The parents of an autistic girl have hit out after she was able to hide in the toilets of her Perth school all day without staff noticing.
Philip and Gemma Marshall, from Abernethy, have hit out at the incident at Oakbank Primary School involving their 11-year-old daughter, whom they do not wish to name.
The pupil went to the toilets at the start of the day after becoming overwhelmed.
However, the couple say school staff only realised she had not been seen all day when her taxi chaperone arrived at 3pm.
The incident happened on Friday, June 20, the hottest day of the year.
A complaint to the school about the incident has been upheld.
Perth primary school staff did not realise autistic girl hiding in toilets was missing
Philip, 40, a carer and joiner, told The Courier: “Our daughter, who has autism and is in an intensive support unit at the school for extra care, was dropped off by her chaperone as usual at the start of school that morning.
“Due to her anxiety and high sensitivity to noise, she went to the toilet to hide because she was scared.
“She was scared by what was going on around her and shut herself in a toilet cubicle.
“It appears no one noticed she was missing from class, she wasn’t registered as either being present or absent and no one contacted us to say she wasn’t seen in school.
“When her chaperone went to collect her, she was found in the cubicle.
“It was a very hot day, and she had had no access to a drink all day.
“The school then handed her over to her chaperone without her even being offered a drink or a welfare check.
“It was also an hour after she was found that the school contacted us.”
Dad claims autistic girl holed up in toilets at Perth school ‘could have died’
Philip says by the time his daughter got home, she was sweating, anxious, dehydrated and confused.
He continued: “In our opinion, the school has failed our daughter on so many levels.
“We have had an apology but we don’t believe that’s good enough.
“Our daughter could have died.
“Apart from the dehydration concerns, what if there had been a fire at the school and no one knew she was in the toilets?
“We want to see procedures put in place to assist our daughter, who will go back to P7 at the same school after the summer break.
“She is now very scared and she will need support to transition into her final year at the school.”
Head teacher blames human error and communication breakdowns for incident
Head teacher Paula Morrison offered “sincere apologies” for the incident in her response to the couple’s complaint.
The school attributed the incident to “a combination of human error, procedural lapses, and system communication breakdowns”.
Mrs Morrison said the school had misinterpreted an email from Gemma about her daughter’s absence on June 19.
It took this to mean she was also off on June 20.
Then, when she did arrive at school, she was not escorted to class.
This enabled her to head to the toilets without anyone knowing.
Mrs Morrison added: “The school acknowledges the gravity of the situation and is implementing comprehensive changes to prevent recurrence.
“A formal apology has been issued, and the school is committed to working closely with you to rebuild trust and ensure (your daughter’s) safety and wellbeing.”
The head teacher highlighted six changes to school procedures she will introduce following the incident.
Dad insists ‘quick fix’ will not prevent a similar incident from happening again
Philip still fears a similar incident could happen again.
He added: “This is a quick fix without even a consideration for my child, let alone other disabled children.
“We also now don’t trust the school’s communication procedures and we want direct contact with class teachers.”
A Perth and Kinross Council spokesperson said: “We cannot comment on the individual circumstances of our pupils; however, any situation which adversely impacts on the safety and wellbeing of children and young people in our schools is of significant concern to us.
“In such circumstances, we will investigate in line with our policies and work with parents/carers to understand why any incident occurred and to take meaningful steps towards resolution to prevent any recurrence.”
Conversation