Mossbourne Academies: investigations into alleged emotional harm and abuse. Part 2

[ParentOfOne]

The previous thread has reached capacity https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/secondary/5225872-mossbourne-academies-investigations-into-alleged-emotional-harm-and-abuse-why-are-needlessly-strict-academies-unaccountable?page=40&reply=149144990

I am continuing here

@tigger29 Thank you for sharing the safeguarding commissioner's response to Tom Bennet https://chscp.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2025/12/JG-121225-.pdf

@ByLemonOP , @Ubertomusic

Will you now appreciate why Tom Bennet's response makes no sense?

I ask again:
You are not satisfied with multiple staff members testifying that shouting and "desking" occurred, because you want a police investigation of whether John Doe's complaint that his child was shouted at on 13-Oct-2023 at 11.15 am was true or not??

This is strange as how do they check someone completing is actually a pupil anyone can complete this

What is strange is to share this survey meant for the children attending the school, with an anonymous, public group of strangers and think that is a good idea?

https://www.mylondon.news/news/north-london-news/top-hackney-schools-leaders-refuse-34266247?utm_medium=Social&utm_source=Facebook#Echobox=1783671301

How upsetting that DFE didn’t even attend this hearing. Says it all really. I wonder what MCA Ofsted will say.

https://files.ofsted.gov.uk/v1/file/50306910
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cz0j5dmgmlpo

That's a different school of the same trust. One of the policies criticised was the confiscation of mobile phones for 10 days, if students were caught with one.

Honestly, it's not even remotely comparable! Confiscating a phone is not the same as shouting at kids and isolating them in corridors to humiliate them

I do know that. But there have been petitions online re fobbing and rules, numerous newspaper articles and council meetings about Mossbourne taking over fobbing. This all happened around same time as MVPA blew up in news. Across the trust the same behaviour policies applied. I just found it interesting that younger pupils especially said how much better they could learn with the strict behaviour policies

@ByLemonOP You are conflating two completely separate points.
Mossbourn took over a failing school which probably had lax behaviour policies.
Stricter behaviour policies, including confiscating phones, seem to have been conducive to a more productive learning environment.

Fine. Like I have been shouting from the rooftops, I am all for strict but fair and reasonable. Confiscating phones is fair and reasonable.

The one and only conclusion we can draw from this story is that the previous policies were too lax, and that stricter policies are better. I fully agree with this.

It does NOT follow that these stricter policies need to include shouting at kids and isolating them in the corridors with the explicit aim of humiliating them.

1. Lax policies --> wrong
2. Strict but fair (including confiscating phones) --> good
3. Struct but batshit crazy (shouting at and humiliating kids) --> wrong

Unfortunately too many bootlickers have drunk the koolaid and seem convinced of a false dichotomy between 1) and 3), as if no intermediate alternatives were possible!

How can you not see the difference???

being a parent at the school it’s a very good ofsted. Being published Wednesday but parents sent today

Have you visited or had children at these schools?

I know a family who does. Why? What are you trying to imply? That only current parents are allowed to have an opinion?

As someone whose life was destroyed by bullying and emotional abuse in the past, I despair when I see bootlickers defending these environments.

I can only hope you will never experience on yourself or on your loved ones what it truly means.

If you think there is nothing wrong with a school that institutionalised shouting at kids and humiliating them, with hundreds of former students and parents coming forward (hundreds FFS!!!!), then you are simply unfit to be a parent.

Suppose that 300 employees of a certain company come forward with accusations of abuse. Would you say: oh, it's a great company, you shouldn't judge, most employees have not been abused after all? Because that's what bootlickers have been doing

No just that locally vast majority view the school very differently. Both still completely oversubscribed and no 1 choice for most of those. People see the children out in the community interact with them and also speak to parents whose children are there and take that on board not just what they read in the papers. are all these people unfit to be parents? Thank you for that. Luckily I have two incredibly well adjusted teenagers (one with SEND). Also I love it when people make sweeping assumptions about what myself and my families lives are like. I am sorry you had what sounds like a really terrible time growing up but that doesn’t mean others haven’t gone through shit. Just because they don’t chose to share it all online doesn’t mean they don’t have crap going on

I do have questions surrounding the whole campaign against MVPA how it was set up and who was running it and also the “triangulation” of data used by Alan wood. Are the schools perfect no but show me a school that is.

Ah, yes, there must always be a conspiracy!
Hundreds of people come forward, an independent enquiry confirms the allegations were true and there was a culture of humiliating children and instilling fear, and your reaction is to imply there must be some kind of conspiracy. You lot will never cease to amaze me.

Every single one of your nonsensical points has already been addressed and debunked in the hundreds of pages of this thread. Goodbye

Are the schools perfect no but show me a school that is.

I cannot show you a perfect school, but I can show you plenty of schools whose kids do not have to go to therapy to deal with the trauma, where hundreds of former pupils do not come forward with accusations of emotional abuse, where no enquiry ever confirmed a climate of fear and emotional abuse.

They haven’t you just don’t agree. It is all a lot more nuanced which if you actually spoke to people locally you would know that.

They absolutely have. As of Dec-2024, more than 140 among former and current parents, staff and pupils had come forward
https://www.theguardian.com/education/2024/dec/07/london-academies-emotional-harm-mossbourne-schools-observer-investigation
By early 2025, the number almost doubled

Have you read the Woods report? https://chscp.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2025/12/MVPA-LCSPR-Report-Published-.pdf

If you think that humiliating children is fine, that's an opinion. A flawed, wrong, dangerous opinion.
If you are trying to deny that hundreds of pupils have come forward and that the investigation confirmed the allegations, you are simply LYING.

From the report:

The review concludes that the concerns raised about practices such as shouting, public humiliation and a lack of reasonable adjustments can be substantiated
^^
^^
Testimony from current and former teachers describing a "climate of fear," institutionalised shouting, and practices designed to humiliate pupils.
^^
Shouting. This was found to be a routine, not exceptional, practice. Shouting has been used at MVPA in a manner that humiliates and intimidates pupils.
^^
'Desking'. Pupils are placed at desks in corridors as a punishment for minor infractions. This is isolating, shaming, and educationally unproductive, with no data collected to monitor how this sanction is used, its effectiveness and whether there is any disproportionate impact

Whereas I am more inclined to agreee with this

https://bennettt.substack.com/p/if-there-are-witches-here-well-find

You mean you had made up your mind before even looking at the evidence? Oh, what a surprise...

That reply is utter bs. It says the report is based on 73 complaints by an activist group. it omits to mention that the report is also based (see page 11) on 324 individual reports and on plenty of other testimony. Why the omission??

Your bullshit reply also claims that the review doesn't attempt to establish if any of them are true. So, let me get this straight: we have got 70 complaints, more than 300 reports, lots of testimonies all saying the same thing, and this is not enough???

FFS have you read the link above? https://www.mylondon.news/news/north-london-news/top-hackney-schools-leaders-refuse-34266247#Echobox=1783671301 Mossbourne "leadership" didn't deny those practices! They said that "desking could be restorative for pupils"!!! What more proof do you want FFS? Video from a CCTV???

School leaders admit the practices, and you don't consider that sufficient proof???

Either you are in bad faith, or there is some serious cognitive deficit preventing you from processing and understanding the evidence that's been presented to you. I cannot think of a third option.

Either way, it's pointless to waste time with you. Goodbye.

Well I’m a local parent with lots of neighbours and friends with children at MVPA. I don’t doubt that some parents like Mossbourne and think the good outweighs the bad. But even if you think strictness is good and the school has been good for your child you are still choosing to look away whilst some children are bullied horrifically by teachers in loco parentis. And you’re teaching your child to do the same.

Perhaps the parents who feel emotional abuse of some children is an acceptable part of getting the best results for others feel the most compelled to say so online. Nearly all the Mossbourne parents I know personally seem to think the Woods review said what needed saying - that it’s an exceptional school in many ways and if if just reigned in the arrogance and cruelty it could still be exceptional without being damaging to some of the children.

Ofsted report on Mossbourne Community Academy is published. https://reports.ofsted.gov.uk/provider/23/134693
lots of warm words about making changes and improving pastoral care but I don’t know how true this is. The report reflects the mixed experience of children and parents at the school.

I haven't seen a new thread on this, is it ok to revive an existing one?

This is in the news again and I don't know what think. I'd hate for my dc to be yelled at or made to kneel in the classroom and equally disruption in classrooms is so detrimental.

This stood out from the report
Pupils eligible for free school meals (FSM)
51.27%

I am not a teacher, just a parent and interested in this as I hate emotional abuse from care givers, teachers, coaches etc. However this school also has excellent results. Is it a case of it suiting some families and not others?

Daily Fail painting it as a woke parents issue 😂
https://www.dailymail.com/news/article-16002625/super-school-torn-apart-woke-left-wing-parents.html

Typical. At least it's in the headlines.

I think the school does work for some children. And I absolutely get the argument that Hackney schools have gone from failing to succeeding and that that’s amazing for the local families (of which I am one). But academic success cannot come at the cost of mental health for vulnerable children. There has to be a better way.