Monmouthshire school to introduce Saturday morning detentions

A school that has been beset by bad behaviour is introducing Saturday morning detentions from this weekend. 

Education inspectors Estyn noted staff morale and pupil behaviour had improved at Caldicot School since the appointment of acting headteacher Alun Ebenezer in its latest report which found the school needed “signficant improvement”. 

Staff had staged strikes in the autumn term of 2023 in response to physical and verbal abuse from pupils. 

Mr Ebenezer said the sanction has been in the school’s eight page behaviour policy since September and said: “We haven’t needed to use it until now.” 

Other steps in the policy include requiring pupils to clean tables if they have vandalised them or supervised litter picking as well as having parents come into school to sit next to their children during lessons, which the head says has been implemented. 

When Mr Ebenezer took over at the school in June he oversaw a crackdown on uniform standards that included girls being sent home if skirts were deemed “too short”, leaving some in tears, and told to remove make up. 

He said most of the school’s 1,300 pupils are following its rules and just four or six boys had to attend after school detention on Tuesday with six pupils required to attend the Saturday morning detention this week. 

A letter sent to parents states the two hour detentions are being introduced to “avoid fixed term exclusions”. 

Parents are warned failure to attend the detention will result in the pupil’s exclusion. Pupils can be given a detention if they collect bad behaviour marks and Mr Ebenezer said the Saturday detention is required where other sanctions, including being held after school, haven’t worked.

He said: “This is the next step to have to come in on a Saturday morning. I’m told it’s restrictive practice, that young people don’t like them, and to use it sparingly but the vast majority don’t get a detention and once young people start liking detention then let’s get rid of it as it’s not worth doing. 

“I have to travel nearly an hour to get here on Saturday and I don’t want to be there. 

“Everybody I talk to wants young people to behave and that doesn’t just happen you have to put things in place but all we seem to get is a backlash.

People talk about it not being good for wellbeing I would argue it’s not good for anybody’s wellbeing to have young people misbehaving and defiant.” 

The letter to parents said Saturday detentions will run once per half term and said they had been discussed in school assemblies. Schools are entitled to hold Saturday detentions, except for those immediately before and after half term holidays, and travel arrangements should be considered but it doesn’t matter if they are “inconvenient” for parents. 

Asked about arrangements if pupils given a Saturday detention rely on free school transport to attend school Mr Ebenezer said: “We will do all we can to ensure young people are able to attend.”