TEmporarily excluded from secondary school

[Piffle]

DS yr 7was this morning excluded for an undetermined time
This morning he filled his blazer pockets with the contents of his pencil case as the puppy has chewed his case.
In that case was a craft knife he uses for manga cartoons
Someone saw it when he met up with his friends before school. DS was suddenly aware he had made a faux pas and ran to school and locked it in his locker.
One of the kids told the teachers.
DS is now home.
He is likely to be exckuded from the national quiz final he and his team mates have worked towards for 7 months, on sunday.
Paying for naivety
I'm swaying between it being bloody unfair and that the school have no choice
Either way my ds is destroyed.
As am I

Sympathise. my ss has been suspended and the school head although didnt want him to be suspended had to as this broke on of the main school rules. I would say that at 7 i would query the need to suspend a child for knife carrying as it seemed an unfortuate oversight. Thought that they had to give a time limit though

Oh Piffle As you say - naivety. FWIW similar happened with my friend's ds. something he had on his phone was interpreted as a 'happy slapping' incident when it was really nothing of the sort. It's an automatic exclusion, no questions asked and no defence taken.

Hope they can see their way clear to include him in the quiz.

piffle, go in and talk to them. It is ridiculous to be punished liek this for naivety ..what is his recordlike in school?

How frustrating for you both. Is there anyway of arranging a meeting with the school?

immaculate beety. not one late homework, never late, no uniform issues nada.
I do intend to take it up with the head, dep head is dealing with it, and she is the first female deputy head in this all boys grammar sicne ... forever.
She is married to a copper and is very rule insistent
Worse, she does not know ds at all
The yr 7 tutor came in and looked shocked and said she hoped all would go well.

Piffle- that strikes me as being very harsh:(

It is a difficult one and I can see it from the schools point of view, but surely with a coherent explanation they can apply a light touch????

I assume you've discussed it with the school already? If not I'd make an appointment to see the head without taking your DS with you, to talk through the various options that the school has to apply leniency in the situation!

If he uses the knife normally at school and the teachers know about it, and there's a rational explaination as to why it was in his blazer pocket along with a few chewed pens, blunt pencils and a leaking ink cartridge, then I think the teachers have to see the other side of the incident! I know rules are rules but there are three sides to every story, yours, mine and the truth, but if your son has an exemplary school record (which it sounds as if he has - he's on the school quiz team ffs!) then this certainly should go in his favour!

The annoying thing is there are probably kids in his school carrying flick knives and getting away with it just because no one's told the teachers yet!!

I was pretty crap I just cried a lot
I think she (deputy head)mentioned she cried once a decade {shock]

tbh, I woudl go in immediatly

Am waiting for her callback any second with the offical punishment FWIw dp and I are not totally at one about this either

No he would not normally have the knife at school
He just didn't think when loading his pockets :(

This could be helpful to you.
\link{http://www.ace-ed.org.uk/advice/booklets/FixedExclusion.html\Fixed term exclusion}

Head cannot give an exclusion of undetermined time.
I would go in and discuss with the head. The exclusion is the punishment. Why should he be excluded from the quiz?

Is the craft knife necessary for his school work? Is he doing Art for example?

My sympathies. However, three weeks ago we had a student knife another in a bit of a random temper losing moment here. We now have one student scarred for life and another up on an ABH charge. Every time we walk past the new piece of carpet laid over the bloodstained one we are reminded that knives and adolescents are not always the best combination.

I think the issue is
Excluding ds for a time due to the "knife" incident
then lauding him at an assembly next week for being part of a great quiz team
I can see their point BUT do not feel a punishment is appropriate per se, as he is only guilty of naivety
I do hope to use his exemplary record and achievement at the school in his defence, I know I would prefer that the teachers who know him better were part of the process too.
But we shall see what happens when I get the call from her.

Piffle, if it is an exclusion of any sort, you should be informed in writing and given the chance to appeal to the GB. This normally would mean a meeting between you and the discipline committee. At that meeting you would have the chance to put your side of the case. Have alook at the stuff on this thread \link{http://www.mumsnet.com/Talk?topicid=1373&threadid=182466&stamp=060613222642\have a look at the stuff I pasted in the middle of the thread about appealing}
Good luck

I am pleased to read about the chance to appeal to governors and so forth
I would ultimately take this step

When i say exceluded for undetermined time, she said she needed to think about what punishmetn was appropriate for him and get back to us later.
And then take him home now please.

I wonder Piffle, if you might gently pre empt the Head by asking to come in and discuss an appropriate sanction for your ds tomorrow morning. You could lightly mention that as you understand it she needs to put it in writing to you, you need to consider it and if you are happy fine, but if you are unhappy you have the right to take it to the governors. Maybe once she understands that you understand how it works, will work with the school if necessary but intend to see he is not unfairly castigated, she might feel such a meeting would be the best way to handle it.

I would guess she has to run it by the Head anyway as only a Head Teacher has power to exclude.
I feel so impotent
The rash part of me wants to shout sod you all then I'll take him out
But man that would be shooting myself in the foot.

It is a shame he put in his locker. It might have been better if he had given it to teacher and explained his mistake.

OK, I know that is hindsight, but it could be used as a defence - he wanted to put out of harms way but just chose the wrong way to do it. He actually acted very responsibly.

A craft knife is as dangerous as any knife but it does support his explanation that it was a mistake. It wasn't a flick knife or whatever.

It's all hindsight today. If I had not been up all night with dd (bust her hand yesterday) I would have been up with ds and would have helped him pack and would have noticed the knife.
If I had not made him tidy his room on Saturday he would never have found the damn thing as it was buried under a pile of his cartooning cut outs.
She has still not rung and I'm getting pissed off. She said she would ring at end of school day?
That was 3.45pm
If she does not ring am tempted to send him in tomorrow

Yes, take him in. They'll have to talk to you then. Good luck. He sound a very sensible boy and shouldn't have such an extreme punishment. I can't stand inflexible rules like that, especially ones that carry such a stigma.

Admittedly we had automatic detention for forgetting homework, but everybody knew where they stood. And there was no great shame about it it just taught you a lesson about remembering homework

I'm really upped by the positive messages, I sort of expected a FFS of course he should be banned majority.
I am calmer now, more rational and thinking about my words when they do eventually call.

BFs DS (also in yr7 at the time) was suspended and then permently excluded for having a keyring pocket knife (which he found by the bus stop on the way to school) In his case it was taken off of him by another student, who then threatened a third student Their school rules said clearly that any 'offensive weapon' bought into school would led to expulsion. Anyway, I haven't posted this to scare you but to say that BF successfully appealed and the school was forced to take him back - he'd had no previous trouble, apart from being bullied by a teacher and then other pupils after being moved away from said teacher . It's now a year later and then is no sign at all that any of this happened, he's got better friends, his grades are good and he's happy. BF will freely admit she hit rock bottom (had to go on ADs) whilst it was going on, it happened in June and wasn't sorted (ie him back in school) until November. She felt the same way in that this was the end of DSs school career, he'd be labelled as a trouble maker etc but it hasn't turned out like that. Your DS is young, you will get over this as will he with your support. Don't feel like this is the end, because I can catagorically say it will get better, you will both get through this.

We were told that given his good history that they were not considering a permanent or lenghty exclusion but that in order to show the rest of the school they were serious and harch on this matter, some exclusion would be necessary.
In other words, new Deputy Head (been there 5 weeks) flexing her muscles in her all male environment,
she has to dicuss it with head teacher first, maybe this discussion is lengthy owing to why she has not called yet...