It is the Local Education Authority’s (LEA) responsibility for providing alternative provision by the 6th day of exclusion. This can often be a PRU.
“Under section 19 of the Education Act 1996, local authorities have a duty to provide suitable education for children of a school age, who because of illness or exclusion from school will not receive a suitable education without these arrangements.” (Every Child Matters, 2005)
PRU provide the gap in the system being focused on meeting the more individual needs of vulnerable pupils. Often the staffs are better equipped and trained to deal with these pupils and results are reported to be positive. This is a quote taken from a survey report on disaffected pupils, “Pupils in panel group 1 were extremely positive about the PRU, describing the staff as friendly and supportive and found the learning experience to be more rewarding than anything that they had experienced at school.” (Riley, 2004) This seems to be one of the more positive and effective was of dealing with vulnerable pupils.
The other types of exclusion are self-exclusion that refers to a child removing themselves from education and unauthorised absence.
Secondly, I am going to look at the types of pupils who are considered to be and are identified as vulnerable pupils;
Pregnant school girls or school age parents are identified as such as teenage pregnancy is often perceived as a failure both by staff and pupils at a school, a pregnant girl may be made to feel uncomfortable in school simply because of the physical aspects of being pregnant. Girls can be made to feel like social outcasts by their peers when falling pregnant and can experience bullying being stereotyped with offensive name-calling. The physical symptoms of may also cause the girl to be absent from school and if there is a lack of commitment and co-operation from the school during time taken of during pregnancy and following the birth for recovery the girl may be extremely discouraged from returning to school. Practical barriers following the birth such as financial arrangements, housing and childcare can also make it difficult for a pupil to return to school. Boys who become fathers at a young age may feel that it s their responsibility to earn money to support his family therefore may leave school to seek employment. The emotional and psychological effects of teenage pregnancy can also be very difficult for young people. “The likelihood of teenage pregnancy is far higher among those with low educational achievements, even after adjusting for the effects of deprivation. Nearly 40% of teenage mothers leave school with no qualifications.” (Lyall, 2006)
Children who are carers also come in this category; in this scenario it is more likely for a girl to be a carer than her male counterpart however it is not unknown for a boy to be in this role also. The child may feel obliged to care for a sick parent or may simply do it because of love for that person either way this can have damaging effects on a child’s education. Difficulties that re often observed in these pupils are punctuality, attendance, and completion of homework or coursework. Often these selfless children put their sick parent ahead of their own success to their own detriment often having restricted peer group and being unable to participate in extra-curricular activities in some cases leading to the child feeling very isolated. Caring for an adult may also put a lot of stress and anxiety on a child and may cause them to exhibit poor behaviour. Carers may start to resent their sick parents for taking over their lives and display signs of frustration at school for example acts of violence. This is a difficult category to identify for schools because unless they are explicitly told about the situation by the parent it may be something initially hard to detect as the child may try to hide it because of feeling ashamed.
Children who are refugees or asylum seekers are considered to be vulnerable because they may find it very difficult being in a foreign country dealing with different cultures and norms. There can often be a language barrier especially for older children and the system of schooling can be very unfamiliar with curriculum being very different and they’re being possible objections to some subjects e.g. religious education or sex education. They may have had recent bad experiences of persecution or conflict in their own country. Dealing with discrimination and racism from other parents, pupils or teachers is very difficult and not being provided with appropriate support because of these views can set pupils back. The issue of having to travel a long way to go to school because the emergency housing they have been provided with is in an area where all the schools are full can cause considerable stress to these pupils making them more tired because of a longer day, having transport issues, having a limited social network or having to constantly change schools and feeling very unsettled.
The next group are children of travellers, there may be physical or practical barriers for them attending school for example they may not stay in an area long enough to get settled or even get a place at a school. The culture and lifestyle of travellers is very different from mainstream pupils and the National Curriculum may be perceived as negative, irrelevant or even harmful to the traveller lifestyle. The schools may not welcome these pupils and may see them as a waste of school time and money. They can often experience racism and bullying and stereotyping forcing them to not want to venture out of their own communities.
Children in local authority care are often one of the first groups of vulnerable pupils to be identified at school due to the involvement of external agencies such as the social services making the school aware of the child’s circumstances. These children may be facing both emotional and practical difficulties participating successfully in education. A lack of stability in housing and location of care homes with children being moved from one place to another can cause many problems, as is the case with asylum seekers mentioned earlier, with travel to school being difficult and general disruption experienced on a regular. Social workers may be more concerned with the immediate risk to that child, for example getting them away from an abusive household rather than on the child’s education. Carers may lack the time and or the skills to deal with a child’s educational needs. There is often a culture of low expectations from children from these more challenging backgrounds and cases of ‘self-fulfilling prophecy’ may be witnessed, i.e. a child is not expected to succeed coming from this background therefore doesn’t put the effort into succeed, therefore doesn’t succeed. The lack of co-ordination of multi-agency approaches to a child’s education can cause the child serious setbacks.
Pupils absent due to medical reasons can become excluded and are very vulnerable to social and academic exclusion. This can be due to them missing the time to socialise with peers, falling behind with schoolwork and generally feeling alienated. The continuing need for medical care for more serious illnesses could make it difficult for a pupil to have a consistent level of attendance and the attitude of the school to their particular medical condition is crucial. It is not unknown for a pupil to be looked on less favourably if they are dealing with mental illness as opposed to a physical illness.
As well as these groups statistics show that there are other groups of pupils that are more likely to experience exclusion, these include;
Boys, “An early survey by the Children’s Society showed that the majority of those who are permanently excluded are boys age between 13 and 15, most having started secondary school with a reading age that was behind their peers” (National Literacy Trust Organisation, 2007).
Children with Special Educational Needs (SEN) who may not have the cognitive, social, physical or emotional skills to deal with and understand school behavioural policies.
Black pupils, particularly black boys from Afro-Caribbean backgrounds are often some of the highest under achievers, again the ‘self-fulfilling prophecy’ being prevalent. “Many of the parents themselves who have children in schools now have been schooled in a culture of low expectations” (John, G. 2007). A lack of positive male role models causes these boys to have different aspirations of success, with the ‘successful’ male role models from their communities often being involved in crime. “There are only two possible explanations for the fact that black boys are three times more likely to be excluded from school. One is that their family background or street culture makes them badly behaved. The other is that schools treat them differently” (Independent on Sunday, taken from Da Vision, 2007).
The need to adhere to peer pressure and be socially accepted is obvious with many recently displaying more negative behaviour such as carrying weapons and participating in violent attacks. Many become involved in gang culture and steadily become excluded from school through their own choice or as a result of their negative behaviour being sanctioned by the school with permanent exclusion.
The next issue that will be addressed is the reasons for disaffected behaviour;
Firstly pupils may be lacking in communication skills, for example SEN pupils may not have the cognitive skill and foreign pupils may not have the language skills to comprehend the instructions given to them by a teach or may have trouble understanding school behavioural policies.
Cultural differences, as mentioned earlier culture plays a big part in the behaviour a child exhibits, children may be behaving in a way that is perfectly acceptable in their own culture but adult staff of the school may find this inappropriate.
Pupils may not have reached the developmental stage where they are capable of understanding something as abstract as a general rule, for example this may be the case with certain SEN pupils such as an autistic child.
The child may have Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD) and have trouble concentrating for long periods of time causing them to get distracted easily and descend into disaffected behaviour.
Pupils lacking in social skills due to the type of upbringing that they have had may lack the skills required to effectively deal with their emotions. Feelings of anxiety may frustrate them and they may only know how to resolve conflict with violence. This could be perhaps a behaviour that is witnessed by the child at home.
Another reason for disaffected behaviour in vulnerable pupils may be that the rewards that they experience from disobeying the rules may greatly outweigh the sanctions placed on the pupil for this behaviour. An example of this can be pressure from peers in certain social situations or social groups to misbehave, in this situation the misbehaviour leads to attention from the child’s peers and following this leads to popularity, greater social status and a general feeling of social acceptance, which will be more appealing to the child especially if they are having problems fitting into school life, as vulnerable pupils generally do.
If a pupil is under considerable stress in their home life as is a common trait in vulnerable pupils, it may temporarily make them unable to make rationale choices, for example a pupil who is being abused mentally, physically, sexually, emotionally, being neglected, from a home where domestic violence is present, dealing with bereavement or is dealing with any of the traumas discussed earlier in relation to vulnerable pupils.
There are two main government reports that relate to social inclusion and vulnerable pupils. First the schools white paper “Higher Standards, Better Schools for All- more Choice for Parents and Pupils” (DfES, 2005). A major issue that is raised in this document is that of greater freedom for schools.
“According to a paper drawn up by the Children’s Interagency Group (IAG), plans to encourage secondary schools to become trust schools with greater scope to run their own affairs, including becoming their own admissions authority, increases the risk that some will turn away vulnerable pupils in favour of those from stable backgrounds likely to boost league table performance”. (Taylor. M, Ward. L, 2005)
This is quite contradictory the green paper “Every Child Matters: Change for Children 2004c” which came about as a result of The Laming Report (2003), which promotes a multi-agency approach for reaching the five point plan goals, being healthy, staying safe, enjoying and achieving, making a positive contribution to society and achieving economic well-being. The effects of the education reform stated in the white paper would cause severe effects and lead to a greater chance of exclusion among vulnerable pupils.
In conclusion there are a multitude of approaches to the problem of vulnerable pupils and it is important that successes are celebrated and developed further and failure is discarded. There are many initiatives in place such as those to encourage attendance, such as swipe cards and combating problems between pupils, e.g. by making the wrongdoers confront their victims. However the true success of these can only be recognised after careful monitoring of the specific initiative. The main point to this is the recognition of those students at risk and putting every possible resource to good use to keep them well supported and in education and recognising the social factors that can hinder a child’s development. If there was a greater focus on prevention there would not have to be the great effort put in to dealing with the after effects of the lacking system. There are many theories that state that exclusion leads to criminal activity so therefore if greater efforts were made to prevent and minimise all kinds of exclusion and give every child an education suited to their need it would benefit society as a whole and save government money and time in the long run when these children become adults stuck in a cycle of criminal behaviour and underachieving.
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Reference List
DfES, 2006 Education and Inspections act 2006
DfES, 2005 The Schools White Paper,” Higher Standards, Better Schools for All- more Choice for Parents and Pupils”
DfES, 2005 Every Child Matters: Change for Children in Schools
Independent on Sunday, taken from Da Vision, 2007 How Schools Fail Black Boys taken from on 16th December 2007
Keys, W. Harris, S. and Fernandes, C. 1995 Attitudes to school of top primary and first-year secondary pupils (Slough, NFER) et al. 1995
John, G. 2007 Plan to help black boys achieve, BBC News at the NUT conference, 9th April 2007Taken form on 16th December 2007
Lyall, J. 2006 Schools take on teen pregnancy, Guardian Unlimited Wednesday October 11, 2006
National Literacy Trust, 2007 Truancy and school exclusions taken from on 14th December 2007
Riley, K.A. 2004 ‘Voices of Disaffected Pupils’ British Journal of Educational Studies, ISSN 007-1005 Vol, 52, No.2, June 2004, pp166-179
Taylor. M, Ward. L, 2005 School reforms ‘could disadvantage vulnerable pupils’ Guardian Unlimited Wednesday November 30, 2005