Daughter denied prom attendance.

[Paul87]

Morning all, first time post for me.

my daughter has a long standing stomach condition that school have been aware of you some years.
unfortunately this has caused her some time off.
she has also had problems with bully’s focusing purely on her appearance.
the school took ages to finally resolve this only after we discussed moving schools and I had told them I’d be looking to hand this to my solicitor due to the ongoing issue.
a vicious circle really, the bully’s exasperated her stomach issue and the time off school made her fall behind and being behind in her work also exasperated her issue.

school said with a note from her doctor to explain this medical condition she would still be permitted to attend prom.
School has since told her, due to her attendance she will not be permitted to attend prom !

Am I looking too much into this or does it seem like she’s being discriminated against due to her ongoing complaint.
thanks.

Don't threaten legal action. Do it, unless you want to give them one final opportunity to comply with the law. Ask them to confirm in writing whether your daughter can or cannot attend.

For places of educational learning, it's amazing how utterly stupid and unaware some schools can be.

It's ludicrous that the adults who run the school have to have it spelled out to them that this is very obvious discrimination on the basis of somebody's disability - no different from the little children having to be constantly reminded to wash their hands after going to the toilet.

Except the children aren't doing it from a perspective of othering and prejudice; and they aren't (at least yet) setting themselves up as wise pillars of the community.

This is the equivalent of deliberately taking away disabled access ramps for wheelchair users, with the nasty 'reasoning' that, if your body won't allow you to climb steps like able-bodied people, you somehow 'don't deserve' to be allowed to use the building like everybody else.

To be honest, I'd really like to see a case like this go to court, and be widely reported on nationally. We all know what the ruling would be; but it would then put the frighteners nationwide on the kind of school staff who actively choose to discriminate against less-privileged pupils and punish them for having a disability - rather than the disabled pupils themselves having to live in fear of what is basically illegal bullying and discriminatory treatment from teachers.

Nasty prejudiced mindsets like these and their adherents should be exposed and held accountable. If they were actively punishing the black pupils for 'not being white enough', nobody but the very nastiest and hardest of thinking would condone it for a moment.

What is your DD diagnosed with? Something like IBS or 'worry tummy', should not be reasons for missing school.

Are you one of the teachers who has recognised yourself in this thread?

So depressing knowing schools are still pulling shit like this. 🙄

Surely you understand that the majority of children who are persistently absent usually have other stuff going on though!? A lot are genuinely in crisis. Curious to know what you think are excuses?

Even without the bullying in the equation (which is on school as they should have promptly & effectively dealt with this!) making a child miss prom for a medical condition is awful 😢

And the fact that a thought comes into your head is not always a reason to express it to others.

I would like to see a case go to court and be reported on too. Its going to be the only way this shit will stop

Now that proms have become part of our culture, they’re not just a treat but a rite of passage. It will stick in that child’s memory forever that they were deemed not worthy to be part of their community doing something to mark the end of their school career.
I think it’s absolutely dreadful to stop children attending.

Attendance is vital in schools and that's why they use it as a carrot for prom. They have told you to get a letter from the doctor them she can go. I don't see what the issue is , just get the letter

Apologies, I didn’t realise people were responding.
I said ‘Some’ children have constant excuses. Not all children. Of course there are genuine cases.

I work in a school in a deprived area where attendance is under 80%. Many children have awful attendance for a whole multitude of reasons that are not completely justifiable. A bad hand for example; or bad period pains.

The point I was failing to make, wasn’t that all children are liars and therefore shouldn’t be absent. It was that many children are giving reasons not to attend school, backed by their parents. In op’s case there is a GP note which makes a difference, but as a teacher attendance IS a huge problem currently, exacerbated by Covid time off. I used my own son as an example of how children can be dealing with health issues that are ongoing and still manage to attend in a lot of cases.

I was not commenting as much on op’s daughter as I was the school policy about attendance points for prom.
I am torn on that as a policy. I understand the issues surrounding attendance, but I also don’t think missing prom is the appropriate solution.

So to clarify, attendance is a huge current issue in schools, for which SLT are thinking up ‘imaginative’ solutions. I understand this issue and in too many cases, it is avoidable, and parents should try to get their children to school. (Not commenting on op specifically). However the attendance policy to do with prom points is unfair and I try to mitigate this myself by dishing out the prom points in other ways.

Err....I hate to break it to you, but expressing one's opinions on a matter is kind of the point of a discussion forum.

I wouldn’t risk arranging her to go to the prom OP. If her stomach problems are so frequent as to cause her kissing so
much school, chances her she could be ill the day of the prom. And that would be a lot of money wasted.

• missing!