Social media criticism of school

fall

Don't know if people came across a vlog today from a women called Rachel Sarah Murphy hammering a school in Cork for how they dealt with two suicides in their school. She used to be an actress in fair city so she has a relatively big following. For anyone that has watched it do she think her actions were fair? She is getting a lot of support in the comments.

happywithlife

I did but also saw a very good response from a TY student in that school. Don't know the school to know if comments slating her for spreading untruths are true or not but if the school has had two suicides and still haven't brought professionals in I do think that is disgraceful.

fall

I also don't know the school but someone else posted to say NEPS were into the school. That's standard procedure when a school has a critical incident. People seem to be suggesting that counselling should have been set up for everyone in the school. With over one thousand students that is completely unrealistic. I personally think there is a lot of posting by people who have no clue how schools are run

heldel00

The whole situation needs to be addressed. Herself coming in shouting the odds and looking for likes is not the way to change things.
The DES have landed dealing with critical incidents in the hands of NEPS. These are educational psychologists and are not specifically qualified to deal with counselling after such traumas. Clinical psychologists are needed and DES need to get their finger out as unfortunately these incidents are becoming more commonplace.

spurious

I got the impression she is a teacher herself. Is she?

She should know well there are schools with no TY co-ordinators in place and it's not for the school not wanting to put one in. You can only do so much to play about with cut allocations before something suffers.

TheDriver

I haven't seen the article or vlog but you will always hear about how a school does nothing about bullying etc etc but sometimes we cant work miracles, sometimes its not all about the school and sometimes we just want someone to blame. Its never as simple as it seems

luketitz

I too got the impression she was an educator of some sort rather that a former actress..

fall

Think she has an acting school but not a regular teacher. Do they not say that you can't start counselling immediately after these incidents. That people are in shock so counselling is not effective. For me the screaming issue here is the fact that the actual counselling services for teenagers are far and few between. A recent phone call to one of these services said there are waiting lists up to three months!

TheDriver

Try getting into CAHMS or similar services or making a statutory report, the services are very much overworked. However with new method of allocating SEN hours for primary and secondary, their psychologists will have plenty of time to regroup and deal with these issues and similar situations

fall

They are completely overworked and the services for acute cases are even worse

r93kaey5p2izun

Don't post links here or anything but where has all this occurred - her twitter, her facebook, a website?

I will reserve judgement unless I hear what she has to say myself, but my initial feeling would be that it's unlikely the school has failed to bring in NEPS or follow its critical incident policy, that her criticism may be misdirected and that public criticism like that is only likely to cause further hurt and damage.

fall

It's on her Facebook page. There is huge upset from people posting both for and against her actions. She took the vlog down then put it up again saying sue me.

Crazyteacher

My immediate thought was to say they could take legal action if the school was defamed. Especially when mentioning such sensitive information about students who were more than likely under the age of 18.

evolving_doors

I'd imagine the school is taking some guidance... does anyone know 100% what that is. Is anyone privy to those conversations. Is she taking all her information from a second hand source (student / parent/ teacher).
Add in further hearsay from all and sundries (true and all as it may be!) And you just have muddy waters.

Deer

I watched the video. I'm not really good at writing my thoughts down but hopefully they will be understood by some

My daughter went to the school, was in the same year as the girls who passed away.

While I wasn't happy with the school 100% I do feel the video is unfair in that it feels to me that it is second hand information. She mentions that there is no ty head when in fact there is. The school can only do so much. If they are not given the resources what are they to do? It is a very big school. The principal wouldn't be great with mental health that much I will say but had no issues with the vice principal. I found her very helpful as were the counsellors. We had another issue with a child in our family which was handled clumsily but with good intentions and to be fair even cahms were boggled at the time and they are the mental health professionals, not the school teachers.

I also intensely dislike this woman grabbing onto these girls to gain a bit of attention. In fact in a later video today in the comments an aunt of one of the girls asked her to stop using the girls name as it was upsetting the family. It will be interesting to see if she gets a reply

There are a good few posts from students defending their school yet she doesn't reply to them.

I also took exception to the end of the video where she more or less says thank goodness I will be there for them (not exact words) and I got from that that she feels she is their saviour.

This is a big big issue and not one for broadcasting over facebook. It definitely should be discussed but I feel that it is very inappropriate and incredibly insulting to all the staff who work in the school.

I am getting tired of all these bloggers and their campaigns to gain attention to be honest. If I thought it was sincere maybe I would be of a different opinion but something about this is off for me.

TheDriver

I think its advisable that we should keep this chat a general one and not particular to the school for everyone's sake