School lateness punishments, neurodiversity and the law

[VividDenimTiger]

Posting here for traffic really. DD 14 has had issues in secondary school- we suspect ADHD to be honest. I am unravelling my own mid life ADHD traits at the moment too.

For DD, one of the things that manifests in school is persistent lateness. She just can’t organise herself to get to lessons on time. The school has now brought in a punishment for lateness where anyone late more than 5 mins gets sent to a punishment room for the lesson. Needless to say DD is now missing loads of lessons because of her lateness.

I know that it’s annoying for teachers when kids are late for lessons but it feels like this policy unfairly targets kids, like my DD, who might or do have some issues with timekeeping because of other things going on.

Aibu? I am trying to unravel some of this for DD (and myself) but I am really angry about how punitive this policy is- it feels like it disadvantages kids who genuinely have issues with organising their time and themselves. The corridors are really busy in school and she gets upset and overwhelmed and that doesn’t help all of this.

I have. There is another achool in the area that has a completely different approach to ND but it’s got a massive wait list.

The school my DD is at is notorious for lack of support for ND but because this hasn’t really become an issue when we applied, we didn’t realise.

Now we know. There are loads of kids having similar issues at the school. My other child went there and had no issues as they are NT and fit the system.

So what is the actual issue here OP? You said originally “she just can’t organise herself to get to lessons on time” which suggests she is getting lost or forgetting things. Now it is “she is overwhelmed in the corridors”. Leaving lessons early might help with the second point, as the corridor will be quiet, but then presumably she will be moving between lessons alone not with friends which increases the likelihood of her getting lost or forgetting things.

Reasonable adjustments are only reasonable if they alleviate the disadvantage caused by the disability and are operationally viable for the school. You need to work with your DD on strategies for being on time - others here have given many excellent suggestions - rather than throwing your hands up and expecting the school to organise everything around her, regardless of the impact on teachers and other pupils.

She should absolutely be allowed to leave the lessons early to get to the next when it’s quiet (when I was at school in the 90s this was actually on my plan-I have autism and adhd ) . It’s a small thing that will really help and in your shoes I’d be pushing for it as a reasonable adjustment.
I know how hard it is and I hope you get things sorted out

Remind them that under the Equality Act 2010, schools have an anticipatory duty to prevent discrimination, avoid substantial disadvantages, and implement reasonable adjustments. Anticipatory is an important word - they can make adjustments before a diagnosis. In practice a diagnosis would help to ensure the school do what they should. As others have said, go private if you can. It’s important to try to get help in place before GCSEs make the pressure on your DC worse.

Check the adhd charities like ADHD UK for information and advice. They are super helpful, really care and might for example direct you to letters you can use to remind the school of their duties and lists of legally acceptable reasonable adjustments (Google 101 reasonable adjustments for adhd). And ignore anyone posting who has no experience of ADHD. Good luck to you.

The school is unreasonable to make a change mid-year. Should have been there from the start and parents be aware of this before applying to the school.

Though if only there had been a similar sanction for the daily Covid conferences which all bar one that I saw started late.

Can she buddy-up to help the corridor chaos? Has she got a group of friends who could look out for her?

Maybe educate yourself

https://www.england.nhs.uk/long-read/report-of-the-independent-adhd-taskforce-part-1/

I’m reading all the posts but to be honest, I am bloody exhausted and upset by it all and I don’t have the energy to argue with some of the posts on here.

I just needed some help and suggestions which I have got and not to have to defend my DD or myself from the posts that imply she’s making it up or my parenting skills are shit.

We are 3 years into this and it’s exhausting trying to fight for your child when you don’t really know what’s going on and people don’t believe you.

I know ADHD does not make life easy but most children with ADHD do get to school and lessons on time, most of the time. Diagnosed conditions that cause time keeping issues, are very common and it would be pretty chaotic if everyone was frequently late.

The school I work in has around 30% on the SEND register. We are accommodating and flexible about this kind of thing but we do work towards children getting to places on time because that is a life skill that they need.

In two years time your daughter will be sitting public exams. Then she will be facing post 16 education and then work. At each stage the consequences of being late or absent become much more real.

DD17 with AuDHD here. Go private for the diagnosis if you can afford it as the quicker you can get access to medication the better, then you can start pushing for the EHCP. And yes look to move her to a school that is smaller and quieter if possible. If she has ADHD she has no internal time clock but you need to work a way through this, a watch that silently pulses for example maybe. Yes your school sounds shit but many state schools are with SEN it’s why I put mine in the private system.

There’s a lot of parents who thing think that we SENCos are ‘useless’ and in reality the job is incredibly tough. We need to make many decisions throughout the day, the emails continue to drop into the in-box and we are firefighting. A lot of the paperwork jobs get done at the end of the day, when everyone else has gone.

It is an impossible job. Therefore requests like this need to go through the form tutor or head of year. After all, we are all ‘teachers of SEN’

What’s the background of your child? Is she generally a rule follower who does not get into trouble?

I ask this, because the school will have more context on the situation. If this is her only challenge, and it’s having a significant impact, the school needs to look to support. However, I do know that there are plenty of young people who intentionally push boundaries and parents will use neurodiversity or suspected neurodiversity as an excuse. Our neurodiverse teens are still teenagers, and sometimes don’t make the right choices.

Sorry that you and your daughter are having such difficulties at the moment. Support is based on need, so the school are wrong to say that without a diagnosis they cannot put accommodations in place. Can you arrange a meeting with the SEND team at the school? Try and make a list of all of the things that your daughter struggles with and if possible have examples ready to show situations where it is causing difficulties. I would also look up SENDIASS for your local area and reach out to them for some support, they could possibly come along to any meetings with the school to look at accommodations.

I would also get this moved to the SEN board - I don't think you will get the support that might help in AIBU.

Good luck.

Would the school let her wear headphones going to and from class? My DD had anxiety and would get overwhelmed going between classes because of the clamour, so she was allowed to play music to drown it out. She was referred to CAMHs though.

I do agree with other PP though that you need to find the coping strategies rather than expect the school to tolerate her lateness. If they make an exception for one child without diagnosis, what’s to stop others coming forward claiming it’s an issue for them too? Before you know it, everyone’s late and learning is disrupted. Also, the school may have a different view on what’s causing her lateness - disappearing outside instead of trying to cope with what she needs to be doing - to what she’s telling you and that’s why they are being strict.

eta this is @frenchtoast

You seem to have got absurdly stuck on this and are now the one making sweeping and incorrect statements. My DS had issues for years, as long as the OP’s DD, and it was only recently he was ‘lucky’ to get diagnosed because we’d been on the list so long we cracked and gave up on lots of other things in order to pay for his diagnosis. They don’t bump boys up the list or give special consideration for them and it’s not some dream scenario compared to girls, even though I agree that diagnosis and presentation differs. Nor was be disruptive in class, he just got lost and left behind and was massively drowning. Which wasn’t lucky. But still, moving from one class to another he followed the class and got to the rooms, even though he could lose his way in most places, so my valid point and question which you miss out, is what else was she doing other than going to the next class. And OP later revealed she is in fact going outside for a minute, so my point/question was entirely justified and the fact she needs to go outside adds something to the understanding of what’s going on here. I don’t know what your problem is and i’ll leave the thread now before finding out because it’s too early for all this, but I hope the fact that I persisted and got the diagnosis and reasonable adjustments is some help to the OP, that this is worth doing if poss.

I know you shouldn't have to, but can you source and pay for an assessment yourself? It would be a lot quicker and then you can hold the school to account with a specific diagnosis. Also, if she has ADHD you can look at getting medication which helps a lot (I have an ADHD child and their behaviour has turned around overnight from it).

Basically at the moment, all the school have is you saying 'ADHD' with no evidence.

keep complaining. Escalate to governors. An early pass is easily accommodated in schools.

It's not good to armchair diagnose but I'd be considering dyspraxia/DCD as well with the exec functioning challenges (that can be a quicker referral also). It's no good saying to a child that isn't managing 'just do it quicker' - it's not going to work, is it? OP isn't actually in the school every day.

I would try this. Where I am it is much cheaper to get DCD diagnosed privately by an OT. You won't be able to access medication if you want to try this route though and will still need ADHD diagnosis. If the organisation and planning is the biggest issue this would at least get support with that. Is she clumsy as well? How is her fine motor skills?

Our school gives the autistic children, those with mobility issues with a 5 minute early
card. Meaning they leave classes 5 minutes early to get to their next one. This means they avoid the noise and crowds. This is applied to
go home too. It works well, all schools should have it.

Young people these days have too many excuses and not enough resilience.

she needs a coping strategy, not an excuse.

she needs to work out HOW she can arrive on time. She has to solve this problem. Otherwise life and the world of work is going to be very tough.

It doesn't work well for teachers or the other kids. It shortens every lesson by 5 mins or those leaving early miss out.

They don’t bump boys up the list however as the NHS taskforce has identified boys are historically diagnosed with ADHD much quicker than girls, often diagnosed up to five years earlier. Said NHS taskforce highlights that women and girls have been massively underdiagnosed due to outdated clinical stereotypes that primarily look for disruptive, hyperactive behaviors in boys.

You say, you’ve been having these problems for three years, and the other school has a massive waiting list. Where are you on that waiting list? You must be near the top by now? I’d be chasing the new school.

What have you suggested to stop her being overwhelmed?

Would asking a friend to walk with her work?

Said NHS let my DS down and OP’s DD hence my suggestion. Campaign away but leave me alone thanks.

The problem with this though other than the disruption if too many are given out it becomes pointless for those who really need it. Things like that should be a last resort not just an easy fix all.