thief in sons school !

chaosweddings

Hi everyone,

im really starting to get annoyed with my sons school, last year his dinner money went missing 13 times !

i thought as the boy boy who was stealing had moved to a different school and the teachers were aware of his stealing that everything would be different
yes right,

1st day of school sons pack lunch was ruined, meat roll sqwuashed within a inch of its life, crisps squished to crumbs, jelly had holes made in the lid so it went allover the place and the 3 choc fingers vanished !

last week £1 of his dinner money went missing from his money pot and hos new water bottle went missing, i went into school and his teacher said " well you know young boys, they leave their stuff all over the place, im sure it will turn up "

and said my son must of fiddled with his money pot before school there fore losing the £1

i was soooo angry

he got the school cup and a special badge for a project he did and was really pleased.
i put the badge in a interenal zipped pocket in his rucksack and guess what, when he went to put it on his tie at lunch time it was missing and to top it off his bloody bike lock keys which i always put in his back every morning were missing, he walked home in the rain and i had to go down and un lock his bike, i know he didnt touch them as i make sure his bike lock is undone so no need for him to go into that little internal pocket until school finishes.

am i being unreasonable or is my son just clumsy and losses things ! he is so good and never looses anything normally ! and he is really upset
so another trip to the school in the morning

sorry for the rant and thankyou

chaos

Marcheline

Hi, what is your son's take on it all? How old is your son? Could he be being bullied?

chaosweddings

he is 10 and has a good bunch of friends that he has known since preschool ,

i think it is getting him down, im just glad he will be going to senior school next year and will be keeping his money on him and his belonings in a locker .

i first thought maybe he has lost it but its now got to the point where i think someone is stealing it, i have spoken to a few other mums and it seem to be happening to other kids too ! even the school bully

i dont know, im def going to the school in the morning and im goign to get the teacher to allow my son to keep his bag in the classroom as all backs are kept outside in a big corridor with 4 classes

chaosweddings

update !

went to sons school this morning and told the teacher it is totaly unacepptable that thins keep going missing and that my son seems to be targeted by some-one, she informs me that it has never happened in all th years she has been teaching until now,
a few luchboxes have had things go missing so the school are putting up dummy cameras to try and deter the thiefs !
well if it works good !

but if not my son is only taking the bare essentials to school and i will go down every morning and hand deliver his dinner money

LJM

it sounds terrible that his school will not do anything about it,he must be feeling very down.cant a few of you parents get together with the head and tell them that there are a few incidents of this happening they surely cant ignore you all

Spendless

I pay dinner money monthly by cheque, take the cheque into the school office if you're worried about it going missing.

tandraig

spendless is right - dont send money into school via your son - pay it yourself- oh, and i would insist on receipt!
it sounds like case of bullying - but school wont identify culprit!
bet your son or classmate know - just dont want to tell
talk to son and his friends if i were you.
oh and damaged items - would notify the school you werent prepared to replace them before the next year.

esmf73

Too true Tandraig. If this happened to my son I would assume he was being bullied - I've been taking my son to school as he said someone on the bus was hitting him (he's only 5 and I'm not sure if he knew what he was talking about). I had to believe him so I now have greater contact with his school - I take the dinner money in each month by cheque and go through his school bag every day to ensure that he only has the minimum in it.

It's quite worrying that the school (in your case) don't appear to accept that there may be a bullying problem.

Susan_Frost

If he has to take money into school, tell him to put it down his sock, that used to be our old trick at school. Just dont tell anyone.

I think it sounds like bullying if food is being destroyed, etc.

What is the use of dummy cameras, kids soon know what is going on. The school have already informed you they will be dummy, so others will have been informed, therefore kids will soon get to know.

It does sound upsetting all round.

I agree with the person who said get together with the other parents and do a joint complaint, en-masse. Maybe copy in the Authority too, if it does keep happening.

WASHER

https://www.parentpay.com/PR1/Info/PP_Index.aspx

I would personally recommend the above to every school, it really does stop the bullying over lunch money and no chance of children losing their money either. We have this system in place at my daughters high school, and the junior school is also looking into after a number of parents made the suggestion to them.

Basically, the child has a card which gets swiped at the till, it has a photo on, so no chance of anyone else using the card, (if the card gets lost, it can be easily deactivated by the school and another one issued and the money which was on the original card isn't lost) and the parent can either top the card up online or send a cheque into the school...cashless system, it really works. It also works for those children on free school lunches, the school allocates the allowance set by the local authority and tops the card up so no-one knows that a child is receiving a free school meal, this prevents any bullying towards those children too.