Given detention for lateness on tube strike day

[Longingdreamer]

My child was given a detention today, despite there being a tube strike in London, which has caused travel chaos. They early but were apparently still late: roads are almost at a standstill it seems.

They get very upset by detentions, due to underlying neuro diversity.

Aibu to think that the school shouldn't give these on a strike day for minor lateness?

They usually give them, even if a child is only 1 minute late, but it seems wicked when it is out of their control.

I agree, that's so ridiculous. I'd either tell him he doesn't have to stay for detention (if it's after school) or reasssure him that school is being unreasonable and not to take it personally.

I agree with @SoftPillow that posters who don't live in London just don't understand how a strike on all the tube lines at once brings the city to its knees.

For lots if us there just ARE no other options but the tube. Even when there are, any alternative transport is packed and roads are a nightmare at the best of times. 'Leaving early' isn't really a solution, anyone who needs to get in by a specified time will be doing the same! Unless you live on the first few stops of a bus or alternative train routes, it's pot luck if you'll be getting on further down the line.

And if you do get into work, getting home will be a nightmare when coming out of central London, even if you can leave work earlier than normal. Even when one line goes down it creates chaos less alone all of hem at once. It took me over 2 hours just to get home from central London to Zone 2 a while ago when my tube line went down and so did the (not very convenient) back up option. Normally takes me 40 mins max.

Very petty. There will be pupils in the same detention room that are there for bad behaviour that they can control, this was something difficult to avoid. Sometimes you can leave in plenty of time but if buses or tubes are late or don't turn up what can you do? Leave 2 hours earlier? 3? 5? Maybe the poor kid should camp outside the bloody school in case.

Also I find schools expect parents to cope when schools have problems with no complaints but it doesn't work the other way. My DD has had school closures for snow, strong wind, teacher strikes and a fire but god forbid a pupil arrive 2 minutes late.

If school won't see sense, I'd consider signing him off with anxiety for the rest of the week. I don't have much patience with unfair systems, and he doesn't need an already overlong day due to the traffic situation made longer by detention.

And make sure they didn't lose out academically by giving some more advanced work at home than anything school were likely to set.

Might be worth messaging his form tutor this evening and explain the situation, if they are getting lots of complaints and lots of teachers were late too, maybe they will make special arrangements.

Guess they just have a blankets”no exceptions “ rule.

otherwise this week it’s a tube strike, next week it was a car accident, the week after it was a lengthy traffic jam. There will be late kids every day and all of them will swear blind it was due to reasons out of their control.

I discussed with my child after the detention today and they were understandably 5 minutes late. The buses were not allowing anyone on, due to being full. They had left very early.

Tomorrow will be a similar situation or worse.

Cycling isn't an option: sore knee, and no cycle lanes. No way I would send a teenager out onto crazy roads at the moment.

Workers are often told to work from home during tube strikes. It can be absolute chaos - unless you live relatively close to work.

The teacher has been very unfair.

The train that OH was on yesterday didn't let anyone on from 4 stops after his. The trains are every half hour. His train was at 06:30 so I imagine that the later trains were even worse - and we're only in zone 3! Making an 11 year old catch a 6am train to get to school for what, 08:45? That sounds a bit neglectful to me

Cycling is often easier than walking, with a bad knee, and is much quicker. Given london has lots of bike lanes, i would have thought getting a bike would be a good option

But presumably they didnt set off from OPs house….

Central london has lots of bike lanes

My son had this. He probably went to the same school as your son. The journey was 30 mins around the M25. The only way you could guarantee getting there on time each and every day would be to arrive 90 mins early so he got detentions.

Spell it out: It is a valuable life lesson that sometimes you get a penalty and that penalty is unfair. And making a fuss just makes it 100 times worse.

No matter what his disability is, learning to not see it as a personal reflection and just to suck it up will be very useful whatever profession he chooses.

Oooo a lot of MN do love a detention & rules - can see you lot just salivating at the over-zealous enforcement of them.

OP - totally unreasonable to give him detention in circumstances like this. What good does it do students to make them feel unjustly treated?

Fwiw I'm a long way from London & cannot fathom having access to such a good transport network when it takes ds3 two hours to get to college 15 miles away lol. And yet I manage to sympathise through my envy!

Not like the good old days when you had to walk 2 miles to school and and ill or not you did it and as for a sore knee, you were kicked out the house and sent to school and of uniform wasnt correct you walked home put correct uniform on and walked back to school sore knee or not

Because they set a detention when the OP's child arrived late to form? Where they also were because they were taking the register?

At St Thomas's, staff required for surgeries stay overnight at the hospital.

I wouldn't want a child to use those lanes.
It's like the Hunger Games - but with bikes !
It's fantastic that bike lanes exist. Unfortunately many of those who use them are clueless about road safety.

Central London has lots of cycle lanes. Suburban London is patchy, and rush hour traffic is insane.

One friend's sons usually cycle to school because public transport means a huge dog leg, cycling is quicker. It's about 2 miles - no cycle paths, they use the quiet residential back streets (and one has been knocked off his bike despite that - thankfully just shaken up and a couple of bruises).

When you have drivers getting frustrated because they aren't moving even when the traffic lights are green, it is even more dangerous. Drivers start cutting up other drivers, ignoring safe distances etc and it's a free for all. Then you get the usually quiet back roads turning into packed rat runs as drivers try to find ways round the congestion, so roads usually fairly quiet and safe for cyclists change considerably.

The buses are full, and traffic increases substantially as people who would normally use public transport drive instead. Then, because of the congestion it takes the buses twice as long to do their normal route, so they can only carry half as many people as usual.

Actually just a thought OP, I'm not sure how far down the bus route you are but could he leave even earlier and get a bus in the opposite direction i.e. backwards towards the start of the route (even to the very first stop) and the swap to get on a bus coming back towards school? The roads will still be crawling along but at least he'll be on a bus and not stuck at the bus stop as all the full ones sail past.

Sounds a bit bonkers but I did that once on a previous strike day and it worked. I even got a seat!

Don't be stupid. People are late for work all the time when the tubes are on strike or if there are other disruptions. Sometimes it's unavoidable. Just because you know in advance a strike is going to happen it doesn't mean that it makes it any easier (or possible) to get where you need to get on time.

Of course the school should make concessions under these circumstances.

This may not be a terrible idea, but I'm not sure where we are on the bus route.

The problem is 'leaving earlier' doesn't work when the delays are so big and unpredictable. For safeguarding reasons I am not going to send her out at 4 or 5am!

Not in my experience !
You stayed home if you were ill (no worries about attendance levels). Our uniform was casual then non existent after 3rd Year (Year 9) so no one got sent home for the wrong clothes.
Most people lived less that 2 miles from home because we all just went to the nearest school.
😁

Well your name certainly suits you! 🤣🤣

That's great. My hospital doesn't offer this. Where would they stay in St. Thomas's? On call rooms are a thing of the past now.

If the child is generally on time, maybe we can believing them?
Tube strike and serious car accidents are objectively verifiable, out of their control and there isn't any teaching moment in giving detention for "my route normally takes X minutes, I'm normally planning X+15, I added another 30 minutes due to the strike and it didn't work by 5 minutes".
Many adults will be late and it will be ok.

For safeguarding reasons...