To think this is the most pathetic anti bullying policy ever?

[Afly]

Ds is having some issues with children from school so I was looking at the anti bullying policy on the website and I'm a bit shocked thh.
I put the parts I find the most useless in old.
basically seems to be that kids will get away with bullying others and won't be punished. I can't see this stopping children from bullying anyone at all!?

BEHAVIOUR AND DISCIPLINE POLICY, INCLUDING ANTI-BULLYING POLICY (last reviewed Mar 2022)
• Interview with the victim/s
When the teacher finds out that bullying has happened s/he starts by talking to the victim about his/her feelings. S/he does not question him about the incidents but she does need to know who was involved. Interview the ‘victim/s’ individually, getting them to describe how they feel. Use poems/pictures etc. How would they want the others to feel about them? Identify who the others are and get the victim’s permission to proceed.
• Convene a meeting with the children involved - usually without the victim/s
The teacher arranges to meet with the group of pupils who have been involved. This will include some bystanders or colluders who joined in but did not initiate any bullying. We find that a group of six to eight young people works well. Convene a group of all those involved, other than the victim. Include bystanders and ‘passive condoners’ as well as those most directly involved. Try to get a ‘healthy’ group, including some who have sympathy for the victim.
• Explain the problem
Tell them about the way the victim is feeling and perhaps use a poem, piece of writing or a drawing to emphasise his/her distress. At no time does she discuss the details of the incidents or allocate blame to the group.
• Share responsibility
The teacher does not attribute blame but states that he/she knows that the group are responsible and can do something about it. Explain that no-one is going to be punished or blamed. Explain how the victim is feeling and how the group is going to try and address these feelings together.
• Ask the group for their ideas
Each member of the group is encouraged to suggest a way in which the victim could be helped to feel happier. The teacher gives some positive responses but does not go on to extract a promise of good behaviour. Ask members of the group to make a commitment to doing something to improve the relationship with the victim. Use the group to reinforce the promises made.
• Leave it up to them
The teacher ends the meeting by passing over the responsibility to the group to solve the problem. He/She arranges to meet with them again to see how things are going.
• Meet them again
About a week later the teacher discusses with each student, including the victim, how things have been going. This allows the teacher to monitor the bullying and keeps the young people involved in the process.
Follow up more formally later by reconvening the group. Give the victim a way of letting you know how things are going

Wtf?! Some kind of group colluding 'therapy' where the bullies are seen as the central ones?

That is just a great long list of bollocks.

That is shocking.

Hey kids, child A feels like this when you bully him.
Bullies: excellent it is working. And now we have more knowledge of how to get to him.

I suppose they admit bullying might possibly happen in their school, so that's a step forward from my school days.

I can only imagine that getting a child to draw a picture or write a poem about how upset bullies are making them and then showing it to said bullies would encourage further bullying tbh
i can't see how any of that is any kind of deterrent at all.

Much more time consuming than a swift talking to and a letter home to the parents.

All this touchy feely drawing your feelings bollocks. You're not in Scotland are you, they love all the writing your learning outcomes and reflection stuff.

I think where you’re talking about young kids (Infants age, so 4/5/6 maybe 7) and non-violent bullying, this could be a reasonable way to tackle things at first.

Younger kids often go along with one or two “leader” children in something like this but when it’s pointed out to them that someone is hurting they stop and feel more able to refuse to participate in the future.

For older kids or bullying that’s got more serious or physical, it doesn’t sound like it would be at all effective - but other parts of the behaviour policy might come into play for that.

You need to teach your child to defend himself.

I do try to teach him to stick up for himself but he's autistic and doesn't quite get it.

It's 'Restorative Approaches' based.

I'd be inclined to ask how they would address the bullying if they did not receive the victim's permission to proceed with this approach.

For younger kids it looks pretty good to be honest. From experience I can assure you that the random detention lottery where there's like a 1/50 chance that the bully gets a detention today does little to help the victim or the bully and can be extremely counterproductive if the responsibility is seen to rest with the victim to report the 'incident'

‘Pass responsibility back to the group’?
What?
is even physical bullying consequence free?

I am. And I’ve never seen any of the kids adhere to it. It’s very much still the “my mum said if he hits me I’ve to hit him back” way. I once had a teacher phone me and tell me that revenge wasn’t the answer. She was swiftly told it’s not revenge if my bairn is being assaulted and chooses to defend themselves like any adult would do in the real world. I’ve never had a phone call since.

In this instance the kids are 10-11
It won't work on the ring leader child who is bullying my ds, because he's very manipulative ( as a lot of bullies are) and can definitely win over adults and convince them he's done no wrong more so than my autistic child ever could.
And if he knows there's no consequences what on earth will ever make him stop? 10 and 11 year olds know right from wrong, he knows it's wrong and he knows it upsets ds he doesn't care, if he did, he wouldn't be bullying him.

Jeez. I moved schools because of bullying (ended up in a PRU as a school refuser)
Remember my dad asking at a school we went to about the bullying policy
Headteacher "not in my school. No bullying. None"
Dad was
Headteacher was right. He was out walking the hallways, on the playground and any bullying he just didn't tolerate and you were suspended

These restorative practices (RP) are well-meant but open to all manner of errors.
By not taking details of the event, they've nothing to hang the restorative aspect on. Or evidence for later possible chain of behaviour for the perp(s). The whole meeting your bully, as was part of proposed RP at my last school, is very dodgy, and I can see it amounting to pressure on the victim in the wrong hands.

As for feelings, what if their feeling was "I want to kick them in the nads?". Also, the sharing of feelings leaves them open to further bullying.

I don't buy the detention doesn't work. It certainly won't change the bully, but it shows the victim there is an immediate consequence, which RP absolutely does not. Then they can their convos.

I think this has some value with younger hangers-on. Older pupils, not so much.
Finally it takes masses of training of staff, with implications for it to be repeated for new staff. Very very expensive.

You get caught bullying you loose break time or something would work a lot better than whatever this is tbh on older primary kids.

Personally I'd suspend kids for any continued bullying if it was up to me, I think it's about the worst thing you can do at school you can literally ruin peoples lives to see it be taken flippantly makes me really angry.