Fuming!!! Bleedin schools....

[annie0000]

Due to bullying and its effects on my son, we had a meeting at school before the summer holidays and it was arranged that he would be put on Stage 2 intervention and would be given support from the school Psychologist. In their words, "we have only 2 years to prepare him for High school - we need to get this kicked off now" Haven't heard a dicky bird and as far as my son is concerned, we don't know about this or the assessment that he had at school. He wanted to keep it private so he doesn't know that this meeting was held.

Anyway - just phoned the school for a status update as they had said that the psychologist may feel that she needed to speak to us and may at some point want to organise something as a family to ensure that we know how to support him.

Guess what - nothing has been done. Psychologist is off sick and they have no idea when she will return so they have done nothing instead.

I am absolutely fuming!!!!

No question as such, just a rant - need to find out now how I escalate this, sure it will be through the council.

Anyone been through anything similar?

[woofgang]

Board of governors, require to see bullying policy to be clear what should be happening then ofstead.

[annie0000]

Thanks woofgang, this is in Scotland - don't believe we have governors.

I have the bullying policy, but whilst this is as a result of the bullying, it's more to do with the emotional/social backlash. He is now very introverted and will not express an opinion on very much - he did some sort of assessment, and apparently the results were highly unusual - he had a few things in his "likes" section, the bullying stuff in his "dislike" section, but everything else went in his "not sure" section.

As a result of this and his now failure to communicate or look people in the eye anymore, he was added to the "Staged Intervention" process where the relevant parties are meant to ensure that he gets support and help.

They were so quick in getting me off the phone, I am not even sure whether someone is actually going to phone me back to discuss.

[redcrx]

i dont know about Scotland, but its Anti-bullying week here this week.

I would contact the LEA (local education authority) for your area and get this moved to next level

[annie0000]

good luck with the anti bullying week then redcrx - they had one of those at our school - while my son was being bullied - the kids seem to be able to seperate out the messages they get with the behaviour that they display.

i am pretty much sure that our escalation process is our council - I will look into it.

Just spoke to place where my son goes to for out of school care during the holidays as they had requested involvment in any meetings - she got an email from the school that answered nothing so she is going to folllow up too.

[zzxxee]

try contacting your local m.p they maybe able to put you in touch with someone to get the ball rolling x

[annie0000]

thanx zzxxee - it's just so frustrating - thankfully they bullying does seem to have stopped, but we have thought this before and then it started again. At one point I did think he would end up a suicide statistic as he is so quiet and introverted - although he wasn't always. He doesn't seem as bad at the moment, but he is still not the boy he was - we wanted him to get some coping strategies and also some was to increase his self esteem and confidence. We are trying to do that at home obviously, but it would be good to have the professional input and the continuity.

[zzxxee]

would it be possible to change schools ??

[annie0000]

We have thought about it - but I think it is the same everywhere and he does have some really good friends -they have set up a friendship circle as well so that if there is something happening, they can all support each other (his friends are maily all quiet like him)- we are thinking about sending him to a different High School to save any trouble on the walk back and forward.

[karenmac60]

Annie, is it the school itself you have contacted? I think you're in Stirling aren't you? There's a number on their website for Psychological Services within the Education Department - it might be worth getting on to them. The number is 01786 443253
x

[annie0000]

Hi Karen, yes it was the school I contacted, they are supposed to be running the thing. Thanks for the number, I will ring them in the morning.

The manager in the out of school care (which is not attached to our school) confirmed that the psychologist for our cluster of schools is indeed off sick, but says that there are others in the area that service the other clusters, and also that there should obviously be a replacemnet for her if she is on long term absence.

My feeling here is that the deputy head who is in charge of these things has stuffed up once again, I have no faith in her at all. I don't think it gets into her head that while she is @rsing about, children's futures are being affected. Is it really too much to ask that they make a bit of effort to sort out the after effects of the bullying that took place on their premises and continued for a year and a half after I first complained?

They honestly don't have a clue, they scheduled my parents night appointment directly after the parents of the ring leader of the bullies and we had to knock for them to come out when they over-ran. that wasn't awkward!

The latest is that another boy in my son's class who has been getting bullied by a couple of boys in the year up has been given a role in the school christmas play.......as a servant to one of the boys who is bullying him!!! Marvelous eh!? His parents are understandably thrilled.......Not.

[karenmac60]

Annie, my dad used to be a teacher and had to deal with this sort of thing all the time - he still rants about it 20 odd years later! The head/depute heads just don't seem to care, as long as they meet targets and the star pupils are doing ok then the rest of them can bugger off. The amount of times my dad would try to help some poor kid with problems only to run up against a brick wall (ie, the head was the only person who could get the school psychologist involved, but she didn't want to cos it might make the school look bad so nothing got done). If there's other psychologists covering other areas then they should be able to sort something out for you, it looks like it's just too much hassle for the school to bother themselves. I hope you get somewhere with it, what a shame for your son and how helpless you must feel! Good luck x

[annie0000]

Thanks Karen - yes, I think it's a case of whether your face fits or not. My kids behave immaculately, have never lost any golden time, have perfect attendence and are in the top groups for everything - the only thing that gets the head's attention is when we say we are looking to remove the boys from the school- that of course brings down her averages for pass marks and attendence, not sure if it so great a point now that they have done away with the 5-14 curicullum - nothing to compare against anymore. They are however in danger of having no "good kids" left.


All I want is for him to start High School being able to look people in the eye and smile - that doesn't seem too hard a task does it?

[TTG]

You will be going round in circles with this. Psychologists, teacher meetings and ringing helplines will be of no help to your son.

Ask your son if he'd like to join a judo, karate or other martial art club. It will strengthen him physically and mentally. No need to pressure him just ask if he wants to go along to one just to check it out. I am sure the bullies will leave him alone eventually when they find out he is no pushover (word will soon get around about his interest). He will have a happy life and successful schooling I'm sure.

[annie0000]

TTG - he has gone to Judo since he was 7, he is also the tallest boy in the class - that hasn't made a blind bit of difference as they used to gang up on him. Being bulied totally knocked what confidence he had, he has always been quiet, but happy and able to speak to adults etc. not any more unfortunately.

At the meeting we had with the school, they asked if he had any outside interests - I think they thought we kept him penned in the house! He goes to cubs, judo, art and swimming - he is a very good swimmer. He has also gone to football and rugby and tried loads of other stuff - he has also climbed a few munros. Everything he goes to though they have noticed a change in his personalty to be quite withdrawn although he always participates.

wyzard - that's not something i have ever considered. I may yet! to be fair, as one of the boys who was bullying him has moved away, it does seem to have split the group up and there doesn't seem to have been any incidents for a while. Long may that continue. It's just his confidence and self esteem that need rebuilding but it is difficult to do that in isolation. I personally feel that he is a little better - we get the odd conversation from him and he does seem to be showing some affection to the cat, so there is some happy emotion in there. He hasn't asked to sleep in our bed for a good while (although he has persuaded his little brother to sleep in his room a couple of times).

[karenmac60]

Are there any youth groups in the area Annie? In our area we have a Trust that was set up by the Lord Lieutenant in his will. It's aimed at kids who might have problems settling in and they run different clubs for different age groups/sections. My daughter joined the one aimed at kids moving from primary to secondary as she was quite shy and didn't tend to get involved in many things. With them she has gone snowboarding, got a certificate in Kayaking, done a course in positive body image especially for girls, quad biking - tons of things, and she goes to a club once a week after school. She's got loads more confidence and friends and is now house captain, class captain, pupil council and works on the school paper. See if you can find something like that - it could do him wonders as the staff are all trained youth workers and are great with the kids.

[annie0000]

That sounds brilliant Karen, your daughter has done really well, you must be so proud of her. That sounds just the kind of thing he would enjoy - he is desperate to do kayaking as he has had a couple of trys at it when he has been on trips with out of school care. unfortunately everything like that is off for the winter, but we have his name down - he is also going to go for a trial for the swimming club in the new year - \i think all these things will help - I just feel we are running out of time - he is in P6 now.

I will look into that to see if there is anything similar here. I know there is a youth club in the community centre, he doesn't want to go and I am not going to make him. It is mainly frequented by the kids that cause trouble for him and his friends so I understand why he doesn't want to go, I wouldn't want to go either.

Sometimes I think that maybe makes it worse because they are not mixing outside of school, at the same time I want to protect him!

[karenmac60]

Don't give up hope Annie, my daughter didn't come out of her shell till about halfway through 1st year. That's always the thing with standard youth clubs - they get overrun by the wee neds and there's nowhere for the nice kids to go. Even try the library. Some of the smaller ones can be great for an informal meeting place for kids - I worked in one for a few years and the shyer kids tended to just come in to hang out. I had a ball with them and a lot are still friends now that they're adults. There are lots of things out there that can help him and he's got lots of time - remember how long a year is when you're that age. Give him a big hug, but don't be too over protective either, he'll find his feet and you'll be there for him regardless.
x

[ELVIS68]

Although all these anti bullying gimmicks look good to outsiders this doesn`t really affect the person involved.

Bullying is often perceived as a physical act and parents will ask the teachers to "keep an eye" on the said child and in some cases this may help, but there is a deeper side to bullying which only the child knows

I can think of nothing worse than a child hating school because of bullying whether it be getting picked on by a certain individual or group or just a few passing comments that knock a childs confidence

I was bullied at school when I was in the second year senior school aged 12 and I hated every single minute of it, it wasn`t physical bullying as in getting beaten up it was mental bullying, I was put in a class with what I would now class as Jeremy Kyle guests and I had to endure a year of getting slapped, spat on, pages getting ripped out of my books etc

When I finally plucked up the courage to tell someone about this (my eldest sisters boyfriend) he said I should ...and this is his words...."Punch the `ringleader` as hard as you can and it will all end"

To me at the time this was a definate no no, but one day I did hit him and although I got hit back twice as hard it did stop

This was 30 years ago and although this may sound strange....that day changed my life

I really hope your son can conquer these demons and go on and live a normal and happy life x

[what..the?]

interesting what you say Elvis yes the same happened to me I was bullied by lots of individuals. I was big for my age but female and nervous for years and then finally I hit out (hilariously my form tutor at the time hated this person so much they said once... hit her for me because I can't) this was in the later years of high school, I was always mature for my age so the tutor would speak to me as an adult. I got in a fight with the girl which ended on the floor rolling around...she never bothered me again.

And then a boy in English who bullied everyone he pushed me too far and a bunched him on the nose, if felt like a light slow-mo tap to me but his nose bled everywhere the teacher had no sympathy for him when he found out it was me that had done it, he knew I must have had good cause and told the boy to shut up. He never said a word to me or against anyone in English again.

I am annoyed though that I waited so long to build up the confidence to hit out and defend myself, they used mental bullying against me and when your the target you can't easily return mental bullying back if you not practised in this, the only way is to roll your sleeves up.

This only started when I changed high schools after moving house it was the start of the second year I joined this new schoold when everyone else had made friends. At i'st worst the whole school even the teachers were bullying and laughing at me because of a frizzy hair cut.

I does make me wonder if I could have done better a school if the bulling wasnt there, Got average results. 1a 2b 7c and the cheek of the teachers too...they said "you are going to say on the sixth form aren't you" I laughed out loud and said "no"