British schools get tough on yobs - and their parents:
PARENTS face weekend detentions with their kids under a tough crackdown on classroom rowdies. Unruly pupils will have to attend catch-up lessons while their mums and dads get a lecture on how to control them. The move is among sweeping powers to tackle problem children in the Education Bill unveiled tomorrow.Teachers will be given the legal right to detain kids on any day they choose, with or without parents’ consent. Education Secretary Ruth Kelly wants heads to set up Saturday sin-bins for bullies, yobs and truants. Offenders will be forced to turn up in full school uniform, with a parent, for two hours’ tuition. Ms Kelly said it would give staff more authority and raise standards.
She said: “It only takes a handful of poorly behaved pupils to make life difficult for staff and disrupt the education of others. The message to the minority is clear — disrupt the class and you will disrupt your weekend.” Parenting orders, backed by the threat of a £500 fine, will be slapped on families of kids who skip detention.
That's a hefty fine. Wonder if the parental rule is really expected to have an effect on the "yobs," or if the parental refusal, heaped on top of student misbehavior, is really just an avenue towards a quicker expulsion of the student? The one school that has already instituted these rules reports that "truancy rates have slumped while exam results have soared in four years" - which could certainly be the result of the problem kids being booted after their parents failed to attend detention.
Headteachers are also set to get more control over the fate of excluded pupils. They will be able to summon parents of kids barred for bad behaviour for an interview before they are re-admitted. Another measure allows teachers to seize mobile phones, iPods and games consoles if they are used in class.
They didn't have those powers before now? Wow.
Posted by kswygert at February 27, 2006 06:28 AM