We are a post Jimmy saville society. This teacher has form for pushing boundaries. He knew exactly what he was doing. Your instinct is right op. He violated the girls privacy. He knew they would be in a state of undress and asleep. He took advantage. He knows this breaks safeguarding rules and as a seasoned perv he also knows how to do just enough to introduce a question mark over his intentions and uncertainty. My bet is he will continue to look for opportunity afforded to him due to his position of trust as a teacher. Are we really so naive at this stage about child safeguarding?

Yes he shouldn’t have gone into the bedroom, but you are actually bothered about something else and tagging this on.

What if there were only male teachers? We can't assume every man is a paedophile. If he was opening the bathroom door when they were in the shower or pulling back the bed sheets or going in there in his boxers yes all those things are in appropriate. But going into a dorm and saying time to get up, I cant see the problem myself.

For people who think this is absolutely fine:

1. a lot of 13yo girls would feel very uncomfortable having a man in there room while they were asleep (I know I would be)

2. adults need to make decisions that are a bit more forward thinking than just the exact scenario at hand. The probability is that this man does not have sinister motives. But he's blurred the boundaries, and paved the way for some else who wants to take advantage of children (and apparently parents) who think this is normal.

I went Hostelling a lot with school in the 70s and this never happened. A female teacher and the male teachers wife always came along on the trips to watch over us girls.
Ditto DD on her school trips in the 90s.
I wouldn't like it either OP

It is possible your daughter borrowed a friends phone and was caught out on that and was upset at being told off.

Do you know another mum whose dc was on this trip well that you could discuss hid behaviour with? And I don’t mean to start a lynch mob, just to fact check.

I think before I discussed this with the school I would want as much info as possible.

I would add probably to protect himself and the girls a loud knock on the door and a verbal announcement that he was about to come in would be best to give them chance to cover up or something

Not all men. We know this.

But what sex offenders do do is blur the boundaries, often over a long period of time. And it’s so easy to do with so many people furiously denying sexual abuse is a thing, happens a lot.

’Do you think there is a peado (ugh) round every corner?’
’Not all men are like this!’
’My dad / grandad / uncle used to spend decades volunteering for XXX and wouldn’t do it now BECAUSE …’

We can see it here, can’t we? Indignation and outrage and huffing that anyone has dared question A Man going exactly where he wants.

To top it off, someone’s already blamed the OPs DD. She was misbehaving. She must have been. No smoke without fire.

Can you all not see what you’re doing?

This man may not have any ill intent. But the fact is that when things like this are done - innocuous things that just might be inappropriate but not really - a hug, a chat in the classroom alone (well he only cares about her and she was probably misbehaving) going into a girls dorm - it blurs the boundaries for other times and it makes it so much more difficult for any girls who are uncomfortable to speak up. And we desperately need them to.