School toilets

[Sweetheart1990]

School toilets!
Son text me to say he had walked out of lesson after being refused permission to go to the toilet, he had finished all his work. I have always told him to do this if he is desperate but he never actually has before.
He has been put in isolation.
I'm angry as I really believe that students should be allowed to go when they need to and he had completed all tasks so was just say in the classroom anyway.
What does everyone else think?

Ideally there'd be someone whose job it was to be the toilet attendant - would cut vandalism and vaping right down. I've never worked in a school that has one though.
The many always suffer for the actions of the few. I don't know any way around that

There's a huge empathy bypass on MN in general. The way some people think just horrifies me, we are not automatons who only exist within certain parameters. Humans lives are messy, we get sick, we need breaks, sometimes our bodies don't work how we expect them to work.

I'm still amused here 🤭

You're so upset at the thought he might be in isolation, you've left him there for two hours while you talk about it instead of going to get him like you said you would.

There's only about another 1.5 hours of the school day left!

Sweetheart1990 · Today 12:27
Loulou4022 · Today 12:24
And then the teacher spends the rest of the lesson arguing with all the other students as to why he could go to the toilet but they’re not allowed!
Also as parents would you be happy for the teacher to pop out to the toilet? No you wouldn’t you’d expect them to go between lessons!!

As a parent I can honestly say if the teacher needed the toilet then I would be happy for them to go! Also the teacher has access to private toilets in staff rooms, they don't have to fight for a toilet with 500 students at break time

If you, hand on heart, can swear that 500 students are fighting for one lavatory at break time, and that you are not simply engaging in hyperbole to gain the upper hand in the argument, then I would say it's YOUR fault. Why haven't you fought for the rights of EVERYONE'S children by protesting such a gross abuse of the laws surrounding access to school sanitary provisions? You are perfectly aware that the school is breaking the law by providing only one toilet for 500 students, yet have failed to advise them. I think we all know the answer to why you haven't. Because you are lying to protect your little baby boy.

Lessons are a maximum of an hour long and sometimes as short as 40 minutes. If he'd finished all his work, he was already a fairly long way into the lesson so it would have only been a matter of minutes.

Students only ever have to wait a maximum of an hour. A teacher might have to wait 7 hours. (And nurses I assume even longer, if they're on their own on a ward.)

The teacher wouldn't have denied access to the toilet if she'd known he really needed it (if he did). The problem is, and will always be, that we've no way to know this.
Students with medical issues will always have access, and are issued some kind of pass in most schools

You are not unreasonable to be a bit annoyed but the school has rules and you sign up for them when you agree to send your child there. The school has to manage classes of 30 pupils and while some toilet requests are genuine, others are a reason to mess about. You keep saying your son should have been allowed to go because he had finished his work. I don't agree with this. Why should a child who is less academically able be penalised and made to feel uncomfortable while one who is faster is not. That would not be acceptable. I don't blame you for telling your son to walk out if he was desperate but also the school are not wrong to punish him for disobeying. If he had finished his work, surely it was almost the end of the lesson and he could have hung on? I would take the punishment on the chin and discuss with him that next time he should go before class even if slightly late because of the bus.

I ring the school, 3 times, have been told they are chasing it up and will call me back. I know school staff are busy so left it as long as I thought appreciate to ring again
No luck. I drove to school, asked if anyone had picked up my messages and had any info for me. Was told that he was sent to isolation but has no been sent back to lessons. Seems that since I ring about it they changed their mind on punishing him for it but did not inform me of any of it.
I told them my feelings and been given details of who to speak to.

I would and have. Even important working people sometimes reach a point where they can't hold it.

Oh

No school anywhere allows children to randomly walk the corridor, they are expected to use the toilet before registration, at break and at lunch, if there are medical exemptions they have a card to show if they require additional breaks, you are enabling the sort of entitled behaviour that makes children unemployable. the rules are there, follow them.

I really doubt that everyone who is making comparisons to their adult workplace has colleagues that behave in the same way as some teenagers in the toilets... 🤔

Omg have a day off.

They needed the toilet, every person at
some point in their life has needed the toilet at an inconvenient time.

he hasn’t killed someone

My daughter, year 7, 12 year old, has come home soaked through with blood because they are not allowed to go to the bathroom. It's in humane.

What then would you do about the student who hadntfinished their work but was equally desperate to go to the toilet? You sound as though you think going to the toilet on request is an earned privilege for being good in class.

That is horrendous

😂 Honestly you are really causing a scene aren't you because your kid couldn't be bothered going to the loo before the class started?

Why was he so desperate for the toilet? Teachers can't just walk out to use the toilet halfway through a lesson, they have to go at break or lunch.

You might be happy for a teacher to leave a class unattended. I can assure you that there are schools where teachers would be disciplined by management if they did that.

And that's why we have such a problem with society these days because if attitudes like yours. .

It's a hard one. Your child may have legitimately needed to use the toilet and not be looking to get anything 'out of it'. The rest of the class may have an entirely different agenda.

The teacher has to manage a whole classroom. How are they supposed to do that effectively if 30 bums are getting up and down from 30 seats randomly throughout the lesson?

If your child knows he will struggle to get through a lesson without needing to use the loo, why can't he go before it starts?

It's a bit unfair on your child, really. If you are instilling in him a different set of rules from the school's, then, either way, he's going to end up being in the wrong.

Many schools now have toilets which make ut really difficult to bully in etc including staff on corridor duty etc.
What are you supposed to do if desperate ? Wet yourself? Or worse? It is inhumane to stop people going to the loo. And before anyone jumps on me I was a teacher for 17yrs.
Certain rules that, mainly, secondary schools implement astounds me!

Personally I would go to see HoY (or whoever ) and clarify what should your son do if desperate and how that aligns to health/welfare.
Im 55 and can recall a girl having an accident when I was 7yrs old. Id imagine its also stuck with her?

Before I was diagnosed with IBS I had to leave the classroom a few times in a hurry. On paper I had no medical issues.

Schools these days are so weird about controlling kids toileting. I'm glad I went to school when I did, being punished because you don't want to soil yourself is unacceptable. I especially feel sorry for the girls, they shouldn't have to disclose that they are on their period in order to sort themselves out.

You would find that, if you had a serious criminal in custody and you actively denied them the right to empty their bladder and/or bowels when they needed to, you would find yourself in legal hot water for denying them their basic human rights and dignities.

But these are not serious criminals; they are children - who haven't done anything wrong. Should they be given fewer rights than convicted murderers and rapists?

Maybe home school so he can pee whenever he wants to. I know parents only consider their own child but loos are a source of many school problems, in a High School we would have groups, usually girls, arriving up to 10 minutes late because one of them needed the loo. Oddly they can often spend all afternoon wandering round town and never feeling the need!