AIBU to not understand how "school refusers" are a thing?

[Idontunderstandmodernlife]

There seems to be a lot of parents that have children that they simply can't get to go to school no matter what they do - these children are often called "school refusers". Parents say they have done absolutely everything to get their child into school but nothing works.

I hate to be that "in my day" person but I simply don't get where these "school refusers" have come from because they simply didn't exist a decade or 15 years ago. Kids just went to school. I never knew of a child that simply didn't turn up most of the time when I was in school? now there seems to be one in every class

What has changed that parents are now finding it impossible to get their child to school? Have schools got that much worse? are parents more lenient? are children more forceful? has children's mental health declined? what is it?

We were taken out of school in term time for holidays because it cost less and it wasn't considered an issue in those days. I genuinely believe that while we missed out on a few days of mainstream education, what we gained from the travel was at least as valuable. Many times more.

I appreciate that's not the case with persistent absence or children already struggling academically but I don't approve of the pressure on attendance at all costs now. I don't live in the UK. While too regular absence is frowned upon here, taking kids out of school for holidays or interesting events is very much considered to have its own learning value and is only discouraged if the child is severely behind academically.

Twin DDs started school over 25 years ago. Both had SEN. I was aware of plenty of mothers with SEN children, DDs knew, who were school refusing by age 7 plus. As one said of her teenage DS:

”DS has dyslexia. He’s over six foot! How am I supposed to make him go to school?”

She was about 5’2”!

I used to listen to mothers of children, tell me how their DC, aged 7 upwards came home from crying for several hours every night because they couldn’t cope at school. Some children were suicidal. One, aged 8, walked in front of a bus, because he’d been in special provision and sent back to mainstream, where he couldn’t cope!

DD1 told me, aged 10, after she was moved to a specialist school, how her life had been torture in a maintained Junior school, and she wanted to sue her teachers over it, when she was 18.

I can only assume OP, you lived in a very fortunate circle!

I'm sure it was a lot easier to get them in when you could just beat them with sticks. It's not the done thing now though. I don't really understand why you are saying truancy is different to school refusal though, it's clearly a child not going to school either way.

I blame Gove personally. Making school so hard and boring for such young children just drives them to hate it and the teachers have no flexibility. My "school refuser" is now a special school and doing brilliantly, not a single day refused. Kids in the right environment do well.

What an absolutely crazy pile on 😅

It did exist then, it was just called playing truant and no one bothered to support them back in. My ex all but dropped out of school at 14, he was born in 1980 and most likely severely dyslexic. When he stopped being able to access the work, he just quietly stopped going

The kids had just gone back to school after the Christmas break, and then the family took three days off to play in the snow. They had snow in their back garden and could have played out at weekends. That can’t be passed off as normal parenting behaviour.

My brother (later in life diagnosed as austistic) was a school refuser 25 years ago. My mother and father tried everything but he simply refused. What was my mother supposed to do, pick up her 6'2" son and put him in the car then drag him into school.

I think its best not to cast judgement about situations you dont understand.

I work in a primary school that has 'school refusers'. The reasons vary. Some of these children are anxious because they have had negative experiences in school (ie neurodivergence and are overwhelmed) and some are experiencing severe attachment issues in that they are distraught at not being with their parents lest something happen to their parent (possible undiagnosed neurodivergence or trauma). And some have parents who don't value education or encourage their children to go in, and some who don't want to upset their children (and there is a life long pattern of not wanting to upset their child and giving in for a quiet life). We've also had cases of children refusing because their younger/older sibling is at home so they want to be home too in case they miss out and see it as unfair.

Of course a child being off for days/weeks/months means they find it even harder to return to class as friendships have changed/moved on. Gaps in learning are growing and becoming overwhelming as they have not learnt previous steps In order to build on their learning. That can cause even more anxiety.

My own (now adult) autistic daughter was a school refuser after Covid. I worked with her school making it quite clear I wanted her in and how we could work together to achieve that. They put things in place (quiet workstation, trusted adults, time with friends to help her settle) but she also knew our expectation that education was important. I'kk be honest, it was touch and go on whether I'd have to give up my job and home educate or part-time timetable her. She also had a therapist to discuss things with too.

Schools need more pastoral staff and time to help children be in school and work with the parents to enable that. They also need more space and money to put those steps in place to have a slower, gradual transition. But no one wants to pay more tax for that, so there we are.

Our school is not the problem. Staff work tirelessly with pupils to get the very best for them. It’s easy to criticise schools and blame them. We get hundreds of parents writing messages of thanks for everything we do for our pupils. Everyone wants the very best and we are obviously very proud of everything they achieve.
But without doubt, the pupils who achieve the most are those whose parents engage with the school.

That wasn't always for school refusers but kids who wanted to wag school in groups.

I was responding to another poster who suggested it’s ok to manhandle - I wanted to know what they’d do with a large child.

done get me wrong - absolutely not ok to manhandle a smaller child either. But some posters seem to think it’s easy to get a kid into school who doesn’t want to be there.

It was for any kids who weren't at school as I remember. No distinction between the reasons why.

So despite the massive amount of people who have explained how they were school refusers “back in the day” and the amount of people who have explained the reason for ESBA, the Op hasn’t replied to a single one of those comments. My 9 year old is in his 3rd year of official school refusal. In hindsight, he had issues going back to preschool (aged 3-5) but was smaller then and could be carried to the door. The effect it has had on our family is devastating. I have had to give up my job. My son is on Prozac. He would stay home (& has done) with zero WiFi, threats, punishments, bribery, rewards friends getting involved, school getting involved, seeing a psychiatrist & psychologist. He has been dragged kicking & screaming, he has made himself vomit, he has self harmed, he realistically should be in a special needs school but is forced into mainstream. He has IEP, literacy support, maths support, movement breaks. The school can do no more. But his mental health is deteriorating daily & there is sweet fuck all that can be done. Everything has been tried. I’d love some help and answers but they don’t exist!

"I hate to be that "in my day" person"

Then don't.

On the flip side this is what my mum did to my brother because she had to work and was a single parent.

He developed severe idiopathic vomiting, years and years of medical professionals and appointments to be told there's nothing physically wrong with him, school telling him to just not be sick, hospital stays due to low blood sugar. My brother desperately not wanting to feel sick at the mere thought of school, but vomiting in school so often they would send him home and then send my mum letters threatening further action, and my brother feeling guilt on top of pain and shame and worry and anxiety, so pushing on even though he did not want to be in school.

By his teens he was rife with suicidal ideation, many attempts, feeling completely misunderstood, struggling with the pressure to perform and not be an inconvenience. Me having to be a pseudo parent because we could not afford for my mum not to work which would have been wholly doable if my brother wasn't always being sick all the time.

I'm so thankful my son's school are much more understanding and trauma informed than my brothers school was, because his forced attendance put us all in a very difficult position and although he left 4 years ago, waves have been made and we're still riding the tide.

I think not only were there school refusers, but it was easier for pupils to leave as if they were going to school & not arrive / go to school and leave / miss specific lessons.

If DCs don't arrive in school messages are sent home.
School fences are complete (no holes in a hedge to escape) with locks on the gates.
Registers are electronic so it flags to teachers that Joe Bloggs was in morning registration but is missing now.

We had none of this. I remember that technically we could have just strolled out of the school premises or snuck through a hedge. People would skive particular lessons.

I know this isn't the whole story, but schools are serious about safeguarding in a way that they weren't 30 years ago.

Are people just purposely mis-remembering Covid now? There were a total of 16 months of Covid restrictions in the UK (March 2020 to July 2021), of that schools were closed for 12 months.

While restaurants and cafes were closed for SOME of that 16 months (reopening between the various lockdowns), parks were still open and heaving, as were food markets and other outdoor spaces. I remember being barely able to move on the South Bank for people who had picked up some food from Borough Market and were walking along river - yes, with their children. Most children were absolutely not confined to their homes for extended periods of time.

All of that nonsense ended some 5 years ago now. Most of Generation Alpha (born 2012-2025) won’t even have memory of it.

So I’m not sure why people continue to attribute almost every problem in society to ‘Covid’.

I was replying to someone who talked about screaming kids.
Our pupils are not miserable - stop goading.
Have you ever worked in a school or are you just an expert from afar? I have been a nursing sister in a top London hospital and working in a large comprehensive is far more challenging. If we supported schools like we support the NHS, then the future would look a lot brighter. Get behind your local school and do everything you can for the next generation.

Every school is a problem for EBSA, no matter how’tirelessly ‘the staff work.

Its not really even about the staff, its about the environment and pressure.

30 years a teacher with an EBSA who did well once out of school environment.

My attendance at one point was 30something percent , I had crippling anxiety/panic attacks. I would beg my mum to call in sick or just walk out of school. Sometimes I’d just sit in the school toilets having panic attack and crying on the phone for my mum to come get me. This was in the 00’s. I taught myself the majority of my GCSEs and A levels and did well in exams and went on to complete two university degrees. My poor mum must have been beside herself with worry though. Now my son is going through autism pathway it’s obvious that I’m autistic too.

I never had a school refuser. But if your 10 stone 14 yr old refuses to go, what can you actually do? You cannot bodily force them? And they absolutely know that.

A lot certainly rule their parents…..
Then it’s the schools problem

Oh for goodness sake truancy was always a thing!!

In the past even if your parents whacked you around for being truant many kids still hid in nearby forests smoking.

Like everything else nowadays it now has a softer name.

Covid has also made it worse cos it showed kids they could teach themselves what they actually want to learn about and not need to go to school.

Many teens are bigger than their parents and violence is rightfully condemned so not sure how you think these parents are gonna just make them go.

Things are very different now to when I was in school in the late 80s.

You didn't hear then of Autism, ADHD, dyslexia, dyscalculia etc in children in mainstream schools as you do now. Doesn't mean it didn't exist then, because it did, but children were either not diagnosed, were pushed out of mainstream school, or just bunked off.
Some of those will be the kids who were seen as the naughty ones that messed around and didn't want to work. They were able to just walk out between lessons because school sites weren't as secure as they are now. Some messed around, some got cash in hand jobs. In some cases the parents either didn't know or didn't care. There wasn't the same push on attendance, and there were probably a few teachers that were pleased when those that didn't focus on the work weren't there.

There are different pressures now to then. Children are constantly being told that exam results determine everything, and the pressure to achieve in exams starts at a much younger age. There is a lot more peer pressure to fit in, things being online and on social media make that harder.
There is a lot more focus on attendance, uniform etc and things in some cases can be more strict - or strict in a different way. For some the constant push and pressure is too much and mental health declines.
The lack of support for some children in main stream is a major factor. Learning needs such as dyslexia will have been missed in thousands of children. It is more known about now than years ago, but in a lot of cases, diagnosis isn't provided by the council/nhs, and is only gained if the parents are able to pay privately for a diagnosis. Even with a diagnosis, children often don't get the support they need because lack of funds means not enough staff to provide the support, or not enough/appropriate training of staff. Not blaming the teachers and school support staff, a lot of which are doing the best they can in a difficult situation. Like every job there will be good and bad, but a lot go over and above to help the children they teach, but there are limits to what they can do without the time or funds.
In some cases the children will actually want to go to school, but their mental health/anxiety physically stops them from doing so.

They absolutely did exist “back then” In the early 2000s I worked for Connexions in a variety of roles supporting vulnerable young people back into education/employment/training. A significant proportion of my caseload were young teens who were school refusers. They were referred to us by social services, education welfare or schools!