School discriminating against one parent in favour of the other

[OhNoooNotAgain]

I don't know whether this is the right board for this so apologies if not.

Basically the school my DP's children attend consistently favours their DM over him. It's been constant with things like tickets for events and places on trips where only one/two places are available they always allow her to take it out give to one of her family members over him. They charge him for things over and above his 50% just because she says so and they just take her word for it. There are lots of examples and it's been consistent. They say they can't take sides, but on every single occasion they do side with her. He has 50/50 care for very good reasons.

The newest issue is that they are refusing for him to allow me to pick the kids up for him, whether planned or in an emergency. The court order specifies she needs to be informed if someone other than him is caring for the children and vice versa, not that they need the other parents permission, and her mother does a lot of the care for her. School have no issue whatsoever with her mother picking the DC's up but they are refusing to allow me to.

He has complained to the school constantly about the way they are favouring her, they always just repeat that they can't take sides despite the fact that they clearly do. What steps can he take next? Does he need to go to court, Ofsted, council etc?

I'm grateful for any advice at all!

This sounds all too common. Not much to offer, but have you seen this www.gov.uk/government/publications/dealing-with-issues-relating-to-parental-responsibility/understanding-and-dealing-with-issues-relating-to-parental-responsibility?

Thanks for the reply!

Yes we've referred to all that before and it doesn't get him anywhere. It's so frustrating! I'm sort of relieved to see you say that it's common though because I've searched and searched and can't find any similar cases to refer to.

HE needs to complain to the governors. Ask the head teacher for the school's complaints policy. Also worth asking the LEA about any advice they give schools about this sort of stuff.

Thanks, he has complained to the head before, a compounding issue now is that the current head is leaving this term- ie, next week!

It's so frustrating.

Also worth asking the LEA is this part irrelevant if it’s an academy?

Yes unfortunately it's an academy. I think it would be simpler of it weren't.

I think I'd get a lawyer to write to the school, copying in the governors.

Have you followed the formal complaints policy?

Why are you so insistent on picking your partner's kids up from school? If 50/50 is in place then shortly he has committed to 50% care. And in case of an emergency can't the mother pick the kids up from school rather than you? Comparing her mother to you is a bit odd frankly. She is the kids grandmother and you are not a blood relation.

We have been following the company's procedure but they keep refusing to deal with it which is the difficulty.

Rentingstress I knew a comment like that would come up. So mum is entitled to assistance (which actually in this care practically amounts to handing over all "parenting") but Dad had to do everything, absolutely everything, himself? We are not allowed to behave as a united family unit? If I made a post about my partner refusing to ever have anything to do with my kids because they're not his and he expects me to everything people would jump on telling me to LTB! Let's start treating mums and dads fairly shall we instead...

Anyway, moving on...

😂

Schools honestly have not got the time or resources to be judging what is precisely fair between separated parents when it comes to things like concert tickets or trips. It is generally first come, first served.

When you say ‘allowed to pick them up’, did you just turn up one day? If the member of staff did not recognise you then no, they probably wouldn’t release the children to you and the next step would be to phone a parent to check arrangements.

How exactly do you know this school has no time or is not prejudice? I hate sweeping assertions like this belittling people's experiences with zero evidence.

"When you say ‘allowed to pick them up’, did you just turn up one day? If the member of staff did not recognise you then no, they probably wouldn’t release the children to you and the next step would be to phone a parent to check arrangements."

As I said originally, they weren't allowing it planned or in an emergency even with my partners permission direct to them. They didn't need to phone a parent as he spoke to them direct (it arose as an emergency) but then they wouldn't even let me after filling in their forms for permission for planned occasions.

As I said the issue was that it's been so many issues over a long period of time. They favour mum over him on every occasion, it's not a question of time.

Gamble - I taught in primary schools for ten years, so I have a fairly good idea of what is feasible for schools.

I mentioned time mostly in relation to concert tickets etc. The school office administers the tickets eg. two tickets per family. If two tickets have been collected for Child A and their sibling then they are not likely to have the time or inclination to explore exactly who those tickets are going to or whether that is ‘fair’.

With regards to collecting, I suggest meeting with the teacher and your DP at the beginning of the year so that you are introduced early on. If your DP has given permission for you to collect and lets the teacher know in advance, then that should be sufficient.

That's the problem though maybe, known or not, planned or not, they would not allow me to collect the children for DP without their Mum signing a form- despite this directly contradicting the wording of their court order- while at the same time allowing her to let other people collect.

We could understand from the point of view of tickets etc that they just can't be bothered to do more than take the first instruction, or that they know she might make a scene so they want to avoid that, but neither actually make it ok to discriminate against the father.

Tickets is nothing to do with 'can't be bothered' and everything to do with spending their time and resources educating children. Imagine if every child had two parents behaving this ridiculously!

The collecting thing should be sorted out.

It's only one parent behaving ridiculously, my DP wants to share everything but their mum tries to block him from everything when possible- even if she doesn't want to go herself. The problem is the school enabling that which isn't fair on the children- and it's them who matter.

And I was referring to the office in relation to tickets. In general the teaching staff are amazing!

How long have you been with your DP? If its a new relationship maybe they have concerns. A grandmother who has always been in the DCs life is entirely different to a father's new girlfriend picking them up. Surely they would have told him why they won't let you pick the DC?

I doubt the school have time to think about 'taking sides'. Schools deal with many separated parents. With the ticket thing, it's probably that their Mum gets there first. Ours only allows 2 tickets per family, separated parents have to battle it out for themselves.

Ah, so they probably use a form as a way of keeping track of who has permission to collect children.

The best thing to do is probably to ask the children's mum to add your name to the form. I know that technically you 'shouldn't' have to do this, but it will achieve your end goal which is all that matters, right?

On the subject of school offices, they are hugely busy places. They are the first point of contact from anything from admissions, ill children to social services on the phone needing to speak to the head ASAP. The people who work in them need to memorise many hundreds of names, faces and individual needs, all the while trying to tally up the dinner register and balance urgent with less urgent priorities. School secretaries are not generally people who 'can't be bothered'. If they were, they would definitely be in the wrong job!

Surely a parent can give permission for whoever they want to pick their child up as long as the school have been informed. FWIW I have mummy friends at school who pick up my dc some days and vice versa. They're not blood relatives or a major part of my dc's life but sometimes we have appts etc so help each other out. I just tell the teacher in the morning and it's fine. If he has PR and 50:50 care then surely it's up to him how he manages school pick ups on his days?

Mummyshark that's exactly what I'm getting at.

Onetough having to battle it out- that's just never fair on the children is it? All my DP wants is for it to be fair between the parents, the problem comes when she wants to make it all about her. It's not a new relationship, they've seen me many times with him as well. There are no safeguarding concerns about him- except wild accusations that she has made which were proved to be false by police, ss, etc- however she has a significant mental health condition which makes her unpredictable, difficult to reason with etc. There are also concerns regarding her mother's mental health but unlike hers, that's not proven. The issue seems to be that the school know that she is a risk for unstable behaviours, but my DP is not.