School trip tragedy - prosecutors trying to overturn not guilty verdict of teachers

[Fairydustandsparklylights]

It was a horrendous tragedy where a beautiful child lost her life. Parents want the teachers to be found guilty as they want / need someone to blame to try and come to terms with what happened.

Looking after other people’s children is a huge responsibility and not a “freebie” holiday. As a teacher, I refuse to do trips and I have many problems at work because of it. Parents complain of a lack of residential trips. This accident now means that 3 teachers have been dragged through court and their personal lives (and their children’s lives) destroyed in the process.

link here https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13475399/amp/French-prosecutors-begin-fight-overturn-decision-clear-three-British-teachers-manslaughter-Jessica-Lawson-12-drowned-lake-school-trip.html

How can they be held responsible for a pontoon collapsing? Why do parents think that the teachers are having a jolly when supervising many teenagers abroad? If the child was with her parents when it happened, they wouldn’t have been prosecuted for manslaughter. Why are teachers different?

Aibu to say that school trips should be banned completely? This way parents can be the ones to take their children for different experiences. Many would miss out but this is the only way to ensure this doesn’t happen again.

Yes I agree, it was on the lifeguard to monitor numbers on the pontoon. I don’t think the teachers were negligent. There was an argument that she had been in the water for a while before being pulled out but again not the teachers’ fault and she would most likely have drowned very quickly and not have been capable of saving even if they had noticed slightly earlier. These teachers did the best they could.

Easier said than dpone- my contract had it written I had to organise trips. It's an expectation to organise these and participate and you cant just say "sorry I dont want this responsability". During one said trips we gave students 30 minutes of free time, during which they went off to get food, except that a group of idiots went off and did something dangerous and could have lost their lives. No one really found out about it but I had nightmares for weeks. We're talking 15/16 yo so I never tbought I would have to accompany then in every breathing moment. Won't even mention a trips abroad where students snuck out of the hotel at night, despite us patrolling the corridors, as eventually we did go to bed and they waited for that and snuck out at midnight. I feel sick thinking something could have happened to them and I would be held responsible because you know, we should nto have slept at all?

That one was actually the last trip I ever lead and while parents have been moaning the kids love trips and we need to do more of them, there was no one else who wanted to lead them. My department and head were however very unhappy with me and tried to pressurise me into running the same trip again. I resigned the following year, but in my new job equally there was an expectation to organise trips written in the contract, managed to bypass it by doing all the paperwork but having another untraumatised teacher go on the trip.

But cool if you can refuse to do stuff, many teachers cant, and many times you cant forsee accidents like this happening even with the best risk assessment.

How sad.

For me, whoever was responsible for the pontoon should be held accountable. It's not unreasonable to assume that if it can flip over, someone could become trapped beneath it.

Having just returned from France, l think their approach to risk is a little different.

However l do think that one teacher in the water for 24 pupils was unreasonable. It may not have changed the outcome though.

@PenguinLord

I understand your feelings entirely.

I’ve spent most of my career in independent schools and the expectation is that we will provide overseas and domestic residential trips regularly. In my current school, everyone is expected to go on at least one per year and this is written into our contracts. Some teachers love going of course - it’s an opportunity to go to some amazing places at no cost - but I have many colleagues who find it incredibly stressful and make themselves ill in the run up to a trip with the worry. Funnily enough our headteacher never has to go and deal with the responsibility but she is very happy to force all of us to do it…says it all really!

What I will say though is that we make it very clear in all our comms with parents where our responsibilities begin and end. We need to sleep and no one will be on duty all night. We have clear rules in place about where children are allowed to go and what they are and are not allowed to do during unsupervised free time. We have a firm bed time and strict rules about children being in each others’ bedrooms after a certain time. If children break the rules and come to harm as a result of that we are not responsible and parents cannot hold us responsible. We had an issue last year where during free time in a coastal location some children decided to go for a swim in the sea, which had been expressly forbidden as it was not in the risk assessment and we didn’t have enough staff to supervise. One of the children got into difficulties, but thankfully the others were able to get him out and he was fine. Once we teaching staff found out, we phoned home straight away and the parent was furious - with their child. They understood that the whole point of that part of the trip was to give the students independence and we had trusted them to adhere to our boundaries on how and where that free time could be spent. The fact that this child had chosen not to adhere to those boundaries was not our fault. If the child had come to more serious harm, we would not have been held responsible and the parents wouldn’t have had a leg to stand on if they had tried to blame us. Our responsibilities have to have limits. We can’t be everywhere all the time and there has to be a minimum expectation that children will adhere to the rules designed for their safety. If they don’t and come to harm - that’s on them.

Having been involved in this appeal process on this tragic case, all I can say is there are no words to describe or express the pain of the parents. Equally, the teachers were supervising the group from various vantage points which was reasonable, they had undertaken checks to ensure the area was safe but would have expected the children to have been safe within an area which was marked for swimming and supervised by a professional lifeguard. They did not know the pontoon was unstable. They reacted appropriately thereafter and this is nothing but a very tragic accident. Sadly drownings can happen even with supervision and within a short period of time. Do you think the teachers have not been affected by this incident which happened 9 years ago? For the lifeguard this event consumes a third of his life. A tragic accident and we await the outcome with a just outcome.

@EnidSpyton sometimes even if you have all these rules in place and expect parents and kids to understand them, they still may not and you can still be held responsible.
We had very strict rules for students staying in their rooms after whatever o'clock. They still managed to leave. When we went back, they were meant to have sanctions applied because of this, and yet a few parents made a massive fuss and tried to blame staff that we did not prevent their kids being stupid and putting themselves in danger by roaming the streets of a busy city at night. More so, some teachers also thought we were responsible!

Teachers in this case quoted here have been cleared, and now will be dragged back to court because parents wants someone, anyone to be held accountable.

I just dont trust the system, parents nor the school management to support teachers if something happens to the kids because of them not adhering to rules or because of a freak accident that you can't foresee.

@PenguinLord

I don’t doubt that some parents would still try and apportion blame rather than accept their child has been irresponsible.

However, in a case such as yours where children snuck out of secure accommodation, there would be no legal ramifications for accompanying teachers, no matter how much parents tried to push for it. You had clear rules in place that were communicated to all parties, and you were not required to provide 24 hour supervision. You did nothing wrong. The children were the ones at fault.

It surprises me how many people seem to think teachers should be on duty all night on residential trips - we need to be able to function the next day to keep the kids safe during the day. We can’t stay up all night and neither should we have to. Our health and safety has to be factored into trip planning as well as the students’. If schools or parents expect 24 hour supervision, then they need to pay for additional relief staff to accompany so that a rota can be created whereby staff doing night shifts can then sleep during the day while other staff take the kids out.

In cases like yours, this is where you need strong leadership support. In a school where the head is useless and throws staff under the bus to appease parents, running a residential trip is dangerous and I would refuse to accompany one in those circumstances.

Once, back in the day, we had a 15yo child in the wrong bedroom after hours.

The deputy head got in her car with the head of year, drove to the field study centre and took said child back to their parents.

Those were the days!

Where has anyone said that you shouldn't sleep at all?
There's a huge difference between teenagers sneaking off and a twelve year old drowning.

And of course anyone can refuse to do things if they feel they aren't safe, or at least include all their concerns in their risk assessment and ask how the leadership team propose to deal with it.

Noone is suggesting teachers should be culpable for things that aren't their fault.

But having trained teachers on allergies, sent them the allergy UK guide policy, and still seen them repeatedly not follow recommended processes and safeguards then I very much maintain the view that teachers do need to understand they have a professional duty of care and that requires them to take safety seriously. And of course, like any professional, and if they fall below that "reasonable"" level of care and skill then they could face civil or criminal consequences. Anyone who volunteers or works has to accept the liabilities that come with it

As an example, as I mentioned earlier, my stepson's school went ahead with a trip to an outdoor activity centre that had had a number of serious incidents all ready (the information was in the public domain) but breezily dismissed my husband's concerns when he emailed to flag the issues with that centre. We didn't send step son but there was a "near miss " incident when the school was there. Although the centre would be primarily liable still, in my view the fact the school had been made aware of the issues with that centre and continued to take children there made them culpable too

What on earth are you talking about?

I did A level Biology, too, and I went on a similar week-long field trip.
The teachers with us supervised every field study, got soaking wet with us on the moor, worked with us in the different habitats we were working in.
They did lecturing and tuition in the Centre classroom when we weren't in the field and they were in the lab every night while we did evening work.

If your college didn't provide a proper field trip, that's another issue entirely.