Wednesday, April 06, 2011

Darwen Vale High School

I thought I had heard every possible daft statement from those who lead our schools, but as usual I was wrong.

Darwen Vale High School, near Blackburn in Lancashire has raised the bar. Their Governors are claiming that the reason the kids behave so badly is all down to the wind and the rain. (Rather than because the Head is afraid to take control of them.)


Amazingly for teachers, the staff are actually going to try and do something about the situation. Tomorrow they are going on strike in protest at the lack of support from above in dealing with the scrotes.

It sounds like my old school, so well done to them and let's hope they succeed.

16 comments:

Lilyofthefield said...

My old school went on strike after a series of assaults on staff and pupils. This staff has no confidence in the leadership or governors to protect staff and pupils from indiscipline" or something.
Shit them up good.

Anonymous said...

So the excuse is 'Wet and Windy' this week. It will probably be 'X Rays and Xenophobia' next week. What will they do when they run out of letters?

jaljen said...

I've always wondered why the staff can't make the same excuses. "Sorry I laid into that lad but you don't know how bad my home life is. It was his fault anyway for winding me up."

Like that's going to work. But why not?

"Oh, they're only young. They've a lot to learn." Yes, and I'll teach them if you give me half a chance.

Anonymous said...

At the last Ofsted inspection in June 2010, the Darwen Vale school was rated as a good school where behavior, the study and performance of pupils is considered positive.
A strike organized by professors creates difficulties for pupils and above inconvenience.Currently, pupils are being taught temporarily at former Holden Fold school buildings, which have a capacity of only 800
Reopen the school, students must have the option of continuing their studies.
http://www.petitiononline.co.uk/petition/reopen-the-school-darwen-vale/2657

Anonymous said...

What is wrong with the staff?
Insist on CCTV in classrooms as a behaviour management tool/evidence.
If assaulted by a pupil - call the police.
If harassment is the offence - call the police.
Side step the management. Yes I know the penalties are pathetic but over a short time the pupils will get the message and hopefully so will senior management who if they are of any use will support the staff.
Failing that and the senior management/Governors have handed the running of the school to the mob then look for another job

Anonymous said...

Sounds like something is wrong with the OFSTED report. It's fairly easy to pull one over the inspectors. In my old school, during inspection the worst of the bunch just so happened to be on exclusion or in isolation that day.

Teachers have a right to work in a safe environment. The school is closed thanks to the failure of management.

cheeky chappy said...

There is a VERY telling quote on the BBC website about this story:

Simon Jones, a local National Union of Teachers (NUT) official manning the picket line, added:

"This is not a strike against pupils. It is about management, and management failure to support staff in dealing with challenging behaviour."

Well sorry, Simon but the strike DAMN WELL SHOULD be about the pupils. Granted the management team may have failed to give support to the teachers', but they are not the root cause of the problem. That, I'm afraid, falls squarely on the shoulders of the violent and abusive pupils in the first instance.

As teachers we are sometimes our own worst enemy, we blame anyone and anything except the ones who need to be blamed, which in this case is the kids!

Like the govenor in The Mail article, we can see the cult of the angelic child writ large. As a nation we have become conditioned to believe that our young people can do nothing wrong and that we must make endless excuses for them, and that if we dare to suggest that they need harsh punishments we are viewed as disgusting human beings.

The bad behaviour in our schools is largely down to the fact that we have given our young people far too many ADULT freedoms, privileges and expectations. Additionally, we have also allowed them to think of themselves as equals to their elders and betters, which they are not. This equality with adults is further enforced because parents/teachers have been ecouraged to be best friends with their kids, rather than traditional authority figures who were able to maintain a certain much needed level of distance from their children/students; in order to enforce clear boundaries and unquestionable authority, which was and should be largely ascribed. To be friends with someone you must first start out as equals. Unfortunately, that then means that you have no scope to suddenly adopt a role of authority when you need one. If you are equal with someone (as you must be to be friends) then you have no power or right to suddenly try and enforce a sense of authority over someone. You simply can't do both.

That is the problem we have in this country.

The "old farts" and "dinosaurs" of education told us all that is what would happen if we did away with traditional, unquestionable authority and discipline in favour of this happy-clappy child centred rubbish and they have now been proved right many times over.

We have made a rod for our own backs and things will only get worse.

English Pensioner said...

According to the BBC the local council and governors are arranging to have discussions with the teachers AFTER EASTER.
No doubt hoping that the problem will go away in the meanwhile.

Cynical Optimist said...

Well said cheeky chappy!

Anonymous said...

No, please do NOT call the police. We are all busy in meetings, trying to meet the targets the Govt. say we no longer have and filling the Courts with people to whom nothing will happen once convicted. Don't bother calling us; we may arrest you instead once the child makes a 'counter allegation'. Just like us, you are on your own with this one.

Anonymous said...

Cheeky Chappie.
Great post and so true. The kids are quick to want their rights without taking any responsibility for their actions. Then when they do something wrong they are very quick to become the child again and the adults should know better than to blame them for anything they have done.

Anonymous said...

Have you seen the news on Ely Community College? http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-cambridgeshire-13006413

They seem to have the right idea...

Lilyofthefield said...

Cheeky Chappie, I absolutely agree that it is the kids who are at fault in the forst instance, but they are children. They must be led and by force if necessary into compliance. We can't do that, so what are we going to do? We can't kicj them out without incurring fines and there is nowhere to kick them out to.

cheeky chappy said...

Hi, Lily.

That's entirely my point though, instead of blaming the SMT (which is justified to a point and I do have LOADS of sympathy with these teachers.) They need to make the strike about the kids and highlight just how bad the kids' behaviour has become and that we need old fashioned discipline (corporal punishment) things that might actually cause a small amount of fear in their heads, bringing back.

This is what I mean, as teachers we are sometimes our own worst enemies. By saying the strike is about SMT, then you are actually excusing the behaviour of the kids and sending out the message that it is ok for them to be violent and abusive.

Until teachers' grow a back bone and ditch this cult of the angelic child mentality, not to mention have the balls to show over and over just how nasty and violent great swaiths of our young people have become, then we will never defeat the cultural left and get real and effective punishments back.

The way you do it is to highlight every gory instance of violent and abusive behaviour. You start blaming the kids instead of making excuses for them. Let parents and the wider society see, in full colour, the shit we have to deal with every day, time and time again. When the full horror and scale of how bad discipline in schools is known; that's when we can kick these happy clappy liberals out and get real discipline and effective punishments back in schools. That's how you do it.

Anonymous said...

I was a pupil at Darwen Vale between 1993 and 1998.

It's hard to believe but back in the early 90s when we were putting down our choices from Primary School it had a good reputation. It had been a grammar a few years before (Darwen Grammar School) and local opinion suggested standards had been broadly maintained.

All I can say is by 1998 it was a free-for-all. Nicking off was the norm and you were never caught or punished for it.

Behaviour was completely unregulated. You could if you wanted get away with almost anything. And because by this time we were one of the "bad schools" it was near impossible to get expelled because apart from nearby Queens Park there was no lower than us to go.

Not only all this but in the last 2 years of my tenure I saw acts of gang related violence that would shock hardened criminals.

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