excluded from sixth form

[frazzledfifty]

I need advice, please. My 16 year old son has been permanently excluded from sixth form college - he is in lower sixth. We are not appealing. He was at fault (I do not want to go into too many details as that is not the point. Suffice to say we are vacillating between fury and despair.) Has anyone else been in this situation? We can't find any college that will take him now - they either don't have space, do not do in-year transfers or do not offer the same A levels he has been studying. Does anyone know of any college that may be the exception? All I can think is that he should apply to different colleges and start from scratch in September - but what does he do until then? I have looked for coding courses or any other short courses, but can't find anything suitable. I would like him to stay in some kind of structured learning. Alternatively/simultaneously he needs to do some growing up and mature emotionally. I am also happy to send him to any programme/camp that would help, including adventure based learning, but once again I can't find something like that (there is a programme that costs £4000 for twee weeks. That is completely out of the question for us.) He is academic. While I am tempted to let him take any job he could find, I fear he will not return to education.

Work experience until September would be very useful. He's funded until he's 19 so he has time to do 2 more years.

I'm sorry you're going through this - I 'm mum to two 17 yo DS. I'd be making this his problem - you talk a lot about what you want for him and what you think and what "we" have done - but ask him for his plan so he can own it and go and do it. I'd tell him it's his responsiblity and to come back to you with constructive options on what he wants to do and a plan to make it happen.

Have you tried ringing your local education authority? They will have encountered this position before and he is supposed to either be doing something vocational or be in at least part-time education until he is 18

You must then do one of the following until you’re 18:

stay in full-time education, for example at a college
start an apprenticeship or traineeship
spend 20 hours or more a week working or volunteering, while in part-time education or training

He has been permanently excluded. He is an academic. Have you ever considered he might be on the autistic spectrum? You won't change his behaviour if you cannot find out the cause of it all. Sending him to "camps" won't help either. Also new colleges will ask old colleges about him. I think you need help here in getting to the bottom of why he behaves as he does. You haven't given us much to go on so we can't really give an awful lot of help.

Depending on the reason for exclusion other colleges may choose not to accept him. Some will be running short courses alongside formal learning which he could join. He could look at online courses (moocs) via sites such as Coursera or Futurelearn. However if he is not well motivated he may well not bother. Princes Trust might be worth a look. Alternatively look at apprenticeships.

here are a few places that you could try. I do not know if they have space, but it may be worth emailing them to enquire.

link1

link 2

link 3

link4

i hope this helped a bit x

He can do NCS in the summer which is £50 for four week - two week residential and 2 week volunteering but that only runs in the summer.

Could do Prince's trust - I think that runs for 6 months which is all about life skills and volunteering I think.

Make sure he's fully dress and out the door by 9am looking for work experience - he isn't allowed in until 5pm - he can go to the library if he's needing to use a computer.

My Mum took away all of my brothers lux items including branded clothes/electronics/freedom and he needed to earn all of it back. He was also woken up at 6am everyday and kicked out between 9-5 and my mum would randomly check where he was. It was the making of him, he worked his way up in his part time job and got really good work experience. As he had literally nothing to do in the evening except read or draw he found volunteering to do instead.

Thank you for being so helpful, everyone! I am still in utter panic and shock, so am not thinking straight yet. Yes, I agree he has to come up with ideas too. And yes, we would also like to get to the bottom of why he occasionally has extreme lapses of judgement. We have been to the GP, to ed psychs, to an OT, to various psychologists. There is no diagnosis. We have been told he is immature - and that's it. Our local authority has not been able to offer any advice on our next steps. As it is a sixth form college, there is no obligation to find him another place: we have to do it ourselves. We understand that new colleges will be told. After two solid days of calling every option I could think of and coming up with nothing, I just feel defeated.

No advice but there's much worse things that could happen then being thrown out of school. Hope you get something sorted

Thanks sleep, that is very helpful!

Try Prince Trust or some MOOCs

List of MOOCs here

100% recommend princes trust - they do short courses throughout the year
I can’t think of any college in England that takes people on through out the year
What about him starting an apprenticeship or traineeship? They’re all year round

Volunteering is a brilliant idea. Thank you.

Sounds like he might need to do something to at least partly redeem himself if possible.

Start applying for entry in the summer now (and yes, he's going to have to stay an extra year, which sounds like it might be a useful lesson for him), but he's got to do something in the meantime to have any hope of them considering him.

Volunteering would be a start - most Wildlife Trusts and suchlike have volunteer days each week, for example - I'd suggest he does at least four, if not five, days each week without fail, foul weather or fair.

It'll mean he also has work experience and a reference that might be listened to in preference to his school/college reference when looking for other jobs in the future.

And Prince's Trust is just wonderful. As is the list of MOOCs. This is exactly the practical advice I needed. One again thank you.

I would be tempted to get him low level manual work to show him what he may end up doing day in day out.

Let him spend the rest of the academic year doing a job, PT or FT depending on what's available, or voluntary work, and start again next year. In the long run it won't make any difference as long as he has not acquired a criminal record in the process. And hopefully it will teach him to be more careful in future.

Hello! Have you had a look at WhiteHat? They're an apprenticeship provider that help young people get straight into work. Anyone applying needs a minimum of five GCSEs grades A*-C, but otherwise there's no other criteria. They really understand that school isn't for everyone and that a lot of people want to learn on the job. Definitely worth having a look and/or speaking to one of their team.

"I would be tempted to get him low level manual work to show him what he may end up doing day in day out."

MIL did that with my SIL when she wanted to leave school before her O levels. It worked!