What should other parents hear/know from school after violent incident

[paddythepooch]

Just want to manage my own expectations really. One child attacked another, hit teacher and broke a window in my DD's class the other day. Scary for all. DD not directly involved. One child appears to have been excluded . Not sure if temp or not.

Other incidents of violence this year. Y7. Plus fair amount of low level disruption.

I am just wondering if I should be expecting any info from school or if I need to go and talk to them for reassurance they are on the case and there is a plan. Dd not involved at all but I think the difference in behaviour is unsettling her.

The school will handle this internally and you should not expect to hear anything if your DD was not directly involved. Obviously the jungle drums will be out and about so you might hear things third and fourth hand but I would be tempted to ignore most of these rumours.

why would you expect info from school about an incident your child was not involved in? It does sound worrying though.

Hmm. Sounds familiar. I wonder if we have DC in the same class...

Anyhow, with an incident of that nature, which would have had an impact on the children, even if they weren't in the firing line, I would expect an email home, outlining what had gone on (to put minds at rest as there would no doubt be exaggerated gossip), and to hear that the school had the situation under control. I really don't think that would be an unreasonable expectation...

Your child was not involved in any way, you should hear nothing. If your child was involved, you would hear what consequences your child faced, but nothing about any other child.

This sounds like a rumour mill to me.
I'm a Head of Year. If I'd dealt with such an incident the child would have been excluded, preferably permanently. I would have advised the teacher to see their GP to make sure they were OK, and the parents would have been billed for the window. If any parents called me to discuss the matter I would reassure them their child was safe in school and the matter had been dealt with in line with school policy. I wouldn't go into details as it is unprofessional for staff to discuss with parents matters which are not directly connected to their children.

I don't think you should hear anything if your child wasn't involved. But you could ring her head of year on Monday for reassurance that it has been dealt with.

But if there is a lot of violence and disruption generally, I would be hassling the school. Just not about this specific incident.

I think you need to let the school know that your DD is becoming unsettled with the behaviour and then look at new schools if things don't improve

If the teachers are having to police the kids constantly, it will take away from the kids learning

you sound like that is a new idea to you, sunnyside up. That is completely standard. if the school contacted the parents of every child after every disruptive incident, it would be a) illegal under data confidentiality, b)impossible to be definitive accurate and c) require probably half a dozen extra full time staff to do it.

We contact home if a teacher or pupil dies although only twice in my career has that ever been during the actual school day, both times sixth formers crashing their cars, but even if it is not during the school day, we still contact home for every pupil ( And most deaths not during the school day are also sixth formers crashing their cars and killing themselves and or passengers)

We also contact home for persistent nuisances, which has always only ever been face book, and remind parents not to allow under age children to use face book, and remind parents that crimes on social media are still crimes, and will be passed to the police. That is without describing incidents or naming individuals, but face book incidents run into the hundreds, and lead to police involvement regularly.

Thanks all for confirming what I probably thought would be the case. I don't know any of the other mums so no rumour mill and dd has a career ahead as a spy she is so reticent to say anything.

Will keep an eye and go and talk to them if it carries on or she remains unsettled. Tbh it's the degree of disruption in some classes that worries me most.