School question

Gatling

Has anyone had an experience where a school banned parents from staying with their children in a school yard when dropping off in the mornings ,
A friend received a note home today saying from Monday morning due to health and safety regulations parents cannot stay with there kids due to them not been vetted to work with children,

Work in a school myself and never heard that before , having to be vetted when your waiting with your child before a teacher to collect's their class

spurious

How many potential unvetted adults hanging around the yard would this stop?
Is it a large school?

_Brian

Are the parents within the school grounds ?? That would be totally inappropriate.

On occasion I have my daughter at the school early she either waits in the car with me, or, if she goes in to play with a friend I sit in the car in the car park outside the grounds where I can Make sure she is safe, and leave when a teacher is on duty, never more than 5 minutes.

Gatling

spurious wrote: »

How many potential unvetted adults hanging around the yard would this stop?
Is it a large school?

No it's a fairly small school around 140 kids ,from what I can gather it's only going to effect junior enfants classes who would be walked into the school yard , where they eventually get collected by a teacher at 8:50 give or take ,

Doesn't sound right saying you have to be vetted to walk on to the school with your own child ,
From what I can gather it's around 20 parents across 2 classes that walk in to the yard ,but thats the norm for the school

dori_dormer

Your post doesn't say you can't walk in, it says you can't hang around. Maybe they had an issue with people arriving too early, or someonen dodgy hanging around claiming to be so and so's 'uncle' Etc.

Big Bag of Chips

I know in our school after the first few weeks parents are encouraged to let the junior infants in on their own. The letter says it is stopping parents waiting in the yard which seems reasonable to me. It doesn't say parents aren't allowed walk the kids in, or wait outside the gate for them to go in. Just that they are not allowed wait in the yard.

Gatling

Big Bag of Chips wrote: »

I know in our school after the first few weeks parents are encouraged to let the junior infants in on their own. The letter says it is stopping parents waiting in the yard which seems reasonable to me. It doesn't say parents aren't allowed walk the kids in, or wait outside the gate for them to go in. Just that they are not allowed wait in the yard.

The school has one yard that's used for the kids to enter into from there they are collected by the respective class teachers ,
And brought into the school via a rear door,
The letter says parents cannot walk their own child/children into the yard as none of them are Garda vetted to be on the premises ,
The principal is claiming he spoke to the department of education who said all parents are to be stopped from entering the yard due to not been vetted for working with children ,

My own School have heard nothing about parents needing to be vetted when waiting for for a teacher to arrive ,
It seems alot of concerns are being raised that a single sna is expected to manage and supervise 140 kids for up to half an hour till teachers collect the classes .

Apologies for not being so clear in my op

heldel00

Gatling wrote: »

It seems alot of concerns are being raised that a single sna is expected to manage and supervise 140 kids for up to half an hour till teachers collect the classes .

Children should not be at school half an hour before school starts.

Gatling

heldel00 wrote: »

Children should not be at school half an hour before school starts.

No but i get the feelings its a common accurance in many schools hence the need for breakfast clubs and the likes ,

I worked in a school camp during the summer which didn't open till 9am but for 4 weeks of camps at least 15 kids were at the school from 8:30 despite repeatedly telling parents not to drop kids off early .

heldel00

The need for a breakfast club is for children who may not get a breakfast at home, not for child minding.
In my own school teachers are not expected to supervise before school starts. Our new principal decided that SNAs are to be in the yard 10 minutes before school starts and i have noticed that children are being dropped earlier than ever to school. Bad move by the principal but they resisted all advice given.

Big Bag of Chips

I don't know who expects the SNA to supervise and manage 140 kids, but it's certainly not the school! Or at least an SNA shouldn't be expected to do that. An SNA's duties are very specific, and even limited in what they are allowed do. The garda vetting might be a white lie or something said by the school to make parents accept the rule of not being allowed to wait on the premises. Schools aren't generally in the habit of enforcing new rules for no reason. There is obviously a problem, possibly safety related, maybe child protection related, that has arisen out of parents/adults hanging and the school is trying to cut out the problem. It may not be the while group of parents, but could be that one, or a number of parents are causing a problem. It can't have one rule for a certain person/group of parents and another for others, so it becomes a blanket ban.

Personally, I don't see anything wrong with asking the parents to not hang around the yard. There is no need for it. There are no parents there to supervise at breaktimes, and yes a teacher will be on yard duty but it is physically impossible for them to be in every area watching every child. I can't think of any reason why a junior infant, plus their parent would have to be at school, and waiting in the yard half an hour early.

Big Bag of Chips

A breakfast club is different, and is organised and ran with supervision. It is not comparable to a school yard half an hour before school .

wirelessdude01

In theory all people on school grounds are meant to be vetted.

Sounds like there has been and incident which you don't know about and the school want to reduce the risk of it happening again by stopping parents from being inside the gate.

Also it is good for the children to make their own way into school from the gate. Sense of independence.

Ghekko

I bring Ds to school and wait in the yard til he's gone in, as do most jnr and snr infant parents. It has always been the way. By 1st class you wouldn't really see parents hang around. I'd only arrive a few minutes before the bell but I know a mum who drops her kids about 20 mins before school and goes to work. There is no supervision prior to the bell and rightly so. We also all go into the yard to collect kids, and on rainy days go into the school hall. I would wonder if this new ban is related to a complaint the school may have received or the schools knowledge of a specific adult. If being allowed in the yard has always been the case then it is odd that it's being stopped all of a sudden. And if it is a recent Garda vetting issue then surely all schools should be included.

jlm29

I’ve never heard of SNAs being expected to supervise a whole school in the mornings. If the parents have time to be hanging around, they should just drop the kids at the appropriate time, which would leave less kids to be supervised! . My son starts school at 9.05, but they can be dropped from 8.45. The school gates remain locked until 8.45 though, which prevents people just dropping their kids and heading to work

Gatling

My particular School gates are open from 8 onwards ,we have 2 yards used for junior enfants and senior classes .in the mornings
1st -6th are kept in a larger yard but we've 270 something pupils .
Most of the parents who volunteer at the school are all vetted before hand ,

To me it doesn't sound right that's the excuse been given by the respective principal .

I don't understand the single sna for 140 children that can't be legally sound

I'm hoping to get into teaching myself but hearing things like this makes me think

Big Bag of Chips

You're getting second hand information from a disgruntled parent so I wouldn't take all details given as fact. According to you, according to your friend there is concern that because parents will not be allowed stay in the yard that the SNA will be responsible for up to 140 for half an hour. That is simply not true. For a start, how many children out of 140 are dropped half an hour early? and who has told the SNA that they have to be there to supervise. And was Garda vetting even mentioned,?! Often the school gate can be a mine of misinformation, exaggeration and supposition! If you're hoping to get into teaching thats the first thing you need to be aware of. Principals put up with a lot of demands and complaints from people who don't actually understand/want to understand how things work. Maybe those parents being there is causing other parents to believe their children are being supervised... By unvetted adults.

This is not a big deal. In the grand scheme of things it is very minor, and obviously being put in place for a reason. As mentioned, if a parent has time to hang around waiting in the yard for half an hour then they can wait half an hour at home and drop the child to school on time.

Edit: there is a school local to me that has a sign on the gate, "Kiss and Go". It has a set down area for cars and the sign says to spend a maximum of 2 minutes stopped. That includes for junior infants. It's a big school, and the kids seem to get on fine without parents hanging around in the yard.

freshpopcorn

Most schools I know open for students about 10-15 minutes before classes begin and teachers would be on yard duty.
From speaking to teachers over the years the issue is probably this. Schools are cool enough with parents coming into the school in the first day or so in Junior infants but they don't want to make a habit of it. Certain parents don't get this message and they disrupt the class by allowing their child to cling onto them.
Another issue is parents gossiping at the wall in the morning. It causes lots of issues from people who blow everything out of proportion.
I do think you are hearing a bit of school gate/wall gossip of the parents.

Big Bag of Chips

If the parents are concerned that 1 SNA will be expected to supervise up to 140 kids for half an hour, without them being in the yard, then that must mean they see themselves in an official capacity helping the SNA to supervise all those children for half an hour? I doubt it! If they are officially supervising then of course the should be vetted. If anything was to happen someone else's child before official school time would that group of parents take responsibility for not supervising them properly? It's exaggerated, disgruntled arguments. The school has school rules, you abide by them, or remove your child.

Maybe them being there (helping the SNA to supervise) is allowing other parents to believe their children are being supervised? Maybe a parent has made a complaint that unvetted adults are helping 1 SNA to supervise their children? They are either supervising the children (and need to be vetted) or they are not (and have no reason to be hanging around the premises).

Also, I'm guessing this is your friend's first junior infant. You say it will only affect juniors. Maybe the same letter is sent out to all junior infant parents every year around the midterm. The children will have had plenty of time to settle in and get used to going in, and the time comes when it is appropriate to tell the parents to let the child in by themselves.