Do you feel your child is safe at school?

[Wildflowerwicked]

i know its a weird question but what does your childs school do that gives you confidence? DS attends Sen school with kids with various needs, mostly autistic spectrum and I don't really feel the school is supportive to all the children's needs (emotional rather than academic) which in turn jeaopdises how safe I feel my son is. I think it comes down to lack of structure and supervision, I would really like to talk to others who understand my worries. I'm already dreading September. DS a changed child in the holidays. Thanks

My son (ADHD and ASD) goes to MS school. He is an August baby and I hated leaving him from day 1 (age 4 and 2 weeks). I watched as a child in his class chased her mum out the school gates. So every day and this is now 4 years on I make sure I am the last in the school to drop off and I watch him enter the classroom with my nose up to the window and then wait until the school gates are locked. School could make this easier by offering a physical handover but they don't. School could help him at lunchtime and break times but they don't - lack of funding ratio 8:400 on a field. I watch from my house and have seen him punched and kicked or simply ignored. On the physical stuff I have phoned the school and put in complaints but nothing helps because as every parent will know every school has an anti bullying policy but will always insist their school doesn't have a bullying problem. My school did on a peak point remove my son from the junior playground and put him on the infants but has since been dumped back there. My son no longer confides in me. School do what they can to get rid of me. School could offer consistent staffing across years even if it was just the TA but they don't. Also my son has an EHCP which sounds like it might help but its just another meeting of professionals justifying their existence and for school to ignore yet another report. I want to get my son out of their before any more damage is done - he has a really low self esteem. Home schooling is the last choice I can see, but all the professionals like to emphasis the importance of school for the social interaction and support network of an ASD child. My son spends his academic life 1:1,1:2 or from this year with 6 other ASD kids of various ages. He is only with other kids at lunchtime and breaktime when he is being hurt. School life has to be better than that!

Stocks - I feel for you. I so agree with what you say about schools effectively being in denial about what goes on. My DS goes to a specialist Independent school. He has a statement for severe literacy/numeracy issues. I understand why OP is asking this as my honest opinion is no, I do not feel DS is safe. Aside from the denied bullying there is a lack of structure and supervision (IMO) which personally I feel is the core necessity for vulnerable children with ASD and associated difficulties. Kids have anxiety which leads to meltdowns and with teenage boys these can be violent and the swearing/ verbal outbursts very frightening for a younger (10 y old) my son has been involved in "incidents" as the school calls them but they brush them under the carpet and I find out from DS rather than anything being properly reported. The lack of communication and open dialogue between school and home doesn't help either.

"Home schooling is the last choice I can see, but all the professionals like to emphasis the importance of school for the social interaction and support network of an ASD child."

This is such bollocks. Not you - the professionals. We home educate. Best thing we could possibly have done for our children's support network (I now have a list of families with whom my children are completely happy - I could leave them with any of those families in an emergency without pausing to think about it; they can express what they need, know their quirks are accepted, have people who take an interest) and social interaction (because their social interactions are positive, in a community where ASD is, if not the norm, certainly a significant and welcome minority. They all get invited to each other's birthday parties).

We didn't send our children to school from the outset, and part of it was that I was not confident they would be able (a) to express their needs or (b) have them listened to in a school setting. And the chances of them being safe and happy were minimal.