What on earth was he/she thinking?

[stevensfo]

PARENTS have received an apology from a Scottish council after a photography firm offered alternative pictures with or without children with “complex” needs.

A photographer working for Tempest Photography took two separate photos of the P5 class at Aboyne Primary School in Aberdeenshire, with children with additional support needs (ASN) reportedly removed from one set.

Parents were then sent a link with both versions to choose from.

Children with wheelchairs not included in one version! Apparently the school headteacher knew nothing until the photography firm published the links.

https://uk.news.yahoo.com/parents-share ... 15853.html

At present, it appears to have been a decision by the photographer. But surely, there was at least one teacher present when the photos were being taken.

Okay, not the end of the world, heads will roll, lessons learned etc.

But I find it quite scary that somebody could actually decide to do this sort of thing.

Steve

PS Yes, I have taken family photos myself +/- dribbling baby, friend of family, obnixious relative etc, but this was a professional taking a class photo!

[Gerry557]

Has that photographer not heard of equality?

He should have included other options such as no girls, no Irish, no blacks, no .....

[Mike4]

But surely, there was at least one teacher present when the photos were being taken.

Either there were two sets of photos taken, one with the ASN kids physically moved out of view, or they have been digitally removed with PhotoShop or whatever in the photography studio.

I dunno which of the two possibilities is the most horrifying.

[Lootman]

Has that photographer not heard of equality?

He should have included other options such as no girls, no Irish, no blacks, no .....

Usually the other way around. I once worked at a company that was 95% white employees, and mostly men. But the company's annual report had in it carefully curated photos that invariably featured female and non-white staff.

The message was clearly "Look at how diverse and inclusive we are", even though they were not.

This school seems to be giving out mixed messages. One photo says "Look how compassionate we are admitting all these special needs kids". The other photo says "Don't worry about sending your kids here as we do not have a lot of special needs kids diverting staff resources away from your precious kids".

These days everyone is categorised and labelled.

[bungeejumper]

Either there were two sets of photos taken, one with the ASN kids physically moved out of view, or they have been digitally removed with PhotoShop or whatever in the photography studio.

I dunno which of the two possibilities is the most horrifying.

Aye, Hitler would have done one thing, Stalin would have done the other.

It's a complete mystery to me. But I see that Tempest says it has 450 photographers (mostly freelances, I think, who seem to be hired for defined-term campaigns), and maybe this one was just having a bad week? There must be a back story of some sort - maybe the kids were making a lot of noise or something and he couldn't concentrate? - but I doubt that we'll hear it. The harm's been done.

As an ex-teacher, most of the school photographers whose work I've seen were quite amazingly good with getting the confidence of their sitters - it's all about the patter, I suppose? A real character thing - either you've got that special quality or you haven't. Most of us will never be that good.

BJ

[moorfield]

But I find it quite scary that somebody could actually decide to do this sort of thing.

A more disturbing aspect of this story is that there might well be some parents who would buy the "aryan" version of the photograph.

[GoSeigen]

Wasn't he/she thinking exactly what a significant proportion of this very forum would think and have thought for years? It shouldn't really be news by now. I know my own step mother would see nothing wrong with excluding the "illegal migrants" for example.


GS

[bungeejumper]

Wasn't he/she thinking exactly what a significant proportion of this very forum would think and have thought for years? It shouldn't really be news by now. I know my own step mother would see nothing wrong with excluding the "illegal migrants" for example.

Up to a point, Lord Copper. People can think what they like, but if the law says no discrimination, then that's that. In this case it's a particularly fair and constructive law, and the photographer's decision to flout it was invevitably public because the recipients have the photos. Sometimes we should be glad that the transgressors are idiots.

BJ

[Lootman]

Wasn't he/she thinking exactly what a significant proportion of this very forum would think and have thought for years? It shouldn't really be news by now. I know my own step mother would see nothing wrong with excluding the "illegal migrants" for example.

Up to a point, Lord Copper. People can think what they like, but if the law says no discrimination, then that's that. In this case it's a particularly fair and constructive law, and the photographer's decision to flout it was invevitably public because the recipients have the photos. Sometimes we should be glad that the transgressors are idiots.

BJ

I did not see any claim that this act was criminal. Only that it was in bad taste, and executed tactlessly.

For discrimination to reach the level of a crime it has to fall into one of the documented specific categories and has to form part of a systematic pattern. This faux pas appears to meet neither standard.

Maybe schools are different now but in my school days there were many forms of "streaming", "selection" and exclusivity that served to elevate some kids relative to others. For a start each academic year was split into four classes, A to D, where A were the smart kids who did O-levels in 4 years, and D was for the thickies. Some of us who were good at sports got a different blazer (school colours) and a different tie ("representative tie"). Again, someone was "top of the form", and someone bottom. The "top" boys were prefects; then there were the rest.

And so on. The idea that there were winners and losers was everywhere.

[bungeejumper]

Up to a point, Lord Copper. People can think what they like, but if the law says no discrimination, then that's that. In this case it's a particularly fair and constructive law, and the photographer's decision to flout it was invevitably public because the recipients have the photos. Sometimes we should be glad that the transgressors are idiots.

I did not see any claim that this act was criminal. Only that it was in bad taste, and executed tactlessly.

And I did not say that the photographer's action was criminal. If I did, please tell me where I said it? If I didn't, how about acknowledging that, and maybe even apologising?

Or do you sincerely believe that laws concern themselves only with criminality? If so, then boy, you have a lot of rethinking to do. To spare you the trouble of looking it up yourself, I'll remind us all that the 2010 Equalities Act (for instance) leaves no doubt whatsoever as to the illegality of taking any discriminatory action within a school which disadvantages any person with a protected characteristic.

And that the law doesn't ask whether the discriminatory action was deliberate, or even whether it actively harmed the individual? It's enough that the pupil was excluded from something that should properly have been his/her right. And I don't know about you, but I'd say that being in the class photo was quite an everyday sort of social right. And that the exclusion would have hurt.

The Equality and Human Rights Commission's report on the application of the 2010 Act in educational establishments (https://www.equalityhumanrights.com/sit ... bodies.pdf) doesn't leave a scintilla of doubt on any of these points.

That doesn't mean that criminal law will take action against this photographer, but it doesn't make his action legal either. I have already said that he may have been under extenuating personal pressures - and I'll also agree that special needs pupils can sometimes be noisy, disruptive, and generally not very conducive to group activities. (Our friends have a SEND kid with all those characteristics, and yes, he can certainly misbehave.) In that sort of a situation, the photographer should have called for guidance and assistance from the school staff, and in extremis he should have postponed the event until he (and they) had calmed down a bit. But he didn't, and it was more than just a faux pas.

You seem to go properly off on a tangent in your last couple of paras, though. Are you suggesting that, because your school streamed its pupils according to learning achievement, that was in some way comparable with disadvantaging, excluding or isolating a pupil because he's got a special need (physical, mental or both)? "The idea that there were winners and losers was everywhere" just doesn't connect with this case at all, I'm afraid. We're talking about protected characteristics here (disability, race, gender or whatever), and that's a very different sort of matter.

BJ

[Lootman]

I did not see any claim that this act was criminal. Only that it was in bad taste, and executed tactlessly.

And I did not say that the photographer's action was criminal. If I did, please tell me where I said it? If I didn't, how about acknowledging that, and maybe even apologising?

Or do you sincerely believe that laws concern themselves only with criminality?

Yes it is possible that someone could try and make a civil case out of this. But again I am not aware that anyone is considering that as appropriate. As I said discrimination cases (assuming that applies here at all) are usually brought about where there is a provable pattern of discrimination. It is hard to make that case for a one-off incident like this.

And of course it was not the school that did this but rather an independent contractor. As a judge or juror I would be interested in why the photographer offered this option. For example was it common for potential customers to ask for pupils to be divided into groups on a basis other than the class they were in? If there had been an option to photograph the boys and girls in separate groups, for instance, is that also "discriminatory". Tall and short kids?

As an aside is it common now for a normal school to have a mix of special needs kids in it? I thought they usually had their own school where they could be treated so as not to disrupt the teaching of the other kids. At my school there were definitely some kids less able than others, hence the streaming. But no special needs kids.

[MuddyBoots]

Yes it is possible that someone could try and make a civil case out of this. But again I am not aware that anyone is considering that as appropriate. As I said discrimination cases (assuming that applies here at all) are usually brought about where there is a provable pattern of discrimination. It is hard to make that case for a one-off incident like this.

I believe disability is classed as a protected characteristic these days, meaning it should receive the same legal safeguards as race and religion etc.

As an aside is it common now for a normal school to have a mix of special needs kids in it? I thought they usually had their own school where they could be treated so as not to disrupt the teaching of the other kids. At my school there were definitely some kids less able than others, hence the streaming. But no special needs kids.

Yes I think this is common, especially as special needs are often on a spectrum (such as autism) and it's perfectly appropriate for many of them to be in mainstream schools. AFAIK all state schools have SENDCOS (Special Educational Needs and Disability Coordinators) who specialise in support for SEND students and arrange whichever reasonable adjustments they need. There's extra government money like pupil premium to help fund it.

Back in my day a lot of these special needs weren't known about or diagnosed so there were probably just as many pupils with conditions without realising it. Like dyslexia or dyscalculia for example, in my school those kids would simply be put in a lower set and got on with lower expectations.

[tjh290633]

Back in my day a lot of these special needs weren't known about or diagnosed so there were probably just as many pupils with conditions without realising it. Like dyslexia or dyscalculia for example, in my school those kids would simply be put in a lower set and got on with lower expectations.

I quite agree. Our junior school had a single stream, some very slow pupils might have been kept down for a year. In my case I was moved up from Class 3 to Class 4 because I already knew what was going to be taught in that year. It was an advantage because I would have been able to sit the scholarship exam twice. Not needed because I won a free place at the first attempt. My future school took pupils from 3 counties and ours had two scholarships of £30/year plus 5 free places.

Obviously the new school would have no special needs pupils, because they would have been screened out. However I have no recollection of any children who might have had special needs in the junior school, except for one boy who was epileptic. As it was he kept pace with the others.

I do have memory of the headmistress, Ethel Cole, telling us as we stood in lines in the playground that one boy would not be coming back. He had been caught in the act of some crime and had been sent to an Approved School, known then as a Green School. This was a warning to all the rest to be of good behaviour, lest the same fate befell us. That was the only instance in 5 years.

Incidentally, all the children lived within easy walking distance of the school and there were no school meals, just the regulation milk. That was the only time I saw milk in bottles, as our milkman Jim brought a churn of unpasteurised full cream milk to the door, where he ladled the pint into a jug. I am talking of the late 30s, early 40s here.

TJH

[Lootman]

Yes it is possible that someone could try and make a civil case out of this. But again I am not aware that anyone is considering that as appropriate. As I said discrimination cases (assuming that applies here at all) are usually brought about where there is a provable pattern of discrimination. It is hard to make that case for a one-off incident like this.

I believe disability is classed as a protected characteristic these days, meaning it should receive the same legal safeguards as race and religion etc.

Ah but is every case of "special needs" considered to formally be a disability? Is Asperger's a disability, for example? I would have thought not.

I maintain this is not a legal issue but rather is a perception matter i.e, a case of poor PR at least in the current climate.

The OP asked a question about why the decision was made to offer this particular option out of all of the possible ones. And I am not sure that has been answered. It seems unlikely to me that the photographer would have come up with such an idea on his own. And that begs the question of who told him that this should be offered, and why?

[MuddyBoots]

I believe disability is classed as a protected characteristic these days, meaning it should receive the same legal safeguards as race and religion etc.

Ah but is every case of "special needs" considered to formally be a disability? Is Asperger's a disability, for example? I would have thought not.

I maintain this is not a legal issue but rather is a perception matter i.e, a case of poor PR at least in the current climate.

The OP asked a question about why the decision was made to offer this particular option out of all of the possible ones. And I am not sure that has been answered. It seems unlikely to me that the photographer would have come up with such an idea on his own. And that begs the question of who told him that this should be offered, and why?

I'm usually a bit behind the times but I think the umbrella term for something like Aspergers these days is neurodivergence and it's up to the individual (or parents/carers for children & adults without capacity) to decide whether they want to be classed as 'disabled'. When I was working we had the usual HR information forms to fill in and we could self-certify. For example I suffer with anxiety, which is on a sliding scale and never put myself down as disabled.

But yeah, this is a tangent to the topic which is about a visible disability, ie wheelchair users. And as usual it's difficult to determine someone's motives when there's little to go on (we aren't mind readers) and I'm sceptical when such claims are made.

[Re my previous post, my mention of pupil premium was inaccurate, that's for something else, but SEN does have funding].

[kempiejon]

Asperger's Syndrome is not a diagnosis and his grubby Nazi connection unwanted these days I think. Autism is the diagnosis, it is a development disorder and as is oft mentioned is a spectrum, some of those so diagnosed have learning difficulties, others need little adaptions to participate in the neurotypical world.

[stevensfo]

Back in my day a lot of these special needs weren't known about or diagnosed so there were probably just as many pupils with conditions without realising it. Like dyslexia or dyscalculia for example, in my school those kids would simply be put in a lower set and got on with lower expectations.

I quite agree. Our junior school had a single stream, some very slow pupils might have been kept down for a year. In my case I was moved up from Class 3 to Class 4 because I already knew what was going to be taught in that year. It was an advantage because I would have been able to sit the scholarship exam twice. Not needed because I won a free place at the first attempt. My future school took pupils from 3 counties and ours had two scholarships of £30/year plus 5 free places.

Obviously the new school would have no special needs pupils, because they would have been screened out. However I have no recollection of any children who might have had special needs in the junior school, except for one boy who was epileptic. As it was he kept pace with the others.

I do have memory of the headmistress, Ethel Cole, telling us as we stood in lines in the playground that one boy would not be coming back. He had been caught in the act of some crime and had been sent to an Approved School, known then as a Green School. This was a warning to all the rest to be of good behaviour, lest the same fate befell us. That was the only instance in 5 years.

Incidentally, all the children lived within easy walking distance of the school and there were no school meals, just the regulation milk. That was the only time I saw milk in bottles, as our milkman Jim brought a churn of unpasteurised full cream milk to the door, where he ladled the pint into a jug. I am talking of the late 30s, early 40s here.

TJH

He had been caught in the act of some crime and had been sent to an Approved School, known then as a Green School.

I didn't know that Approved schools existed at the Primary school level. Isn't that a bit young? Having read a lot in the past about the harshness and cruelty of such schools, I can't help feeling sorry for the little chap.

Steve

[Arborbridge]

For discrimination to reach the level of a crime it has to fall into one of the documented specific categories and has to form part of a systematic pattern.

and has to form part of a systematic pattern.

I doubt that - are you sure?
I would expect individual cases or "one offs" would be presecutable and you wouldn't have to prove that event part of a systematic pattern. Trying to prove or dispute a "systematic pattern" would make such a law impossible to prosecute except in the very worst cases. I can imagine the legal arguments dragging on for years.

Arb.

[bungeejumper]

He had been caught in the act of some crime and had been sent to an Approved School, known then as a Green School.

I didn't know that Approved schools existed at the Primary school level. Isn't that a bit young? Having read a lot in the past about the harshness and cruelty of such schools, I can't help feeling sorry for the little chap.

I can remember some wrong'uns from my primary school days who would have been intercepted pretty smartly by educational psychologists these days, but who were consigned in the late fifties/early sixties to correctional establishments that taught them little, except perhaps how to get away with crime.

One such was the school bully at our primary school, aged nine. He lived in a somewhat deprived area, and he'd grown very fast - indeed, he was already like a strongly-built 13/14 year old. A quality which he used to ambush other kids on their way home from school, so as to extract cash with menaces, or just to beat them up for the fun of it. He scared the bejesus out of most of us.

At age 10 this kid was arrested for nicking electrical goods from a shop. At 11 he set fire to a 300 year old barn and half-destroyed it. At 13 he was sent to borstal after he pushed an elderly lady into a canal. It was fortunate indeed that she didn't drown. I never heard any more about him, but I'd be surprised if he didn't end up behind bars, long-term, learning more stuff from the old cons.

Was that avoidable or preventable? Or was he doomed from birth by some brain defect or some dark psychopathy? I don't think so. But for the lack of any psychological care facilities in education during that time, we'll never know.

BJ

[stevensfo]

He had been caught in the act of some crime and had been sent to an Approved School, known then as a Green School.

I didn't know that Approved schools existed at the Primary school level. Isn't that a bit young? Having read a lot in the past about the harshness and cruelty of such schools, I can't help feeling sorry for the little chap.

I can remember some wrong'uns from my primary school days who would have been intercepted pretty smartly by educational psychologists these days, but who were consigned in the late fifties/early sixties to correctional establishments that taught them little, except perhaps how to get away with crime.

One such was the school bully at our primary school, aged nine. He lived in a somewhat deprived area, and he'd grown very fast - indeed, he was already like a strongly-built 13/14 year old. A quality which he used to ambush other kids on their way home from school, so as to extract cash with menaces, or just to beat them up for the fun of it. He scared the bejesus out of most of us.

At age 10 this kid was arrested for nicking electrical goods from a shop. At 11 he set fire to a 300 year old barn and half-destroyed it. At 13 he was sent to borstal after he pushed an elderly lady into a canal. It was fortunate indeed that she didn't drown. I never heard any more about him, but I'd be surprised if he didn't end up behind bars, long-term, learning more stuff from the old cons.

Was that avoidable or preventable? Or was he doomed from birth by some brain defect or some dark psychopathy? I don't think so. But for the lack of any psychological care facilities in education during that time, we'll never know.

BJ

OMG!

When I was about nine (1969), I used to think how boring our peaceful, idyllic village Primary school was. A new building with open plan classrooms, rarely a voice raised, family atmosphere, kind teachers, adults keeping a beady eye on us as we walked home. Nothing exciting ever happened.

No canals either.

Steve

PS We did have a large village pond, but despite my efforts to lure them towards it, the old ladies never went close enough to push them in.