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NEW POWERS FOR HEADTEACHERS TO TACKLE POOR BEHAVIOUR – PARENTS RESPONSIBLE FOR KEEPING EXCLUDED CHILDREN OFF THE STREETS
04 September 2007Parents of pupils who have been excluded from school will be required to keep their children indoors, attend reintegration interviews with the head teacher and work with teachers to develop strategies for improving the behaviour of their child, announced Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families, Ed Balls. From this week, under powers in the Education and Inspections Act 2006, there is a new duty on parents to ensure that, during the first five days of an exclusion from school, their child is not found in a public place during school hours, without reasonable justification. Mr Balls also pointed to the Social and Emotional Aspect of Learning (SEAL) programme – being rolled out to secondary schools starting from this term – and said that taking preventative action and earlier intervention to stop children going off the rails in the first place was crucial to improving the behaviour of young people inside and outside the school gates. Measures from the Education and Inspections Act 2006 that come into effect this week, include:• Parents are now responsible for keeping children indoors during exclusions – parents of children found in a public place during school hours, without reasonable justification, can be subject to a £50 fixed penalty notice. This will be £50 if paid within 28 days rising to £100 if paid after 28 days but within 42 days of receipt of the notice. Failure to pay could result in prosecution of the original offence which, on conviction, could mean a £1,000 fine or a community sentence. • Parents of excluded pupils will have to attend compulsory reintegration interviews with the head teacher – where they will discuss strategies for managing the pupils’ behaviour in future • Earlier intervention through parenting contracts – schools will have the ability to develop parenting contracts, which set a clear, agreed action plan for unruly pupils, before bad behaviour escalates to the point where exclusion is necessary – previously, parenting contracts only came into play after a pupil was excluded;• More power for heads to enforce parental responsibility – heads will now be able to apply directly to the courts for parenting orders in cases where parents do not take responsibility for their child’s action. These enforce the terms of a parenting contract and mean that parents will be fined if they then fail to take the agreed action. • Tighter rules to help prevent excluded children slipping behind - After the fifth day of any exclusion, either the school (in the case of fixed exclusions) or the local authority (in the case of permanent exclusions) must provide an alternative source of full time education to prevent the excluded child from slipping behind. Under the previous rules this was required after 15 days, not five. Ed Balls said: “Good discipline and strong leadership are vital for driving up standards in our schools. But schools can only do so much in isolation. Parents have to be responsible for instilling right and wrong too. Our measures help to build strong and supportive partnerships between parents and teachers that will create a more united front against poor behaviour. “I want heads to engage with parents, including using parenting contracts at an early stage, so that schools and parents are able to work together to prevent bad behaviour from escalating. It is also important that parents take a central role when a child is excluded – making sure they are at home working, rather than treating the exclusion as a holiday or an excuse to wander the streets.“And in those rare cases where parents persistently obstruct or fail to work with schools on their child’s behaviour issues, it is right that heads should have direct powers to apply for parenting orders to force parents to take action. I hope these powers are used rarely but it is important they are available as a last resort.“Ofsted reported that most schools have good behaviour most of the time. In fact, last year the proportion of secondary schools judged to have unsatisfactory standards of behaviour was at a historic low but I understand the concern of parents and will not allow troublemakers to disrupt the education of others.”As part of the Government’s strategy for preventing bad behaviour, Mr Balls also announced that secondary schools will begin to introduce the new social and emotional aspects of learning (SEAL) programme, which has already been successfully implemented in around 60% of primary schools with excellent results. Mr Balls announced a £13.7 million fund to expand the SEAL programme into secondary schools in July.SEAL will teach pupils hard-edged social and emotional skills, such as how to resolve conflict effectively and fairly, solve problems collectively or independently, manage anger, frustration and anxiety, recover from setbacks, compete fairly, stand up for the rights of others and understand and respect diversity.The programme will be taught across the curriculum rather than specific lessons. Some examples of how teaching could incorporate SEAL include:• Exploring the subject of personal motivation through drama and English by • exploring the experiences of characters who have overcome difficulties.• Developing empathy in Citizenship by exploring current conflicts and considering why it can be so difficult to keep the peace.• Teaching children through PE how to work as part of a team and experience winning and losing gracefully.Ed Balls said:“Clearly, prevention is better than cure and we have already seen from the experience of primary schools that SEAL can improve discipline by making young people think about the impact of their actions and addressing the root causes of bad behaviour. “In secondary schools, SEAL will partly help teachers to teach the ‘behavioural 3Rs’ of rules, responsibility and respect. It will also help to cultivate the right attitude among young people, giving them the broader social skills that will allow them to do well in job interviews, the workplace and wider society.“SEAL will help to develop a culture that promotes discipline, respect and good manners. Working with tough new measures to clamp down on bad behaviour, it will help us to create a better learning environment for teachers and pupils.”
Editor's Notes
This press notice relates to 'England'
1. The latest figures (05/06) show that the number of permanent exclusions has fallen since the previous year by 2.5% from 9,570 to 9,330 cases in all maintained primary, secondary and special schools (and academies), which adds up to a drop of 25% since 1997-98. 2. At the same time, the number of fixed period exclusions in secondary schools rose by 4% to 343,840 last year, suggesting that more schools are using short suspensions as a way of clamping down on lower level misdemeanours before they escalate to the point where permanent exclusion is necessary. 3. The vast majority of fixed term exclusions lasted for no more than a couple of days: 27% were just one day, 71% were three days or less and 89% were five days or fewer. This suggests that schools are using them as a short sharp shock to tackle low level disruption.4. The most common reasons for permanent exclusions were persistent disruptive behaviour (2,370 or 30% of all permanent exclusions – a drop of 150 on 2004/05), physical assaults against a pupil (1,260 or 16% – a drop of 240) and verbal abuse or threatening behaviour against an adult (900 or 11% – a drop of 80).
Contact Details
Public Enquiries 0870 000 2288, info@dcsf.gsi.gov.uk
Press Notice 2007/0154
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