Complaint against school

[tubsters]

Posting with a name change to protect my child’s identity. Has anyone had experience with a Level 3 complaint panel hearing at a school?

My 12-year-old son, who has never really been in trouble before, was given what I feel were punitive and degrading punishments. For example, he was made to sit alone on a bench in the yard for about an hour, as all the other children walked past knowing he’d been excluded from a trip – a clear act of public humiliation.

He was also called into a meeting with the Head and three other teachers, where he was pressured to end every sentence with “sir.” He was clearly nervous, and this only heightened the power imbalance and distress he felt. he is usually very polite and would always use ‘sir ‘ in normal circumstances

I accept that children need discipline and have always supported teachers, but the way this was handled felt oppressive and unnecessary, especially for a child who posed no danger and was already anxious.

The Head has denied much of this, so I escalated it to the governors and it’s now going to a panel hearing. I feel quite daunted about going up against the school, but I strongly believe this needs to be addressed for my son’s sake and for other children in the future.

If anyone has been through a panel hearing and can share their experience or advice, I’d be really grateful.

Wow ok, it just sounds like you kept him in and the next year and THEN he had that episode during crosscountry. I also thought that perhaps you wrote that the school hadn’t learnt the lesson.

Headteacher, Head of year, teacher who witnessed the incident?

Not OTT at all.

Perfectly normal in my school to have meetings with students where several teachers/staff members are present. It's not designed to intimidate - it's designed to ensure that everyone with the appropriate expertise is in the room to support that child.

I haven't read all the replies but it feels totally wrong that your son was treated so harshly

Asked to sit on a bench for supervision and safety while others boarded a bus

Asked to call the head teacher 'sir' as per usual school practice

Apparently given an unknown punishment for an unknown misdemeanour

I was actually 52 minutes. The other child timed it on his watch.
they were deliberating on whether he should go on the trip or not that was just a confusing part- They were excluded while they were deliberating on what to do with no explanation.

He was asked to sit on a bench. That’s it and all about it.

Well, he certainly wasn’t supported

The other thing is that the teachers involved may privately know ( if they think about it )that the situation didn't turn out well and be sorry that you and your son were so upset . Officially the school may have to fight back and justify what they did .If you support your son that may be all that really matters.You are done with them all now .And perhaps save your energy.
And I firmly believe that people reap what they sow , good and bad .
And certainly it helped my sons to privately have a different view of authority and its limitations although they appear law abiding on the surface

Sorry @tubsters , I just re-read this. Has your DS already left this school? So this is all just a point of principle?

I actually agree with you about the inappropriateness of making him sit on the bench infront of everyone, but for your DS's sake, let it go. It happened in the past and would already have been forgotten by your DS, his friends and the teaching staff by now. Raking over it again and again will not get you any benefit, but could end with your DS being less willing to bring concerns to you in future if he thinks that you going off the deep-end (even in defending him) is likely to make things worse.

You are a wonderful parent. You have defended your cub. Now let it go.

Wow, OP, you are truly the mistress of obfuscation. And A* in stickability.

I love that in their distress and 'humiliation' they still had the nous to time how long they were on the bench, so they could use their 'evidence' to complain to mummy later and get the teachers in trouble for being 'mean'.

I find it incredibly hard to believe that the teachers were genuinely deliberating for 52 minutes.

Delaying a trip for that amount of time would make the trip no longer viable. It literally doesn't make any sense to the point of being implausible.

Regardless of whatever random timer your son's friend put on his phone - it's not evidence of anything in reality.

Thank you xxx

Er, ok..

no..just clarifying. A bit like your posts to me

It's kind of relevant.

It's completely irrelevant. OP isn't contesting that were needed, she's contesting the way the type of consequences that were used.

Humiliation is never appropriate, whatever he did, so you're only asking to be nosy.

Where’s the laugh emoji when you need it?

"Was it drug related"? Have you run out of inane things to say now or are there more to come?

Do you think drug-related consequences are sitting on a bench, a meeting, and no police involvement?

Not nosy at all. @tubsters chose to be vague about what her son did. Had she wanted only to know how a complaints panel operated, she could have put up thread asking just that. But she didn't.

She chose to be vague because it's irrelevant.

She wants to know how a complaints panel works with respect to complaining about an inappropriate and humiliating punishment being used. Humiliation is never appropriate, regardless of the behaviour of the child, so it doesn't matter what he did.

As I said: nosy.

If my DC’s biggest upset was sitting on a bench whilst his teachers walked others to a bus for a trip he was missing out on through his own poor choices, I think I might just have a cup of tea and think ‘sounds about right’ and feel like I was winning at life. If it crushed him like a petal I would be peeved though, and have a serious word with myself about where I’d done the poor lad wrong

Hopefully she does take her son out and then the school would be rid of one more 'know it all' parent of 'perfect' children, who couldn't possibly do anything wrong.

I'm sure they'd be sad to see the back of her and her little cherub.

Yes

I know, right?! Another parent who thinks their little angel never misconstrues or misrepresents a situation. Sigh.

The kid has done wrong, but now the mum wonders why he was 'not supported'. One wonders what type of adults these kids will be.

OP if you're going to pursue this, persure the procedure not the treatment - why did the offical punishment happen the day after but he was excluded that day? Did you know it would be happening or that he'd be put in internal suspension or not? Does the behaviour seem jn-line with the behaviour policy. Because it will be a very difficult complaint otherwise - the school will talk about staffing, how he did cry (it wasn't a situation of pastoral significance or SEN or disability where they alienated a child for an issue outside of their control is what they will argue) and Level 3 may not reach this threshold.

Regardless of the incident, sometimes when busy e.g about to go on a school trip, staff are having conversations, going over risk assessment (which they may have been adapting due to your son or his friends) for kids who have SEN, any disabilities which are physical or sensory or chronic, procedures for children who have those needs, checking in on whether your son can go -about whether they were supporting him -that is supporting him, having a fair (hopefully) discussion on whether he should attend and if so, how they deal with him if does or doesn't go, staff involved need to be aware to give suport if and when needed. However if the incident happened early or even in midday, the day before I'd question why this decision wasn't made that day, so youhad notice or was he following up on the behaviour before the school trip was about to leave and a decision was then made?

It's hard to anyone to agree with you on "proportionate" when you don't share the thing he was being punished for.