My niece is a hero!

Today at lunchtime a few boys were playing with matches and set the bathroom on fire.

The whole school was evacuated and 3 appliances arrived to put out the fire. In all the kerfuffle an 8 year old boy who was sitting in the classroom next door to the fire and who has asbergers so severe that he is still in nappies was forgotten by everyone, except my 7 year old niece who went into the classroom and helped him to the assembly point.

It wasn't until about 10 mins later when the class roll was being read that the teachers remembered the boy, luckily Elizabeth had thought of him immediately and got him out of the classroom which by then had suffered smoke damage.

I am so proud of her but so angry at the school imagine if it was your child they forgot and noone else remembered him

What an awesome wee girl! You have every right to be proud of her. And yes I would be absoloutly furious if that was my child they had forgotten!!!

I don't have the full story yet but knowing the school I doubt it.

My niece has had a problem with being bullied but since one of the bullies is the teachers son it's overlooked. The schools policy on bullying is, we don't have a bullying problem at our school.

Furthermore when my nephews deafness was diagnosed earlier this year the specialist wrote a report saying what my sis and the school had to do to help Josh, much of it I thought was common sense (for any child) and I was surprised that the school needed to be instructed to do it. Their response was to ignore the report entirely and refuse to meet with my sister to discuss it. About a week in Debs got a call from the school because Josh had defied his teacher and the teacher was really upset about it. We were very proud of Josh though because the teacher had asked him (nay told him) to do something that the specialist had warned against.

Joshua was withdrawn from the school and has been homeschooled by my dad for the past month, Elizabeth's application for exemption so she can be homeschooled is being processed atm.

Interestingly Debs discussed her plans with a class aid that used to work in Elizabeths class and he said that being homeschooled is the best move for Elizabeth.

Edited by MrsMojo

good grief , the school sounds like a horror story !
My parents had some sh*t times with my sister and her primary school when she was young but that was back in 1987-you would think in this day and age it would be different!

as for your niece, what a star, but it pisses me off that she had to risk her life because her school is too slack to have proper safety measures in place.
Sounds to me like shes too good for that school-they clearly dont deserve her

Maya wrote: Yay for your niece, but I agree with Kelly - how dare the school expect her to risk her life just coz they are slack! We had similar problems to what you've described with DSD when she was at primary, she was bullied and the school told us she "deserved" it, and they weren't very supportive of her hearing problem even tho she was working with RTLB and SES at the time.

that she DESERVED it??
No child deserves to be too scared to go to school because they have good reason to be afraid of their peers.
EVERY child deserves to feel safe and secure going to school and every parent has the right to expect nothing less-its the schools responsibility to look after every student while they are in their care, not just the "easy ones" or the ones they prefer ....DIS GUS TING

from what Mojo has said, she was probably the first one out

that sounds terrible! well, neat for your niece though.

we actually had a "fire" today as well - actually one of the boys set it off - but as teachers we stayed in each class, took each child out - i had to search both changing rooms in the gym and the toilets. we assembled and quickly marked off every child. now granted we have on;y300 in our school, but EVERY school should have a comprehensive plan. IN fact we have several key people in charge of a few special kids we have - one is partially deaf, one has a memory problem and tends to wander off. Each of these kids is "looked after" in emergencies by these staff members. I can't believe that a child would be forgotten like this. It makes me angry actually.
as for the bullying thing.....this really pees me off too, as I know the work we and our school do in the area. not saying my school is perfect, but we are well aware that a lot of bullying happens "under the radar" and to pretend it doesn't is ridiculous.


grrrr, this has got me mad!!!!

wow what a brave and wondefull wee girl on the bulling i cant belive that in this day inage this is still happing my sister was teased in high school the teachers told my mu m it was her fault its not good anuff agghhhh makes me so angry

Man, these stories are really sickening. I really can't believe how uncaring and horrid those teachers are!
Really makes you think about how little we know about the people we're trusting to care for our kids!
Wow about your niece though! How awesome that she has such courage and integrity so young!

WigglesFan wrote: Gosh! I really hope that the boy's parents hear the real story and kick up one hell of a stink!

I asked Debs if she'd spoken to his mum yet and she said she was going to give the school a chance to explain first.