One father was outraged when he learned what a teacher considered collateral after his daughter misplaced a school uniform accessory. According to Mirror , the Kings Grove High School teacher took the girl’s inhaler when she needed to borrow an extra school tie. Garry Gould’s daughter, Sian, was reportedly without the inhaler for days. However, he didn’t make that discovery until she was having an asthma attack. As a result of the incident, he was forced to contact the family doctor to replace the confiscated inhaler.
Gould recently spoke with the Crewe Chronicle about the shocking incident . Of course, he was furious and could not understand why a teacher would consider an inhaler as “security” for a school tie. The level of importance is totally different. He even took the time to Google whether or not a teacher had the authority to confiscate items or medication used to treat a student’s medical condition. What he discovered was quite disturbing.
“I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. The fact that an adult, even worse a teacher, thought it was acceptable to take away a child’s medication is unreal. When I found out I went mad. Sian hadn’t had her inhaler for a few days because she still couldn’t find her own tie. She didn’t want to worry us. To think she was without medication that could potentially save her life is so scary. We contacted the school and the teacher wasn’t in to return it. We rang the doctors for a replacement and they couldn’t believe the reason behind why she needed one. I actually googled whether or not a teacher had the power to take away medication and the first story that came up was a child that had died in the playground after something similar happened.”
Gould reportedly filed a complaint against the teacher who has been identified as, Trevor Langston. He also shared details about the school’s response to the complaint.
“We made a formal complaint to the (then) governors and they came back to say the teacher had been reprimanded and warned never to do such an ‘exchange’ again and the school governor said the teacher understood that the teacher was wrong to take my daughter’s inhaler but I think people still need to know to highlight the problems the school is having.”
The school’s council recently released a statement in response to the incident. Following the formal complaint, Langston reportedly resigned.
“We understand that a teacher did remove an asthma inhaler from a pupil and that the present interim head-teacher, who was not in post at the time, has robustly reminded staff of the DFE guidelines to schools on pupil medication.”
[Image via CT-News ]
