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?

My friends daughter was denied the toilet, she told the male teacher that she was desperate to change as she had her heavy period and he refused. She leaked all over her skirt and chair and ran home crying at lunch. My friend went straight in to see the head. I feel so bad for these kids

this sounds weitd to me.

my dc secondary (not uk) is quite spread out and each wing has their own small set of toilets (usually 2 stalls for each sex) plus a larger toilet block near the lunch hall.

the big toilet block is locked during lessons and the smaller ones are locked during lunch hour.

that seems to avoid some of the problems described with loitering/bullying.

dc still would go only if absolutely necessary as the toilets just are not very nice and the paper is scatchy.

That’s a discipline problem the school needs to manage. That school that’s famous for being the strictest school does staff toilets, it is possible and I personally think all schools should do it.

Being safe and being able to perform basic personal care tasks are absolutely basic human rights. Schools should not be able decide this is not their responsibility. And frankly, any school that does has forgotten that children are its core focus.

You can bet your ass that if schools were inspected by their regulator on this, and marked down, they would find a way to staff the bloody toilets.

Please use some common sense. Obviously a school with xxxx pupils and staff would not lock toilets all day. They’ll be locked during lessons to stop lessons being disrupted.

What @custardcreme77 sent is helpful. I’m currently going through a shit load of rehab to retrain my bladder after a childhood of being told to “hold it” caused bladder leakage from my twenties.

I’m a pretty relaxed person in general but if the toilets genuinely are locked all day I’d kick up a right fuss. That’s awful and there’s no way I’d be able to concentrate on lessons all day if I’ve been dying for a pee since the morning. You’ll just end up with kids dehydrating themselves every day.

The low key sadism that surrounds the culture of secondary state school education pertaining to uniform and now toilet access has to stop.
The good suffering for the bad cannot be an accepted dynamic when it comes to the basic human right of having access to a toilet in a school or workplace.
So many degree educated minds in one building and this is the conclusion says far more about the adults that would work in such a place than the children that exhibit anti social behaviour.
And I always side eye the parents that agree with this type of censure too.

Actually we had this when I was in school.

Yes my secondary aged children don’t go toilet all day so barely drink in fear of needing toilet. There’s only one toilet assigned per year group and each year group has nearly 200 students. They claim they can go during break and lunch but they then get sent to detention room if they’re late back from standing in toilet queue. Kids cannot win. Even if you get a medical toilet pass my son is scared to use his as the teachers all say you’re really not supposed to during lesson … so he feels bad to “be different” than his fellow students and having some kind of power card. So he won’t use the card, he won’t have any sort of favouritism. He says he will just be hated for using it.
It’s horrible.

My child frequently experiences uti so I'd literally find a school where they could use a toilet when needed to AVOID it becoming a medical need. These are not caring adults that should have a say in education they are actively creating a confrontational and stressful environment

The low key sadism

That's quite an insult, isn't it?

So many degree educated minds in one building and this is the conclusion says far more about the adults that would work in such a place than the children that exhibit anti social behaviour.

Teachers upthread have explained the problem. If we're all so thick (and what, spiteful? perverted?) please tell us how you would solve it. Bear in mind, the solution has to have zero cost.

Why is the response from people to bang on about human rights, and not to go off on one about the shite behaviour from fucked up kids that is destroying other children’s right to an education?

All things aside, and in the abstract comparison, I would think it is because human rights are constant and so do not depend on collective good behaviour. In this situation, I think it's an incredibly stupid decision of the school if it turns out that they have done this because surely there are other ways of controlling behaviour rather than preventing access to a basic need

I’ll be telling my son that if he's absolutely desperate and they won't let him then he's to walk out of the door and go for a wee

Doesn’t work if the toilets are locked though….

There’s no way they’re locked at break times. But personally I think it’s wrong to deny them toilet access in lessons. It’s just a shame the imbeciles ruin it for the genuine students.

We looked round a prospective secondary school for our year 6 son last week. We were told that there, toilets are locked apart from the first half of break and lunch, and when they are opened each year need to use a particular set of loos. The year 7 who showed us round said that she often has my got back to the right block at break time due to where he class is, so has had to wait for lunch. I know this sunny exactly the OPs issue, but for all the doubter, strict toilet policies are in place. We're not sending our child there.

This. It’s disgraceful.

Just wow. I work in an FE college that has many, many faults 🙄 However, despite our students being far from angels (❤️) we have none of this. No locking loos. Low level issues in loos including vaping and persistent phone use. Little violence however and little vandalism as far as I’m aware. If students need it in class I just let them go. Most come back again. Thank goodness this isn’t the latest thing SLT have pounced on as that would be the last straw! But actually, I will somewhat boldly state, toilets are no problem for us or students 🙂

Hopefully it'll have been a misunderstanding.

I emailed DD's headteacher a few years ago as she was under the impression that there were only 4 individual unisex toilet cubicles available for 450+ students and "all the other toilets are locked at all times". Unfortunately this turned out to be true! It was an ill thought out whole school punishment.

Only way to get round this is to get pupils to get over their embarrassment and just piss themselves in class every time they need the loo during the day. Or walking out of lessons to go home to use the loo and then walking back

Not having access to the toilet during the day can have a long term negative effect on the body

*Saschka

I’ll be telling my son that if he's absolutely desperate and they won't let him then he's to walk out of the door and go for a wee*

Doesn’t work if the toilets are locked though

Who said anything about using a toilet.

Maybe when pupils start shitting in the middle of the play ground or pissing up the wall of the classroom they might consider it better for pupils to have access to toilets

My son's school they are all locked during lessons. So not unlikely at all, his isn't the only one. Kids asking to go during any time in a lesson would be considered 'distruptive' it's ridiculous.

Yep the school my two just left was like this, toilets locked all day and you required permission to get the key. Problem being the office was way away from the looks available to lower and upper secondary. The nearest ones were sixth form and these were not locked

Then they had the bright idea of removing the door to the loo. Not the stalls I hasten to add but still. It made many feel uncomfortable all because a rogue few were vaping or being anti social.

It's disgraceful. Never have I not been able to use the loo in work. I'm literally the manager at my place and no one asks, they just say "back in a bit" and that's it. If you need to go, you need to, it's not something you can do anything about!

I would be raising this further. Being given a behaviour warning for a natural bodily function is a joke.

If this really is the case, which I hope it's not, I'd be pushing back. I'm fairly certain if you ran this past any medical professional they'd confirm how bad it is for someone's health to hold it when you really need to loo. With that in mind I'd be asking parents to ask local GPs to write to head teacher explaining this & asking for a review. Alternative get together with as many other parents as possible & ask them each to individually get a note from doc to confirm it's not suitable for their child to have to wait due to risk of uti's etc (or if letter from parents is sufficient, perhaps you all do that). Seeing a bulk push back on the issue would hopefully prompt them to reconsider.

Have you read the entire thread? There are comments from teachers and other parents who have stated that this is happening in other schools. I know the high school in the town I live in tried to pilot a similar scheme. Luckily, the parents banded together, and it was thrown out. Imo having the toilets locked at all is wrong, having them locked at break times is barbaric!

OP send an email to as many parents as you can, post on the schools socials and contact the board of governors. The power mad heads need to know that this year's students and their parents, are not going to take this lying down.

Good luck.