Our primary school says if children need medicine at specific times 'pop' in & DIY

[wonkywillow]

Surely this penalises busy working parents, with occupations where they can't just 'pop' in? Or a parent who simply has other pressing commitments..

Can schools actually do this? They seem to be negating their responsibilities towards providing education and support for children with long term medical conditions that require regular medication.

I snorted at your description of yourself as 'duty-bound', as you know.

Why does that cause you to snort? It is rude, scornful and patronising. Every parent has the duty I talked about in my post.

@Broken11Girl
I am sad we live in a culture where schools won't do a simple task for fear of litigation

Why aren't you sad that parents look to litigation rather than supporting the school?

If I was still at my old school there is not a chance I'd be willing to dispense medication to the child previously discussed - and I have medical training far beyond first aid.

In my experience many/most schools have a number of staff willing to go above and beyond their actual employment because it is for the benefit of the child and that's why we do the jobs we do - for the children.

But along comes one of 'those' parents and spoils it for the rest. A parent that spouts 'discrimination' and looks for someone to blame at the first hurdle is very likely to be one of 'those' - and sensible people won't touch that sort with a barge pole. Not if they value their jobs.

So this means families with children with ongoing health conditions requiring medication risk severe poverty. If both parents to work, financially or are a single parent family. JSA would not be payable either to a family in this situation. So that these children are further disadvantaged in terms of their education. No wonder there is still an education gap.

Ultimately that is what could happen. It isn't the job of schools to enable parents to work. Usually a compromise can be reached but if the parents insist that the school has to do it and the school says they can't - then that's the solution from the LEA. Educational provision is made by home tuition. That's what they are obliged to provide and nothing more.

Because most of the parents appreciate the help from school and don't see it as "right" and try to work with school.
If you have posted about school's reluctance to accommodate your child's specific medical needs, I am very sure you get a lot of supportive and helpful comments from posters including teachers and TAs.

Our primary school says if children need medicine at specific times 'pop' in & DIY
At specific times
Presumably because they simply haven'y got the staff to say:
11:30 stop doing the letters, collect timmy from y2 do timmy's meds
12:00 - sophie needs X half an hour before food
1231 - all the studenys who have parents wantinf them to have calpol will come down
14:00 adam needs a b c
etc.
Not sure on primary but our medical staff are pastoral non teachers and admin staff so having a list of things at specific times might be a logistical nightmare.

If a child has an ongoing medical condition then they will have things in place (we have a lockable fridge and only some staff can get into it to get the meds - secondary). Primary will probably store tjem in the staff room

It might be that if it's something taken 3 times a day, they'd be able to slot in a chikd going to the office over the lunch break, but they can't guarantee speciifc times becayse there's general school stuff.

I don't know, just offering some potential reasons from their side. Annoying, yes. Going straight for discrimination? A little iver the top

A parent that spouts 'discrimination' and looks for someone to blame at the first hurdle is very likely to be one of 'those' - and sensible people won't touch that sort with a barge pole. Not if they value their jobs.

As a parent who knows their child's rights, I also know how to exercise them very subtly but definitely . A Mumsnet thread is very different. This is a public forum and is more about exposing what is actually going on in schools and the mindset of people who work with them. Which has been made abundantly clear.

Every school should have nominated first aiders and part of their training should be the safe administration of medicines. The first aider doesn't have to be a member of teaching staff, in fact it's often better that it isn't. My mother as a school secretary was a first aider and handled all the medicine dispensing for her school. Whoever is in charge of staffing needs to ensure there is always a first aider on the premises. And yes, the school is in loco parentis so it is their job no matter how much they may try to weasel out of it. I'm glad the government guidelines make this clear.

Random administration of Calpol, cough medicines etc would not be covered by above, only prescribed medicines.

Wonky hell would freeze over before I medicated your child. You are abrasive and I would be concerned about the implications if I administered a wrong dose.

I would use discretion with other children, knowing their parents and the type of people they are.

As stated above, the school can provide home tutoring from the LEA to cover their educational responsibility. School IS NOT childcare so parents can work FFS.

In which case OP why bother posting a thread asking people's views if you are so convinced you have all the knowledge and expertise requires and have zero intention of considerinf anyone with a different view to you.

Why not start a thread saying:
i think.... school are clearly discriminating against me... only post if you agree with me or if you'll tell me I'm right to be fuming.
Thanks huns.
P.s. i'll give you brownie points if you tell me to meet with the head/write to the governing body ir call ofsted'

Let’s also remember the guidelines being discussed at with regards children with long standing medical conditions not just x who needs a few days of antibtiocs!

Wonky hell would freeze over before I medicated your child. You are abrasive and I would be concerned about the implications if I administered a wrong dose.

Derm my posting style serves the purpose of uncovering the truth of what is going on in schools and what responsibilities they do have. In real life I would not even expose my views to you. You wouldn't know them.

Why not start a thread saying:
i think.... school are clearly discriminating against me... only post if you agree with me or if you'll tell me I'm right to be fuming.
Thanks huns.
P.s. i'll give you brownie points if you tell me to meet with the head/write to the governing body ir call ofsted'

Because it would not be very informative. I wanted teachers/other school staff/governess to reply. So parents know what they are dealing with when advocating for their children. I wanted people to know what other parents in this pretty stressful situation have to deal with.

my posting style serves the purpose of uncovering the truth of what is going on in schools

I left this thread last night but couldn’t leave this post unanswered.

OP, you sound like you’re on a mission to dig up dirt where there is none. As many people have posted on here, school staff put the children first and do whatever they can to ensure they are happy in school. Sometimes we have to work with obstructive and confrontational parents,but we do it nonetheless. Rather than post about some imaginary conspiracy by schools to avoid supporting children so they can sit on their backsides being lazy, why not start a petition calling on the government to address your concerns through increased funding for schools? I’m sure all the time you’ve spent posting on here could be used much more constructively.

And yes, the school is in loco parentis so it is their job no matter how much they may try to weasel out of it. I'm glad the government guidelines make this clear.

Yes, ferrier. No matter how much they attempt to gaslight parents.

Because it would not be very informative. I wanted teachers/other school staff/governess to reply. So parents know what they are dealing with when advocating for their children. I wanted people to know what other parents in this pretty stressful situation have to deal with.
Except you have zero interest in listening to what peoplr are saying so you're only looking at alternatuve points of view so you can clutch your pearls some more and feel like some kind of victim of discrimination.

You've clearly got a particular question with a particular school but rather than resolve the specific situation (which would be the sensiblr and reasonable thing to do), you've come online as some one woman keyboard warriour who is going to, in the course of a MN thread, open the world's eyes to this stack of discrimination you claim is happening everywhere because a situation in one school wasn't what you wanted.

Riiiggght.

How schools deal with medication for students will depend on a number of factors, factors which even some of the staff don't get informed about because a child's medical situation is circulates on a need to know basis (rightly so).
You cannot possibly decide that your experience = a whole sector.

Equally, people are commenting on your tone because it is smug and you come across like you are just looking to whip up fury online and then pick and choose bits of the thread to suit you.
E.g. people comment on your tone and the impression thry get = seems to give you more proof that you're some wee victim who's taking on the system.

why not start a petition calling on the government to address your concerns through increased funding for schools?

And that would really work? We need a change in government for that to happen and I voted for this.

Oh here we go.
In the time taken to write a reply, we've got gaslighting mentioned.

It's going to be one of those threads where reason is lost quite quickly and anyone who has ever had an issue in school is going to sit and oat each other on thr back in a self-congratulatory way.

What petty stressful situations are you talking about?

And that would really work?

Anything’s got to have more success than you spending hours on here trying to convince people that there is scandal of massive proportions in schools just waiting to be uncovered.

How schools deal with medication for students will depend on a number of factors, factors which even some of the staff don't get informed about because a child's medical situation is circulates on a need to know basis (rightly so).

So not dependent on which parents the teachers decide are 'nice' enough to them? As repeatedly suggested, by teachers apparently, on this thread.

Our school will administer medicine to children who require it every day over an extended period. They will supervise diabetic children checking blood levels, or asthmatic children using an inhaler. A friend of DD's was on regular pain killing medication for a chronic condition and school managed that too.

They won't manage medication for short term things. So won't help with a short course of antibiotics (and don't have refrigeration facilities anyway), won't give Calpol or anything else which either isn't prescribed by a doctor or isn't for something long term.

I think that's fair enough really, there are almost 400 kids at the Primary, and parents would be so quick to sue if there was a mistake.

k2p2k2tog
Especially if they are like the OP, who (i realised after thry got increasingly argumentative and gaslighting got thrown up) is a first time poster who has only ever commented on their own angsty 'people be fuming' thread.

What petty stressful situations are you talking about?

The pretty stressful situations I am talking about is managing a child's long term health condition whilst being subjected to increasing poverty because schools failing to meet children's needs in this way (and others ) is a barrier to parents working.

As soon as we had the School confirmed which Ds would be going to I got in touch with them about his medical needs. Before he started we had meetings with the school nurse to make sure everything was in place. It is up to the parents to work with the school, explain situations and help the school come up with a workable solution.

We have found ways that medicines are due at break and/or dinner time to reduce disruption for example

If I had turned up on day 1 and said “he needs x h and z and these times” I wouldn’t have expected them to be anywhere near as helpful!