Disruption at secondary school

[madasamarchhare]

Ds is in year 9 at at a local boys grammar school. A couple of weeks ago a boy sitting behind him stuck gum inside the neck of his school shirt. My ds was very embarrassed told the teacher and was sent to student support. He was given a shirt from lost property and asked to wash and return it (the next day!!!) and was told we would be contacted. The student support manager called by husband the following day and said this not would be severely punished. I don’t know the outcome of that we as parents are not informed of what action they take.
Fast forward to today and the other boy in this duo has stuck more gum on his neck and a little on his new winter coat.
I have rung the school and the head of house is to call me but they think this won’t be until tomorrow. I have briefly explained the situation and expressed how upset and frustrated I am for my son. Both incidents happened in the same lesson and at the start of the lesson my son has asked to move and was told he wasn’t able to.
What can I insist the school do? What would you be asking and insisting on? Would you escalate it past the head of house?
I feel a bit out of my depth I’m not good at confrontation but obviously want to stand up for my son. This is my second child in secondary and I’ve never had to deal with any issues before.
I need to know that this will not happen again. Twice in the space of a few weeks is unacceptable (as would once have been) it’s RS so I could ask that he’s moved to a different group but obv I don’t know if timetables would allow this. Any suggestions?

It might be that the teacher didn't realise why your son wanted to move.

If it was me I would send an email to the RS teacher. Explain what has happened and say that the head of house is sorting however please could your child be moved asap.

There is no point "escalating" as things don't work like that in a school. If a parent goes to the headteacher it just gets passed back down to who should be dealing with it and makes everyone frustrated, sounds like they have done everything they should have done for a first offence but obviously things will ramp up now as it is pretty much bullying.

Also be aware that schools are very busy places - it might not be that the head of house can investigate and get back to you within 24 hours, in our school (we work in year teams) there are probably 10 incidents a day with the head of year possibly teaching all day.

sd249 has a brilliant response already.

It sounds like bullying rather than disruption to me.

Teachers get requests to move seats all the time from students, for any reason great or small so in this situation I can see why they didn't move him.

Like SDsaid, this wouldn't be a 24 hour response thing from a head of year. It's two issues in a few weeks. As a form tutor I have picked up 3 incidents today alone and they have a whole year to look after.

I would contact the teacher directly for situations like this. Contrary to popular but inaccurate MN advice, going to the top rarely has the best impact. Explain what you've said here and can your child be moved well away from the child who has been targeting them.

Thank you both that sounds like good advice. I appreciate they are busy and that really this is bullying. It’s a good idea to email the teacher and I will do that this evening.

Definitely email so that there is paper trail of your phone call. It helps to also put this in a diary in case this is the start of something.

I don't know how your son asked the teacher to move seats but generally when a kid comes to me and asks for vague non- specific reasons to move seats because they don't like someone they're sitting near I say no.

On the other hand if a pupil comes and explains to me specifically what the problem is I am generally happy to change the seating. Check with your son he made clear to the teacher why he wants to move seats because if the problem is just confined to this one classroom it's easier to get your son and the class teacher to resolve it. Also he should ask at the end of the lesson or break or lunch not the start of the lesson

A/ This IS bullying and should be treated as such. Once this is made clear to the teacher he/she will do something about it.
B/ The teacher could just as easily move the bully, why should the victim have to be the one to suffer the move, it being made obvious or whatever?