The use of isolation rooms/booths in schools has featured in the media recently. What are your views? Do they work? Do you use them in your school? Here, ASCL members share their views.

Time out

Boundaries and consequences 

These are used in my school. I always say that isolation rooms are like prisons, everyone in there is innocent (don’t know why they are in there!) and it works for those who never go in there. 

The current media scrutiny is quite sensationalist. After all, the idea of isolation rooms is to avoid the need for a fixed-term exclusion. Young people need to be taught boundaries and that actions have consequences. Isolation rooms are not supposed to be enjoyable places. Most students only spend one day in there, not 40 consecutive days as one report stated. Isolation rooms are perfectly fine as part of a whole-school system that has other strategies to address the needs of young people.

Stephen Gray
Deputy Headteacher, The Whitby High School, Ellesmere Port, Cheshire

One part of an overall strategy

There is nothing inherently good or bad about isolation units. When used well, they can be highly effective in transforming the behaviour culture in school, as has been the case in our experience. Used badly, I have no doubt that they achieve little and may even make the situation worse. 

In my view, the key elements of effective practice include: 

• setting out your behaviour expectations with total clarity 
• working tirelessly to ensure that these expectations are applied consistently and fairly 
• investing in high-quality staffing, that is, accepting that this cannot be done properly ‘on the cheap’ 
• balancing the sanctions with support for high-needs students 
• investing in systems that allow impact to be monitored and tracked meticulously 
• communicating with staff, students and parents regularly 
• making sure that positive behaviours are recognised and celebrated systematically 

In short, as part of a coherent overall behaviour strategy, isolation units can be highly effective. The positive impact of these approaches in our school has been extraordinary.

Francis Power
Headteacher, The Fallibroome Academy, Macclesfield, Cheshire

A necessary evil 

Isolation units are a necessary evil for those extreme (and rare) students who, due to their disruptive behaviour, can’t just be moved to another lesson. However, once in the isolation units, students should be provided with learning resources and a teacher should monitor them to offer support so that their educational journey isn’t hampered too much by their behavioural choices. 

Neil Middleton
Assistant Headteacher, Wood Green School, Witney, Oxfordshire

Isolation v internal exclusion 

I think it’s important to distinguish between ‘isolation’ and ‘internal exclusion’. This is not a matter of semantics; we use internal exclusion, where students work at individual workstations with computers with trained behaviour support colleagues. This is not the same thing as isolation that suggests pupils being placed alone for extended periods of time (which we don’t use). 

The reality is that internal exclusion is part of a raft of behaviour-management techniques, some positive and some less so. We try to avoid it by using other techniques, but sometimes the behaviour of a minority of children is beyond the pale and the disruption to the learning of everyone they share a classroom with is unacceptable. 

It is a method we use to actively avoid fixed-term exclusions; it can also be very useful in helping to identify pupils for whom a more bespoke provision is required. 

Morgan Thomas
Principal, The Littlehampton Academy, Littlehampton, West Sussex

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