# Seven-year-old girl with diabetes 'banned from school trip because she had to miss class for appt.'



## Northerner (Oct 8, 2017)

A seven-year-old girl with diabetes has been banned from a school trip - because she had to miss class to attend a hospital appointment, her parents say.

Olivia Harkins has reportedly been left "devastated" after being told she can't go on the trip to the cinema, which is to reward pupils with perfect attendance.

Her furious mum has accused Blackmoor Park Junior School in Liverpool of discrimination, saying: "They are discriminating against children who are sick".

Students will be eligible for the fun activity if they attend the West Derby-based school 100% of the time over the next half-term, the Liverpool Echo reports.

But medical appointments are not exempt – meaning Olivia, who has type 1 diabetes, will miss out because she had to see her consultant at Alder Hey Hospital.

http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/seven-year-old-girl-diabetes-11306797

How terribly unfair


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## Ljc (Oct 8, 2017)

I agree it’s so unfair.


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## Robin (Oct 8, 2017)

I hate it when schools do things like that. At my son's school they had an initiative where the class with the best overall attendance got a trip. My son let the side down by having a burst appendix!


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## Contused (Oct 8, 2017)

How utterly disgraceful!


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## HOBIE (Oct 8, 2017)

That's life. The newspaper has used words like BANNED. To make it sound like its a horrible. Have they tried to swap dates ?  Anything to sell bits of paper ?


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## mikeyB (Oct 8, 2017)

I don’t see a difference between “banned” and “not allowed” to be honest. I think it is grossly unfair. There nothing better than inculcating an idea in this girls mind that she is a pariah.


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## Northerner (Oct 8, 2017)

mikeyB said:


> I don’t see a difference between “banned” and “not allowed” to be honest. I think it is grossly unfair. There nothing better than inculcating an idea in this girls mind that she is a pariah.


Indeed  It may lead to her resenting her diabetes at a very impressionable age


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## Lucy Honeychurch (Oct 8, 2017)

Very unfair


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## Pumper_Sue (Oct 8, 2017)

If I were her parents I would take her out of school on that day and treat her to something she would like to do.


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## Lucy Honeychurch (Oct 8, 2017)

Pumper_Sue said:


> If I were her parents I would take her out of school on that day and treat her to something she would like to do.



Yes, like the cinema where her classmates will be to watch the film


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## HOBIE (Oct 8, 2017)

So what would happen if your cars Mot was booked in at the same time as a hosp apt ? You would work something out would you not ?  Life is full of these problems & tommy newspaper man has made a story out of it. Look at some of the words that are used to exaggerate, Can this happen when she leaves school & starts work ?   Life is like that is it not.


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## Robin (Oct 8, 2017)

HOBIE said:


> So what would happen if your cars Mot was booked in at the same time as a hosp apt ? You would work something out would you not ?  Life is full of these problems & tommy newspaper man has made a story out of it. Look at some of the words that are used to exaggerate, Can this happen when she leaves school & starts work ?   Life is like that is it not.


Well, you'd move the MOT, being much more easily moved than a hospital appointment. My daughter used to have eye clinic appointments during school time, there simply isn't enough time during school holidays or after school hours to fit every child in. We always found out from the teacher what she'd missed, so she could catch up if necessary. Now she's working, her employer is sympathetic about time off for medical appointments, as is my daughter about staying late to do extra if there's a crisis at work, it cuts both ways.


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## HOBIE (Oct 8, 2017)

Robin said:


> Well, you'd move the MOT, being much more easily moved than a hospital appointment. My daughter used to have eye clinic appointments during school time, there simply isn't enough time during school holidays or after school hours to fit every child in. We always found out from the teacher what she'd missed, so she could catch up if necessary. Now she's working, her employer is sympathetic about time off for medical appointments, as is my daughter about staying late to do extra if there's a crisis at work, it cuts both ways.


Exactly Robin  Tommy has to sell lots of newspapers you know


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## trophywench (Oct 8, 2017)

Hobie - it's virtually impossible to move hospital appointments round here - unless you'd be absolutely happy to move YOUR child's diabetes hospital visit a further 6 months?  I don't think you would!

We are not able to actually choose 'when' even if we know we'll be in Australia for a family wedding.


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## Amigo (Oct 8, 2017)

If she were an adult, she could take action under the Equality Act against an employer for this kind of discriminatory behaviour. Appointments are often hard to come by and specialists won’t do after school and weekends to accommodate. Shame on the school for punishing her for something out of her control. Planned absence should be exempt.


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## Matt Cycle (Oct 8, 2017)

Pumper_Sue said:


> If I were her parents I would take her out of school on that day and treat her to something she would like to do.



That would be an unauthorised absence and a possible fine.


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## Radders (Oct 8, 2017)

I usually manage to see my consultant in the school holidays. There are 10 weeks after all (for me: 13 for the students) so I feel I would be taking a bit of a liberty to have time off for a routine appointment. It's different if there is a problem though. Sometimes I just use TOIL rather than rearrange. 
The trouble is schools are penalised if attendance is poor, and these kind of schemes are proven to work in improving it. I have always felt uneasy about them because they don't distinguish between penalising those who "swing the lead" and the genuinely unwell.


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## HOBIE (Oct 8, 2017)

I have been T3 since being 3 been to lots of appointments.  A long time ago. Its the newspaper reporter that has MADE a storey out of this. To SELL bits of paper ?


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## Copepod (Oct 8, 2017)

Going back to the photo of school letter in original article, I hope the school will reconsider how to count authorised absences for medical appointments. There is no way any paediatric clinic could possibly offer appointments ONLY on non school days.


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## Amigo (Oct 8, 2017)

HOBIE said:


> I have been T3 since being 3 been to lots of appointments.  A long time ago. Its the newspaper reporter that has MADE a storey out of this. To SELL bits of paper ?



But would you really want this child to lose out on an outing she’d looked forward to Hobie because of her diabetes? Things were different educationally back then when you were a kid. Now there’s a culture of measuring performance and punishing non attendance by legal means. 
Regardless of what the newspaper got out of it, the facts remain. It wasn’t necessary to punish this child for needing a medical appointment. It’s an issue that newspapers should expose. They’d soon report it if the parents neglected her medical appointments!


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## Pumper_Sue (Oct 8, 2017)

HOBIE said:


> So what would happen if your cars Mot was booked in at the same time as a hosp apt ? You would work something out would you not ?  Life is full of these problems & tommy newspaper man has made a story out of it. Look at some of the words that are used to exaggerate, Can this happen when she leaves school & starts work ?   Life is like that is it not.


now considering the child is newly diagnosed she needs to be seen more often and these days consultants do not work weekends what is your solution?


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## Pumper_Sue (Oct 8, 2017)

HOBIE said:


> I have been T3 since being 3 been to lots of appointments.  A long time ago. Its the newspaper reporter that has MADE a storey out of this. To SELL bits of paper ?


If there was a dislike button I would press it


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## Sally71 (Oct 9, 2017)

The primary school my daughter was at did this, they had a deal with a local airport that all children who had achieved 100% attendance for the whole year would get a day out there, be shown around and see how things work etc.  I know the idea is to stop people from bunking off and going on holiday during term time, but I think the school have stopped that particular treat now because so many parents complained! Not just the parents of children who have long-term conditions and need regular check ups, but also parents of otherwise healthy kids who have maybe only missed a couple of days during the year just due to minor illnesses such as tummy bugs and so on (there is a rule that they are *not allowed *to go back to school for 48 hours if they have vomited, even if they feel fine, in order to avoid spreading germs). These children are basically being penalised for being ill, which is not their fault and they can't do much about it!  If you are ill on the day of an outing and can't go then it's tough luck, you have to just accept that sometimes there are disappointments in life, but to reward children for not being ill seems a bit wrong!

Perhaps they should change the ruling to "all children who have had no *unauthorised* absences get a treat" and that might be a bit fairer, as genuine illnesses and medical appointments go down as authorised absence. But even then I know some parents who would still rather take their holidays during term time and pay the fine for unauthorised absence, because it costs less than going away during the school holidays when the prices go up exponentially.  So you can't win


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## Redkite (Oct 9, 2017)

The school is actually in breach of the Equality Act 2010, as they have set up a reward scheme which disabled pupils (i.e. those with medical conditions) are ineligible for.  Pupils with type 1 must see their consultants at regular 3-monthly intervals, and these are appointments over which families have no control.  I know of no hospital consultant who holds clinics in the evenings or at weekends.


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## Amigo (Oct 9, 2017)

They’re just downright mean and more concerned about their performance figures!


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## MikeTurin (Oct 10, 2017)

Radders said:


> The trouble is schools are penalised if attendance is poor, and these kind of schemes are proven to work in improving it. I have always felt uneasy about them because they don't distinguish between penalising those who "swing the lead" and the genuinely unwell.


If the goal is to have a nice number to present to the power that be is a thing. Unfortunately this goal doesn't work very well because the dry number hides the causes of low attendance. 
Now in this case penalize a girl that has a serious condition is a problem. What bugs me is that if in a school there are rules and not common sense, if an emergency happens like a bad hypo and she passes out, I am not sure that she will be helped correctly or will receive a punishment for felling asleep during class...


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## Bloden (Oct 10, 2017)

Good grief! What a bunch of fascists...


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## trophywench (Oct 10, 2017)

No not really Bloden - more like sick of banging our heads on the wall of a world where numbers and ticking the right damn boxes are regarded as being more important than people - and in this case - a person the organisation is supposed to be instrumental in raising to be a useful member of future society.

This is demonstrating that it's FINE to discriminate against people who can't tick all the right boxes and it matters not in particular that it relates to diabetes.

It's the principle of it that is WRONG.


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