WIBU if I complain about this teacher?

[Throwawaymama]

I need impartial advice in an awful situation.

my son (14) has got into a fight today at school. I am not happy about this obviously. Lots of stuff going on and I’m looking at getting him help.

There has been back and forth drama between him and another boy for the past few weeks, and today this other boy was being kept in isolation at lunch with his head of year (boy is year below so it’s a different HOY). I don’t know why but he was with her all afternoon.

my son has found out where he was and gone storming into the room with 3 of his friends (again this is NOT okay) and started to punch this boy.

here’s the bit I’m not happy with.

the head of year has forcibly got in the middle and told my son to get out - he did - but as he turned round again to say something to the other boy she has pushed him away from her and again screamed at him to get out. She’s not big or tall and she didn’t hurt him.

WIBU to complain about the teacher doing this? I thought they weren’t allowed to put hands on students?

throwaway for obvious reasons.

I've worked in schools as a teacher my whole life. If you are assaulted by a student, you are heavily discouraged from going to the police, to enable the school to keep a 'good reputation'.

It's awful, but the way a lot of schools are run.

Thank you for your kind response. I haven’t thought about it for a long time but I felt a bit unsettled last night after posting. I still remember the 2 boys’ names and faces 20 years later, and wonder how their lives turned out. It’s very kind of complete strangers to empathise, thankyou for that ❤️ Teachers face potential danger every day in many schools and I send solidarity to all of them.

You need to count your lucky stars the school didn't call the police on your son. Getting 3 mates, forming a gang and going round deliberately to attack someone

Seriously you need to give yourself a slap. I would be beyond mortified if that was my child and tbh my school would be looking at expelling him

Can you see appreciate how scary that was for the teacher. Iv been in that situation with 14 year old boys/men (as they can be huge) and its bloody terrifying.

But he wasn't walking away. He was tuning around to start again

You should be bloody embarrassed and grovelling on your knees to the teacher

Parents like you are what is wrong woth our schools today.

Bloody justifying your own kids violence.

Mine wouldn't be let out of his room for a month

He routinely refused to provide references for staff who highlighted the discipline problems in the school. That included me. When I phoned the LA the person who answered the phone yelled down the office "TB is being difficult again". Another colleague of mine who went to work in the LA (she'd managed to leave without crossing him) confirmed that his failure to support staff who'd been assaulted was well known.

Thank you for confirming this. I hope the teacher in this case is supported by her management team.

Tgis attitude towards this ex teacher by their school is getting to be normal, and "normalised" by SLT, unfortunately. I have colleagues where their own parents have passed and the head has been sniffy about time off and not even a "sorry to hear that" (whereas the golden teachers/teacherettes have had their own parental losses emailed out by the head, school wide, to warn everyone to tread carefully and they might be "delicate").

I have had pregnant colleagues (yes more than one) knocked over by children in corridors - knocked to the floor but invertebrate SLT said nothing, same with 2 colleagues who had suffered miscarriage.

Same as colleagues who have intervened to stop two kids fighting and have suffered long term medical issues (won't saying what so as not to potentially doxx)...

The list goes on. Not a surprise there is a crisis in teaching. As your own kids' school, everyone, how many unqualified teachers (eg long term cover supervisors) they have in school teaching your kids' lessons. I bet you'd be shocked.

HonestAquaMember, totally true. And then they will have the front to throw you under a bus if you complain, take it further etc

Again, can confirm, this also happens, and far too regularly.

I'd say I can't believe this is real, but I'm a teacher, and this happens ALL the time.

Your child is a violent thug, and you are a horrifically bad parent. I hope that he faces severe consequences, I hope that you do too, and I hope the poor teacher is OK.

Hopefully your son will be expelled so he can't do this again. You should be in the school apologising not looking to complain. You have raised a thug.

Or in our local authority been informed that police have asked we only report incidents if a weapon has been involved or someone has required medical attention!

Great. That means they wouldn't have been interested when I was held by a boy much bigger and stronger than I was and had my head repeatedly smashed into a wall. 🙄

This Terry Pratchett quote seems apposite here.

She was protecting the other boy from the intimidation of your son and his friends. If my child had behaved like this the last thing on my mind would be complaining about the teacher, I'd be mortified and despairing I'd raised a thug!

Outrageous! How did the staff feel about that and why was he like that?

He was a rotten manager and horribly insecure. He had poor qualifications and was very conscious of it. He'd been the Head of the middle school when it amalgamated with the high school and most of his toadies moved with him when the merger happened. Anyone who questioned or criticised him got reported.

I just hope the poor teacher in this scenario doesn't work for someone like him.

That is really appalling @ilovesooty and, like you, I sincerely hope this poor teacher, doesn't work for a Head like that!

I’m appalled-and I rarely say this-that your focus is on the teacher protecting the other child! We are allowed, as staff, to restrain/move students if we think harm will come to the attacker/the attacked or property. Get over yourself. The teacher was probably shitting herself when 3 idiots stormed in to beat up the other kid.

If you go to reddit teaching uk you will see it's daily. Teachers are over a barrel to their senior leadership team because teaching is built on reputation and they only have to say one thing in a certain way to anyone in the school a teacher is applying for and they will find they are ostracised.

Heads have long discovered their power and are not afraid to use it. Teachers are merely living, breathing, sentient babysitters in a lot of cases.

Teachers who can have walked. Those who can't afford to are trying to keep their heads abover water and are crashing out with stress/MH/depression.

And these will be the schools you will be sending your kids to tomorrow. It's commonplace - normalised. Zero protection for health and safety for staff. Except a "Mental Health Awareness Day", for which you are expected to give up your lunch to attend, thus, ironically, worsens it.

Oh and the academy trust CEO will be on 200K plus https://schoolsweek.co.uk/revealed-the-academy-ceo-pay-premium/ with no discernable improvements on results. In fact they are worse https://www.nasbtt.org.uk/epi-report-academies-no-better-la-schools-7-important-findings/

I actually can’t believe what I’ve read. If that was my son. We’d be immediately going to the school with a bunch of flowers(paid for by him) He would profusely apologise to the teacher give her the flowers. Next we’d go to the young lads home where my son would be apologising to the boy and his parents.
if I was the mum of the lad who was assaulted I would be calling the police. If you let your son get away with this and label the teacher as the bad guy you are going your son a massive disservice. You’re basically telling him he can break the law, be a violent thug and mummy will sort it all out for him!!

Imagine your son being the person who was in a classroom when 4 older boys stormed in and attacked,

the teacher stood by and did not intervene except to call for support from other staff members.
meanwhile your son is being physically assaulted by 4 older boys.

What would you expect from that teacher..
you would be complaining about her not intervening and protecting your son from older, bigger, physically stronger and violent young adults. That one smaller teacher would immediately try to protect your child.

You would be up in arms if she did not do that.

Yet your complaint about her trying to protect someone else from getting hurt by your older bigger violent son is to complain about her trying to prevent serious injury to anyone.

You should be grateful she was willing to put herself in harms way to ensure the other student was safe and protected from your child.

Imagine the consequences if she had not done that… your son and his friends could have seriously hurt another child. Again you would complain because you would blame the teacher for not stopping your son and his friends.

You are lucky that the parents of the other child have not called the police as it is assault- regardless of being in a school.

What did your son and his friends do to the teacher as it will not be as clean cut as your son will make out?

If that had happened outside of the school your son and his friend’s would be getting a visit from the police.

You should simply be grateful she stopped something far worse happening.

You should instead focus on your son’s behaviour.

Hopefully your son is expelled and the other parents call the police.

I agree completely, @Biscuitmonster2318 - I hope the OP is still reading this thread, and learning from it, but I'm not holding my breath.