Deceitful behaviour from school - don't know where to turn

[godofthunder24]

Hi,

My son's school denied him access for 3 days last year due to his mum having COVID. Following our own research we determined that it was unlawful for the school to deny access for this reason.

Once we presented the legal advice to the school they changed their advice and altered their criteria for allowing my son back into school. It seems very clear to me that they were concerned about the repercussions of unlawful actions and tried to misrepresent their original instructions.

I complained to the school and I've gone through the complaints process with the chair of governors, a complaints panel and the DfE.

The governors have consistently provided inaccurate information during the complaints process which I strongly believe is their attempt to cover up the schools original actions. The governors have access to all of the evidence which is in email form but they continue to misrepresent that evidence.

The DfE have confirmed that the decision to deny access was unlawful.

The Local Authority are not willing to do any other than ensure the school is adhering to the complaints process from now forwards.

I am literally sick to death of feeling wronged by the school and not having a channel that will listen to me and go through the evidence in sufficient detail.

I don't really want to go down the legal route myself but feel like I'm running out of options. Would be great to hear any advice from someone in the know or someone who has been through something similar.

Many thanks,
Ian.

Of course not. It is well established that children with potentially serious infectious diseases should be kept at home. That is not what we are dealing with here.

I would hope schools can refuse to care for an ill child, who might make other children ill...

But that is not OP's situation, since there is no suggestion his son was unwell.

But according to some posters ANY TIME a school sends a child home is an 'exclusion'.

It’s also highly unprofessional.

Especially if some of the ‘batshit’ parents have mental health problems, disabilities or stressful social problems (e.g. domestic abuse) that mean they may not always behave in a typical way, compared to healthy, able people.

In most professional settings, staff don’t moan and gossip about service users.

If they need ‘catharsis’, to decompress from difficult interactions or stress, they have reflective practice discussions with a manager or as a team. Or are offered counselling sessions.

In social housing, a culture developed of brushing off tenants, as ‘that tenant’, ‘serial complainers’ or ‘troublemakers’. Tenants weren’t listened to. 72 people died in a fire they’d warned about.

Which posters?

Neither is a child whose D&V is over. But they are potentially still able to pass it on to others, which is why they can't return to school for 48 hours after the last episode of D or V, even.if they feel completely well.

And some parents are just babyish whiners. These do get spoken about in the staff room. Believe me teachers are well aware of the ones with issues. In my experience they are discussed sympathetically. Not the batshit ones though. Whether you believe it’s right or wrong, it happens and that was my only point,

You did at 8.50 today, for example, as did the poster following you.

Having worked within a school I would say to you that teachers, as a profession, are very loath to admit any mistakes, ever, in public. It can lead to infuriating behaviour and them tying themselves in knots. You are very unlikely to solve this by pressing your case further, as they will have put you in a mental box marked “difficult parent” and once you’re in that box they don’t need to consider the merits of your argument any further.

I get that it’s the gaslighting which is pissing you off most. But I would walk away from it now.

Your complaint was upheld. Measures in place to prevent a similar thing happening in the future. The complaints procedure is ended.

In my experience of schools they don't admit when they make mistakes and reflect on it so improvements can be made in the future. It's a simple thing that's done in other industries and we are encouraged to do it in health care so we can learn from it and improve for the future. Unfortunately I've seen them become unnecessarily defensive and obstructive at the slightest criticism. I think it would be a good example for the kids too, people make mistakes.

I 100% agree. They will def not give the op the gushing apology he is hoping for. They will change practice but definitely not have the candour that is present in other industries.

It sounds to me like one of the things you would value the most is the admitting of a mistake and an apology. Yet it also sounds as though this isn’t going to happen. I completely understand that this is deeply frustrating but I also think that since you all now no longer have any connections to the school, this apology is all the less likely to be provided. I think we’ve all been in situations when the thing we’d want most is the other side to admit a wrongdoing and apologise, yet I expect we have also all been in situations when even if that apology finally comes, it still doesn’t necessarily make us feel better as it almost feels forced and not genuine anyway. My fear is that at this stage even if you did get any apology, it would hardly seem genuine to you and wouldn’t suddenly make you feel at peace with it all. I’m not sure if that makes sense but I guess what I think I’m trying to say is that sadly, this will always remain a situation that wasn’t handled as you’d have hoped and that you now need to channel your energies into moving on. You can control your own reactions but unfortunately you can never control those of others. I hope your son has settled well into Yr7 and this new school works out well for you all.

In most professional settings, staff don’t moan and gossip about service users.

Do you really think that??

You sound pathetic tbh. Move on or leave them alone but stop this crusade for some kind of recognition for being wronged. It was a few days off school ffs.

Yes. I accept it happens in unprofessional settings.

I had a annual review for my child where the senco cut and pasted her AR from last year into this year's. Dd was almost expelled last year. Said she had made zero progress and was dangerous. Dispite a complete turnaround in her behavior. My mum died suddenly hence her bad behaviour last year.

I was told all this year she was doing great. Good academic work, better behavior so imagine my surprise when I got this alfwul report.

I challenged it and after weeks of robustly asking how could the report be in such stark contrast to the feedback I'd had all year inc parents eve. Very slowly they admitted each section was wrong as I put evidence forward to prove it was wrong. Even the dates was from last years report.

My daughter was going to be moved to a SEN school on that report.

No one at all willingly admitted a mistake or was even willing to admit it might be a mistake. I had to involve my LA. But I didn't raise a complaint and I approached the LA separately without telling school.

Once school close ranks your screwed.

So decide what you want here. It's not in my child's best interest to complain or win or prove I'm right. It's in her and my best interests to protect her and let the school and other parents deal with a senco who just blindly copies and pastes reports that are wildly out of date.

Ie to hold the senior mangers and therefore the senco to account would harm my child. I feel the senco is dangerously incompetent because her report would have sent my child to semh school. But I'm not going there because schools do close ranks and they do not appreciate learning from mistakes. You will be the problem. Whatever mistake they have made. Not all SMTs are like this. But too many are.

in my job though (publishing) we dealt with tricky authors and customers.

Tricky authors would vary from a handover of handle with care to one situation where all the communication went through a high up manager

customers again there was a list that if one rang it would go to a senior advisor or manager

i assume schools can be the same

I suspect some of this is frustration with yourself - there was no need to inform the school of his mother's covid.

If he's no longer at this school and it's been a year - seriously you are likely the one hung up on this and he's likley moved on or normally would have.

An apology for people who likely won't mean it from a school your child no longer attends - it's meaningless.

I get the frustration and annoyance about lying - we sat in a meeting to talk about lies we'd already proved with one dc school just before GCSE were so to get ambushed by a whole new lot - unfortunately for them IT is our area so got when pointed out rubbish and they backed down then at one point another staff member was recounted a very differnt conversation to one I thought we had and had to remind her I had a witness - she back down immedailet;y. Upshot was HT still belived DS was in wrong - but we got what we needed which was a way for him to hand his coursework in. Worse in my eyes there seems to have been some attempt to blacken my child's name informally when started at college - time has shown college our child was not ever an issue. We had a younger child left in the school couldn't move GCSE years which has been a pain but school seems to have a short memory and seem surpised neither that child nor us want them to stay on.

Had similar isses with HCP personally and family wide - including notes doctored after fact and lies exposed. Complaints get managed away when you get to a postion you feel you can complain. It's little comformt when time proves you right and some later scandel blows up in that department alomg similar lines.

It's shocking when you find professionals outright lying - but you need to move on.

Do you seriously think there is the time and resources for all these reflective meetings?

I'm going against the grain a bit, and I think the OP has had a rough time on here.
I think it's absolutely worth pursuing an acknowledgement/apology from a school that has knowingly misrepresented evidence and consistently given inaccurate information.
If they can do it for this issue, who can say they're not doing it/wouldn't do it for something else? It's not OK to run a school like that.

Then why leave your child there?

Ie to hold the senior mangers and therefore the senco to account would harm my child. I feel the senco is dangerously incompetent because her report would have sent my child to semh school. But I'm not going there because schools do close ranks and they do not appreciate learning from mistakes. You will be the problem. Whatever mistake they have made. Not all SMTs are like this. But too many are.

We had same with some shcoking elder care - learnt form maternity compliants from Dsis and me that left us heard and managment acknowledge they'd fucked up but with us having lesser care afterwards. We couldn't be there 24/7 to protect them and needed care to improve - so you have to be careful and work with/round them.

Here the child no longer at the school - I'd have left it with a written complaint and thought a change in procedure they got going foward was a win.

Name, shame and infame the lot of them!