"School refusal" trend

[ruthxxx0]

Can't help noticing the spike in this over recent times...
In my line of work I'm coming across increasing numbers of families who have child(ren) who "refuse" to attend school... Parents pretty much shrug their shoulder and say things like "I can't make them attend" (we're talking about primary aged children). Or "they don't like the rules/teachers/uniform/the classroom decor..".
I'm from a generation and background where school attendance wasn't a "choice" for children to make then dictate to their parents.
Parents (being the adults!) were the ones who sent the children to school.
Today I met with a family who had allowed their 10 year old to pretty much stay in their bedroom for almost a year, not been to school and didn't seem under any urgency to works towards getting the child back to school.... No mental health concerns (not referred to CAMHS or GP either). The child just "didn't want to go" and parent was ok with this. Just for a quiet life, to avoid the child "kicking off". Like seriously... What's wrong with today's parents?

Not sure why I am wasting time on this thread but it has absolutely nothing to do with permissive parenting*. If you sat in a primary school classroom and tried to guess which children would go on to be school refusers based on entitled, spoilt behaviour I think you’d have a very low hit rate.

*Neurodivergent children, who have genuine neurodevelopmental differences, often do need a different, lower-demand approach and it can be counterproductive attempting the same strategies you’d use with a neurotypical child.

I have not read the whole thread, so this may have been mentioned before. When I was in an adolescent unit for 'emotionally disturbed adolescents' way back in the mid- 1970s, there were a high proportion of teenagers in the units who were 'school refusers'. In fact, many of these children had a host of other problems which was obvious to anyone who spent time with them, but the label upon which they were admitted was 'school refusal'.

Indeed, although I was in there with an eating disorder, the boys who also had eating disorders were thought to have a primary problem of 'school refusal', however, that is another discussion

School refusal is a behaviour. Often it is not even a 'refusal' to attend school, but an overwhelming level of anxiety which makes it impossible for the child to go anywhere near the school, even when they want to attend. This was the case with my youngest. He wanted to attend. He did not want to miss school, but his anxiety levels were through the roof, and, unfortunately, still are through the roof over ten years later.

So, I would ask parents to stop using the term 'school refusal' to describe a serious mental health issue. I would also ask people to consider the impact that a child not attending school has on the child, on the family on siblings and so on. Surely we have moved on a bit over the past fifty years

I presume he has no tech / tv / internet whilst he's at home.

Do you think that will magically cure his anxiety and he’ll toddle off to school?

The term that is used these days is either EBSA or our LA use EBSNA. Emotionally based school avoidance or Emotionally based school none attendance.

Your sister has no idea if that’s the reason why. Because that is private information that’s nothing to do with her.

And following on from my post earlier, today was a difficult day for my child. She's not made it in. This has only ever happened once before but her anxiety was too high today. As soon as we took the pressure off and said she didn't need to go she read her phonics book, did her maths homework, did TTRS and then read with me. She's now watching an animal documentary. I so want her to be in school but I feel we will have no choice but to home educate in the end. It absolutely isn't what I want but she went from being an anxious and scared child at 9.15am when I was trying to convince her to go in to a child who was happy, willing and ready to learn at 9.30 when we made the decision that she was too disregulated to go.

Schools have got harder to cope with for ND children, anxious children.

The really strict behaviour rules, such as detention for not having a pen...can scare the shit out of anxious kids.

The GCSEs have got stricter. More pressure is put on kids.

Sats are awful in Y6.

I've also noticed a difference between the experienced older teachers and younger newer teachers (generally) in classroom management and engaging autistic kids. The older ones are better and have strategies. Some of the younger ones are clueless and this is the fault of their training. R/Y1 teachers shouting at kids a lot is not necessary. (Seen in person) Lose your experienced teachers you lose the guidance for new teachers to learn from.

Caamhs are shit. You can't get help for pretty serious mental health issues. The waiting lists are long etc. You can't get kids diagnosed for years and they are not getting supported in school, in which time they can be traumatised by school because schools don't have the resources/training to help and have had to be more rigid to cope with lack of resources.

Teachers are overworked and don't have the time/capacity to make it easier for children who need support.

I don't have current experience of parents and parenting so can't comment on that, but often there is more to it than feckless parenting.

This is the best response ever.

This is a 16-page thread. Do you really think families have not already considered and tried blindingly obvious suggestions?

Are any statistics or datasets which show what happens after children who refuse school do after the official school leaving age?

Do they go into further education? If home schooled, are the career patterns similar to school attenders? Do they get jobs? What happens?

You’d have to look I can only go on my own lived experience..

My sisters both had EBSA (it’s not that they simply refuse school) one has her own business and the other works as TA in a school! (I get the irony!) 🤣

Can I butt in? I want to say thank you to everyone who replied on this thread. Here was me sat heartbroken at my kitchen table today,angry,upset and confused and feeling very alone and isolated.Reading all your stories of your situations has helped me more than any of you will ever know today.I feel less alone and my goodness that bit was a revelation. I am struggling too OP and trust me from my limited experience no parent or child wants to be in this situation. I am too tired for the wheres and why fors but it is so hard and it is very real.Please don't judge we do enough of that ourselves.

I think any statistics about what children with EBSA do later are unhelpful if they don't take into account the reasons for the difficulties attending school in the first place. If a child doesn't attend because they have autism then that may well impact them in their future studies/ work life.

I know one who is now a musician and has her own business.

I know of many home educated teens who start GCSEs in subjects of interest at around the age of 12 or 13 and get enough for sixth form by 16.

i know one home educated while who got a scholarship aged 13 to a private school then went on to get GCSEs and alevels.

Why are so many more children so anxious these days? What causes it? I’m sure it’s so much more prevalent when I was a child. I’ve suffered anxiety on and off since my 20s but didn’t even know it existed until then. It just wasn’t a word in my vocabulary. Can anyone say why their child has such extreme anxiety that they cannot even go to school?? I’m terrified of ever being in this position. DS is extremely calm, happy and friendly boy. Will he suddenly wake up one day and be so anxious that he can’t go to school?!

Not necessarily, I don’t think it helps that education is such a one size fits all approach and it can lead to all sorts of bother!

we have always struggled with my daughters behaviour (mostly hyperactive and impulsive behaviours) however one day she saw her sister vomit and that triggered something for her. She is now terrified of people coughing or vomiting. Sometimes even the word sick is too much. This prevented her from attending school and when she did attend she’d feel trapped and want to run. We forced her in as we were under the impression this was the right thing to..

it was the worst thing we’ve ever done as parents, it broke her and I’ll never be able to forgive ourselves for what we pushed her to do when she was in a state of sheer panic. Even the teachers agree now forcing the attendance is the wrong way to go about it.

Probably autism. And the school environment has changed so much from when I was young that it had triggered her anxious tendencies earlier than she would have been otherwise.

I am an anxious person but wouldn't say I really suffered from anxiety until I was in my 20s. My daughter is selectively mute - the school environment being where she can't speak. It is an anxiety disorder.

Just to add to the other ladies, I think a lot of it is to do with teachers. I was a teacher so I know the pressures but some of them are just dictators on a power trip. The SLT at my last school is the reason I left teaching and it’s all 100% because of their nasty bitchy behaviour. My son (autistic) is very empathetic and because he struggles he ends up being a “thorn” in the teachers side. She can’t “control” or “deal with him” because she ignores every reasonable thing we have put to her (let him step outside, let him take a breather, let him get his medication for his spinal scoliosis if it’s playing up!) and just ignores him or antagonises him. Until he snaps…

The rigid, autocratic, fear based environment of secondary school causes my daughter huge anxiety. A complete lack of understanding by staff of her SEN doesn’t help. She’s a sociable intelligent girl but there have been days when she’s been unable to get in. And yes she has screens when she doesn’t go in - because how else can she do her work!?

When I started teaching in FE 20 years ago we used to say that first year was like rehabilitation for students - I never expected so many years later that school would still be so bad.

I'vev seen three EBSA episodes today. One child with difficult circumstances who was probably trying to regain some sort of sense of control. One with emotional regulation difficulties. And my own DC who made it into school then was rude to a member of staff.

I honestly think my school refuser would have attempted to kill herself if I’d taken away things that she enjoyed. As it was she’d thrown herself out of a car, squeezed herself under a gate and run into a road to get away from school.
I tended to limit tech during school hours and often she was too deregulated to do anything much but sleep after a school related meltdown.
once we moved away from ‘punishing’ school refusal and accepting that she just couldn’t go our relationship improved significantly and whilst her attendance is still awful she is not self harming or indulging in risky relationships and, probably selfishly, I’m not a wreck of a person-I can function at work and be a better mum to other child as well as her.

Back in the day children learned from a young age that school is not a choice but a fun place to go, see your friends and enjoy learning. They have to go to school just as parents have to go to work. None of us like every part of school or our work but you've just got to crack on with it because that's life.
How are working parents of these primary school refusal kids supposed to go to work if their child won't go into school for 6 hours?! Anyone's work will only tolerate so many "sick days" for the parent to take time off before letting them go then how do they pay the mortgage, bills etc etc??
You have to ensure they're happy at school, of course, and nip any bullying in the bud quickly - my primary aged dd didn't want to go to school one day and feigned illness, I knew this wasn't like her and she eventually opened up about it that another child was being mean to her. I told her I'd sort it and speak to her teacher and she sorted it out.
There's nothing that can't be fixed and my dd knows that.
I do think Covid didn't help as it was seen as "kids can 'learn' from home and people can 'work' from home" - my child really needs to be in the classroom and I think it's set back a lot of children and changed the mindsets of a lot of parents.

I would probably also be smug and sanctimonious had I not lived through this myself. Have a read through the parental experiences on this thread. It has a lot to do with a changing environment in schools since 2010 that places more pressure on teachers and staff and makes it particularly hard for neurodivergent students to cope.

I don't claim to be "smug or sanctimonious "! Just start the kids out well from the start with a positive attitude to school and learning and they'll thrive.