I Wonder What Happened To...

 I've wrtten before about some of my previous work as a Head Teacher in a Pupil Referral Unit. Here's a story from the mid 1990's: just a date, the narrative continues.

We had a mixed group of troubled young people at our centre and the labels didn't mean very much-labels have a tendency to damn the future rather than to explain the past.

When working with troubled kids, there were a few things we did know and "Thing One" was, don't leave them unsupervised (stuff kicks off very quickly!).
I didn't insist on very much from the staff, having a great team for me meant helping them to do their job and we had a few conventions in place to help. The big one was that everyone's "stock-box" (pens, pencils, rulers....that sort of stuff), was replensished daily and before we started teaching. That meant that if an uncomfortable situation was gathering pace, the class teacher might send one of the kids down to the office for a piece of stock-this was a signal that some help was needed and we would take it from there. 

Monday:

Teaching started at 08:45 and at 08:55 one of the learners from Bev's group came down for some staples. I went up and Bev handed me a note

"Chris is in an awful state today!!"

Chris:(a) witty, charming, funny, open, empathetic, cooperative and biddable.

Chris: (b) abusive, quarrelsome, selfish, destructive and rejecting.

........all of the above and more!

I asked Chris to come with me to the office: I asked him how his week-end had been-

Chris: "Bad, man...bad!"

Me: Have you had any breakfast, sleep...that sort of stuff, Chris?

Chris: Nah, it's been a bad week-end.

Me: Sit down there Chris, I'll sort something out

...and in a few minutes he'd had some tea and toast and a few minutes later he was asleep and stayed asleep until 13:00. When he awakened we had version (a) restored. More tea, more toast-he was on a reduced programme and went home at 13:30 ish.

A Bad Week End

Chris had a chaotic homelife, a co-depedent relationship with his mom whose drug and alcohol abuse were accompanied by a number of fee paying sexual partners, some of them stuck around for a while and most of them didn't. Chris seldom had clean clothes and frequently stank of weed.

Chris: (to me on another occasion) It's like this Sir, she has these blokes round and they start on the rum and she gets off her face on this and weed and I have to look after her, I can't stop it but if I'm awake and around maybe that wont hurt her....it's a fucking mess, Sir. They don't want me around and I've said I'll stab 'em if they don't fuck off....

Agencies had tried their best and we were the first educational setting he'd stayed at for anymore than a couple of weeks. Social services were reluctant to take him into care, given that he would almost certainly abscond and there were real concerns about the impact of the decision on his mom's safety.

We all knew what was needed but there was no capacity to deliver the complex support package required to even give us a chance of making some positive impact beyond "rescuing the present in the hope that the future might bring us better times." This did nothing to 

• reduce his mom's alcohol dependency and drug use
• decrease mom's vulnerability to sexual exploitation
• increase her safety
• increase her agency 
• address Chris' care needs
• address Chris' educational needs

....it goes on

Chris continued with us for a few weeks more until he and his mom joined the ranks of sofa-surfers, the invisible, the troubled and troubling. He was never heard of again by our service and I remember him not for the version (b) Chris, but for the version (a). When the light shone from him it was brilliant and so was he: this was a light that at that time was reduced by circumstances beyond his or his mother's control.

Chris will be in his late 30's now....I wonder.....

An Awful Reminder of The Need To Look Further Than Ticks In Boxes -Or Registers

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2792285/teenager-killed-years-bullying-forced-going-school-strict-guidelines-taking-time.html

This article is a painful reminder of the folly of a “one size fits all” approach. What works for general and low-level non attendance is unlikely to work when non-attendance is the manifestation of a deeper, complex and more troubled situation. 

It’s not that long ago that during an attendance review we spotted an erratic attendance pattern in a bright Year 10 pupil. This at a time where Education Social Workers were a vital link between school and other agencies; their role looked at engagement, development and assistance: these vital areas were never the servant of compliance, Our bright Year 10 pupil took time off when he believed that his dad a perpetrator of domestic violence, was likely to assault his mom. His dad wouldn’t carry out the assaults when his son was around. Our Education Social Worker found this out, organised a multi-agency strategy meeting with a series of “Who does what” outcomes. Result? Perpetrator out of the house and banned from the area, Mom gets some assistance with enabling her to understand what has happened to her and how to move forward, Year 10 pupil attends regularly and grades improve.

Although I’m certain that the bean counters who have authored the current raft of compliance that floats on a sea of manure mean no harm, it is clear that they cause harm or are a part of harm being caused. Whereas it’s true, they didn’t bully the boy to death it is unavoidably clear that they are an unnecessary function of a bizarre culture that insists on measuring the wrong things for the wrong reasons, producing a flawed “devil take the hindmost” culture is so doing.

This child-yes child-is dead through no fault of his own. He is the victim of bullying, aided and abetted by a system that seems to have forgotten how to care and why it should.

Safeguarding and Child Protection. It Needs To Be Taught, Not Caught!

DY 3Solutions is pleased to announce that we are developing a separate identity to deliver our work that addresses many facets of Safeguarding. This will be delivered under the trading heading of URIncluded. But for now, here's a write up some training we delivered last week. There's a mixture of really positive outcomes and a few serious concerns about how and when training is accessed.

Safeguarding Related issues seem to be bubbling close to the surface again in Birmingham. We recently delivered our standard “Awareness Raising” programme to a group of enthusiastic and committed teachers within a Primary Training Partnership.

Here’s the feedback.

First, the group was asked to comments on how well we had met the Learning Objectives for the session

Second, the group was asked to comment on how we had contributed to Competencies

In each area 84% "Excellent", 16% "Good"

Here are some of the evaluation comments received on the day:

In dealing with the issue

• Dealt with issues in a ‘nice’ manner.
• In detail, approachable with a difficult subject.
• Very professional and friendly manner used to approach a difficult subject.
• Good content/approach to difficult topic

Taking back to the working environment

• I feel confident about my role in School and what I should expect from the School.
• I can leave with a much clearer understanding of safeguarding in schools and peoples responsibilities and duties regarding children.
• Feel a lot more confident about what we should look out for in a classroom situation.
• Confidence to trust instincts
• Gave so many hints and tips I can use in the classroom – links to the curriculum.
• All relevant to schools and settings we work in.

General safeguarding

• The ‘signs’ of problems and what I can do about it are clearer.
• Great insight into the role of safeguarding.
• An eye-opener as to how easily child abuse can slip through the net.
• Highlighted main issues/areas for concern.
• Gave us very clear indicators to look out for.

Case Study

• Case study was particularly important to me.
• Case study was interesting
• Good use of case studies to highlight areas of concern.
• Good case study activity.
• Case studies to look at – to pick apart the signs.
• [The case study] makes you think of warning signs and then in discussion what you can do about them.
• Case study really interesting!
• Case study – being able to pick up signs for ourselves.

Information

• Informative
• Very informative lesson.
• Very straight to the point and full of a lot of good information.
• Information about the process you should follow and what should be done.
• Informative – what we can do, where we can go – process.
• Do and Don’t on how to keep your notes very helpful.
• Do’s and Don'ts about notes.
• Great information on policies, signs, what to do if you spot signs etc.
• Good content – essential information.
• Extremely useful information.
• A full-on experience, really informative.
• Very informative.

Delivery

• Enjoyed being referred to as ‘colleagues’ and included in lecture as opposed to just being spoken to/at.
• Good information delivery.
• Delivery of the lesson
• Good pace to the afternoon.
• Good slides
• Engaging speaker.
• Lots of information presented well and clearly.
• Really good afternoon. J
• Well explained
• Presented himself well, [and I can] clearly see his passion for teaching and learning.
• Interactive.
• Engaging
• Clear Objectives
• Clear Instructions.
• Key information presented well and clearly.
• Educational
• Really highlights the importance but not in a statistical boring way.
• Eye opening.

Improvements for next year

• Safeguarding updates would be useful around the year.
• Heavy session. Maybe break up part 1?
• Longer time spent working on this area.
• Maybe have him teach other sessions.
• Longer session – maybe on when we should be concerned – difference between attitudes of children.

The programme was delivered over 3 hours.  I was supported by an experienced co-facilitator and we helped 19 people who are beginning their journey in the teaching profession to understand a few key points. Here they are:

• Front line workers are the “eyes and ears” of Safeguarding
• Children and young people will talk to people who they feel are “safe and can be trusted”, this could be anyone on the school community.
• How to deal with disclosure-what to do/what not to do
• How Child Abuse cuts across socio-economic, ethnic and cultural boundaries
• Healthy organisations accept that “It can happen here”
• Policies are one thing, knowing how to implement them is another
• There are clear protocols for reporting suspected abuse and there’s no excuse for not following them
• Abusers hide in plain sight.

There were 19 people in our group that day: this was the first exposure they have had to Safeguarding Training,  We both reflected with incredulity, sadness and anger that this vital area should be "Taught Not Caught" prior to members of our the Education Workforce entering the classroom in any capacity.