If you're child was being bullied...

[KurriKawari]

Beginning to question myself right now!

If you're child was being bullied and you'd emailed the school, phoned them, been in to speak to two senior members of staff, both of whom told you "yes yes we will get your child the support they need" and done absolutely nothing, you'd remained calm and polite throughout...but your child was still having an awful time, when you tell their school you're moving schools, would you expect then to finally get some support or for them to say "alright" and do nothing?

Please can everyone keep their fingers crossed she gets into another school soon thank you. My child's spirit and confidence has become so broken.

My fingers are completely crossed for you - this is a horrible situation and destroys confidence.

This exact same thing happened to us, albeit at primary school. Fortunately we were in the private sector, so I took my child for the assessment at another school and they were offered a place immediately. The school they were at didn't want to know - mention the word "bullying" and they shut down, in spite of repeated assurances from many different staff members that the situation would be remedied.

The route for bullying concerns are (we found) teacher, head of year, head of Key Stage, Head, Governors. We never got to the Governors stage because we'd had enough - nobody wanted to help and I think it was a relief when we said that we were going, because we weren't going to "rock the boat" (which we were accused of!). The truth is that some schools simply don't want to deal with bullying, even when faced with conclusive evidence.

DC moved and has been sooooo much happier since. I truly hope you get the place you want ASAP.

This happened to my eldest in year 9. The school never did anything to help. We moved her in the middle of year 9 and she's never looked back.

Unfortunately none of the decent local schools had places so we had to go private but I'd do it again in a heartbeat.

If you've said "she's moving schools", then I wouldn't really expect them suddenly to get organised on supporting her - why would they put something in place if she's going to disappear as soon as they do?
If you have said "thing can't go on like this - unless things improve then we shall have to look at moving her", you might expect more reaction. Unfortunately the possibility that she moves school might still seem the simplest solution to them.

There are schools who do nothing about bullying. A friend of mine moved both her DC because of it - the school only cares about its academic kudos and nothing has changed. The DC are much happier and doing better academically at a slightly less shiny school with excellent pastoral care.

I got lucky with our secondary, my DC were extremely well supported when they reported bullying and the perpetrators had the sky fall on them - they never tried it again. It's a lottery and as parents, moving your DC is all you can do.

In my experience, they will do fuck all.

I had to move mine in primary as one was being bullied and the school did fuck all. Pretty shocking, really, their abject refusal to deal with it even though everyone knew it was happening.

Turned out to be a fantastic move for them.

DS was being bullied in primary school. I had lots of email evidence, school always wanted to talk rather reply by email. There wasn't even a bullying policy.

In the end I sent an email saying I was keeping my DS home until they could guarantee his safety as it was ruining his self esteem and mental health. I knew the head would try & fine me despite a good attendance record. I didn't get a reply off school so after a week, I deregistered via letter to homeschool. I explained all the issues regarding the decision to homeschool and also sent a copy to the LEA & Ofsted.

When we were allocated a Council homeschool monitor, they were appalled at the school, the Headteacher mysteriously left after a month or 2 and now works for a different LEA.

School's who take this approach really don't care about the damage they do to children & in many ways is emotionally abusive. If you as a parent were letting and sibling bully another, without acting it would be considered neglect and emotional abuse. School are in loco parentis and have legal duties to protect every child under their care.

We were lucky he was in year 6, he started a high school away from the bullies & is now doing great.

My daughter was horrifically bullied in Y7 and one particulary nasty incident was caught on CCTV. I went to a meeting and head of year said she was too sensitive and i should get her counselling. I walked out of meeting and removed my daughter to home educate.

My daughter was told she needed to be tolerant by her school when she was bullied. She continued to be bullied throughout her school years.

When it happened to my son I told him to punch the bully squarely in the face. He was never bullied again.

I had told him that if the school told him off I would be straight in to back him all the way. I was called in and told the school that I had told my son to do it. They were really shocked but they left it at that.

I don't usually condone violence but sometimes you need to stick up for yourself.

Keep your DC off school but say your DC is refusing to go into school due to lack of safe-guarding. They can't fine you if you have a valid reason and this is a valid reason, it's not like you're going on holiday!!

Ask to the see the safe-guarding policy and the bullying policy of the school and demand the emails of the governors of the school and then drop in that you are thinking of reporting the school to the local authority for failing to safe-guard the mental and physical health of you DC.

Escalate.

Write to your MP. Do whatever it takes. And yes, take her out now, immediately. Bullying can't be undone. It leave scars. Stop putting her through that horrific experience.