To wonder what has happened to my Son's school

[k2493]

Just posting for thoughts

Both my kids have gone through the same secondary school. When my daughter started, the school was lovely and new with around 750 kids.

Fast forward to 2024 and there is now 1500 kids and it's become like a dictatorship.

Due to the number of kids, the school has put lines either side of the hallway that they have to walk within otherwise they get detention.

Every hallway is a one way system.

The minute they arrive in school, they have to remove their coats or it's detention even with no heating in the middle of winter. The other day my son arrived back to school to find that there were long queues outside while they did two uniform checks at the door. By the time he got in, he was frozen. Immediately he got shouted at for still having his coat on even though he had just stepped in from the cold.

He then went around the corner and got shouted at again even though he tried to explain it's really difficult to be expected to stay warm, keep moving and remove your coat all at the same time. Nope. Threaten with detention again.

AIBU to wonder what has happened to our education system? I'm lucky in that my son is quite strong minded and just brushes it off but what about the kids who's mental health this is impacting? Surely we want our kids to remember school as being enjoyable for their education and friendships rather than for being shouted at every two minutes for not walking between lines or not taking their coats off the minute they arrive in school?

As an ex teacher I can tell you that no teacher I've ever met has time to hassle with the admin of logging a detention over a ruler.

Scenario:
Child forgets ruler and asks person next to them to borrow theirs. No issue and teacher looks the other way. Child forgets ruler and shouts out over teacher, I've got no ruler, give us yours Tommy you scruffy twat. Cue argument over ruler between kids derailing lesson. Then a detention is issued and the reason might get recorded as 'no ruler' as it's faster to write and started the issue.

As for the nose blowing. Once with an oops sorry no problem. Waiting til the teacher is mid explanation and repeatedly doing so startling student with SEN is now an issue.

Coats on in class. Child with sensory issues has coat on no problem, but then Tommy has his on and the hood up and so do Dave and Steve and half the girls too.One of them is playing offensive music from their phone but you can't tell which. There's a cloud of smoke coming from one table cos they are hiding under hoods to vape. One nasty scrote is filming another child to make fun of them online. A years worth of kids in puffer jackets in the ridiculously narrow corridors of a new build takes up a surprisingly large amount of extra space. Although I do think the rule should be coats off in the class not as you come in.

I think schools should be made smaller and not increasingly larger, behaviour is easier to deal with at primary because you get to know the kids better, better knowledge of families and kids can't be anonymous in a crowd. No hiding in terms of behaviour or slacking!

And in case I sound too severe, I do also think most homework should disappear until GCSE except for English and Maths. Would create much less stress for both staff and students.

There is soooo much wrong with your question 😩

Imagine a child getting a piece of Shakespeare for homework. It should take the average child around 15-30 mins to complete.
My DS (yr 7 English) - it was like he was learning Russian!

It meant sitting still and learning what every sentence meant, then drawing pictures in cartoon boxes, then writing about each box and what was happening. All of this whilst he was having an autistic meltdown because he didn’t understand the homework and wanted to make it perfect.

3 hours later, I decided to give up be called he was so unregulated.
As he was so exhausted, didnt sleep until the early hours and petrified he hadn’t done the homework, he then refused school the following day.

Multiply that type of homework session for every home work session and you can see how difficult it is for neurodiverse children in a mainstream school where staff don’t understand their needs or have very few means to support them if they do understand.
I wrote to the school and told them I would be differentiating the homework from then on and hoped they were on board. They said ok.
But he still left the mainstream system school from not being able to have his needs met.

It can't be any coincidence that with all these ridiculous stringent rules, behaviour is getting worse? Kids will rebel the more they are restricted.

And that folks is the problem right there.

@VeryGoodVeryNice awful but sadly you are defo not alone on this. Money for support for SEN kids has been cut so much. My DD has adhd. Thd schools are left to deal with it

We seriously need a massive school reform - one that gets kids wanting to go to school and behave in school because they enjoy it. One where they can learn important life skills and one that offers a balanced curriculum - getting into work versus getting into university.

Thankfully our DC school is strict on basic stuff but not like one local academy chain. My DS has had a few short detentions for stuff - but he's not bothered as they are common and other kids are worse. Not uncommon

My middle school back in the 90's tried to do that stupid coat thing but after a lot of students, teachers, and parents complained they changed the rule. It helped that they could not give a coherent reason as to why students couldn't have their coats on.

How ridiculous to not trust children to wear coats inside the school building. Something is very wrong with this society if our kids are hiding knives, vape + drugs, or are using the coat as a disguise while intentionally hurting others. Parents blaming schools, schools blaming parents, where are we headed... Children with record number of mental health issues.

Things need to change fast and dramatically. This is not working.

OMG, for all you teachers.... forget us In A&E!!! you poor souls!! We deal with druggies, drinkers and people who are properly sick!!! I cannot Imagine the consequences of shitty parenting. The feral kids as young as 6, wanting to kill you!! And having to deal with these poor wee souls!
You have my respect and support.
I couldn't do it!! People say they couldn't do my job.
I couldn't do yours!!!!!!!😶

These kids have grown up with smart phones, 24/7 porn, social media, if they are not heavily monitored by parents (or in my case didn"t even give them a phone until 14) all kinds of shit goes down. Not in every school, but in plenty of schools. They have less friends and socialize in person less than previous generations, many kids barely ever touch grass. We are doing a huge social experiment on kids. Many have the attention span of a flea, if noone is monitoring their screen usage. Boys turning up to school exhausted as they stayed up till 2:30 am gaming etc etc

It has deteriorated across most schools.

They are trying to turn our children into frightened robots apparently

As a parent of SEN children I was dreading this. Thankfully they will be in specialist schools and hopefully this madness won't happen as much.

Could you raise it with the parent governor?

@Verbena17

Sounds like he did the exact right thing for himself. I really regret the closure of so many so called "special schools" remedial education was so rewarding and important. Now millions of Neurodiverse kids are playing catch up in an environment that's actively working against them.

Of course behaviour is getting worse.

Its like during covid when it was illegal to meet a friend for a coffee or a walk, a lot more people were caught breaking the law.

If you criminalise normal behaviour more people become criminal by definition.

She does/did.
But afyer a full day at school she wants to switch off and relax but as I said..
Home schooled at the minute

They had those or similar rules when I was at school.

You had to walk on the right in the corridors, no coats inside, hair tied back

We also had a different summer uniform.

In defence of PE teachers, my DD's class teacher is a PE teacher and he's kind, keeps discipline without shouting, and not a navy suit in sight! (wears jeans and jumpers mostly, even hoodies sometimes though I expect he doesn't keep his hood up...). A far cry from one PE teacher in my secondary school that I remember, who bullied my friend (homophobically) and instead of being sacked, or disciplined, my friend was just allowed to stop doing PE.

@k2493 Your son’s school isn’t TCS in Thornaby &/or being run by a ‘Trust’ called NET - Northern Education Trust?

Many of the kids at that school were, yesterday, subjected to a humiliating & dictatorship style inspection on arrival at school & while stood in -1 weather;luckily not raining or snowing but the morning was dark & damp.
A percentage were told their clothes were not modest enough - wholly inappropriate due to tights not being dark enough, skirts too tight or short, shirts too tight, top buttons undone, tie not tight enough, trousers too ‘straight’/‘too tight’, hair clips & bobbles removed as they weren’t black or purple & only bobbles now allowed, many were made to remove makeup in the freezing cold as well as being shouted at for simply having a cold weather coat hanging over their arm - that they had removed for the inspection - as they had come to school dressed appropriately for -1 weather!
All of this has occurred on the same day the DFE announced that bums on seats in school are important to a child’s education while failing the majority due to their education style being dated & non-inclusive!!!!
What you wear to school does not effect your education but being ‘targeted’ & ’humiliated’ in what is already a bad environment with higher than normal bullying & persecution & being sent home because your shoes have a gold buckle, your tights are 30 instead of 40 denier etc etc blooming well does.
I understand that schools are trying to ‘tidy up their images‘ but this is getting beyond a joke now!

Read some of the posts by teachers. The rules are consequences of declining behaviour not a cause.

It is quite a shock reading how far from reality many posters are about the state of schools. Rules may seem ridiculous to outsiders but they are needed. Children are going home and saying “Jimmy got a detention for not having a ruler” and parents are choosing to say that is ridiculous! The teacher is a power hungry despot. Not knowing the full story. Not knowing the background of that child and their dynamic with that teacher. Not getting into negative dialogues with their child about an adult.

It’s like everyone has forgotten that the staff are adults and we are dealing with hundreds of irrational, angry, hormonal people every day. You all want us to treat them as if they’re rational adults and they simply are not. Potentially your one child may be compliant and very mature at home but I guarantee they are different when in a crowd. Your one child may be capable of making correct decisions at home but when faced with hundreds of people behaving in a dangerous manner they are more likely to follow suit. Schools have rules- no coats, one way system, water only at breaks and lunches, toilets restricted so LEARNING can take place. People are forgetting that is the purpose of a school.

It has to be one of the only jobs where everyone is an expert because they once went to a school or send their children there. We wonder why so many teachers are leaving the profession? Just look at this thread.

Yes, I'm aware of that. What I'm saying is how do some schools manage to allow access to toilets.