verbal threats secondary. how should the school deal?

[carrie1987]

yesterday i received a verbal threat from a student who then squared up to me and refused to leave my room, for a few minutes at least, until he was good and ready. To be clear, he's only just come back from 2 weeks iso. not sure what for exactly.

The school claim to have investigated and the boy spent the rest of the day in iso. I have to attend mediation, which is to be expected.

4 periods of iso for threatening a teacher just seems so light. This child has zero respect for me or my role. The attitude was that as his class mates (most of whom are scared of him) said they saw nothing, it's no big deal.

I am ECT 1 and i've only been in the school for 6 weeks. I'm feeling really let down by the school. I do not feel safe around this child. He was cool as a cucumber whilst intimidating me. It wasn't a situation where i had shouted at him or anything extreme. this is worrying.

| am now in two minds about staying at the school as I feel they have little regard for my safety. Is this a typical reaction from a secondary school in the UK?

This is what is happening in lots of schools and in society, unfortunately. Especially in secondary schools, where threats and violence are becoming more and more the norm. Law and order has been completely eroded in society and in schools, as many have gone soft. The riots in the UK, were only brought to an end, when the rioters realised there would be a hefty punishment. There is a lesson there. Pardon the pun!

Can you find out why he was not there for 2 weeks. If it was for something similar or worse and he was excluded then the leadership need this to be escalated. Did you do an incident report? This needs to be recorded and put in his file and for you to have a written statement from your side for your own personal record. Speak to your mentor and your outside providers. Insist it is recorded in the "accident book" which is for accidents but cover emotional stress, feeling threatened physically and verbally because if you end up having to go off sick with anxiety/stress due to this you have made it clear how you felt and how it impacted on you personally and professionally. Four hours in isolation for this does not cut it especially if he has a history of this kind of behaviour. Make you stance clear and do not be afraid because you are an ECT. That is what you are hoping for , that you will not make a fuss as you are so new to the profession. Get your mentor or provider to state this to leadership very clearly if you feel you cannot do it at the minute. Good luck in your new career. Make sure it is all written down and recorded.

A similar thing happened to me last year. A group of girls were running in the corridor when they should have been in lessons. All I said was ‘Come on girls, you need to get to class’ One of them then attacked me and called me a cunt. I reported it and she had to make a statement. My HOD came to my room at the end of the day to question whether it really happened because the student and her friends were saying I was lying. I even had a mark on my face where I’d been hit! I suggested they should check CCTV but was told it wasn’t necessary! No further punishment was issued and the student turned up in my lesson the next day. I didn’t last much longer at that school, that and other incidents ended my teaching career. I think this is more common than incidents actually being dealt with.

I have learned over the years that only making a huge fuss will get you anywhere with behaviour incidents like that, in schools that don't routinely punish bad behaviour.

You put everything in writing. Report the incident to your line manager, head of department (if two different people), your mentor, the head of year for the student, their tutor and the behaviour lead via email. Phone the parents and record this on whatever system you record communications. Insist on a meeting with the parents and the head of year and negotiate with your head of department that the student will not be back in your room until said meeting has taken place. Inform all of the above of this.

If you do not get a satisfactory (or any) response you see the above people in person, perhaps also a related assistant head, and explain to them exactly what happened and use the words "feel threatened", "stress" and "anxiety". If that doesn't get a decent response, inform your union - CC your line manager into this. Go see the head.

Record any and all incidents with this student. Chances are, by now you have made enough of a fuss to either have increased the punishment (perhaps not by much, but we're working towards future incidents now) or to have the student moved out of your class.

The beauty is that, once you have made a fuss a few times, any behaviour incidents towards you are being taken more seriously and usually a harsher punishment is issued from the get-go. The caveat to that is that you need to have followed the school's behaviour policy to the letter every time prior to this. The behaviour lead will be far more likely to take your side if they cannot claim you haven't done your part.