To think that After School Detention these days is classed as more serious than in our time.

[Georgianattiude]

When I went to school some 30 years ago after school detentions were seen as nothing really. These days they tend to involve SLT's taking them, letters home follow ups about the Pupils conduct and it requires a pupil to generally have misbehaved quite badly to get one.

The difference in approach or meaning of after school detention, can be compared with my 20 or so through my secondary schooling and DD1s who is in year 11 1. DD 1 was distraught when she got a after school detention in year 10 whereas my year group used to laugh and actively seek to be the first one to acquire one. It sounds silly but an a after school detention was seen as a badge of honour with the highest value going to the girl with the most. This was by the way a Girls Grammar in the late 1980s early 1990s, so not really difference from DDs1 current school inn character.

However, DD2 year 9 goes to a non grammar school where there does appear to be a group of girls who get regular detentions . These girls have dragged DD2 in to detention on three occasions because she thinks its cool to engage with their stupidity at times.

Therefore, are detentions today seen more of a serious sanction today, than when they were given out by bored teachers who had to stay late. This was said to me and four friends one day in Physics!

Not in my school. We used to get lunchtime detentions for things like not doing homework on time/at all, but a Friday Night Detention (ie after school on Friday) was for really naughty stuff.

I actually think it's the opposite now - there seems to be too many detentions/isolations for minor things like school uniform infractions, which our teachers told you off about and moved on from. Nowhere near as much phoning home, either.

I left school 11 years ago...afterschool detention was totally normal and not seen as a big deal..it was just stay back for an hour, no parents involved. Saturday morning detention was the nuclear option and generally happened if you skipped your midweek detention or maybe for something drastic. I never got a Saturday detention so not sure how long you had to stay for but definitely got afterschool detentions a fair few times!

I'd have been distraught to get an after school detention when I was at school 35 years ago. It was absolutely considered a big deal at my school.

I was at school in the late 70s, I didn't get a single detention because they were absolutely not something to aspire to. DD and DS were at school in the early 00s and again, detention was not regarded as cool or something to be desired but maybe that's because most of the kids lived a way from school so used school transport so detention meant your parent/carer would have to go out of their way to pick you up from school. I don't remember either of them having a single after school detention.

Detentions are not a big deal at my kid's school, they seem to get them constantly - forgotten pens, late homework, chatting in class.

I think everything is more closely documented now with arse-covering processes to follow so it all sounds very official.

It's quite a big deal at my DC's school but a lot of that is to do with the fact that a substantial proportion of the pupils travel fairly long distances on dedicated school buses and can't easily get home on public transport. After school detention means missing the bus, and missing the bus for the majority means a parent having to come to pick them up.
The staff recognise that an after school detention can be extremely inconvenient for parents so lunch time detentions are used first and seversl days notice are always given if a pupil is going to be kept behind after school. Most of the pupils I know would view an after school detention as a fairly severe punishment, probably at least in part because their parents are likely to be pretty cross about having to come and get them so there are likely to be further sanctions at home. I guess in schools where the majority of pupils walk home it doesn't have quite the same impact!

I left school over thirty years ago and work in a school now. I think that they are taken less seriously than they were back then.

They seem to be given for very minor infractions these days. My very rule abiding dc had a lunchtime detention last week for the first time. Whilst they had done their online homework they had forgotten to click the turn in button on Teams and so it was showing as outstanding still. When so many children are getting detentions then they are no longer taken seriously.

They were rarely given out when I was at school in the 80s because the teachers were usually working to rule and not doing any after-school 'activities'.

Nope not in my kids school my son got a detention for being 3 minutes late, also demotions are given for forgetting PE kit, forgetting home work etc

Being put 'on report' was the main sanction once the cane was abolished in second year (old money); head of year, head of house or headmaster depending on severity. After each class the teacher had to sign to say the pupil had behaved themselves and they had to present the report to the relevant head at the end of the day.

The only boy I knew to have received the cane was on almost permanent report from third year onwards.

The other girls aren’t making your child misbehave. That’s her choice.

I'd disagree.

Very serious at my school. They didn't use it often, but if they did it was considered very serious. Getting two in one week was so almost unheard of, I can remember the odd times when someone did because everyone was talking about it.

Now it does depend on the school, but of the local ones, I don't think any have it that seriously. One hands out detentions like smarties, so even the best ones get a few a year, so they treat them as an occupational hazard. Another is much rarer, but even so they're generally treated more as an extra lesson than punishment, and the other gives them the choice between lunch time and after school.

I’m only half a term into secondary parenting and after school detention seems to be a big deal at my son’s school - there’s a whole route of warnings, formal report and lunchtime detention before an AS detention would be given.

I have no idea what you had to do to get after school detention at my school but I never had one and neither did my friends or siblings.

I went to school in the 90s and detentions were practically unheard of at my school. You would have been close to a permanent exclusion to get one.

Nowadays, children seem to get them for even minor things. My nephews don't seem to take them seriously at all.

They aren't common at my current school (we're an independent through school) at all. We sometimes have the secondary-age kids "sent down" to us to spend the day with the primary kids to learn how to behave. They usually aren't fond of that at all. Their audience has gone and the little ones just want them to play with them. Not cool, apparently.
They also have to help out the maintenance team sometimes to make it up to the school community, usually because they broke something or climbed on a roof or whatever other silly thing they did to show off. It means they help clean or do planting or whatever. (Don't mess with our facilities manager. Never a good idea.)
Detentions, though, not usually.

We sometimes have the secondary-age kids "sent down" to us to spend the day with the primary kids to learn how to behave. They usually aren't fond of that at all. Their audience has gone and the little ones just want them to play with them. Not cool, apparently.

Out of interest @Busyhedgehog is it a boys', girls' or mixed school you teach at?

I left school in 96.

I can't remember anyone ever getting an after school detention. There was threats of it, but I can't recall anyone actually getting one.

My DS gets them for breathing I think so it literally has no affect on him whatsoever. Whereas I would have been mortified.

Not a big deal at DDs school really compared to my school... at mine the vast majority did 5 years without an "afterschool". DD got one for two pieces of late homework (and I'm meaning 30 minutes late, not majorly late!).

However we had lunchtime detentions etc, whereas they only have 35 mins for lunch so no time.

DD2 is quite an academic child just she tends to turn her self off and graduates to those she thinks are having a better time. This is a reason why she deliberately flunked the 11+ because her friends told her she would have a better time at the non grammar. The school are getting increasingly disappointed in her attitude and perception about school. The school are constantly ringing me up about her behaviour and putting in different pathways for her complete lack of focus or interest in subjects. She has had five after school detentions already this year and the school are threatening Suspensions and Managed Moves.

The school are particularly anxious because she should be the most academically able year 9 pupil at the school. She is as capable as her sister who is line next June to get all 8s and 9s at GCSE.

She does things without thinking of the consequences and afterwards is very sorry for her actions. Getting her to Do any Homework is impossible. This is completely different to her year 7 brother who has additional SEN needs but loves doing his homework that the school give him.

I know this is different from the initial posting put it has given me the chance to vent my anguish !

I don't know OP. If I dared get a detention that meant I missed the school bus which meant a 5 mile walk home on country roads in the middle of nowhere and ended up with a massive (and painful) punishment from home too. I only did it the once 😂

"Gravitates to"

We had two kinds of detention. Lunchtime ones were pretty minor. After school ones were both a big deal and a badge of honour. I got one once in third year for sneaking out to the shop at lunchtime. There was also being gated and being on report, both of which involved having to get a form signed by a teacher at regular intervals. Can’t remember the difference between the two. This was a comprehensive in the early 90s.

If DD2 keeps going the way she is, she will not be "Graduating" anywhere.

There are way too many detentions and not enough just telling off and that's an end of it.

The only time I got detentions was a whole class detention (which was infuriating). I was very well behaved but if I went to school now I'd probably get several detentions for minor things and I'm sure it would make me perpetually anxious and less able to learn. School is like a Professor Umbridge regime these days. Boring, no fun, tons of rules and rigidity, learning by rote, loads of testing, far too much homework (largely as the teacher don't even mark it now - I can't imagine tgere would be half the homework set if they had to mark it all) no questionning anything, hardly any school trips, field trips or enrichment.

I used to be a massive cheerleader for state education but now I can't wait until DD2 is out the other side and done with it.