New member looking for advice re school

[Anonymous]

#4337

HiI wonder if anyone on the forum here could give advice.I have a 4 year old son who has autism. He attends a mainstream school which has a Specialist Teaching Facility in it for special needs children.I arrived at the school at normal time on Thursday and was told by the teacher to come in as he had injured his ankle. I came into class and they were bouncing him on their lap to try and stop him being upset. They said they hadn't seen how he had injured himself and just "had seen him on the floor crying and trying to take his shoe off". They had tried putting an ice pack on it but he didn't like the cold sensation.I took him home and give him some food and then thought it best to get him checked out at the hospital. After X rays etc it showed my son had actually broken his ankle. In addition, as I could not explain how he obtained his injury (due to school not being able to explain) I had to go to the children's ward after my son had his plaster so someone could question if I was a fit father or not.The next day I left a message on the school phone explaining that my son had broken his ankle and would be in plaster for 5-6 weeks. We then received a phone call from his main class teacher full of apologies and that they "think" my son may have injured himself as he likes to run along a very slight slope on the yard and that he may have gone over on it running along as he likes to do.Later in the day I received a phone call from the Headteacher of the school. Her story had now become that one of her other teachers (not in my son's class) had seen the incident and what the class teacher thought may have happened was now actually what did happen (amazingly). I explained how the teachers the day before did not know his injury had occurred and she said that the teacher who had seen how my son had injured himself had not explained the situation to my son's teachers/assistants.The situation now seems to be a cover up to me. It could have been a genuine accident (my son is non verbal so can't explain) but due to his age and special needs I wonder whether this is any excuse. In addition, if this teacher had seen him fall then surely she would have been first to get to him and see if he was ok, rather than his teachers turn around and see him crying/taking his shoe off.My question is do I accept it or pursue the matter through the courts/media? I'm not the sort of person to run around screaming for compensation at the slightest thing but if my son is not looked after then I think something should be done about them to stop this happening again to someone else. As stated, it might have been an accident and the headteacher is telling the truth but the story seems a bit unbelievable for us to have confidence in their side of the story.My son lives in the UK and any advice would be appreciated (sorry for the length of topic).

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