AIBU to raise boys’ changing room bullying with the school?

[EagerLion]

My DS is 12 and he came to me yesterday to tell me he’s worried for the start of school going into year 8. At first he just told me about what I expected, which was the usual- more work, worried about more expectations, unsure about what it will be like etc. He’s rather anxious innately (he’s got mild autism) so social situations aren’t his favourite, but obviously something he will have to get used to.

However, he told me about how he is worried for PE and sport because he hates getting changed. I asked about it and he told me there are a group of boys that immediately start fighting as soon as the teacher leaves them to it, they act feral. One boy always slaps other peoples bums because he thinks it’s funny. The biggest thing he told me though was there is a group of them that will randomly try to pull other peoples underwear down so that they can laugh at the others willy and make comments. This happened to my son before the summer holidays and he’s worried about it for when they go back to school. I know I need to bring this up with the school but my son is extremely scared to have the spotlight on him with this and so I feel like I’m between a rock and a hard place. It’s harassment and bullying for those that have to deal with it every time they get changed and it needs to stop. I was chatting to my friend about it and she sort of brushed it off as ‘boys will be boys’ and said ‘they’re just messing around, they’ve all got willies so there’s nothing to be embarrassed about’. Honestly I was a bit upset by this mindset. I just don’t know how best to go about the situation.

I'm all for the cubicle..I can't pee if someone is standing next to me.

Neither can my son, he avoids eating or drinking so he doesn’t need to go at school which I’m trying to help him with

Quite.

Oh that's a shame I hope with your help he manages to navigate the minefield of Secondary School.

There are ways and means. You can have a staff member standing outside, you can have time limits - so you've only got 5 minutes to change, which reduces any mucking about as you literally don't have time to do anything other than change if you don't want a detention for not being ready on time - and you can have very strict consequences for any misbehaviour.

The reality is that there are lots of unmonitored spaces in schools where children have to be given privacy - i.e. toilets, changing rooms - and schools put in place as much mitigation as they can to ensure children are safe in those spaces within the parameters of what is feasible.

Safeguarding children involves safeguarding them against adults as well as other children. The minute you put an adult in a space where a child needs bodily privacy, you're risking their safety. So it's a very challenging issue because if you try and safeguard them against other children in a space where privacy is required by putting an adult in the space, you're then not safeguarding them against a potentially harmful adult. So it's a catch-22.

I would also say that schools can't 'guarantee' that a child will be safe at all times on the school premises. Safeguarding identifies risks of potential harm and puts in place effective policies and procedures to prevent and manage those risks. However, safeguarding policies and procedures do not act as a guarantee that harm won't happen. It's impossible for schools to 100% guarantee a child's safety, even with the most robust procedures in place. Accidents happen, children don't follow rules, adults don't know/follow procedure, etc, etc.

I've just asked DS who's now finished yr 9 and he said nobody at his school has ever done these things in the boy's changing rooms.
It's a very ordinary Comp with a mixed intake.

How are boys at harm from having a man in the changing room ?

these days they don’t shower so they’re not naked

Thank you. I think kids often think that telling a teacher won't help, the teacher will give some punishment, and then as soon as the teacher isn't looking it will make life much much worse for the kid that told an adult.

I remember being a kid, and at least at the school I attended, this was a reasonable concern. Do you think schools have changed enough that it actually is in the child's best interest to report it?

It’s not bullying, it is inappropriate though. They shouldn’t be doing it at all but especially not random boys they’re not friends with. I would explain to him just that. I would go to the school. I would say you want your son kept anonymous. They will. They’re likely to take this very serious.

Yes IT IS BULLYING! There's more to bullying than name calling. No wonder bullying is such a big problem in so many schools when people don't actually understand what is happening in them.

Not everyone is heterosexual and some adults find children sexually attractive.

Boys might not be fully naked in the changing rooms but they are still taking clothes off. It is not appropriate to have an adult of any gender who is not related to you watching you take your clothes off.

There is also the reality that children can make false allegations against teachers and any environment where that could be a potential risk should be avoided at all costs.

I have never heard of a child thinking they would be punished for reporting another child's behaviour towards them. You must have been in a very unpleasant school environment.

I can't imagine why any teacher would punish a child for reporting bullying.

It's always in a child's best interests to tell a teacher or another adult they trust about bullying and this is something all schools teach children from day one.

What about other boys who may find their classmates attractive?

Personally I think the time has come to have compulsory cubicles and ban "open" changing areas completely.

Well of course that can be the case, but schools can't do anything about a student fancying another one. That's not a safeguarding risk in the same way as an adult teacher finding a child they teach sexually attractive, is it?

I don't disagree but many schools can barely afford to keep the heating on in the winter at the moment, so sorting out changing room facilities is likely to be very low down on the agenda.

I was bullied mercilessly and reported it lots of times, but the teachers basically "victim blamed" me and ignored it. I'd like to think that teachers' attitudes have changed these days, but suspect not given that bullying still seems to be a massive problem in some schools. I can easily understand why some pupils will see reporting bullying as a waste of time if they think the teachers will do nothing about it - it's how I soon felt after my teachers repeatedly ignored it because the bullies were the favoured ones, i.e. in school sports teams, or top of the class, or always got the parts in school plays etc!

Sorry if I wasnt clear. I mean the teacher would punish the bully with a detention, but because the teacher could not successfully hide the identity of the person who reported the problem, the bully would then just beat up the kid who reported the problem more severely. Its not like schools have the ability to provide protection for the kids, especially outside the school gates.

I'm sorry this happened to you. This was a different dynamic to what I was referring to, but also a reasonable concern. I was referring to the idea that the bully has plenty of opportunities for retribution against someone who reports them.

So what’s worse, someone looking at you or being bullied

I'm sorry this happened to you. I have always taken bullying seriously as a teacher and would never victim blame a child.

Schools should be swift to tackle bullying but the issue that we face nowadays is that so much bullying has transferred from the physical to the online world. Most bullying happens on phones - on snapchat or instagram - where messages disappear or can be deleted and it's very difficult to investigate and punish when you have no concrete evidence.

Bullying is very complex to deal with and when you have parents who are unsupportive and defensive that also makes it even harder. We can only do so much if we're not supported with proper parenting to reinforce positive behaviour towards others.

Well it is difficult in a lot of circumstances to hide the identity of a child who is alleging bullying, of course.

But dealing with it should be a lot more than just a detention. There should be parents involved, suspensions, mitigations put in place to protect the child from interacting with their bully during the school day, etc. If a child was beaten up physically, police should be called.

Of course the school can only do so much but a detention for bullying is not really going to do very much and I can't imagine many schools nowadays seeing that as a solution.

As someone who was sexually harassed repeatedly by my male PE teacher due to their ability to freely enter the girls' changing rooms while we were getting changed, I'd say probably safeguarding against a potentially predatory adult is the priority here.

You can station a staff member right outside the changing rooms who can hear what is going on inside and be able to intervene quickly if things get out of hand. There is no need for a staff member to be physically present in the room for children to be safe.

One tip for the changing room: suggest to your son that he sits down to get changed. I'm assuming there are benches in there. Immediately removes the possibility of his trousers/underwear getting pulled down. They shouldn't be doing it anyway, but it's an easy way to make sure it doesn't happen.

Haven't read the whole thread so this may already have been mentioned - at my school, "pantsing" is deemed to be a sexual assault and is punished accordingly. Please do report this and hopefully your son's school will take proper action.

The only dynamic not considered are the ' Teflon' children, who behave in ways that most kids would be permanently excluded.

The ones whose home life is so awful they are kept at school for safety.
This absolutely happens at DS's school.