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Truancy

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Is your teen reluctant to go to school or lacking in motivation?

Watch agony aunt Suzie Hayman discuss how you can help support and encourage your teen in their education, and what the school can do to help you.

When your child is in trouble at school or truanting, you may feel desperate, with no idea what to do. As a parent you have a legal responsibility to make sure your child attends school regularly but this doesn’t mean it is always easy to do this, even though it could make a real difference to your child’s future.

Truancy can occur in all families and may begin as early as primary school or when children start secondary school. Whether your child is truanting or has been excluded, it will help if you can find out what might be the reason – your child may be unhappy at school, may be being bullied or may be finding it difficult to keep up with the work.

If your child continues to truant and/or behave disruptively, the school may ask you to sign up to a Parenting Contract. This is a voluntary agreement between you and the local education authority or the school’s governing body. The contract will mean that you are given practical help and support to make sure your child attends school or improve their behaviour.

In the case of regular truanting or exclusion you may be served with a Parenting Order. This is a court order which will insist you attend a parenting programme and comply with orders about your child’s attendance or behaviour. This support is designed to help you tackle your child’s behaviour and to gain the skills and confidence to make a real difference. The courts may also impose an Education Supervision Order which means the LEA can tell you what to do to make sure your child is properly educated.

There are also a number of fines and even in extreme cases, jail sentences, which can be imposed if your child persists in not going to school and it is felt that you have not done enough to get your child back to school or aren’t cooperating.

If things are getting serious, it is really important that you find out more about these measures and your rights - To find out more about Parenting Contracts, Parenting Orders, possible fines and other penalties you can order a leaflet on school attendance called Is your child missing out? (Ref: PPY181). Available from the Department for Education and Skills at Tel: 0845 60 222 60.

Remember - children may drop out of education because of things that are happening away from school. If you want help and support in finding the causes of your child’s trouble at school and at home, contact our free Parentline on 0808 800 2222.

Watch the video below to find out some of the reasons behind unauthorised absences and what it can mean for your teen's education. This video also talks through your rights and responsibilities and offer some support in encouraging attendance.

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On 03 December 2008 01:07, Aloski wrote:

I would like to comment the following statement from above:
"– your child may be unhappy at school, may be being bullied or may be finding it difficult to keep up with the work."

My children occasionally stay a day off school.
They refuse to go.
No, the reason is not the standard answer of bullying, nor is it the inability to keep up with work!

The reason they give me is: "It is boring!"

The rule and my approach in this cases is:
Fine, you find school boring. Okay, exceptionally you can stay at home. I call in and say you are unwell.
I then give them interesting tasks for different subjects and make sure they do a lot and learn a lot within a couple of hours. They say at home they learn more in one day with me than at school in two or three weeks, especially in Maths and Science. If they stay off school I do not accept that they waste their time on PC or in front of the telly (unless its a program in a foreign language). If they've done good work for a couple of hours, more work than they would have done at school, I even allow them to go to football training, despite being unwell.

Sure, if lessons in schools were more motivating and more interesting, truancy rates would go down considerably!

Why is this central issue and main cause of truancy never being mentioned in all the "truancy debates"??

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On 07 January 2009 13:01, angie.walton wrote:

Again further to the statement above :- – your child may be unhappy at school, may be being bullied or may be finding it difficult to keep up with the work and also the word from Aloski. The problems we are having is that our daughter is probably the mouthy one, initially causing the problems and then cant handle it when the other students give as good as she gets. She hate's the school she is in but we are unable to get her into the school "SHE" wants due to the lack of space. She has actually admitted that she is trying to get kicked out of school but doesn't seem to realise, although we have tried to explain, that this will not get her where "SHE" wants to go. How do parents deal with something like that !

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On 20 January 2009 21:19, jen32 wrote:

hi my son will not go to school he is 13 well we take him to school then he come home, just do not no what to do the school doing all thay can but still will not go,

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On 22 January 2009 23:05, Aloski wrote:

jen,
why does your son not want to attend school?
What does he say?

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On 25 January 2009 16:48, jen32 wrote:

he do not talk a lot 2 me or my mum and dad or the the school, so do not now he referral to cahm's,

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On 29 April 2009 12:57, greyhaired wrote:

HI my 15 year old daughter does not want to go to school. I approached the education authorities last year when it first started asking for help. Since then I have been threatened with imprisionment, fines, and various other things. I have attended a parenting course which as a mental health professional was like being at work and I helped other parents on the course, the organisers of the course could not understand why I was there.

It seems all the emphasis is being directed on me and what a bad mother I am because my daughter does not go to school.

I approached everyone I could to get help for her, and would give up my life for my daughter. Physically she is 5 ft 7inches tall, and too heavy for me to pick up and take to school, we have arguments every morning and this impacts on everything we do. She is permeantly grounded has no computer or playstation as it has all been confiscated until she goes and still she refuses.

I am a single parent and the authorities have said they will not take action against her father who lives up north as he does not have much imput with my daughter.

The whole proceedure is wrong. I feel constantly being put down, I work as a psychiartic nurse which is a very stressful job, in order to provide a home and shelter for my daughter. My own mental state is begining to be worn down and I feel I am now just going from day to day not really feeling anything just acting on automatic pilot.

Unsure of where to turn, people I thought would help just seem to want to point the finger. My daughte just gets angry when I mention school and we end up fighting with her swearing its really wearing me down.

Can anyone help, before I tear my hair out

thanks

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On 29 April 2009 12:58, greyhaired wrote:

HI my 15 year old daughter does not want to go to school. I approached the education authorities last year when it first started asking for help. Since then I have been threatened with imprisionment, fines, and various other things. I have attended a parenting course which as a mental health professional was like being at work and I helped other parents on the course, the organisers of the course could not understand why I was there.

It seems all the emphasis is being directed on me and what a bad mother I am because my daughter does not go to school.

I approached everyone I could to get help for her, and would give up my life for my daughter. Physically she is 5 ft 7inches tall, and too heavy for me to pick up and take to school, we have arguments every morning and this impacts on everything we do. She is permeantly grounded has no computer or playstation as it has all been confiscated until she goes and still she refuses.

I am a single parent and the authorities have said they will not take action against her father who lives up north as he does not have much imput with my daughter.

The whole proceedure is wrong. I feel constantly being put down, I work as a psychiartic nurse which is a very stressful job, in order to provide a home and shelter for my daughter. My own mental state is begining to be worn down and I feel I am now just going from day to day not really feeling anything just acting on automatic pilot.

Unsure of where to turn, people I thought would help just seem to want to point the finger. My daughter just gets angry when I mention school and we end up fighting with her swearing its really wearing me down.

Can anyone help, before I tear my hair out

thanks

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On 30 April 2009 09:07, Moderator wrote:

(Edited by Moderator on 30 April 2009, 09:09)

Hi greyhaired,

I can understand how distressed you must be feeling but there is someone out there if you want to talk.

You can call our Parentline 0808 800 2222 and talk through everything that is worrying you with one of our calltakers who will be a parent so are going to be able to relate to what you are going through.

Please get in touch with us and let us know how you get on. We wish you the best of luck. Stay Strong.

From the Gotateenager Team at Parentline Plus.

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On 03 May 2009 00:43, dawnski wrote:

Hi Greyhaired, I know exactly how you are feeling I too work as a nurse (although not psychiatric) just general and my 14 year old son who has ADHD plays truant despite me actually dropping him off in the school grounds, he is on reduced time table so only goes to school 2 days a week and on the other days he is at home. Yet I still have to work and have found out recently that he and his friends have been smoking weed in my house/garden, strongly denied by him off course and i have no idea where to go for help or who to turn to anymore I really do feel at my wits end. Sorry if this makes you feel more sad I just wanted you to know that there are other people who are going through similar experiences and being a professional I thing people do put more pressure on you.
Take care

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10.

On 03 May 2009 17:42, zelda wrote:

I totally understand where you are coming from dawnski and greyhaired. I too have a daughter who is ADHD. She is now 16 and life has been a living hell for years and still ongoing. Its almost as if she is on a complete self destruct program and the only ones who care and are trying to help are her parents but there is no support and the way the law sits all the rights and protection is for the children with nothing there for us the parents. The schools are of no use and quite frankly have little or no understanding of ADHD and how to deal with it. It seems to me that they don't even recognise this as a proper condition, aparently as long as your child looks ok there is nothing wrong with them and their behaviour is simply down to poor parenting. Sometimes I feel like it would be easier to give up and let her do what-ever she wants since there isn't much she hasn't tried or done already and no matter what I do, Im always the one who is wrong, but I will never give up on her as she is my child and I love her. Good luck to you both, I share in your parenting pain but its good to know there are other parents who are silently suffering the same parenting woos.
xxx

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11.

On 09 May 2009 22:11, riptiz wrote:

My daughter also does not go to school and we have had no support or help from the EWO's(about 4 in 18 months). The last one told us before xmas they were going to take out a supervision order.She went off ill and left the service although nobody informed us.The new EWO said we should have rang the school when nobody contacted us.Everybody has ticked their boxes and dumped us.In my opinion they are pretty useless and not interested in helping anybody, just interested in forcing your kids back to school at ANY cost to families.

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12.

On 09 June 2009 13:36, busymum wrote:

I totally understand what greyhaired and the others are saying. I also have a 13 year old who frequently misses school, and won't tell me why, if she is being bullied or what is going on. The school just blame me, and constantly berate me, even when her attendance improved, the school were still onto me about lateness and other things. I too am a mental health professional, and a single parent, it feels at times there is no-where to turn. I have tried to get on a local parenting class, but I have left repeated messages on their answer phone, and they do not get back to me.

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13.

On 02 November 2009 11:17, JacquiJ wrote:

I am having the same problem with my 15 year old, she has hated school for some time now because she was bullied a couple of years ago and decided to befriend the bullies and so ended up in the wrong crowd! I have had call after call from the school and meeting after meeting but nothing will make her stay there once I have dropped her off.

I have had a discussion in the last week with our local college and the Education Authority and it is looking like I can take her out of school for the last few months (she leaves in June) to do a two day a week GCSE course at College. The school will not tell me this as it looks bad on them if their numbers go down!

I am waiting to sort this out this week and have it confirmed; I was told last week (half term, and the people I needed to talk to were on holiday) that as long as the school have proof that she is attending college then I am within my rights to do this.

Maybe this is something you could all look into.

Good luck, and remember this is a phase and there is an end!

Jacqui
xx

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14.

On 09 December 2009 13:38, Prairie wrote:

Hi,I'm new and, Greyhaired, I have to say that I, too, had a run in with a EWO on Friday, who, although very polite, left me in no doubt that continued absences from my daughter would not be tolerated. I was threatened with charges brought against me.
My 15 year old has been ill and off school for roughly half the term. She is very bright and works hard when she is there, but has not wanted to go, partly because of coursework and getting behind.
I totally agree with you that support for this type of absence is non existent from within school and the one person, a school counsellor, who should be a confidant and trusted, actually tore a strip off my daughter in front of her PE class. Despite her training, she told me that she forgot my child was so sensitive. A teenaged, girl, sensitive, blow me down!!
when I phoned her form tutor to have a word about her missing school, after leaving a message,it took him two days to get back to me and when he did, he verbally attacked me, accused me of bad parenting and acted as if it had been him who had contacted me and not the other way round. He even accused her of wanting to stay off because we had recently acquired a puppy! Some of her peers had told him of the puppy and he enraged me by taking their opinions seriously.
I have never had trouble with the school system before, and have to say I am totally disillusioned with the whole thing.
My daughter wants to do A levels at the school, so I am hoping that, as in my son's experience, it will have a different feel and she will be treated better by the staff.

I hope you others in this situation reach a desired outcome and manage to stay sane in spite of it all. I think the education system should offer parenting classes to everyone before the trouble starts. But heaven forbid the government does anything preactive or creative.

Best of luck to all.

Prairie

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15.

On 08 February 2010 19:43, deni wrote:

I too have a 13 year old son who refuses to go to school. I actually work in education so I think that it looks really bad on me that I cannot get my son into school. When I question him about it he just says 'schools boring'. I have had meetings with the school who have offered to put things in place which would make him happier, these things have neverr happened, all they keep saying is that 'its the law your son needs to be at school'. Like I don't know, I want my son at school I just need help getting him there. I feel that the education system needs updating as the way children are taught does not suit all children.

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16.

On 25 February 2010 15:32, kwaterman wrote:

My son is almost 15, and has 2 elements of autism. (Not the speech and language part) I struggle every single morning trying to get him out of bed. After a while, he becomes verbally abusive. He has told me he hates school. Simple as that. He gets very easily bored, and cannot sit still for very long. I drop him off at school and he escapes and comes home while I'm at work. The school, as in your case Deni, promised to keep up his enthusiasm by giving him guitar lessons etc, but it came to nothing. I think they just regard him as a nuisance.

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17.

On 09 March 2010 17:34, trace402008 wrote:

Hi just read all the above comments and at least I feel better knowing I'm not alone. My 12 year old son hates school, every day is a constant battle with him escaping home every chance he gets, there is help on the way but its taking a long time coming. School seem to treat him like he's a nuisance and when he does make the effort and go in he gets it in the neck or a detenion which makes the whole situation worse. As a single parent I am literally at the end of my tether, i've tried everything, calm approach, strong approach, bribery, with-holding privileges but nothing works. He has glasses but won't wear them in public so cannot even see to get the bus. How on earth do I deal with that, short of supergluing them to his head. I've offered to buy him expensive ones or get him contants but he isnt interested. Just doesnt want to go to school.Can anyone help me please? x

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18.

On 27 March 2010 07:22, knorman wrote:

(Edited by knorman on 27 March 2010, 07:24)

I really rate the book - What to do when your child hates School by Antonia Chitty.
It sets out the various options that no-one else seems to know about.

1. Ideas for how to work it out with the school
2. How to change schools
3. Alternatives to school

What no-one will tell you is that your child needs an education, not necessarily at school. It is your responsibility to see that your child gets an education, not the schools or the Local Authorities. If school is not working for your child then you can change school or home educate. Find out more at about home education at http://www.education-otherwise.org/ and http://www.heas.org.uk/.
These organisations can also put you in touch with local groups where you can find out more from families who are home educating - some of whom will have chosen it as their first choice, others have removed their children because school was just not working for them.

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19.

On 06 May 2010 20:46, femme_regal wrote:

I am so pleased (Knorman) that you have put the link up relating to the option to home educate, I am actually amazed that there is no specific page around alternatives to mainstream education,so many parents do not seem to be aware that it is education that is compulsary and not school.

Obviously this has to be an educated choice based around the reasons mainstream school isn't working for your child, for me it was literally a matter of life or death (racial bullying which caused profound mental health problems for my child) and wild horses would not prevent me from putting my childs welfare first. Be aware that electing to take your child out of school does bring with it huge responsibilities and in my particular circumstances it was a generally horrendous time as my daughter wasn't well, but if you think this is best for your child you will find some amazing home education forums etc as above. Good luck and where possible keep school on your side, if your child is unwell & want to access resources via CAMHS/ESTHMA etc keep your child on school roll:)

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