Schools receive warning letters over exclusions
SCHOOLS have been warned it is illegal to "unofficially" exclude a pupil as punishment for bad behaviour.
Stoke-on-Trent City Council has written to its schools to clarify the regulations after councillors raised concerns about the practice earlier this year.
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A task and finish group claimed that some schools were using so-called "grey exclusions" in a bid to avoid them showing up on their records.
In some cases, a pupil may have been signed into their school, but only actually be there for a short time during that day.
The councillors made a series of other recommendations in a bid to try to cut the number of youngsters in the Potteries getting expelled or suspended from school.
Their suggestions included offering more specialist support for primary school-age children to prevent challenging behaviour getting out of control.
In 2009/10, 10 of the 58 pupils expelled from city schools were in the primary system.
The council's cabinet will discuss its formal response to the task and finish group's recommendations at a meeting due to be held at the council's Civic Centre in Stoke on Thursday, October 27, at 5.30pm.
Comments
by boonster75
Thursday, October 20 2011, 9:12PM
“Well it is about time that this was picked up by the local council! I have a 9 year old child who has been sent home on so many occasions in the last 2 months due to "behaviour". I even contacted the parent partnership company who advised me that what the school was doing was "illegal".My sons education has suffered so much as these days schools don't or won't tackle the problem head on.I am glad that this story has been published because it is very close to my heart and my frustrations because its the children that suffer in the long run and basic educational needs are not being met.”