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Bohunt school meeting 14th december END OF THE WORLD! - anonymous982 (18th Dec 2012 - 19:56:05) DEAR all parents of pupils at bohunt school On the 14th December at around 8.50am , mr.strowger lead a school meeting which was about the end of the world on 21st December and i feel it was not nice or very relevant to school. The meeting started off with a very scary video about the planets which i thought was going to end up being about how tiny but great our planet is, it was not. It was about the end of the world which involved a meteorite hitting the world and it all going up in flames and ending. I found this not very nice but thought it would be followed by mr.strowger saying it was rubbish and not true. He didn\'t say anything like this and then went on to talk about the conspiracy theories and how they were all coming together. He never once mentioned that it was not going to happen. my friend in year 11 is a mentor for year 7\'s. Before school meeting the year 7\'s were talking about the end of the world and getting quite worried, she managed to calm them down and they went off to the meeting.After the meeting all the year 7\'s were very scared and were saying things like \"If the head teacher says its true, it must be the end of the world\". My friend tried to tell them mr.strowger was joking but it didn\'t stop them worrying. I talked to several teachers on Friday and Monday and lots of them said it was unnecessary, harsh and a waste of a meeting. i saw lots of pupils crying,not just year 7\'s and a few people with anxiety were very worried and have been since that meeting. I do not feel this was a very nice or friendly meeting and i would love to here yours and your child\'s views, please comment. If you feel you would like to complain to the school please call 01428 724324 or pop in to reception. Thank you for reading x

Re: Bohunt school meeting 14th december END OF THE WORLD! - Phil (18th Dec 2012 - 21:15:22) Would suggest - and with respect - that this needs independent verification and a formal statement from the school, rather than anonymous discussion through social media.

Re: Bohunt school meeting 14th december END OF THE WORLD! - Richard (18th Dec 2012 - 21:18:47) Surely Bohunt schol have scheduled a counterpoint to the previous speaker's presntation so that all sides are heard, after all, pupils are supposed to be shown both sides of a postion so they can make up their own mind... For the record, I am not a parent of a child at Bohunt, and this doomsday scenario rings about as true as the Earth being flat and being at the centre of the known Universe...! My suggestion is...Parents engage with your children so potentially misguided ideas are shown to be precidely that, misguided.

Re: Bohunt school meeting 14th december END OF THE WORLD! - CB (18th Dec 2012 - 21:22:22) Yes, at first it may have scared children but all he did was merely present the ideas and conspiracy theories from different people about the world ending and didn't say this was right. He then went on to say how stupid the ideas were and explain that the Mayan calculations were wrong and that if we were to go by their calculations the world would have already ended and well, it hasn't has it? So actually yes he may have scared people at first, even though personally I found it rather interesting. But he didn't tell anyone that the world was indefinitely going to end, and I didn't see any young children crying around school and if they were who's to say it was about the school meeting? I think you may have over exaggerated the matter and trying to influence people to call in and complain is a bit far. But by all means if people were in the meeting or know all the information about the meeting then call in and complain. However I don't think it was as bad as you've made out. Also, what if the world is to end? No one knows that it isn't, so if it is then he's prewarned us and we can all be ready to fight off the zombies in the zombie apocalypse that may come... -Year 11 Student, Bohunt School

Re: Bohunt school meeting 14th december END OF THE WORLD! - Maureen (18th Dec 2012 - 21:28:12) My son is in year 10 & has had sleepless nights over this. Absolutely mortified Mr Strowger would pull a stunt like this. Complaint made in writing already.

Re: Bohunt school meeting 14th december END OF THE WORLD! - JS (19th Dec 2012 - 12:05:49) I agree with Phil. Extremely poor etiquette to start a discussion on here without speaking to the school. Happy to air your views but not happy to reveal who you are...

Re: Bohunt school meeting 14th december END OF THE WORLD! - richard (19th Dec 2012 - 18:59:09) JS, You too, have not used your full name? A little hypocritical! As for etiquette, i dont think there is much etiquette in frightening the life out of pupils, especially at this time of the year! I expect it wasnt that bad, and i am sure the majority forgot about it straight away! However, some children can be very sensitive, and i think that if it was intended to ally their fears, perhaps it backfired a little! Happy Holidays All!

Re: Bohunt school meeting 14th december END OF THE WORLD! - tony (19th Dec 2012 - 20:17:37) What??? Sounds like poor judgement to me. Mind you, poor judgement for turning up to such a load of nonsense too. Schools are only as good as the people that work there. Still, not worth getting upset about. School is also about preparing kids for the real world and can't be too soft, a bit of a shock like that is probably OK in the scheme of things.

Re: Bohunt school meeting 14th december END OF THE WORLD! - Skeeter Davis (19th Dec 2012 - 22:40:21) Why does the sun go on shining, Why does the sea rush to shore, Don't they know its the end of the world, 'Cause you don't love me anymore. Why do the birds go on singing, Why do the stars glow above, Don't they know its the end of the world, It ended when i lost your love.

Re: Bohunt school meeting 14th december END OF THE WORLD! - (19th Dec 2012 - 23:09:06) Yes school may be a place for pupils to see the world but as Richard said some people take thing differently. Having witnessed the school meeting i would agree that it contained some fairly moving intonation. And yes on three occasions there were indeed so fairly scared pupils. In my opinion I think that it should not of been the subject of the school meeting. Year 10 student

Re: Bohunt school meeting 14th december END OF THE WORLD! - Eneida (20th Dec 2012 - 00:00:23) I can't believe the nonsense in some of the posts on this thread!! All I can say, to anybody that's worried, is read the excellent link the Editor (I assume) has posted under Local Events, Friday 21st December. There you'll see that the Mayans did NOT predict the end of the world this coming Friday...they were just saying that about this time it would be the end of an era in their very complex calendar and the start of a new and better era, with the return to earth of a powerful Mayan God. Actually, they seem to have been correct in this respect, whether by chance or not, as the discovery of enormous amounts of oil has made the Mexican economy currently one of the most boyant in the world and instead of Mexican workers trying to get into the US many are going back to their home country...

Re: Bohunt school meeting 14th december END OF THE WORLD! - Jay W (20th Dec 2012 - 14:28:00) My child in year 7 did come home the other day talking about the perceived "end of the world" and how if it were true, it would already have happened because the Mayans failed to take account of leap years. Consequently, he wasn't bothered .... maybe others should have listened more carefully to what was actually said. And this from a child who does not like and will not watch anything with zombies, Dr Who weeping angels, ghosts or vampires - a bit more sensitive than he would care to admit!

Re: Bohunt school meeting 14th december END OF THE WORLD! - Mark (22nd Dec 2012 - 00:40:15) A yr10 boy having nightmares because of an informative school meeting on a popular topic at the moment? Stop mollycoddling the child and let him grow up. He\'s 15, not five. Several people have said that ALL sides were covered. He was encouraging debate - something people don\'t seem capable of these days without resorting to public slanging matches, or unwarranted hysteria. It\'s plainly obvious to anyone on the outside that a couple of kids who don\'t like the head teacher are just using this to get at him. Move along, nothing to see here.

Re: Bohunt school meeting 14th december END OF THE WORLD! - Maureen (22nd Dec 2012 - 08:57:40) Mark. Perhaps he has learning difficulties. Think before you speak.

Re: Bohunt school meeting 14th december END OF THE WORLD! - Phil (22nd Dec 2012 - 10:21:59) With the benefit of hindsight now - much ado about nothing. I have a 6 year old who jokingly said 'farewell' to his school friends on Thursday .... so even a normal 6 year old could see through this nonsense!

Re: Bohunt school meeting 14th december END OF THE WORLD! - Lisa (22nd Dec 2012 - 10:29:01) Maureen, perhaps you should have mentioned that in your post. It was a bit misleading and not indicative of the reaction of most his age.

Re: Bohunt school meeting 14th december END OF THE WORLD! - Richard (22nd Dec 2012 - 15:50:40) When is the next "end of the world due"? I forget, as they seem to crop up with monotonous regularity?

Re: Bohunt school meeting 14th december END OF THE WORLD! - Pam (22nd Dec 2012 - 16:40:20) I totally agree with both Eneida when she referred in her post to some of the nonsense being posted in this posting, and Lisa's reply to Maureen's posting. My grown up daughter said to me recently that she envies the fact that I was brought up in a time when people did not blame everything and everyone for things that go wrong. She said my generation were encouraged to take responsibility for their own actions and accept that life is not always fair. Now we have the "compensation and blame culture". Opinions in this post seem to vary - on one hand it seems that Mr Strowger was predicting the end of the world and on the other that he was presenting a balanced view. Either way what happended to parenting? If I was upset or frightened as a child I would go to my mother and tell her about it. She would first of all comfort me and then reassure me if reasurance was appropriate. If it was not she would rationalise with me and discuss the problem to see if there was a solution and the best way of how I should deal with it. This taught me that life is not always fair and sometimes shit happens. When it does one has to "get on with it" and move on. My generation had to live through many crises and the one I remember as being the most frightening as a child was the "Cuban Missile Crisis." This was not an "imagined" end of the world. This was a real threat - nuclear war and all its potentially terrible consquences. You could not turn on the radio or open a newspaper without being bombarded with it. However we as children coped and pretty well actually. My sister and I talked to our parents and this time there was no reassurance. We were told that it was a dangerous and potentially devastating situation and they did not try to lessen the seriousness, but at the same time had great faith (not religious, just faith in life) which they imparted to us that a peaceful solution would be found and nuclear war would be averted. This helped us enormously to see the world as it really was and to live under the cloud of "The Cold War". As children we used to discuss in the playground what experience would like to have if the world ended in 4 minutes. This was the amount of time there would be left if nuclear missiles were launched. The boys almost all said they would like to have a sexual experience!! Girls had wider choices. Children need to feel they are listened to, told the truth, loved and valued. Overprotection never helped anybody because sooner or later bad things in life have to be faced and no one is immune. It is how the individual, whether they are young or old, deal with the vicissitudes of life that count. The two mantras at home when I was growing up were: "It's easy to smile when life goes like a song, but the one who's worthwhile, is the one who can smile, when everything goes dead wrong." "Do as you would be done by".

Re: Bohunt school meeting 14th december END OF THE WORLD! - nadine (22nd Dec 2012 - 20:01:20) Hurrah to Pam. I, too, remember lying awake at night, discussing with my friends (we were at boarding school), what we would do if there was a nuclear war. None of us were going to get home in time that was for sure - and it was all girls, so not much sex there either. We may have just had time to fit a game of lacrosse in, if we were lucky... It was a very real fear - but we have all survived unscathed. Kids need to toughen up - and I shall now quote Prince Phillip (love that man) when asked how he felt when his mother left home when he was a young boy. "How do you think I felt??? I just got on with it"... And there is my mantra for life "just get on with it"

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