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School brings in detentions for children who don't wear a cycle helmetChildren cycling (picture credit pressedienst fahrrad)

School brings in detentions for children who don't wear a cycle helmet

Cambridge school head says he was shocked after a child was treated in intensive care
by Sarah Barth
Sun, Dec 10, 2017 13:10
43

A headteacher is taking drastic action to make cycling safer - with detentions for children who cycle dangerously.

Ed Elliott, headmaster of the Perse School in Cambridge, was dismayed to see his charges cycling to and from lessons on poorly maintained bikes in a less than orderly fashion.

Pupils at the independent school, where fees are £17,000 a year, have been told they must wear high-visibility clothing, helmets and no headphones.

Those found to be flouting the rules face a letter home to parents or a detention, and teachers can report transgressions on and off school grounds.

“Everyone who cycles to school must wear high-visibility clothing, correctly fitted cycle helmets, they must have working front and rear lights, brakes and pedal reflectors,” Elliott told the Times. “I tell children off when they are wearing headphones to listen to music when cycling; you can’t hear the reversing sirens on an HGV if you have headphones on.

“We spend a lot of time talking to pupils to make sure they stop at red lights. It is amazing how many cyclists run red lights in a place like Cambridge.

“In a teaching career you will sometimes see children who die. Early on in my career a child I knew well was killed in a cycle accident. That changed my behaviour.”

Elliott added: “Last year 309 children were seriously injured in cycle accidents reported to the police and there were eight deaths. Those aged 10 to 15 are most at risk, particularly between eight and nine in the morning and three and six in the evening and that risk increases in the winter months.”

This summer Ewan Morris, 16, a GCSE pupil at the Perse, who cycles a mile or so to and from school, was treated in intensive care at Addenbrooke’s Hospital after coming off a bike. He was wearing a borrowed cycle helmet.

“I can’t remember what happened,” he said. “I was put into a medically induced coma and released after a few days. My helmet was split open at the back — and I think that saved my life.”

Elliott, also a cyclist, has a festive message for parents wondering what to get their kids for Christmas. “I will be encouraging parents to consider buying cycle safety gear. Children think they are invincible; we are trying to create a different mindset.”

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43 comments

Avatar
brooksby | 6 years ago
9 likes

I was chatting to my sister in law yesterday. She's a teacher in an academy, a state secondary school; head of department and has been a teacher for twenty odd years. I was telling her about the other recent story about a head wanting kids to wear cycle helmets and have number plates. She said it's none of their business: staff are on site from an hour or so before and after the end of the school day, in case kids come in early or leave late, but that's it. She said it is not the schools responsibility what the kids do outside of school hours and off the school site (unless on school-arranged buses etc). The school could mandate helmets on school property, but that's the end of it.

Avatar
Bluebug replied to brooksby | 6 years ago
3 likes

brooksby wrote:

I was chatting to my sister in law yesterday. She's a teacher in an academy, a state secondary school; head of department and has been a teacher for twenty odd years. I was telling her about the other recent story about a head wanting kids to wear cycle helmets and have number plates. She said it's none of their business: staff are on site from an hour or so before and after the end of the school day, in case kids come in early or leave late, but that's it. She said it is not the schools responsibility what the kids do outside of school hours and off the school site (unless on school-arranged buses etc). The school could mandate helmets on school property, but that's the end of it.

Lots of Academies seem to want to do stupid things there as if they were controlled by the local authority they wouldn't be allowed to even suggest it.

With this independent school parents  will vote with their feet, and I am aware in certain areas too many parents have been so many such schools have closed down.

Avatar
kitsunegari replied to Bluebug | 6 years ago
1 like

Bluebug wrote:

With this independent school parents  will vote with their feet, and I am aware in certain areas too many parents have been so many such schools have closed down.

Why would they? Would you risk your childs education at such a place (that the facilities seem second to none)? Or would you just get on with it, grumble a little on the internet and make your child wear a helmet? Changing schools over something like this would be silly, and so the anti-cycling idiots like Mr Ed Elliot win, motorists win, and our children grow up being scared of what should be a safe activity.

Avatar
Bluebug replied to kitsunegari | 6 years ago
1 like

kitsunegari wrote:

Bluebug wrote:

With this independent school parents  will vote with their feet, and I am aware in certain areas too many parents have been so many such schools have closed down.

Why would they? Would you risk your childs education at such a place (that the facilities seem second to none)? Or would you just get on with it, grumble a little on the internet and make your child wear a helmet? Changing schools over something like this would be silly, and so the anti-cycling idiots like Mr Ed Elliot win, motorists win, and our children grow up being scared of what should be a safe activity.

Heads who put in one stupid rule tend to put in a lot more.

Avatar
davel | 6 years ago
13 likes

Either Ed Elliott doesn't understand unintended consequences or he is deliberately reducing the numbers of kids cycling to his school.

Either way, I wouldn't be sending my kids to a school with such a chump in charge, even if it was free.

Avatar
Yorkshire wallet | 6 years ago
2 likes

£17k on school fees but the kids have shitly maintained bikes?

Avatar
Hirsute | 6 years ago
6 likes

Perhaps hgvs should be equipped with reversing lights and have a banksman.

Avatar
cyclisto | 6 years ago
5 likes

If they require 17000 a year, it is sensible that someone has to shoot about their customer's safety. But for so much money they could hire somebody to drive a car behind each customer, do I have to do all the thinking?

Avatar
Grahamd replied to cyclisto | 6 years ago
1 like

cyclisto wrote:

If they require 17000 a year, it is sensible that someone has to shoot about their customer's safety. But for so much money they could hire somebody to drive a car behind each customer, do I have to do all the thinking?

Would prepare them in case they decide to be cycling politician as well.

 

Avatar
drosco | 6 years ago
18 likes

Unfortunately, this is pretty much all this website has become. Endless footage of 'near misses' and articles about helmets. Chuck in the odd overpriced jacket and there you go. Everything joyless about cycling.

Avatar
Wheelsgoinground replied to drosco | 6 years ago
2 likes
drosco wrote:

Unfortunately, this is pretty much all this website has become. Endless footage of 'near misses' and articles about helmets. Chuck in the odd overpriced jacket and there you go. Everything joyless about cycling.

True, dat. And the worst of it is, I don't choose to read this drip-drip of fear and misery, it comes free of charge or choice thanks to my Google news feed. It's like having the Daily Mail read to me over breakfast. Make it stop!

Avatar
ChairRDRF replied to drosco | 6 years ago
4 likes

drosco wrote:

Unfortunately, this is pretty much all this website has become. Endless footage of 'near misses' and articles about helmets. Chuck in the odd overpriced jacket and there you go. Everything joyless about cycling.

I see your point - but that's the same about all "news" - you have to mention the bad stuff.

On the plus side, I am hugely encouraged by the sensible comments of so many below who can see through the victim-blaming and non-evidence based red herring that is pushed by those who should know better.

Avatar
Ush replied to drosco | 6 years ago
2 likes

drosco wrote:

Unfortunately, this is pretty much all this website has become. Endless footage of 'near misses' and articles about helmets. Chuck in the odd overpriced jacket and there you go. Everything joyless about cycling.

On the plus side: your whinges always bring a smile to my lips and put a spring in my step.

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