6yo absconded from school - help?!

[KimberleyS91]

I'm looking to gain some understanding/perspective as obviously my anxiety is at an all time high right now and I'm exhausted from the last week.

Tuesday my 6yo managed to escape from school. It was a serious incident - he was missing for 30-40 minutes, walked home, met a stranger, walked back home again with the stranger, crossed multiple roads... so yeah, a LOT of risks and just pure luck nothing went wrong. The school didn't call the police when they realised he was missing.

Thankfully my son is safe and of course I am grateful for this. He is awaiting an ADHD assessment and this has all been added to his referral and they're looking at different strategies to help with his emotional regulation, etc.

Thing is, I can't understand why the perimeter of the school playground can't be secured. The gates have bolts but the main gates are open all day long. He literally walked up a set of steps and off out. No one saw him despite PSA's being "strategically placed". Access to the buildings is secure, but in theory, anyone could walk into the grounds.

I'm originally from England where I understand that primary school perimeters are secured/locked. Here in Scotland, that doesn't seem the norm? I've been told it's so the school doesn't seem "like a prison" and that there are kids and parents coming in and out at various times of the day, which makes complete sense... but based on this, how do schools that ARE locked manage?

It's been an awful week, so please be gentle with me! There have been countless meetings, conversations, emails... it's been genuinely quite traumatic but I just don't know where I go from here. Thank you.

Scottish schools are not "shite". I hardly think you can comment on every single school. What a narrow minded and rude comment.

Also, as you seem incapable of reading like most of the others who have replied on this thread, it's not actually standard to have unlocked gates and free access to the grounds in Scottish schools.

Schools do have protocols for visitors and site access but they also have fire escape routes! These are one way exit doors. The dc don’t just pile out via reception!

A public footpath can be fenced. It doesn’t have to be open. Most schools would not accept this. Footpaths are often diverted to keep school premises intact.

Nothing in any of this discussion alters the fact that the school must keep dc safe and they didn’t. It is vital their security is reviewed.

Ds school gates are locked. You have to be buzzed in.

Then there's another gate that you need to be buzzed into.
The there's the main door it need buzzing again.
The finally there is one more door to buzz and you finally get into the building.
Ds school is a special needs school and they would have regular escapes if there wasn't so much security in place.
The children only have one way out onto the street.

In the case I am thinking of, the public footpath cannot be fenced off as it is also the only access from the school door to the actual playground. It is difficult to describe but there is a public footpath that runs immediately along the side of the Victorian school building which is also the only access to the playground. Topography of the site (steep slope) would prevent widening the path or running an access path along the other side of the building. Well I guess it might be possible to do it but you'd probably have to tunnel into the hillside to do it which would be prohibitively expensive to do safely in such a way that it didn't cause collapse of adjacent road, homes and gardens!

I don’t really have time to send you the many pieces of evidence for how poor the Scottish education system is, but you can feel free to google it!

@EducatingArti The school could also ask that the footpath is deleted. It’s not a given that it must stay. Or get it rerouted. Depends what school feels about dc getting out!

Have only read page one of this. I am in Scotland and our local primary definitely does have a high fence and locked gates. The only way in is via the office which has security cameras and buzzer. I thought this was standard following Dunblane across all Scottish schools but obvs not.

I visited a school once that had their button so high up I couldn't reach it and I'm an adult!

On the short side but still!
That would really annoy me if I worked there

Love the comments about SEN kids being at fault. Couldn't eyeroll hard enough. He's 6 it is the school's job to keep him safely on school grounds.

My youngest DS did this once at a similar age, he's Autistic we live 5 minutes walk away, he was really distressed and wanted me. It didn't occur to him I might not be home, luckily I was. As soon as I knew he was OK I phoned the school, they suspected someone was missing, a teacher thought they saw a kid walking up the street at the end of lunch time and they had just made an announcement asking all the teachers to do a head count. His teacher had already noticed and was about to contact the office so they were all over it. He ran home and was probably off school grounds for 3 or 4 minutes. When i spoke to the school afterwards they agreed if he was distressed and needs me the school will call and I'll speak to him on the phone or come down if needed, which he knows now. I spoke to 2 of the deputy's and one spoke to him when he was back the next day but it was all around making sure he was OK and letting him know that there were extra adults as well as his teacher that he could go to if he needed anything.

When I pointed out I might not have been home he hadn't considered that so that made an impact. I've got a key safe by the front door now, so he can let himself in and my phone number written beside the land line. I was on edge for months afterwards, and felt really anxious whenever the school called. I have 3 Autistic DC and 2 of them also have medical conditions so the school calls a lot. But it's been nearly 2 years now and it never happened again.

No thanks. I don't need any info about the Scottish education system and it is not poor. The English system is not superior by any means.

The statistics don’t lie. I’m Scottish by the way, with many family members working in education. As I say, the academic results are terrible (kids leaving p7 unable to read!) but actively putting the children in danger is a whole other issue.

There is no real space to re-route it without serious engineering, as I have already explained. It gives access from one side of the village to the church and the bus stop. It also gives access from one of the 2 areas parents can park at school drop off/pick up and the school.

Good for you. But you cannot say the entire system is bad just because of your own limited experience. And children are not in danger because leaving gates unlocked and schools not secure is not a standard thing.

Also if a child is leaving primary school unable to read then that's clearly either a fault with that particular school or the child has additional needs. It is neither common nor something which doesn't also happen in England.

@TizerorFizz
Actually come to think of it, the entrance to the school building is not directly accessible from the road. You can only reach it by using an albeit short section of the footpath. I suppose they could catapult the children from the road?

They do actually close the fork of the path that goes up to the bus stop once a year but that is for pagan ritual practices!

What leads you to the conclusion that Scottish schools are “shite”?

And as several people on here have posted, in general, schools in Scotland ARE locked. In fact, OP has clarified that it was nothing to do with gates, the child walked out through a hole in the fence. Hardly something that’s representative of all schools in Scotland 🤦‍♀️.

How are English schools doing it? Clearly not well enough since it did actually happen. Sounds like England was waiting for this to happen before they changed policies.

OR. Maybe in both cases there was a lack of security. One which is not necessarily an indicator of the situation in all schools, just those particular ones.

And OP has clarified that it was nothing to do with gates being locked, it’s that there’s a hole in the fence that has been there for an extended period of time without being addressed. Clearly that’s not a national policy.

The bar for deleting or even re-routing a PROW that likely predates the existence of a school by hundreds of years is extremely high. There's a private school in London currently trying to do this and facing a massive legal battle with the council and residents. Not least because the footpath is used by local school children who would otherwise have a much longer walk to school along busy roads.

Morning, so another update..!

So firstly, the gap is very noticeable and the staff are aware. Children/parents have just been lazy and walked round the fence creating a little walk way. But this leads directly on to the road entrance to the car park.

I was pulled in this morning to talk about a query I had about smart watches with trackers. They discourage them because of the distraction and also because I would be able to hear into conversations with other children if he were to call me so it’s a data protection thing. It doesn’t help in terms of alleviating my anxiety, but I suppose I understand where they’re coming from.

It turns out that on that day, he had got a plaster from the infant building and should have stayed in the infant playground but he’s come down to the main playground (like I said, this isn’t uncommon as they go back into their classes this way). What I didn’t know until this morning is that he’s come down to the playground, actually gone into the building, gone into his classroom, got his bag and coat, came out the classroom door and then left the main playground like I said. They’ve told me that the reason he wouldn’t have been stopped is because staff wouldn’t have known he was P2 or something along those lines. I still can’t wrap my head around it. Not only that, when staff realised he was missing, another member from the nursery staff had actually seen him walking past the nursery and towards home. They didn’t query it because they assumed he was with me or meeting me for a home lunch. Apparently some children go out that way or something (my head was a jumble) for home lunches to meet parents. I said “yes but at 6 years old?” And didn’t really get an answer.

I have also been contacting local schools to see about moving him and at least in my area they do not lock gates. If the gates HAS been locked, he wouldn’t have gotten out the main gates to drive in. I’ve been told these are now being bolted during the day but parents may leave them open anyway. They also somehow knew I had been looking elsewhere.

I think they’re feeling irritated that nothing they say or do is resolving the situation. They’ve told me they think this was just him being impulsive and won’t happen again but they know I’ve lost trust and they want to know if there’s anything they can actually do. Short of securing the site perimeter, I don’t know myself, especially if they won’t allow him a tracker watch.

I have no idea what to do from here. They may be irritated but I am still anxious. My son could easily have been injured, abducted or even worse and it breaks my heart thinking about him being in that much danger. I don’t know how to move on from it.

The Stockport attack didn’t happen in a school. Schools are locked. HTH

I didn’t know schools in England are supposed to be locked. I read this thread last night and looked closely both at the one near nursery and the school near my house this morning, both primaries. As of 10:30 and 10:45, neither was locked. One had the main gate open, one was closed but not locked. The actual schools are fingerprint accessed from outside, but the inside is just a touch sensor. My son will likely go to one of them, so I’m a bit concerned if they should be more secured!

I’m not sure what your next steps are here, if I’m honest, I’m sorry. Does he wonder off from you? It sounds horribly stressful and I can imagine it feels difficult to trust that he’s there and okay now. Can he have more adult supervision? Would he qualify for a support person?

@YouveGotAFastCar. Are you sure they are not closed? Many schools have a drive way that is open and a front that can get you to the front door. However the playground is fully enclosed and you cannot enter the building without a pass or through the office.

I work directly opposite a school (private) and just down the road is a state primary. Both schools looks open from the outside but once you go closer they are locked and the children can't get out without going via the office/reception.

I would be really surprised if they weren't locked. Safeguarding is the first thing Ofsted looks at and if inspectors find doors/gates etc aren't locked, the school will fall at the first hurdle.

And fire escapes must be unlocked. If a school is found with locked fire exits the fire brigade will close them down.

Most schools are secure against people entering not leaving.

Has the school reported the incident to their local council? If not, they should have done. Ask them for a copy of the report.