Arthur Mellows Village College

Attitude towards students is beyond critical especially pastoral. There is no freedom for children, everything has become drastic. Pen run out of ink and no pencil- Poor Behaviour sent to parents, asking for time table again Poor Behaviour, singing a song in a classroom Poor behaviour or detention. Protecting yourself from being bullied or attacked- isolation...

Bullying is not dealt with, mental health is not a priority, medical issues - you have to beg someone to listen to you. If I could send my child elsewhere I would. Staff are conditioned to follow the rules, so don’t expect to get help from anyone should you need it, better hope your child is perfectly unbullyable and has the emotional maturity of a 40 year old. Be prepared for your child to go hungry if getting school meals with any kind of allergies or specific diet.

very bad teachers, students are rude and interoperate. this School does not know how to handle bullying or their students

It's Okay. It's a good school to go to but there a things needing to be improved.

they claim there's no problems and bullying isn't an issue when I've I've bullied since year 7

I’ve been at Arthur mellows since year 7 and there are multiple issues. One issue is a lack of consistent help especially with me being a disabled student. There were times when I had support from staff but other times when I felt like I had no where to turn to and get the support I needed. The pastoral team are so-so, yes I did get help when I got bullied multiple times but there didn’t seem to be any consequences for the students who bullied and just got told off basically. Bullying persisted for most of my time mostly by the same people and I just feel like not enough was done to prevent it from happening over and over and it just felt I was going in circles with reporting it. I never had much one on one support and i often felt like I was left to struggled as I struggled to ask for help, it made my anxiety worse and work would quickly pile up.

Another issue is no gender neutral toilets or facilities. The toilets are all gendered towards boys or girls which makes things difficult for people who may be non-binary/trans or just don’t identify with those labels. The changing rooms are also split boy/girl which again will be difficult for people who are trans or don’t identify with those labels, it’s not inclusive and needs to be sorted out. Also I feel like the best LGBTQ+ friendly thing we have is the posters saying “she’s gay, deal with it” which isn’t the amazing support they think it is. Also there is a lack of LGBTQ+ education which I noticed during life skills lessons as an example.

Also there is a problem with AMVC favouring the “intelligent” kids over those who aren’t as academic or aren’t good at sport. There’s an obvious divide and it made me feel even more isolated and not great especially during some lessons.

Also as previously mentioned, the ableism. Yes there is things like SEN support and accommodations with exams but what about lessons?. In lessons like PE for example there seems to be a lack of understanding that not every child enjoys things like football or netball and aren’t going to put loads of effort into something they don’t enjoy. I personally have poor communication skills and I’m not a fan of contact sport but I feel like I was pushed into doing things I was uncomfortable with and were out of my comfort zone. I was also shouted at and bullied by the more athletic children and the teachers just turned a blind eye to it. Disabled and not athletic children were ignored most of the time and forced into doing things they were uncomfortable with.

Also when the dance teacher left they didn’t bother finding another one. There are so many dancers looking for jobs in the field that probably would have jumped at the opportunity but the course currently no longer exists and I was unable to take it as a gcse for this reason. It was quite disappointing.

There are so good things but the bad things outweigh the good mostly. I’m glad the years of trauma and bullying are over. Excited to move on from it.

i don’t like it, teachers r bad, students are annoying.

Facilities are great