Should I complain to the governors?

[camegonfle]

DC has a history of anxiety. Severe episode 2 weeks ago which resulted in A&E trip and CAmhs referral within 24 hours. DH went to school to pick up DC for therapist appt which for which we'd pre-notified school. School were unable to locate DC. They'd been marked medically absent from a previous lesson and hadnt turned up to the following lesson. We had a torrid 40 minutes whilst they looked for them. They were found sitting in a corridor with a member of staff (thankfully) having had a panic attack.

Is it unreasonable to think this is a major safeguarding fail? Surely if a kid goes out of a class on medical grounds they should be checked on/notified to pastoral care at the very least.

We'd already been in discussions with safeguarding as they truanted from the last lesson of the day recently and it was not flagged up to anyone; I had to tell the school that DC had truanted and wanted to know why school hadn't contacted me.

Would it be unreasonable to involve the governors at this point?

I am a teacher and SENCo. In this situation, if I thought I child was visibly distressed, I would have called using our online system for Emergency Support. I would also have asked another child to go and check on her. Or if I was really worried, checked the nearest department office and asked if a member of staff could help. I would do this for extreme anger or upset too. We have students at our school who are also red slip and marked on the register, if they aren't there within the first 10 mins or leave in a state, you must call for support. You should find out if the school have a similar system. I personally wouldn't make a complaint here as it is a tricky situation as individual teachers are unlikely to knows the details of your DC's anxiety etc. You could also ask the school to share this with teachers so they are aware and also offer a bit more tlc.

I would see this as a learning opportunity rather than a complaint. Schools are honestly on their knees at the moment. Staff absence and budget cuts means everyone is doing their best but sometimes things could be handled better and learned from.

@Bewitched005 well they have to mark the child medically absent anyway so it's surely not much of a stretch to ping a note to pastoral care/safeguarding. If there's a medical incident in a classroom it causes a certain amount of disruption; thems the breaks. If there was a projectile vomiting incident or someone fainting for example. Or would you be another dismissing mental health?

I think that you need to be very clear with the school if your dc is at risk of harming themself.
If he is and if he cannot be trusted to stay on site and in class, then ask them to produce some instructions for staff.
This could be that he is not allowed out of class without a member of staff.
It could be that if he is missing, staff email pastoral support.
However, you and he will then have to live with these restrictions. You cannot then ask for him to be given an exit pass to go for a walk or to stand in the corridor.
I think it would be unreasonable to complain in these circumstances. I am assuming he was allowed out of the lesson to go to sick bay as he felt unwell or was allowed out as he felt anxious. He then did not do that. He was picked up and cared for by someone so complaining would be unreasonable.

I'm not dismissive of panic attacks at all! I've witnessed them in adults and children and I know what's involved. I'm simply saying that a medical condition occurred and a teacher helped out!
If a child had an asthma attack I would say the same thing. The child left the room, stating where they were going. If they then had an asthma attack in the corridor and a teacher spent 40 minutes with them, I would still fail to see what the school had done wrong.

We have a system where we log on class charts if student is out the lesson. This is then picked up by pastoral team.

However we have a huge increase in students who for whatever reason are unable to cope with a full school day. So it depends on who is available as the pastoral team could have numerous students to deal with.

Teaches are not allowed to leave the classroom. So once it has been reported it would not be logistically easy to keep checking on them.

I understand that you are anxious and worried. But if we have a full class & we are expected to teach a proper lesson with starter, questioning, a group task etc it's hard to keep popping out the room to check on that other student. If each class has 2-3 students needing this level of care nobody would get any learning done.

I say this as a parent of a child who suffered anxiety post covid. So I am sympathetic.

It’s absolutely not a governor issue, at least not until you have exhausted the complaints process. Each school will have one, it should be set out on the website, but it almost certainly has several steps before it goes near the governors. At my school any complaint to governors would just be sent straight back to you with advice to follow the process. If you have identified what you believe to be a safeguarding issue it needs to go to the designated safeguarding lead, again not the governors. It’s simply not their role.

@realmsofglory

This sort of thread is a real eye opener to me. What happened to teachers you know just teaching the kids , are they really expected to issue an alert every time a teenager leaves the room to get a breath of fresh air or something? Ridiculous!

This is why the job has become so stressful post covid. A big increase in anxiety. Students unable to stay in lessons.

I don't think OP is ridiculous however expecting someone to know where their child is during lesson time.

@Aroloruns thank you that is extremely helpful. You're absolutely right about trying to make this a learning experience not a confrontational one. I am so aware that resources are stretched and am very grateful to the lovely teachers my kid has (met most of them recently in person for the first time). I had talked to friends IRL who recommended the governor route, but ironically braving the viper's nest of AIBU has proved far more helpful

I think YABU to go straight to the Governors rather than discussing it with school first.

I am just trying to get the facts straight -

Your child left the lesson on medical grounds, but you haven’t actually said that they were having a panic attack at this point? What reason did they give the teacher for leaving the lesson? This would affect the teacher’s reaction.

If they had told the teacher they were just feeling a bit unwell and wanted to go to the medical room then the teacher wouldn’t have known they were in the corridor having a panic attack? they would have assumed they had gone to the medical room.

However, if a child was very upset or left a classroom with anxiety, in our school the teacher would have reported it to the on-call team (who are actually members of the senior teaching staff who are on a rota to deal with difficult situations) and ask them to try and find the child - a class teacher couldn’t leave the classroom themselves as that would involve leaving 20-plus children unattended. Once the on call team responds, the class teacher will assume it’s being dealt with.

The teacher for the second lesson - if there was an appointment already arranged, this could have already been noted in the register as ‘Medical’ appointment and the teacher will assume the student is there. Or that they are still in the medical room.

The Reception staff would not necessarily have been aware that your child had a panic attack. Secondary schools are large places and the assumption is that students are teenagers and will take some responsibility for themselves.

if your child has needs such that they need to be escorted at all times then you need to discuss that with the SENCO and safeguarding lead.

with It relating to safeguarding and a particularly vulnerable child best go through senco and safeguarding lead to resolve. If this fails jump straight to LA safeguarding and notify head/governors in retrospect.

I think you would contact class teacher, or your child's tutor to find out more. If you are unhappy escalate to Head of Year then someone more senior if you are still not satisfied. Governors would be a last resort.

I think it depends also whether you are looking for more support or you wish to complain. If you find out more detail you may be satisfied your child was in safe hands. It sounds like they had a staff member supporting them.