Teacher and sports coach swearing at children

[Vincent05]

If a sports coach swore at children in a threatening manner, ie “fucking little shits” fuck off you are fucking useless, or called one a wanker , what would you expect the sporting body to do about it. If this sports coach was also a teacher what would you expect the school to do about it? Bearing in mind it happened outside of school. Thoughts please

Yes my experience too, there are some very very unpleasant people in the horse world. Bullying is seen as normal behaviour ie you are fucking useless is seen as a perfectly normal statement to a teenage girl

Absolutely right, this.

As long as you thick skinned. Unbelievable

I would agree, serious emotional harm occurred.

And if this was language used over a long period of time?

Persistently bullying them would cause serious emotional harm. Having been a witness in several narcissistic female bullying cases at work it is impossible to prove in my experience. The bullying is subtle, degrading and isolating. The victims is left a shadow of their former self

This school actually had a massive blip in their GCSE results the year this all happened from 60-65 % A -A* down to 38%.

No it isnt ok, but there is a very fine line between bullying and pushing and hard facts.
For example body shaming is nit ok, but the hard facts are that extra weight will in gymnastics make a huge difference.That is the hard fact.

Thick skinned?? Seriously??

So it's ok for a teacher to swear at children because it teaches them to be 'thick skinned' ???

No teacher - ever - should be allowed to treat children like this. Ever. She clearly shouldn't be teaching in the modern world.

Abuse is never ok, persistently putting a child down and feeling them they are useless shouldn’t happen. A teacher in a position of power should build children up and develop them not destroy them to the point they are suicidal.

I’m actually really glad ours was a unique experience- I would hate other children to have gone through what ours did. I have never experienced anything like it before or after and I regularly socialise with teachers outside of school. The swearing was outside of school hours but it was a teacher using the F word at current pupils. It was the abuse of power it demonstrated that was the underlying real issue to me

It's not unique I'm afraid. I know the parents of another child in this pony club who was bullied by this coach. And yes, she is a teacher. The worries and warnings about the coach, bullying and self harming were given to the DC and safeguarding but was ignored. It has been a truly awful time for them.

This is sad but not surprising. Bullies will bully as long as people let them get away with it. That this is being done by someone whose job is as a teacher is just awful. The pony club and the school should be ashamed.

Awful things happen when good people look the other way. Bullying needs to be confronted even when it’s difficult or awkward to do so. In my experience bullying without empathy for the victim is totally devastating for that person.

What is meant by bullying in this context? Shouting during lessons or something else?

Very much something else. A whole lot of something else, and none of it acceptable.

Setting a child up to fail, excluding and ostracising that child, telling them they are fucking useless, manipulating the team so that the other children won’t speak to her either. Totally ignoring that child. There were serious concerns this child would kill themselves. All the above is very difficult to definitively prove however

Sad it hasn’t changed, I was bullied appallingly at PC nearly 50 years ago.😔

There were serious concerns this child would kill themselves

Wow that’s awful. Riding is meant to be fun. If it’s not fun definitely no point spending a fortune just to to be unhappy. Any option to move riding schools?

Sadly it’s accepted as normal behaviour by some branches. You would hope that there would be change in this modern day and age. Some branches are amazing if they’ve got lovely people running them, others allow the abuse of children to go on.

Child has now moved branches I believe, and I’m told the teacher is prevented from coming into contact with her

That is so sorry to hear. It makes it sound like this is an institutional problem, probably allowed to go on because the people at the top are 1, retirees and of an age that tough love and just get on with it child because that's how it was in the past, and 2, they can't afford to admit there is even a problem.

Does such protection of a coach attract bad eggs because they know they will be protected? Is thus why so many sports and institutions have had problems with coaches and teachers who have been in place for decades?

Does the same protection happen for teachers I private schools? Is a 'quiet word' had where in the state system there would be a suspension and an independent investigation??

IMO any teacher who swears at children should not be teaching. The school should be ashamed to have her on their staff.

Absolutely terrible! I’m an equestrian coach in pony club (different country) and I would never angrily swear at children. I may have occasionally used swear words in context with experienced older teens but never as a reprimand more as maybe an exclamation when things went unexpectedly wrong.