Should school have contacted DS's sports coach about an incident that took place at school?

[ptangyangkipperbang]

DS aged 8 got into a fight at school. It was over with in a few mins, the boys made up and they missed a playtime and had to write about the incident at lunchtime. I thought it had all been dealt with and supported the school by talking to DS about making the right choices, etc, etc.

A week later the boys went to judo and were called over by the coach who talked to them about their behaviour as one of them had mentioned a judo throw had been used when they were fighting.

It turns out that without asking permission from parents the school had contacted the judo coach to ask him to 'tell them off'. The school have a relationship with the coach because he'd run an after school club there in the past so he'd been put in a difficult position.

1. Can the school contact an outside body without a parents permission? (Excluding child protection)

1. Can the school 'sub-contract' discipline?

1. Have the school over reacted?

1. AIBU to be really cross?!

Any comments gratefully received as I'm a bit open mouthed about it all.

and I've answered it aftermay!

You haven't mrz.

I suggest you re read the thread Growlithe

No, you suggested breach of common law confidentiality, did not define it, and did not tell us what penalty it carried.

If you look further back I also said they would be in breach of other regulations (but that would be up to the legal dept to sort out)

I dont think that there is such a big difference between telling the coach about the fight and telling a local shopkeeper about a pupil caught stealing. They are certainly in the same order of situation.

And this is the problem, it is all shades of grey.

This is why there are guidelines/rules etc. While there might be some justification for going to the judo coach there would be less justification for going to the shopkeeper. However once you have set a precedent that sometimes it is okay to tell an unrelated person about minor discipline problems it get easier to make the next step. It also becomes harder to say 'no, this is confidential'.

Most come under the Children's Act 1989 & 2004

Mrz It's all very vague. You would have to get the legal dept to sort it. So what gives you the authority to comment with such certainty on other schools and the actions of their staff?

All schools will have policies regarding confidentiality. I would have thought what the school did would go against most schools' basic rules regarding this. Rules are there for a reason. Procedures and policies are there for a reason. For example CRB checks go some way to ensure the safety of children. Such as all agencies working with children will require staff have an enhanced CRB check to try to ensure suitability. Judo coach had run a club in the past but is not current member of staff - even if he had a CRB check in the past I believe if coach had a gap in employment and no or minimal contact with the school since, his CRB check would no longer have been valid. He could have been up to anything. Yes one might say he runs a Judo club that OP sends her child to. However club is completely different entitity with its own rules re CRB checks etc. OP would have been aware of this when she sent her child there. It was up to her to ensure suitability and safety of her child in her club. Whether she leaves her child there, what information to share with coach. Up to her. Her decision. Her call. NOT the school's.
No-one on here disputes the boys did wrong, but the school did.

excellent post Leonard

Thank you :)

I thought CRB checks only covered your suitability to work with children within a setting. How does it apply in this case?

I think the relevance is that the school had no up to date knowledge about the judo coach, he was simply a third party. They had no knowledge of how the judo club was run and whether the judo coach was an appropriate person to contact in this situation.

The school was acting simply on assumption and out of date knowledge of an individual.

I used to be a governor (CRB checked) at a primary school and privy to a lot of pupil information. I am no longer a governor so if the school were to contact me about a pupil issue because I knew the pupil involved and had been a governor in the past this would be entirely wrong.

But what would that have to do with your CRB? I am CRB checked at my DCs schools but it wouldn't be appropriate for them to contact me with information about a child.

The CRB issue is completely irrelevant. The school did not place the children in the coach's care. The parent did.

'The school did not place the children in the coach's care' but they shared confidential school info with a him, a third party, not school staff, not vetted by school. Yes parent's choice to place him in coach's care. Parent's choice whether school shared info? No.

It seems that the school contacted the judo coach simply because they knew who he was (or thought they did). The fact that he might have been someone they had known and trusted in the past should not have given the school the green light to contact him.

I am guessing that if the school had not known the judo coach from a previous situation then they wouldnt have contacted him.

I am using the CRB checking as a kind of shorthand for the kind of knowledge and trust the school appeared to have placed in the judo coach.

But CRB only covers whether a person has a criminal past which would deem it inappropriate for a setting to have children in their care. What you are saying is it covers information too?

So anyone who handles data relating to children needs to have a CRB check?

CRB is a red herring in this case. If a law concerning confidentiality has been breached, it wouldn't matter if the coach's CRB check was in or out of date.

Was that to me Growlithe?

As I said I am using CRB checking as a sort of shorthand for the kind of knowledge of and trust in the judo coach the school appears to have had. It appears to me that the school has perceived the judo coach as a colleague.

In my opinion because of this perception the school felt happy to breach its own behaviour guidelines.

CRB (though I accept they're not infallible) is just one of the ways to ascertain whether appropriate for school to share info with him. If he were school staff, he would have one and would be subject to their usual procedures regarding info sharing. He was not, therefore he probably hadn't, therefore he wasn't.

Do we know the school's behaviour guidelines? I'm confused now.

YY WorrySighWorrySigh that's what I think I was saying too. :)

Expected behaviour from staff I beleive that means.

Surely this is the basics.

What happens in school should not be discussed by staff with people outside of the school.

ptangyangkipperbang Tue 14-May-13 21:01:53
Is a school allowed to contact 3rd parties as their Behaviour Policy suggests not?

I believe you are now writing the guidelines for a school you don't even know.

My point on here is there have been comments on the school breaking the law, but no one has told me what that law is, what bit they broke and what penalties can be expected.

Then the OP needs to weigh that information against the fact that it was her son's behaviour which caused this, and act accordingly.

Ah sorry to assume what you meant there, WorrySighWorrySigh.
But wow!! I missed this bit - so OP states school spelt it out so clearly in their policies
They were wrong wrong bloody wrong.