Are there schools with bullying cultures

[Achanging]

This might not be the right forum, but I am concerned about the secondary school my DC has just joined. It is very militant. The children have not even had a week of lessons yet and were told they’d be helped to settle in, not to worry too much if they can’t find their way around. I’ve heard reports of leaving the classroom in tears, detention for being late as they’ve gone to the wrong room by accident, public shaming in front of the whole year on the first day and subsequently. The head and head of year have been present on occasions. It seems really out of proportion. I think it goes beyond strictness or high standards.
These are year sevens. I feel really uncomfortable at this introduction to secondary and what it says about the culture and the management. I hear these stories and I feel the same reaction as I do towards bullies. Am I being OTT? Does anyone teach in or have DCs in a school like this? Does it ease off? I’m feeling on edge waiting until DC is on the receiving end. I know it’s a big transition, but it’s unusual for me to feel this way and it’s getting worse.

Do some schools have bullying cultures? A few years ago I’d have said no, of course not, teachers want to work with children, with people. Yes high standards are necessary, but not bullying.

But then the school I worked in was taken over by a group of unfathomably, inexplicably harsh people who did, objectively bully the children. And then bullied any staff who wouldn’t comply (or asked questions).

It does happen. But you can’t ’win’, you won’t change the system. It’ll take years and a huge groundswell of parents and local politicians and journalists to even begin. Staff will leave. The school might eventually return to an even keel but it will never be the same.

I recommend you visit the school during the teaching day. Witness lessons and lesson changeovers. Is it just well run with high standards, or is it inhumane? Do they achieve calm lessons where teachers can teach and children can learn? Or are lessons delivered and learning is by rote? Does the headteacher/SLT listen to you and make you feel heard and reassured? Or do they refuse to hear you, belittle you, speak like a politician? Do you feel you can trust that person?

If you have other schools in your area, visit those too to get a sense of your options.

I hope you’re just feeling oversensitive at the change and this is not an unnecessarily harsh place.

i moved my oldest due to this kind of behaviour. I had mentally prepared for all sorts of behaviours and situations when they moved up to secondary, but the staff bullying the children and generally being rude and unkind, wasn’t on my list of things that would happen. It nearly killed my kid…. My biggest indicator was, for want of a better description, the male teachers taking the piss out of how the boys looked or spoke, as if young people don’t have enough to deal with. If you trust your kid and they’re reporting back to you… definitely listen. Advise above is really good. Best of luck.

”I had mentally prepared for all sorts of behaviours and situations when they moved up to secondary, but the staff bullying the children and generally being rude and unkind, wasn’t on my list of things that would happen.”
This captures it well. It may be their intention is to show who is in charge, but I’m feeling resentful, that the teacher behaviour is cowardly and I have lost trust and respect. Other schools encouraged a visit in the day. This one doesn’t do them as they are too big. A child trying to find a classroom in week one is punished? That’s not about following the rules really is it? I don’t feel the school are approachable. It was very much our way or the highway, we will always be right, your children will lie to you at the open evening. It feels adversarial. The behaving more harshly in front of other teachers makes me scared it’s embedded. I don’t want to tar all the staff there with the same brush though.

I’m sorry your child had such a hard time.

That’s a bit red-flag-y.

Are you in a city or town where there are multiple schools to choose from? Go and visit the others, see what they feel like.

If you’re more rural with one school accessible then things get tricky. And this authoritarian regime doesn’t work in such places (and I am cross that those academy trusts inflict such things on people who have no real choice, especially in areas and cultures where it is so inappropriate).

Go and visit other schools, explore transport options. And if you want to move your child doing so sooner rather than later will be better. (Although it’s not too late till you’re in y11)

There are others, but they all have a zero tolerance warm/strict approach. She has been trying so hard, I’m really proud of her. Shes still at the stage where she’ll chat to me about her day. She’s noticed the inconsistency between what some teachers say they’ll do and what actually happens but describes it as weird. There was a phrase or poem they got taught yesterday which said it’s ok to make a mistake and it’s expected. She said shortly after a boy got into trouble for making a mistake and she just looked at the phrase on the whiteboard thinking “ok then”. There is another local school, where a parent has just removed their child in a crucial year. I don’t know much more about it other than it was described as toxic. The younger sibling is in my DD’s year, so I don’t know if I’ll be jumping out of the frying pan into the fire.

It’s bonkers.

I left the school I taught at after this kind of thing. I particularly remember an assembly about emotional abuse and coercive control that basically described all the tactics they used at school.

It occurred to me that they were desensitising the students to this abuse, normalising it. I had already refused to participate in a lot of the very toxic strategies (to my own detriment), but this really hammered home what they were doing.

Warm-strict can be done well. And there are always parents who complain that their child is being asked to behave reasonably. My old school started well, but took it too far.

I would really recommend visiting yourself.

That’s a really good way of putting it and is probably what’s making me uncomfortable.

I went to see the school on their open evening, but it’s not allowed during the day.

I suppose the parents who complain think they are not being unreasonable either. I genuinely don’t think I am. She does all the “right” things for school. We do all the “right” things to support that. I don’t think that’s going to be enough for this school. There’s no break from the tightrope and it seems that the teachers are the ones wriggling it! I suppose I’ll have more of a feel as to how widespread it is in a few more weeks. Lots of schools have a teacher or two who goes really over the top, but it’s not the norm for all teachers.

I’m sorry about what happened with you and the school you taught at. How did you try to combat it and what did school do in response? Did you find another school?

A neighbour was an English tutor for primary age children. She said she noticed children from a particular school would change in a certain year, especially boys. Parents put it down to age related changes, curriculum getting harder, phase they were going through etc. The neighbour said year in year out, the change was really pronounced from one school, and that it was most likely that the teacher who taught that age group was the biggest factor.

This is not a teacher bashing thread, but I am concerned about this school.