Bullying/Safeguarding Year 8 Son

[Silveryfox]

Can someone who knows about these things please help me?

My 12 yr old son came home on Friday and told me he and 2 other boys had been touched inappropriately by another boy in the changing rooms while they had been getting ready for PE (someone turned the lights off and the boy who touched my son did it while the room was in darkness). Another boy also physically assaulted my son straight afterwards. My son and the other 2 boys who were touched told the PE teacher what happened, but instead of hauling the perpetrators off to the head masters office immediately he instead shouted at the perpetrators to stop being stupid, then punished the whole class for mucking about when they should have been getting changed. The punishment was that the whole class had to change repeatedly from uniform to PE kit and back to uniform, over and over, for the duration of the lesson instead of doing what he should have done. The PE teacher did not report what happened and allowed the children to leave as normal. Because my son had told the PE teacher what the kid who assaulted him had done, that boy then waited for my son after school and threatened and assaulted him again.

Obviously I have gone through the proper procedure, left it with the school to "investigate" but I also rang the police to get an incident number. I have now had a call from the Deputy Head this evening (Wednesday) to say they have "sanctioned" both boys/perpetrators and phoned their parents. Going on past experiences at this school, the "sanction" will be a lunchtime detention. No mention of safeguarding in relation to the sexual touching OR the physical assault and threats. My son tested positive for Covid last saturday so is not going to be back at school until next Monday, but apparently when he returns, the schools solution to making my son feel safe is to ask him what he'd like to happen next to make him feel safe and to see if he would like to sit down with the 2 perpetrators to do "talking reconciliation". 1) My son is 12. He wouldnt have a clue how to answer the question of how can the school make him feel safe and 2) how can they even think of suggesting he sits down to talk to the boys who did those things to him?? I said to the Deputy Head teacher when she called that the so called sanctions dont seem to me to fit the crime. She said she couldnt discuss that with me because she had to protect the kids who were responsible!!

So I guess my question is, are there any senior school teachers/leadership or social workers here who can tell me if this is how this situation should be handled? Because as far as I'm concerned this school is NOT safeguarding my child. Then again, his primary school was exactly the same.... they all seem to protect the bullies, not the victims. Ps I have contacted the Board of Governors about other things my child has been subjected to when the school didn't seem to be interested in protecting my son, only the bully, and they came down on the side of the school.... any advice?? 🙏