Bullying at school - pls advise what to do?

[tunafortea]

Hi

My Dd is being bullied at school. She is 8. Been going on for over a year.
School are failing to inform me of the incidents. Also refusing to confirm whether incident reports are being filled out or not.
I have complained, in writing.
Each time, HT gets Dd into his office, grills her, Dd clams up, HT claims Dd is confirming 'nothing is happening'.
Dd now sobbing, 'please don't report it mum, I am scared of seeing HT again'.
Dd has SN (significant auditory impairment) so cannot hear the kids coming up to her from behind etc. She may also have other SEN, (still being assessed).

Do I email latest incident details to school, knowing it will result in Dd being dragged in to HT to 'confirm' she is okay?
Do I go to LEA? (given that local head of education has v bad reputation indeed) School has just got a poor OFSTEAD report.
Do I go higher? (where)
No chair of govorners here tho as north of the border.

Sorry its long!
Thank you

Firstly I am sorry to hear that your dd is going through this. Ds1 has been through hell at the hands of certain bullies at his school and it took us a while to get it sorted, but we did eventually get the school to act and he is so much happier these days, so it can be done.

In your shoes I would write to the HT detailing all the incidents to date and stating that they are not to interview your dd about the incidents without you being present, that will take the extra pressure off your dd of having to face the HT on her own. In England I would advise you to specifically mention the Disability Equality Act, but obviously that would be different in Scotland.

There were a couple of articles recently about a Scottish report that has been done specifically about the impact of bullying children who have SNs. Here and here. Not sure if you can find out any more about that to quote.

This might help. It's 'A Guide to the Disability Equality Duty for Education Authorities and Schools in Scotland', so I would assume is similar to England's Disability Equality Act.

I would definitely request a copy of the school's anti-bullying policy and check that they are doing everything they say they will and meeting the requirements of their own policy.

Sorry not sure about who you could escalate a complaint to, as here it would be teacher, HT, Governors, LEA. Perhaps you could call the LEA and ask their advice?

Failing that, there a couple of really good anti-bullying websites which offer good advice:

Bullying.co.uk and Kidscape.org.uk

I hope you can get something sorted soon. It's heartbreaking as a parent to know that your child is being bullied and feel powerless to help.

Thank you, moosemama

Yes, I will say they are not to grill her about it unless her dad or I are there.
They have tied her up, pushed her down and attacked her head, chucked her hearing aid on the roof, etc. Although fortunately no permanant physical damage has happened, it is more than mere name calling and she is stressed both about the bullying and the schools 'handling' of it (manipulating her).
The school is notorious for simply ignoring bullying and denying incidents occur.

But its not right. I am angry and sad tonight.

Sorry if this is old grond tuna - if these attacks have happened at playtime, then does the school not have any adult supervision in the playground?

If so, have they been informed of the bullying?

Also enquire, although set up for giving guidance on special needs education could tell you what laws etc. would apply in your child's case. They have a help line and are very friendly and helpful.

How sad for you daughter and you, hope you get this resolved.

Had a similar thing with ds, he was being bullied but couldnt explain himself, so school concluded he was telling lies and he got sent to the HT each time for a telling off! Even though they themselves had reported some of the incidents to me, only the ones that left marks on ds though.

Keep a diary and record each incident.
Say that you dont want your dd questioned about it for the reasons you give.
Get her to write down her version of what happened, that should be enough she has given her side of the story.

I then wrote to school and the attendance officer and stated that if they could not guarntee my child's safety and well being, i wouldnt be sending him and i would be tell Ofsted, local authority, my mp etc, etc exactly why.

I eventually ended up having to remove him from the school, which might be something you may want to consider, if its been going on for over a year and nothing is being done. All my letter did was make the school even more determined to prove that ds was telling lies and that i was an 'over anxious' mother.

I did not have the denial thing with DS, but they were not linking incidents.
I felt so bad when I finally did.
I wrote down each one and a date if I could ( or roughly when it happened).
I then went to talk to the head myself with my list. I asked if they could confirm that they had recorded all of the incidents. I also asked why they had not put 2 and 2 together.
It was always the same group of boys bullying DS and usually at times where no one would see or hear - like on the stairs on the way out of school for the day etc.
My list was comprehensive and the school knew about a lot of the incidents, but their reporting is not joined up - so each teacher would deal with something, but the notes would not be linked to the individual children involved so that a pattern could be seen. We explained that DS would admit to say hitting in retalliation but would not be able to explain what had led up to this as he would be fixated on knowing what he had done wrong and so would end up being in trouble rather than the bullies.

To be fair the school did take this all on board. They accepted that it was happening. At our insistance ( DH and I) they called in the parents of the children and told them (before it had all been handled in school) and we were asked to e-mail any further incidents to the head and the teacher so that they could deal and monitor.
The school did a lot of work with those boys in particular and the boys in DS's year in general that year about bulling, acceptance of differences etc, The bullying died down and 2 years on the boys are actually sort of friends now ( Although I must admit I am still very wary of this).

It really does depend on how seriously the school takes you. I did drag DH in with me to show that we were taking it seriously ( and that I wasn't an over anxious mother).

We had a good outcome from this.
I hope that you do too.
You need to compile as detailed a list as possible and go to the head with it. Demand to be seen as it is a serious matter and take it from there.

Good luck.

We had the same issue as alison, most of the incidents were dealt with at the time, but by different teachers, lunch supervisors etc, so there was no bigger picture connecting them.

I logged everything and sent a detailed letter to the school pointing it out. The next incident that took place, they took witness statements from four other children who were around at the time, plus got ds and the bully to write up their own versions of what happened and there was no disputing what was going on.

Dh and I met with the Head as well and having received a copy of the schools so-called Anti-Bullying Policy, dh shoved a copy at the HT and told him it wasn't worth the paper it was written on - to which the response was that the HT totally agreed and it was already the next policy on his list to overhaul (he was a new HT).

You need to stand your ground, remind the school of their duty towards the children in their care and the law, particularly with respect to equality and protection of children who have SENs. As Claw said, tell them you will escalate the complaint to OFSTED (or the Scottish equivalent), the LEA, your MP and if necessary the papers if they don't take swift action to protect your daughter. I would also point out that the physical bullying is actually assault and you will be taking advice from the police if it doesn't stop.

You can approach your local community police officer to suggest he visits the school to do a presentation about bullying. I know other parents have done this as a shot across the bows of the school.

Thank you for all this good advice.

I will escalate the complaint now.

I will first go to the council, then to mediation. Then MP/Parliament etc.
Disgusting I am having to fight this way

The lead child is actually the child of a local police officer

Tuna, do you think your dd will be ok after all this with the HT and the other children, if it was sorted out right this second?

Ds was petrified of his HT, after being told off and punished for his difficulties.

He was petrified of some of the other children, after they strangled him, poked him with sticks in the face, bit him, took his lunch and belongings away from him and that is just what was reported to me by school.

This went on for over a year, with the school not doing anything about it, in fact they said that ds was telling lies and he was then punished for reporting incidents, by being sent to the HT for a telling off.

Even if ds's school were told to clamp down on bullying, by the Queen herself, it wouldnt have changed anything.

Do you think the school will deal with it appropriately in the future, if told to by a higher authority?

Do the school have much understanding of children with SN's?

Hi Claw

Well this is a school that has just been officially assessed as being rigid, with poor communication with parents and poor involvment of pupils.

Dd is petrified of the HT (so are many parents). She is v unsure of some of the other kids. She has no support socially re her auditory impairment and she has been floundering for 3 years now being bullied on and off but it is getting more and more relentless, whilst we have been fobbed off.

We were sent to cahms who have been useless. School and cahms have got together and decided that I am overanxious. Even now we have the Dx of auditory impairement they are still singing the same tune.

I would take her out tomorrow, but I have to give 6 weeks notice here and they don't automatically say yes anyway. I may make myself vunerable to SS involvment as the HT has a reputation for reporting 'problem families' to SS (don't know if this is true, but wouldn't surprise me).

The school is vile re kids with SN's.

I want to take her out of this school but I need the cooperation of the professionals to get the bullying logged up (school refuse, even to fill out incident reports).

Could you de-register for homeschooling until you find another school. I don't know about the Scottish system, but in England you can just send a letter to the school informing them you are de-regging and taken the child out there and then.

From what you've said in your last post it does sound as if moving her would be the best option. If the problem is that entrenched, in a school that has lots of problems, it's going to take a long time and a lot of fighting and pushing to change the culture and in the meantime your dd will continue to suffer.

I wouldn't worry about SS involvement, even if the school was vindictive enough to involve them they would just do a quick check, see there is no case to answer and close the case. I do understand why you are worried, but if the alternative is this awful situation continuing for your dd, it might be worth trying to put those fears aside and removing her anyway.

Why do you need the bullying logged to move her? Is it because she has a statement? If so, are you able to call an emergency annual review to discuss what you are doing and why?

I feel for you in this situation, we were unable to move ds1 because all the other schools locally are oversubscribed with long waiting lists and I can't get him to anywhere further afield. Its horrible when you feel every exit is blocked, but there must be a way out - keep posting, I'm sure someone with knowledge of the Scottish system will be along shortly to offer much better advice than I can. If not, it might be worth starting a thread with a specific question about the Scottish system in the title so that the right people see it.

All sounds very familar to me.

We were sent to CAMHS too, ds had a year and half's therapy there to deal with his anxiety, caused by school.

What i will say, is that ds's old school also reported to CAMHS that ds didnt have a problem, i did ie 'over anxious' and ds didnt not have a diagnosis at the time either. My parenting skills were very much under the spot light.

I also found that CAMHS did not disclose to me what school were saying to them ie i was the cause of ds's anxiety, so i could not dispute this directly. It was an uphill struggle.

But what i will say for CAMHS is that once ds began having weekly 1:1 therapy with CAMHS and also got to know me a bit too, they could see that school was the problem, not me. Ds also received his official dx during this time too, which helped. It took them a year and half and for ds to move schools, before CAMHS would finally speak up and say that difficulties in school were the cause of ds's anxiety and that moving school was a positive step for ds (they put it in a very nice way of course) and they supported my application for a statement.

Even with the support of CAMHS and them saying it was school and a dx, i still had my over anxious mother title and the Local authority 'referred' to SS 'to help mum deal with her anxieties' (i wasnt supposed to see this). I declined their offer of 'help', unless we are talking child abuse etc, you can decline.

While ds was at his old school, CAMHS would not support my request for ds to change schools. They will not get involved in school disputes.

Ds began refusing school, i tried to sort it with school and copied in the attendance officer, they took the same approach as they did to bullying. So i removed him.

What do you mean you have to give 6 weeks notice?

As long as you have written down and you have told the school, it doesnt matter if the school record it. The record is you reporting it to the school in writing.

You have the right to home ed your child, even if that child is not being bullied or having any difficulties at school whatsoever. Its a choice parents can make regardless.

OMG, the school have just called again.
Another incident. This time the bully forcing their way in on Dd whilst in a toilet cubicle.
I asked them to comment on y'days incident: they said; news to us.
I asked them re the incident form from the incident 2 weeks ago: DHT said, HT will speak to you. This is over 2 weeks ago.

I have had enough.
I can keep her off this week. Take her to GP. Then she will miss the Ed Psy assess she is supposed to be having in school. And she will miss her 'Olympics Day'. All DHT kept saying was: we are working with the boy on his boundaries. I asked her what they were doing to keep Dd safe and she said: we'll have to get back to you on that. Bastard bastard school.

Oh no! I'm so sorry, your poor dd.

'Working with the boy on his boundaries" What the hell does that mean? Essentially - we are letting him continue to bully until he learns not to and your daughter is collateral damage? That's absolutely outrageous and totally unacceptable.

Is your GP sympathetic? If so take her to see them asap and get her signed off school with. Our GP was quite firm that ds's anxiety was being caused by the school and it would be detrimental for him to attend while he wasn't being adequately protected from bullies.

How do you feel about the de-registering option?

Do check those bullying websites and call their helplines. Standard response is to 'work with the bully' while leaving the victim to continue suffering or to protect the bully 'because they have issues' and move the victim, so that again the victim ends up feeling like it must be all their fault - and this obviously completely wrong. The anti-bullying agencies are well up on all this and should be able to advise you on the best course of action.

Follow that telephone conversation up in writing. State exactly what was said. Stay calm and reasonable. You always have to appear to be the reasonable one, even if you feel like exploding, otherwise you give them more ammo for 'over anxious'.

Take her into school for EP assessment, then bring her home again.

Dear School,

Thank you for phoning on xxxx to inform me of the incident today, which involved xxx forcing their way into the toilet cublicle.

I was surprised to hear that you were not aware of the incident yesterday, fill in the incident.

I have also previously asked about the incident form from 2 weeks ago, involving xxxxxxxxxxx and i was told the HT would get back to me. I have still not heard anything, could you please confirm?

As you are aware, this is not the first incident as i have previously reported xxxxxxxxxx to you. I am concerned for dd's wellbeing and safety, as these incidents are happening on a daily basis and are causing her great distress and have resulted in dd not wanting/refusing school (as reported previously if you have reported)

You stated today that you would get back to me about what you plan to do to ensure my dd's well being and safety, could you please reply in writing asap.

Yours Mrsverypissedoff

That kind of thing, include a list of incidents, if you have one, include what the school have told you is being done ie working on boundaries etc with the boy.

WTF is this school like? IThat sounds terrible. I wouldn't want to be sending her to school if she was being treated like this. This is not "just" bullying. It sounds like she is being regularly assaulted by this boy.

Is there another local school with a space so you can work on getting her a place there, supported for her HI and her social skills.

This is so bad :(

Just got in. Very very

My Dd and bullyboy were the last out of class. CT was chatting to someone, no-one paying attention to any interaction between the two of them (ie Dd vunerable again, imo). I went in to classroom and stood with Dd whilst she packed up. Bullyboy's mother arrived and she and CT had long chat which was all quite jolly and ended up with CT reminding bullyboy not to 'forget his sticker chart now' with a big smile. Dd and I went to go, CT completly ignored us. I asked her: 'did you see anything yesterday' and she just said: 'no' and turned away to walk off. I said: 'well that's a pity, each time the adults seem to be looking the wrong way'. Which was a bit snippy of me, but I was annoyed. She said: 'I take exception to that! It is Dd's responsiblity to inform us of any so called incidents, and home school link worker says she hasn't hit her targets on that yet'. I just goggled at CT and said: 'having been spat in face, and tied up' she was supposed to come into a room of 50 kids, get your attention, and tell you, and because she didn't then its her fault?' CT just grinned at me. I asked Dd if she felt okay about going to HT office and she said NO. CT just glared at me. I left. Slamming the door [shame]

There is no respect whatsoever here, is there?

NOOOO!!!! .
CT clearly is not on your side is she?
I am beginning to think you should look at other schools - still persuing this one to get its act together though.

Ct is in early / mid 20's by the looks of her - NQT +1. The one Dd had last term was not a great deal older. Both have blamed him for not reporting the bullying enough and spoken to me with no respect whatsoever either. I feel really frightened by their arrogance and lack of compassion for a child at this stage in their careers. Either that, or the school attitude of 'MrsTuna is nuts' has infiltrated very quickly and they are taking full advantage of it.

Tbh, I'm just on the floor, crying

Ok. Stopped crying. Going to follow Claw's template.
Thanks.

Oof. Whilst typing email received one from HT.

It says an incident report was filled out (for the incident 2 weeks ago that school has never officially told me about). It gives no details of the incident but says Dd not physically hurt (she says her back was sore but they 'didnt put an icepack on as they couldn't see anything'). It says HT didn't contact me as' Dd handled it so maturely he felt there was no need'. (!) It attaches the schools bullying policy. It makes no mention of the incident of yesterday or today either.

I have carefully typed out all details as per Claws template. Do I reply to the HT or just go straight over his head now to the next level do you think?
I think Dd will refuse to go in tomorrow (she has refused on and off quite a lot lately) . If so, I will take to GP and report stress and see if Dd will describe details, to get it logged. I need to get the bullying logged in detail as I think the school/LEA will come after me for 'arguing back with them'. Can't go into details here, but have very good reason for thinking this

bump

Your poor DD. Would it be possible to raise this with the PCC, if your school has one? There may well be other bullying incidents involving other children which you are unaware of and the PCC may be able to put pressure on the school to take action generally.

I'd also repost this in the section dealing with bullying where other people may have some great ideas.

Why was the boy in the girls toilets? Had he gone in there to follow DD? I'd tell DD to only go to the toilet during class time, where there isn't any risk of her being followed. I'd also tell her to play near one of the playground assistants during breaks and lunchtime. It sounds as though the boy is unlikely to try something when he will be seen by an adult. It'll be difficult if you work all week but I'd also try to arrange some playdates at the weekends. If DD has some good friends the bully may be less likely to target her. I'd also speak to the teacher re reporting the incidents. It is unrealistic to expect a child who is being bullied to speak out about it in front of a class full of kids. You also can't expect a child to stay in the classroom after the class has finished to talk to the teacher because the bully may well realise what is happening. Perhaps the teacher will have some ideas about how DD could tell her what is happening.

Good luck

I have replied to the HT email with a full description of the bullying.

I have said that I think his stance that, he didn't call me (as he told Dd he would) to notify me of the incident with the banged head as 'she handled it in such a mature way' is bizarre! (negligent, actually)

I have asked for details on how they plan to keep Dd safe.

I will copy it to council, I will copy it to cahms (who are 'trying to get to the bottom of Dd anxiety issues' yet seem to think it is all me not 'distracting her' enough. Grr)

OFSTED have a leaflet on who you can complain to and in what order
here
You should complain to the Governors as well
DFE guidance here

Tuna, as hard as it is, the best approach is to try and detach your emotions, stick to the facts and what do you plan to do about it.

I learnt the hard way, that all 'blaming' school does, is puts their backs up, makes them extremely defensive and gets you nowhere.

By all means mention the banging heads incident and him not phoning you as he said he would because 'she handled it in such a mature way', not that it is bizarre, but in more of a dd may appear to be handling it in such a mature way, but she is certainly showing signs of distress about the incident at home. And given that your dd has sn's and significant auditory impairment she often has difficulty understanding what is said (or whatever you feel the problem is)

Say to school that you would like to be made aware of situations, so you can help your dd to understand and to deal with the distress these incidents are causing her. Suggest a diary, where any incidents can be written, so that you and school can work together?

This way you are not just critising school, you are making suggestions and trying to resolve the situation and getting incidents recorded.

School may well be neglectful and incompetent, but i doubt any school would say ok, hands up we have been neglectful and incompetent, when backed into a corner they will fight back by blaming you iyswim.