Exclusion from school
The decision to exclude
The decision to exclude your child should only be taken:
- after serious breach of the school's behaviour policy
- if by allowing your child to remain in school it would seriously harm their education or welfare
Only the headteacher (or, in the absence of the headteacher, the acting headteacher) can exclude your child. The decision to exclude permanently is a serious one. This should be used as a last resort.
There could be exceptional circumstances where a school will exclude your child for a first or 'one off' offence. These might include:
- serious actual or threatened violence against another pupil or a member of staff
- sexual abuse or assault
- supplying an illegal drug; or
- carrying an offensive weapon
Factors to consider
Exclusion should not be given in the heat of the moment, unless there is an immediate threat to the safety of others in the school or to your child. Before deciding whether to exclude your child, the headteacher should:
- carry out an investigation
- consider all the evidence available
- allow and encourage your child to give his/her version of events
- decide if the incident has been provoked
If it is more probable than not that your child did what s/he is alleged to have done, the headteacher may exclude. However, the more serious the allegation, the more convincing the evidence needs to be.
Unofficial exclusions
If your child needs to be removed from the school site for an incident, formal exclusion is the only legal method. Informal or unofficial exclusions are illegal regardless of whether they are done with the agreement of parents or carers.
If your child is sent home for disciplinary reasons, some headteachers have viewed this as a 'cooling off' period, and have not excluded your child formally. There is no basis in law for this. If your child is sent home this must be formally recorded as an exclusion.
This page was last updated on 05 December 2007
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