to threaten ds's school with getting the police involved

[elmofan]

hi , my ds has been getting bullied on/off for the last 3 years , we have lost count as to how many meeting we have had with his principle who keeps telling us that the boy involved is on his final warning ( this boy has already been expelled from 2 other schools) last year he beat up my ds (10) kicked ds in the head & face etc which triggered off migraines which eventually he had to have an MRI scan but everything was ok thankfully , ds came home from school upset yesterday & told me that this boy has told him that he is going " to get him again" after school on monday this boy is also telling another 2 boys in ds's class that he is going to "RAPE" them
dh & i are planning to go up to the head again on monday morning to let her know what is going on , i am sick of feeling like we are the ones who get fobbed off so would i be out of order to let her know that if my ds gets hurt again i will get the police involved ?

thanks you all for your posts , its good to know that i wont be over reacting to get the police involved ,
maggie that's terrible & such an important year for kids , my niece was also bullied this year while sitting her leaving cert , my sisters house was egged & their car damaged all because my sis & bil warned these girls to leave dn alone ,
evaangle2 - yes we have learned to put everything in writing as the principle seems to respond better to that & we know we have it on record that this has been ongoing 3 years now ,
hercules1 - my ds is 10 & other boy has just turned 11 in july .

Report to police and tell them about the rape threats as well, the boy has obviously heard this somewhere and social services should be alerted.

you most definitely will not be overreacting by going to the police. you say this has been going on for 3 years. the school have had their chance to deal with it and they obviously haven't. otherwise it wouldn't still be going on to this extent.

if it was my child, i would be arriving at the headteachers office on monday morning with a police officer with me.

think ill write a letter to ds teacher that way it has to be logged & go up with dh on monday morning to speak to the principle & tell her that if ds gets any more threats then i will be getting the police involved ,
i have been more than fair imo giving her the last 3 years to sort this out ,
cant understand why this child is still in the school tbh as i know of lots of mums who have complained about him . thanks again x

I don't think that's right - I think you need to report it and tell them you have not use it as a threat

3 years is 2 years 6 months too long for them not to have sorted it out (and that's being generous)

and I do not understand why you wouldn't then report it

objectively you have said

your son has been bullied for 3 years

he is getting threats of physical violence

he has been attacked and injured already by the person threatening him

3 years

and you're still talking about it

I wouldn't be

I wouldn't have let it get this far with any of my children

I am slightly surprised that you haven't taken action before now. You are not impotent.

I'm with franklymydear
I think you need to take the lead.
3 years is a long time. Phone the police, your child has been threatened. the school are obviously not going to do anything.
The police will.

Elmofan you have given them enough time for them to 'sort it out' and you are giving them more Stop sitting on the fence and get the police involved, this is your ds. FGS I would have removed my dd from that dreadful schoool ages ago when discovering they were not taking things seriously.

My dd was hit in the face at the end of last term, by a boy with "issues", he was moved on from his previous school, in reception!

It was hard enough to break her glasses, I told the school I won't stand for her being assaulted and if it happens again I will report it immediately to the police, and I will definately do it, I certainly wouldn't wait 3 years .

Go to the police.

I struggle to understand why assaults on children are left unreported, just because the assailant is another child!

I accept a bit of pushing and shoving is inevitable in shools, but kicking and punching is assault, you wouldn't hesitate to call the police if someone you worked with did this to you.

Go to the police and put it in writing to the Head. This has gone on long enough and the school sound useless.

you may actually be helping the school if you go to the police. in some areas LEAs do anything not to finally exclude a pupil as they then have to provide alternative education, and this is vvv expensive.

i have know cases where the school applies to permanantly exclude a pupil, but be told that there is insufficient evidence, when there are over 100 documented incidents for the one pupil (disruption & violence). maybe the head is too weak to make the stand, maybe the head if fighting to get the boy excluded, but being ignored by the LEA.

either way, the police will make this a more serious incident, and could bring some swifter action from the policy makers.

sorry maybe i haven't explained the situation properly , yes the name calling etc has been going on & off for 3 years but there has only been 1 physical assault which happened October last year , & i was assured by the principle that my ds would be safe & that they were keeping a very close eye on this boy , but yesterday this boy threatened ds again so threes no way we are letting ds be a sitting duck as this boy seems to carry out his threats ,
ds laughs at the name calling & says that it doesn't bother him at all but i don't want him to have to put up with this boy any more ,
piglet - unfortunately - ds's school is the best of a bad bunch where we live , its a 20 minute drive away .

kickassangle - you might be right there as the head has made several comments about how much easier her life would be if this child was not in her school anymore which makes me wonder why he is still there . so far the principle has had to keep this child in at break times ( because he hits the other kids in the yard) she has held him back at home time to give the other kids a chance to get down a long avenue to where their parents are made wait on them , but she only does this for a week or two then lets lets him go out with the rest of the kids until another parent complains .

The police take this sort of thing very seriously IME and will act accordingly.

MIL called the police when SIL was being bullied as soon as she realised the school were doing nothing.
The police went to the bully's house and her parents were livid and mortified. The school hadn't even bothered to contact the bully's parents and tell them that there had been complaints about their daughter.
The police told MIL and SIl that they could press charges and the bully would get a criminal record. SIL said she didn't want the bully to have a criminal record, so the police just gave her a warning, but it was enough to stop her bullying.

but this boy has already been moved out of 2 other schools?

depends if he was permanently excluded, or if parents moved him JUST before the paperwork made it official. (Schools sometimes encourage this, for the follwoing reason) It used to be (and I think still is) the case that if a pupil is permanently excluded from three schools, then they are not entitled to main stream education, but have to go to a Pupil Referral Unit. These places are v v expensive to run, and some LEAs only have one, with a very limited number of places available. They are 'schools' but come with panic buttons & barbed wire (not all, but some), so pupils only go there as the absolute last resort.

IF he has been perm. excluded from two schools already, that is his next place to go. It could be the other side of the county, with no transport, other than LEA funded taxi (but some taxi firm refuse to take pupils there). You can see why the head has to have a cast iron record of events to ensure that this happens.

I am guessing that the boy may not be the best behaved in class? It may be that the staff don't enjoy his presence in the school, but at this stage, they have to do everything by the boook.

However, I have known cases where just one incident of bodily harm was sufficient for a pupil to to excluded. It sounds like this boy is 'borderline' for that kind of treatment, and that there are politics further up the education system which are affecting this.

Tbh honest, none of that is relevant. If you feel your son is under threat, go to the police. As a teacher, I sometimes encouraged this, as the school is soemtimes wanting extra help to deal with a difficult pupil, particularly if parents weren't supportive.

Do what keeps your son safe, let the school worry about the poitics behind this. I'm just trying to explain some of it, as it might help you to understand comments made by the head.

You can tell I used to do the real 'inner city gangs' type of teaching, can't you? Would just like to add, it's been a couple of years since I was actively involved in this side of teaching, so could be out of date, but I think the underlying ideas still remain.

thanks mrschemist , how old was your sil at the time ? i know that the principle is telling the bullies parents as his mother came over to me the next day all guns blazing & said that it will be my fault if her kid gets kicked out of this school
dh wants us to talk to the principle on monday & see what action she is going to take & then tell her that the police will be getting involved if ds gets any more threats , & i am also going to phone the police on monday morning & get advice ,

That is absolutely unacceptable that the HT told the parents bullies that. It is very unprofessional and a complete breach of trust.

Sounds like a good plan. An even better plan if each time the boy physically assauted a child the parents went to the police. A school needs concrete info to procede to PRU and a catalogue of police complaints and to the LEA would do it. Your ds and the other students deserve to be safe and this child who is violent clearly needs something he isn't getting at the school.

thank you so much kickassangel that is very helpful , i do not know if the boy has left two schools voluntarily or not but his mum said that this school has him on his final warning , i suppose i was hoping that the principle would be able to sort this boy out but i dont think she can , i didn't want to put more pressure on her by getting police involved but i dont think we have any other choice at this stage . the annoying thing is when the principle is on this boys back he backs off & leaves ds alone but then the principal slacks off & the boys starts up again .

Thinking of you this morning elmofan. Hope it goes well at the school. Be strong and don't be fobbed off!

Sorry, elmofan, I know you're going to see the principle this morning, but I can't fathom why on earth you are not going straight to the police?

Whether or not your son gets physically assaulted again by this boy, he is already being emotionally and psychologically damaged by this and you are doing nothing that will stop it now.

If he were one of mine he would not be going into school and I would have gone straight to the police the first time he got beaten up.

Please encourage your DH to take your DS and this situation more seriously.

Hope your meeting goes well this morning.

thanks positiveattitudeonly - & flamingobingo

went up to speak to the principle this morning & it seems she was expecting me dd is sick atm so dh sat out in the car with her which i really wanted him with in there with me but anyway , the principle said she heard the threats through the "grapevine" that the bully made to my ds , i told her that if ANYTHING happens to my son while he is in her care i will be back with the police ,
later on this morning the principle rang me to say that it was actually the bully's mum who tipped her off , the bully had been bragging to her that he was going " to kill my ds " the mother rang the school to forewarn them but what i am really upset about is - the school knew & the bully's parents all knew before me & none of them warned me it feels like the principle is protecting the bully rather than my ds
I've been very upset all morning , the principle has offered to hold my son back for a few minutes at home time so that the bully is gone , to me that means my son is punished & made to feel different whereas the bully is left alone , also I've had to listen to how the principle's heart is going out to the bullies parents as they are having a very hard time coping with their child etc
who cares about we & ds's feelings , we are going down to the police station later with ds as we want all of this put on record also am thinking of ringing the board of education for advice . am seriously thinking of trying to talk to the bullies mum to home time this afternoon but the last time we spoke she got on her high horse ,
so not sure it would do any good , x x thanks everyone who posted

Well done Elmo.

Go to the police but do not speak to the bully's mum. That sort of conversation can rapidly escalate and it might not reflect well on you.

The school does sound like it is protecting the bully. Your son should not be held back a few minutes after the bell has rung. Why is he the one being punished? On a serious note there is absolutely nothing stopping the bully from waiting around the corner for a couple of minutes anyway.

Good luck at the police.