Is Grandson's School being unreasonable?

People ask all sorts of things in forums.
As far as I can work out, that is the whole point of them.

Why are you asking this? Why are you worried about how the school is handling the attendance of your grandchild? Isn't that his parent's job? Just seems like you are overreaching here in my opinion. Also blaming the genetic issues all on the mom, whether it's a fact or not, isn't a good look. Was that info really necessary?

Germanshepherdsmum

Excellent post by Marydoll. We are lucky to have such experts on GN.

I agree. x

What happened to lateral flow test?

I think we also need to remember that at 5 a child is still building their immune system and this happens by getting coughs and colds. Having been isolated away from the usual inoculation process ( other children) some children will take time to build up their immune systems. I know as a new teacher or when I moved schools I caught new coughs and colds for a while. Then things settled down.

While since the year dot, I have been asthmatic, it hasn't bothered me too much in adulthood, but about 10 years ago i had a cough, i coughed and coughed, the docs gave me antibiotics which improved it for about two weeks, then i'd start coughing again. I kept asking to be referred to the respiratory clinic, but kept being told I needed a test, but couldn't have it because I was on antibiotics, this went on for 5 years, I'd been for a very strained weekend in Glasgow, not a place if you can't breathe. When I cam back I went straight to the surgery and said I wasn't leaving until I had an appointment for the respiratory clinic. The doc looked up and asked if I wanted to go to the hospital then or in a fortnight. I went then, and was kept in for a week where they discovered i had non infectious TB - I now suffer from Bronchiectasis. Whether you get your doc to refer your son, or take him to A & E, before he has permanent damage to his lungs.

As far as I understand it,if attendance drops below (quite a high figure) somewhere in the upper 90%’s, parents are given warnings and then matters are pursued via the education welfare officer at the council resulting in potential court action, it doesn't matter if the absences are authorised or not its the % attendance figure they look at.
My second DGD has coeliac disease and migranes and misses more school than some as a result which is s source of huge stress to her parents! I realise that attendance is vitally important but I do not think that adding stress to parents of ill children is at all helpful

Sounds like many folks on here are very unsupportive of schools and teachers. We’re still in a pandemic and there are thousands of new cases every new day in the UK - more than just about anywhere else in the world. Let the professionals do their job to the best that circumstance seem allow and protect themselves too. It’s a bit like the NHS, they also seem to be taking a lot of abuse and lack of support. We’re all fed up with COVID and it’s impact on our lives, so try to support those who are there for you and your children and stop giving them a hard time.

I agree that she could reduce the time he needs to be off by taking him to a testing centre rather than waiting for a pcr to be posted to her and then posting it back.

There must be something causing him to get a lot of coughs and colds.

It happens to schoolkids unfortunately.

Also there may be allergies - at this time of year fungal spores are high which cause hayfever/cold type symptoms in some people - I have suffered since childhood so its not "a new or unusual cough" although I am left testing "in case".

I remember my mother asking the school to keep an eye on me which often led to the teacher asking asking what I had been doing whenever I was coughing!!

I know that you can give the wrong tone unwittingly in an email but I don't think you should rely solely on a meeting as a form of communication especially when these days parent's can be prosecuted for not sending their children to school. Also, parents have been known to hear what they want to hear and teachers sometimes misinterpret things. My advice would be to have a meeting, try to decide a course of action with the school and then send them an email detailing what was agreed. If your child has a medical need then it may be that the school need to make adjustments to ensure that he gets an equal chance of a good education as the other children.

KG1241

His absences from school shouldn’t affect his attendance percentage as there is a attendance Covid mark which is put on the register, he shouldn’t just be marked as absent or ill. Ask the school.

The Covid regulations about marks do not affect the school's duty re attendance. The document states clearly.

Attendance is mandatory. The usual rules on attendance continue to apply, including:

parents’ duty to ensure that their child of compulsory school age attends regularly at the school where the child is a registered pupil
schools’ responsibilities to record attendance and follow up absence
the ability to issue sanctions, including fixed penalty notices, in line with local authorities’ codes of conduct
the duty on local authorities to put in place arrangements for identifying, and to follow up with, children missing education

His absences from school shouldn’t affect his attendance percentage as there is a attendance Covid mark which is put on the register, he shouldn’t just be marked as absent or ill. Ask the school.

trisher

Can I just point out that in the actions they take and the reasons for those actions schools have very little "wiggle" room. Their attendance figures and the actions they have taken to pursue poor attenders are scrutinised by Ofsted and a school will be criticised and may find its rating slips down if the figures are high and due diligence in pursuing the absentee hasn't been applied. The school may be sympathetic to the family, Ofsted is never sympathetic.

Yes, unfortunately that is the case.
Several children in one of my DGC's class had terrible attendance records when they started back after lockdown, including DGC, because of all the coughs, sniffles etc going round and, of course, they were asked to stay off until they were better.

The EWOs would have been overwhelmed with work had all the computerised prompts for poor attendance been followed through.
Some leeway must be given at this time by Ofsted too.

Some PCR results were taking longer than 24 hours here

Gabrielle56

Someone needs to educate the teachers(there's a suprise) coughs and sniffles are not symptoms of covid in youngsters! A lateral flow jobbie would do the trick, they're being a bunch of know alls -as usual- when they actually are getting t so wrong, poor lad must be fed up!

You’ve got it wrong.

A lateral flow test will not “do the job” once symptoms are present. Maybe you’d like to look up why and join the know-it-all’s.?

I hope you haven’t been out and about having had a few symptoms and then got a negative result from a lateral flow?

Gabrielle56

Someone needs to educate the teachers(there's a suprise) coughs and sniffles are not symptoms of covid in youngsters! A lateral flow jobbie would do the trick, they're being a bunch of know alls -as usual- when they actually are getting t so wrong, poor lad must be fed up!

Perhaps if parents didn't criticise teachers so much they w0uld be prepared to take such decisions, as it is if a child had a cough/cold, and had been in school without anyone questioning it, and there was a case of covid in the school, there would soon be parents criticising, and wanting to know why that child hadn't been sent home and told to test. That's it with teaching you are always to blame. No wonder no one stays in the profession any more.

Someone needs to educate the teachers(there's a suprise) coughs and sniffles are not symptoms of covid in youngsters! A lateral flow jobbie would do the trick, they're being a bunch of know alls -as usual- when they actually are getting t so wrong, poor lad must be fed up!

Can I just point out that in the actions they take and the reasons for those actions schools have very little "wiggle" room. Their attendance figures and the actions they have taken to pursue poor attenders are scrutinised by Ofsted and a school will be criticised and may find its rating slips down if the figures are high and due diligence in pursuing the absentee hasn't been applied. The school may be sympathetic to the family, Ofsted is never sympathetic.

we had the same last academic year (different school) and we had a letter off the attendance officer but nothing ever came of it

She may be aware but she might not be aware of the difference in wait between the two methods. I wasnt the first time I did it, I could have been at work the next day rather than missing almost a week. As far as I can see nobody is criticising anyone.

It would appear that , if the child is coughing , then a trip to the GP would be in order?
If the child is ill, then surely finding out why he coughs (Asthma or an allergy maybe) is the priority here?

Could you change the test centre, the PCR test I had in Manchester was taken at 11am and the result came through by text 9.20 pm on the same day?

And? His autism may mean that the car or strange environment do not make him comfortable and so mum has to do it at home.

As I said his mother will no doubt be aware of the drive through options. It's right next to the home delivery option.

The issue here is the school being ridiculous.

Bibbity

Maybe due to his Suspected Autism mum needs to do it at home. I'm sure she's not purposely trying to take the longer option

Doing it in the car with strangers could be very traumatic and overstimulating for him.

My 2 year old covers her mouth and nose and screams at the sight of a swab now. Any swab. You don't even need to be moving towards her.

My GC is a preschooler and has asthma. DD has had to take her for multiple PCR tests as she always has a cough when she gets a cold. When they go to the test centre here it is the parent who carries out the test on the child in the car. DD makes as much of a game out of it as possible and says it's a tickle and that seems to have worked so far.

My 2 year old covers her mouth and nose and screams at the sight of a swab now. Any swab. You don't even need to be moving towards her.

Me too, *Bibbity^, in fact I start gagging before it gets anywhere near my tonsils.

Poor little girl, it's horrible.