To expect my 11 year old to be able to use the toilet during the school day?

[bendy75]

Is this the norm? My 11 year old started in at secondary school last month and has had two warnings (or stage 2 - Low level disruptions) for asking to use the toilet.

I told him to try and go at break times but he tells me they are locked, confirmed today by staff when I asked, children who have a medical need can apply for a toilet pass but he does not, so has to try and go from 8.00 am until returning home around 3.00pm without using the toilet.

AIBU to be shocked by this?

However, I can believe that in other schools that there are sufficient safeguarding and cost reasons to make it necessary.

And if you are FURIOUS and UP IN ARMS about this sort of stuff, where have you been for the last 13 years when teachers have been trying to raise the alarm?

Sigh.

No. This is never a justifiable or proportionate thing to do. This is a breach of the children's human rights.

@noblegiraffe exactly! People are looking at the toilet thing in isolation rather than a symptom of a completely broken system.
How is any of this the teachers' fault? I can't believe that people are attacking teachers when it is SLT who make these decisions, influenced by their budget/ lack of money/staff etc.
A local school now finishes at 2.30pm with only a 30 min lunch break and they have done that to save money on heat/lighting and staffing.

Then what are your solutions to the cost and safeguarding implications of keeping them open?

I mean sigh all you like, but that's not solving the problem.

Are you aware that in schools there are children with a legal right to support, written in their EHCP that schools are also not providing because they can't, and there's fuck all that can be done about that either?

I would just....keep them open.

Bugger the cost, toilets are a basic necessity. That is why all schools, workplaces and accommodation are required to have them.

Here's a general rule of thumb: if you wouldn't be allowed to build this building without toilets in it, you shouldn't be allowed to close the toilets in this building.

I would just....keep them open.

Ok, and now they are broken. What now?

And that is terrible but it is less of an immediate problem, and one with less of an immediate remedy, than children at risk of soiling themselves because the toilets are kept locked.

Fix them. Sorry but this is part of your legal maintenance obligations.

With what money?

And actually @MargotBamborough not giving the support to pupils with EHCPs can be linked to the toilet issues too. Some pupils will need personal care or support getting to the toilet block. If they don't have the support and there are other children wreaking havoc in the toilet block, they are not going to go to the toilet. The toilets can be unlocked all day but those children will not venture into those toilets.

Again, vaping, bullying etc can put children off going into toilet blocks, so again doesn't matter if toilets are unlocked all day, some children won't go.

@MargotBamborough a local school had £20k worth of damage done to a toilet block. Are you going to donate £20k to fix them, because the Government aren't giving them any money to fix them? So those toilets are out of action and will be for the foreseeable.

That was issue at DC school - they tried many things for entire school year before shelling out for shutters and having heavy restrictions because again and again they were vandalised costing money to fix they didn't have.

Parents were warned and with costs made clear every time and it was getting to be every week - pupils were getting warning daily - nothing changed so they installed shutters and put in restrictive access procedures - they should still have some access - and they've not have to pay out to fixed toilets so in a usable state since.

I don't like it but there are bigger issues for DD2 than this.

It's a symptom of a wider issue that I do think the SALT team is unable to get to grips with - but they struggled to find a HT last time I cant't see it changing any time soon.

So your solution is to level the playing field by ensuring no one has access to a toilet?

For a lot less than 20k you could put security cameras on the doors, work out who is vandalising them, and then make a case for expelling them.

Voting labour.

DC school had CCTV didn't stop vandalism - which was a surprise to me but that's what happened.

It either restrict and have working toilets at some points in day or open and quickly in unusable condition.

Shouldn't be that way - but its where DC school found themselves.

If you go in to a toilet in lesson and rip it off the wall then the natural consequence to that should be that you can't go to the toilet unsupervised.

No, the natural consequence should be that you are expelled.

Under the previous SLT team pre covid - they didn't have these issues though they did have more experienced staff - been huge exodus - and exceptional pastoral support - all of which has been stripped out and there been a decline in behaviour since covid as well.

but @Carpediemmakeitcount has already complained that the money for cctv should be being spent on the pupil's education.

So the main point to come out of this is that no-one wins.

My daughters school is similar in that toilets are locked during class time and only one “block” open during break. Often there’s that many queuing, there’s no time to go. She’s currently refusing to attend school and I’d hazard a guess as to why.

They’re also currently building “open plan toilets” which are unisex and will have no room as such, just free standing cubicles… I have no idea what they look like yet but I’m mortified - as is my daughter. It’s a different world and I’m sorry our children have to experience this.

@MargotBamborough not much point having CCTV if the toilets are broken! The lot less than £20k is zero in most schools. Who are you going to pay to look at CCTV all the time. If used after the event to track down the culprit the toilets are still broken

Also see points above from some teachers that exclusion is nigh on impossible