Who’s expelled a school pupil at 21?
Apr 26th, 2008 by Chris
I doubt many of my friends at university or other people of a similar age across the country have permanently excluded a child from school. On Monday I took the rather heavy decision to expel a child from the school of which I am a governor. While obviously the details of the case must remain confidential, the child (who was only 13) had attacked a teacher and several pupils in the particular instance, but had a history of violence at the school. Myself and the two other school governors took the view that what took place was very serious and the child posed a threat to other pupils and staff and had to be removed.
While making the decision was relatively easy - there is a great deal of guidance from the government on how to judge the case - it has been bothering me for a while about the impact this will have on the child and how it will be possible for his life to get back on track.
There are two things in particular which I want to address - how the child got to this situation and what happens to the child now.
The child’s mother was present at the hearing. It was relatively clear that she was reasonably overwhelmed by bringing up the child, not helped by being a single parent. But she had also been let down by the health system. Often children with behavioural problems have underlying mental issues and it had taken several years for the NHS children’s services to investigate this fully with infrequent meetings and observations of the child, with treatment for ADHD only starting several days after the child committed the violence leading to his exclusion. While there had been nothing else as serious, there had been many minor incidents which may have been avoidable if the health service had diagnosed the problem more promptly, started treatment if necessary and informed the school of what actions they could take to help the pupil.
I strongly doubt that the staff working in the children’s services section did not do the best they could. I imagine it is a resources problem. But there is also a lack of joined up thinking with the school having to jump through hoops to get details on what action to take towards a pupil with behavioural problems from the health service (in the hearing a new letter from the health service was sprung upon us - if letters were copied to the school it would be far more helpful). How these services work together for the benefit of the children needs to be re-examined.
Keeping the child out of the mainstream school system is certainly not in his interests. Being outside the mainstream education system can easily lead to continuation of antisocial behaviour and for excluded children to become involved in crime is hardly unknown. Manchester City Council will be responsible for the education of the child yet I am told there are only around 300 places in the city for pupils with behavioural problems. Are there really only 300 excluded pupils in Manchester? Does Manchester City Council provide enough money to the schools where excluded pupils are looked after (called pupil referral units) so that they can properly help the children attending them so they do not fall through the safety net? I would be very interested to see crime statistics for excluded pupils in comparison to the general population (and have submitted a freedom of information request to find out).
In conclusion it was a challenging experience to be involved with. While the consequences for the child are severe and I wonder if at 13 he can properly appreciate that, I know that we took the only appropriate decision. Excluding a pupil is a last resort and the school had tried all other alternatives. There are several issues to be addressed on how to have more joined-up thinking on tackling behavioural problems. I certainly hope he can turn his life around.
