How do boarding schools make sure pupils sleep

[Jannie65]

Hi
looking for some insight into how boarding schools make sure pupils go to bed at night. What’s to stop them pulling all nighters and keeping back laptops to watch tv all night?

They have to hand in their phones if they’re in the younger year groups. The school’s WiFi gets switched off at a certain time. And there are bedtimes for the younger kids and times at which the older kids are expected to be quiet and in their rooms.

No phones, no telly in the dorms, lights out at a certain time and someone on call to tell them off if they're pissing around. If they still don't want to sleep then that's on them-as long as they're not disturbing anyone else.

So what’s to stop pupils having a second phone or not handing one on . What’s to stop pupils not sleeping in their bed and hanging. Out with friends. I know the rules say one thing but how are they actually enforced

House masters/matrons live in very close quarters and hear quite a bit. Pupils are quite tired after full on days and tend to get annoyed at people who piss about too much late at night. Normally pupils have a late nights the night before half term and end of term with the house parents’ blessing. I’m sure there are a few second phones in senior school but I suppose that is up to parents to keep an eye on as well.

Thanks. I’m trying to work out what’s normal at boarding schools and how much ti ask the boarding house staff to step up .

Constant rounds by the duty teacher who resides in the building too. Turns all room lights off at around 9pm. Phones/pads handed in. Not allowed out of their rooms unless for toilet.

How do parents know their children don't have second phones or creep out at night? There have been numerous threads on here about both happening without the parent realising.

Ok- if that’s the case staff should absolutely police bedtime if there is an issue for your DC to sleep. From what I gather the odd little whisper/chat after lights out is ok but there should not be more than this and pupils do get spoken to/sanctioned if not adhered to. Of course this also depends on the age of the boarders.

At my child's school the hallway lights are motion activated, the room doors are all heavy fire doors which do make a noise regardless of how gently you try close it. And if they get caught there are varying degrees of punishment.

The phone issue would depend on the age of the boarder. If they are at the age of some financial independence they might of course be able to get a phone without parents knowing. Otherwise they would need the help of parents? ‘I broke my phone and need a new one?’ But of course, they can smuggle anything in to the boarding house.

But If staff don’t know and children don’t say how does the school have policies that help this happening

Presumably, they'd become suspicious when the child is falling asleep in lessons the next day?

You’d think so but no !

All tech is handed in at 9.10 unless in sixth form. There have been some who have second phones but harsh punishments are given if found. The prefects do the rounds to say good night to the younger ones and check they are in bed. They aren’t allowed out of rooms apart from to use the toilet after their ‘bedtime’ which gets 15 mins later per year group. House staff are in the building and can hear those talking and ask them to be quiet or they get a punishment such as an early night the next night etc. They wouldn’t creep around as they would be heard and caught by prefects/staff. Mine are ready for bed and keen to sleep as they have busy days with sport and will often ask to go on ‘early night’.

The days are busy. DC are tired. Staying with friends is the norm not a novelty. They have lights out by a certain time, tech handed in in the younger years and staff will be nearby.

As for a second secret phone couldn’t any teen do that regardless of whether it’s school or mum taking the phone? All they need really is access to money and a phone shop. And then who knows if it would even work if the wifi is off given that a lot of boarding schools are in rural locations so good chance there’s no signal anyway. Then you’ve also got the fact that they’d have to be using the phone in a way that doesn’t disturb whoever they’re sharing a room with and that teachers would definitely notice when they’re tired in the day.

If you’re looking at future schools for your DC then these are excellent questions to raise with prospective schools and I would hope they’d provided reassuring answers.

They can creep to different rooms and no one knows . Is this normal in boarding schools ?

OP, it sounds like you have a child in boarding school who is having issues sleeping. If you can be more specific then you'll get better advice.

I’m interested to know other schools handle the issues of children staying up late using laptops and phones when they shouldn’t and sneaking to each other’s rooms to hang out. I don’t know if this is common or unusual as in reality how would they know once it’s later and people gone to bed

It’s not been an issue for the boarders I’ve known - some instances of silliness at the weekend, but nothing dramatic.

I agree with PP that if you have a particular problem in mind, you should start a new thread with the specifics.

As parents how would you tackle this and how can this actually be stopped so children get good quality sleep

These are the issues

Perhaps they need a matron like the one Roald Dahl described in his autobiography: who had phenomenal hearing to catch the sound of a whisper behind a dormitory door, and could (and did) send boys to the headmaster to be caned on the spot.

My experience is many decades old, but we got up to all kinds of things - creeping around at night and the risk ratio of getting caught/punishment wasn't weighted enough on getting caught to stop adolescents chancing it for the fun when you didn't get caught!!

But there were things going on that with hindsight were really not ok.

And so, if you have concerns about your child and want the staff to be more aware/active/step up then I wouldn't hold back from speaking to them.
You are paying them to look after your child and their professional role is to look after your child.
It doesn't really matter what other schools do/parent think if you have a sense that things are not quite right...

How old is your child? What exactly are the issues? (Housemistress here with lots of experience)

Year 9 .