School Water Bottle

[BreezyGreenRobin]

Could somebody please help me with where I stand. My daughter is in year 2 at a state primary school. Her school has a very strict uniform policy and the children are required to have lots of items with the school logo on them. The school ask that all children use a standard school water bottle which is made of plastic and has the school logo on. As a family we are trying to reduce our use of plastic container for all of our food and drinks. I have therefore sent her into school with a plain white metal water bottle. I must add that nowhere in any of the school's policies does it state that the school logo bottles are mandatory, the head teacher has said that this is a verbal policy. I have now had several emails from my child's class teacher and the head teacher stating that her water bottle is not regulation and she is not allow to drink out of the one I have sent in throughout the day this includes during PE lessons. All other children are allowed their bottles on their tables during lessons and to take them to PE. I have raised my concerns regarding micro plastics with the head teacher and was simply told that this is not an issues. The chair of governor's has said that she is not able to get involved.

What can I do?

I doubt she'll be given a cup in lessons or play times given what OP has said. There will likely be an opportunity to drink with her lunch only.

Not a cup!!!!!???? Surely …

You approached your child's child's class teacher, head teacher and all the way up to the chair of governors over a standard plastic water bottle?

Wow.

Dc can get water at break! Honestly most don’t need water every 30 mins. They all then want to go to the loo and miss teaching. Why schools allow water bottles all year is beyond me. When it’s hot, yes. Otherwise water in break and at lunchtime. It’s so easy with common sense.

I’d be interested to see how much class time is wasted dropping drink bottles, picking them up, fiddling with the cap/ spout to open it, fiddling again to close it, then twenty minutes later “ Please Miss, I need the loo…”

When I was young you drank at break. You were also supposed to go to the loo then although you could ask if you got desperate in class.

Quite. I’m aghast at this!

I sadly have had to be ‘that parent’ and approach the school with concerns, on occasion. But for good reason.

It gives all parents a bad name when you have those that choose to have battles with schools over things like this. Yes, sometimes schools get things wrong, very wrong. But this sort of piffling nonsense is part of the reason that parents are considered as moaners when we come up against something that actually does have merit and needs sorting out.

Maintaining good relationships with schools is essential and pays dividends in the long run. That doesn’t mean never challenging them. It means not being a PITA over nothing.

How embarrassing.

I feel for the OPs child too. It must be rubbish being singled out like this and it’s not the child’s fault.

@Calliopespa Well even my dd did ent they aren’t parents yet! What has happened in the last 10 years?

I wouldn’t consider being concerned about your child drinking from plastic every school day for years to be ‘piffling nonsense’ @rainbowrosalie.
It’s a genuine concern. The number of people not taking it seriously on this thread is actually surprising to me.

We’ll have to agree to disagree on that point then!

Is plastic reduction ideal? Absolutely, particularly single use.

Is plastic elimination realistic? Nope. Children are at school for six out of twenty four hours a day. Child can drink from whatever receptacle parent likes for eighteen hours per day.

It’s just not a hill to die on, really. But you’re entitled to your opinion, as I am mine.

the LA and Ofsted have to act as the teacher and by default any other staff who are aware of the issue are creating a child welfare issue.

They really won't get involved. Advice will be to follow the school complaints policy.

Is the school an academy? The LA will be even less involved.

In any case most complaints that OFSTED do act on, once the complaints policy stages are complete, come back to the LA with an LA officer contacting the school, asking questions and reporting back to OFSTED.

In most cases nothing is heard from OFSTED again.

If the school is deciding to not providing water at all and in a way ofsted cant detect the LA have one or more cases of child neglect which would not be resolved by an internal process.

And with proper risk assessment lack of water leading to serious dehydration puts a childs body on a pathway of a possible death/serious medical harm outcome. Although the likelyhood of an adverse event is low it is not zero.

Thats a different risk assessment (or clearly should be) to being feeling bullied into using a branded water bottle when its not official policy.

The issue that ofsted need to worry about is that the school is using rules which are not written policy. That is a poor internal culture issue but also undermines any inspection process.

The school is saying (or not) one thing in its written documents and doing something else. Thats a fundamental audit detection fail and any prior report results become questionable. The section under H&S for portable water would change to "not provided". Which would roll down into the safeguarding medically vulnerable children etc.

And a report that the school is breaking the law in a way that could kill a student should not be managed the same was as a dispute over a branded item. If it is being managed in the same way then is a bureaucratic not-fit-for-purpose response.

And unlike other risk of serious harm assessments ( eg student on student/staff violence) checking there is no water fountain and then requesting the installation of a water fountain with a tight timeframe is an easy win.

You can die from not having water for 8 hours? I'd better stop sleeping and wake up hourly to hydrate then.

Ha ha so very clever.

(Dont quit your day job.)

OFSTED absolutely does NOT contact the school about minor complaints like this. Unless it's a safeguarding issue (and this really isn't, despite the ridiculous overreactions in some recent posts) or other very serious infraction, it's simply noted for the next scheduled inspection.

As far as the LA is concerned, it will depend on the nature of the relationship between the school and LA.

TheLA will have no interest in undermining the headteachers running of the school especially with regard to petty, inconsequential matters like this

Dear parents,

As you all must be aware by now, since we were informed by email, from today children are no longer allowed to bring their stainless steel water bottles and must instead use plastic ones.

This morning I spoke with the head teacher of Saint Mary’s Catholic school in Isleworth and explained that our daughter will continue to use her bottle, as we choose what’s best for her health and wellbeing. For both health and environmental reasons, we avoid plastic.

The explanation given for the ban was that “when” children throw stainless steel bottles, they can hurt others. This means the behaviour has already happened, yet instead of addressing the root cause — supporting the children in understanding and managing their actions — the solution has been to forbid the use of safer, more sustainable bottles.

As parents, I believe we should be able to decide what’s best for our children, especially when it comes to health and environmental impact. Perhaps the school could consider consulting a specialist (for example, a trauma-informed therapist or behaviour expert) to address the situation in a constructive way, rather than simply imposing a ban.

I’d really like to know how other parents feel about this, and whether anyone has suggestions on how we could approach the problem together. Our voices are definitely more powerful if we use it together 🙏🏼

Warmly,
Juliana

Brilliant!
Are you going to encourage others to take in their own chairs too? Trays for lunch? What about playground equipment?