Head’s Blog: Too many detentions

I read a news story a few years ago about a town in Wales that decided to stop issuing parking tickets. The idea was that if you ask everyone to park responsibly, drivers will do so and there will be no need for tickets. Traffic wardens are famously unpopular after all – presumably the person responsible for bringing in the ‘no parking ticket’ policy was not a fan of them either. The policy was short-lived and you can imagine the result. Cars were parked illegally everywhere and life for local residents became a nightmare.

Sanctions are necessary

In truth, any civilised society needs to have clear consequences for poor behaviour. Schools are no different. I have occasionally heard of schools that decide to ditch sanctions and the results are entirely predictable. Removing sanctions make schools much less safe.

Teachers do not like setting detentions   

Whilst we know sanctions are necessary, there is no teacher who enjoys giving out detentions. It is undoubtedly one of the more tedious aspects of the job and every teacher is happier on a day when there has been no need to set a detention. However, as teachers we know that not setting detentions for poor behaviour is a recipe for disaster.

Too many detentions       

As school leaders we have been reflecting on the number of detentions that are issued and have concluded that too many students are being sanctioned for relatively minor offences. We have therefore made a temporary change to our approach to issuing detentions. Students will only get a detention if they receive three or more behaviour points in a day and students will always receive a sanction within 24 hours of poor behaviour.

A fresh start every day        

When detentions are issued for relatively small indiscretions, more students build up a backlog of sanctions and the incentive to behave well on any given day is diminished. So whilst the number of detentions will reduce, the immediacy of the sanction will improve. Parents will still receive details of all behaviour points that are issued. As school leaders we believe this is a fairer system that ensures every student has a fresh start every day. We will evaluate the impact on behaviour over this term before deciding whether to adopt this policy for the long term.

As a result, I hope we see fewer sanctions issued by teachers and better behaviour from students, which would be a good outcome all round!

Tim Spencer, Headteacher