Pupils who wore the wrong socks were amongst 50 students who were booted out of their school in one day for breaking uniform rules.
Parents are fuming after the strict headteacher of The Deepings School, Alun Ebenezer, refused to let pupils in for flouting the school’s strict dress code.
The Lincolnshire school has now become a battleground between parents and staff, after 50 children were put into isolation for breaches including some pupils who reportedly wore the wrong kind of black socks, on Monday (September 26).
READ MORE: Fuming dad calls police after schoolgirls put in isolation over length of their skirts
Furious parents hit out at the school zero tolerance policy, accusing Mr Ebenezer of being “heavy-handed” and running a “police state”.
The educator defended the move, saying any slips in discipline “leads to carnage”.
(Image: James Linsell-Clark / SWNS)
One dad, who asked not to be named, said he was baffled by the decision to exclude his daughter over her plain black ankle socks and long trousers.
“The actions taken are completely unreasonable and have served only to disrupt my daughter’s education,” he said.
“This is the last thing that is needed at a critical point in her schooling, especially after the disruption of the Covid pandemic.
“Uniform is a minor infringement – they should just have a word with the pupil and then escalate the matter if it continues.”
(Image: James Linsell-Clark / SWNS)
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Another dad stormed: “My son was hauled out of lessons for having non-regulation socks on. It’s crazy.
“It’s not just heavy-handed – it’s like some kind of police state.”
Another said: “My son, who is really doing his best to improve his grades, was sent out of lessons when the teacher said his socks were ‘too short’.
“It really would be laughable if it wasn’t true.”
The excluded pupils at the school, which caters for 1,449 children aged 11-18, were ordered to spend the day in the “behaviour inclusion centre”.
(Image: James Linsell-Clark / SWNS)
Ofsted inspectors have twice rated the school in Stamford, Lincolnshire, as “requiring improvement”.
Interim headteacher Alun Ebenezer, who was brought into the school over the summer, defended the strict rules, saying he was cracking down on “open defiance”.
He said: “The pupils who are put into the behaviour centre will be those who said they’re not going to follow the rules.
“We are trying to instil discipline and standards.
“This school has required improvement for the last two Ofsted inspections.
“It can either go into special measures or become a good school – it can’t stay as requires improvement again.
“There is enough here to make it a good school, but we can’t do that unless we sort out the environment and culture.”
(Image: James Linsell-Clark / SWNS)
Mr Ebenezer said he also wants to improve standards in pupils’ manners, posture, speech and body language.
He added: “I have excluded quite a lot of pupils so far, just for a day, and they come to school the next day with their parents and we have a chat.
“At the start it felt like I was excluding a pupil every half-an-hour just to get the point across.
“I have told the teachers that the first half-term will be tough, but the culture will have changed by the time the school opens after the holidays.
“The most serious thing is open defiance because if everyone did that there would be carnage.”
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