News Archive

Dear Parents

I am writing to you to add further details to the communication sent out yesterday morning about an incident in school on Friday.  There has been an excessive amount of false information about what happened and I am aware this has caused distress to some people.  Whilst this is not the school’s fault I am obviously sorry this has happened. I am genuinely shocked by the lies that have been shared about the school via social media and extremely concerned that some of this was shared and speculation fuelled by those who should have established the facts first.

Firstly I will address what happened as far as it is appropriate to do so.  On Friday 8th February a student was injured on the football pitches at the end of breaktime. The circumstances that led to that injury are currently being investigated. One boy was injured and we called for an ambulance.  He was taken to hospital in the ambulance and discharged later that afternoon with no serious injuries. I spoke with his parents over the weekend to receive updates which confirmed this. We will now complete our investigation into what happened and then ensure students are appropriately sanctioned for their involvement. Contrary to inaccurate views shared by some people on social media there were staff on duty there who addressed the situation and we had CCTV cameras in operation. The paramedics who attended wondered if the air ambulance might be needed so called for it as a precaution.  Whilst the helicopter landed and took off I kept all students inside the buildings and delayed a lesson changeover to ensure this happened safely (as it was a very windy day). When the ambulance left school students moved to their next lesson and we continued with the school day without further disruption.

Secondly, I have been utterly shocked by the way in which numerous people have used social media to create a story that is not there, tell lies about a situation they knew nothing about and to criticise the school when there was no justifiable reason to do so. There were stories that a student had died, that packs of children brutally assaulted a boy, that there were multiple stabbings, that the school did nothing about it, that someone was airlifted to hospital and subsequently died and that this was a racially motivated assault. In many cases these were all framed in the context of the school allowing this to happen and seeming to be doing nothing about it. I have also found myself being personally attacked by elected officials for not providing a statement about something that did not happen and which gained traction as a result of social media scaremongering which took place over the weekend and that I was not aware of. I am sure most reasonable and balanced people can see just how absurd that is.

It is important for me to highlight that had it not been for the air ambulance most of the school would not have known anything had happened and that it is not uncommon for an ambulance to attend school for all sorts of reasons and we do not routinely write to parents about this.  When the incident happened we knew some students were distressed and we had our school counsellors on hand should they have needed it.  These staff were onsite as part of the ongoing work we have in place to support students every day and acted as was necessary.  It is certainly the case that the air ambulance caused additional anxiety not reflective of the actual situation and we calmed students in this situation.

Finally, many parents have contacted the school to offer support to us and challenge some of the atrocious and unfounded things said about the school online.  This provided a welcome balance to the insults and abuse which some of my staff have faced because of the views some members of the local community decided to adopt about something that did not happen.  We will obviously be conducting a thorough review of what happened and how we handled it as is good practice in such situations. We will revise any procedures we need to in response to that review. In the meantime I am able to inform parents that our handling of the situation on Friday has been praised by colleagues in the local authority, police and safeguarding teams.  

I hope there will be lessons learned by those who engaged in gossip over the weekend and who caused unnecessary stress to students and their families.  Social media is a powerful communication tool and on this occasion we have seen just how harmful it can be when inaccurate information is shared without facts being checked first.

Yours sincerely

 

 

Mr Peter Collins

Headteacher

 

Click HERE to read the January 2019 edition of the Slough and Eton Review. To view our archive of previous issues, click HERE.

Senior Citizens from our community were invited to Slough and Eton for our annual Christmas Party. Staff and Student’s put on a fabulous evening, providing excellent entertainment from the Music and Drama department, delicious food from the Food Studies department and staff donated prizes for the Raffle and Christmas Quiz. Our guests also had the pleasure of a visit from Santa, Mrs Claus and their elves who brought along gifts for all. The evening finished with a good old sing along to Christmas carols with Staff, Students and our guests wishing everyone Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!!

For Photos from the event visit our Gallery

You can also watch a video of the event below:

 

 

Click HERE to read the December 2018 edition of the Slough and Eton Review. To view our archive of previous issues, click HERE.