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?

I decided never to have children whilst I was still at school myself because I didn't want to inflict life, including the British school experience, on my own flesh and blood. I was relatively lucky, with an all-girl school and supportive parents, and I still had a bad enough time to want to not have children at all sooner than inflict schools on them. Mainstream schooling in the nineties was traumatic for autistic girls.

I see that schools have deteriorated further since the nineties. I made the right choice in not having children.

@noblegiraffe some people just have to argue! Ignore

That was me, because I'm concerned about teachers burning out.

Honestly, let stuff break. It's the only way to get the people with the purse strings to spend more money. As long as you find ways of hiding problems, the people in charge will think there's nothing wrong.

And we know there is a lot wrong. Don't the girls who are forced to truant during their periods because they cannot manage their sanpro at school deserve loo provision that will allow them to attend school every day?

That was me, because I'm concerned about teachers burning out.

Actually it was the other poster, who definitely has no concerns about teachers burning out.

You're the poster who thinks that the only issues created by closed schools are educational ones.

Neither of you have kids in English schools and yet think you can talk over people with actual experience.

I've no issue with arguing.

I do have issue with people insulting teachers and spending a lot of time insinuating that they don't care about their pupils.

Yes. They do.

And I'm getting sick of seeing teachers justifying this breach of these children's human rights just because the school they work in has lost control over the kids.

And I'm getting sick of seeing teachers justifying this breach of these children's human rights just because the school they work in has lost control over the kids

Who would that be? My school doesn't lock the toilets.

Same

I'm from Denmark, and I'm... lost for words. Is this really a thing in Britain? To be able to only use the toilet once during lunch break at school, and if they're locked/occupied it's just bad luck? Relieving yourself when you need to should be a human right, and no child should be made to feel like they misbehaved just for asking to go to the toilet during class. As an adult, if my employer told me I could only use the toilet during my lunch break, and only if they had the time to unlock it for me, I'd file a major complaint and hand in my notice immediately. Why is it okay to demand of a child what no adult would put up with?

I don't want to be asked what understaffed schools should do. ANY solution is better than having children hold it in all day. Leaving the toilets unlocked all day and just letting the children go in when they need to seems like the obvious solution.

So why aren't you condemning those that do, like all normal people on this thread?

I totally understand why some schools keep their toilets locked.

Indeed, MrsH.

Some people really don't understand, perhaps because they entirely lack experience in this area.

Because they have no effective management.

If you say so.

Based on zero experience.

If you can't maintain even a basic enough level of discipline to be able to keep toilets open in your school, you shouldn't be in teaching.

Zero experience.

If you say so.

Look, it's just non negotiable, OK?

If your school didn't have toilets in it, it wouldn't be allowed to open. So quite obviously you can't just close them.

I can't believe this discussion is even happening tbh.

If you say so

I have experience of being at English school, same as everyone else. Do you think that when we turn 18 our memories are wiped?

I work in HE. I saw what lockdown looked like for undergraduates. We had freshers being confined to student flats with four strangers for a fortnight at a time whilst the university delivered sandwiches because the students couldn't go shopping. Yet we don't have to lock our loos during lectures, even as the schoolkids whose GCSEs were trashed by Covid enter the first year this year. Last year, these kids were at school sixth forms and apparently not trustworthy to use the loo without staff watching them, yet the worst "trashing" I ever see is someone forgetting to take their Starbucks cup from where they left it by the basins.

You might want to think about which kids actually make it to uni.

VitoCorleoneOfMNMafia

If you can't see the difference between those pupils that go on to HE and those that have to be in schools and trash the place, you have no business been in education.

I'm pretty sure our phantom shitter isn't going into HE.

You might want to think about how locking the loos hurts the bright kids because they are the ones who will only use them when absolutely needed, but won't be able to.