How would you expect a boarding school to respond to this?

First, really appreciate all of the posts about the disciplinary issue. Very helpful and supportive; I hope it does serve as a cautionary tale to other kids.

As our time as boarding school parents ends, I am having very mixed feelings about some things. I’d like to hear from other parents what kind of response (if any) you’d expect from the following email re. concussions. We were told by a Dean that she would look into it with the head of the athletics department; we’ve never heard a word. Since our son is graduating in a month, should I drop it? Ask what (if anything) happened?


As of this year, [our son] had suffered four concussions (two at school), which continue to affect his concentration and focus. To avoid a fifth, [son] was not supposed to wrestle this year. [Son] felt strong pressure from [Coach] to continue and loves being part of the varsity wrestling program. He agreed to help manage and practice, but was not supposed to participate in tournaments. We recently found out that not only was he sparring in practice but he was also being pressured by the coach to compete.

On December 6, in practice supervised by [Coach], a student was aggressively making contact with [son’s] head. [Son] told this student to stop and stated specifically that he had a history of head injury; the student ignored him. After another head contact [son] became dizzy, nauseous, and developed a severe headache. Health Services subsequently diagnosed his fifth concussion. The student who inflicted the concussion has experienced no consequences while [son] has still not recovered. We believe the coaching staff let our son down by pressuring him to participate despite the health risks and then by failing to properly supervise his activities during practice to protect his health.

This is terrible. I’m so sorry for your son. (The conclusions could also explain some poor choice making BTW). Is there no concussion training paperwork that needs to be signed by all athletes and coaches? My husband is a varsity level coach but in the public schools and needs to complete concussion training every single year. They do not take any risks with concussions anymore. Your son was put into a terrible position with the coach pressure and I would absolutely address this. In fact, you could possibly have a law suit on your hands if the same rules apply for concussions in boarding school as they do in public school. Although I am not sure what rules are in place in the state your DS goes to school.

They do have an extensive concussion policy including a back to school policy, IMPACT testing before and after, etc. He was sent home for the fourth concussions because he wasn’t recovering at school and missed a couple of weeks. To get him cleared to return included a lot of testing at home and a call between the school doctor and our doctor. I’m mostly disappointed that the school never followed up with us about whether anything was done in response to the above. Our son quit wrestling and lacrosse after that concussion on advice of his neurologist. Concussions are a terrible thing; sadly it is often the parents pushing to get their athlete kids back out, more than the schools.

Several friends said we had a potential lawsuit; we are not interested in going that route. Not worth it.

That’s really disturbing. I’d be on the phone to the School Head, followed up with something in writing, expressing my profound displeasure. Assuming that your son’s medical condition was known by the coach, the athletic director and the school’s medical team, it’s hard for me to conceive that a coach could be so stupid, thoughtless and just plain negligent. The impact of concussions is in the news constantly. Ignorance is impossible.

I’m so sorry to hear about your son. My daughter has had 6 concussions and continues to deal with post-concussive syndrome. I can’t advise as to what you should expect from the school, but it does seem that they were irresponsible.

On a separate note, I would urge you to have your son meet with a neurologist that can fully document the issues he currently experiences.

In our experience, many of my daughter’s symptoms seemed to go away over the summer. But, once she entered college those symptoms came back. We didn’t have current medical results so it took some finagling to get her the appropriate accommodations.

You may want to consult with the college now and, depending on their response, consider setting up a late Aug appointment with a neurologist local to the school. It can take months to get those appointments so it is worthwhile to investigate now. My daughter now has an IEP which covers both housing and academics. She still struggles, at times, but the IEP has helped significantly.

That’s awful. I don’t have any further advice, just empathy. Sports injuries, particularly concussions, and pressure to continue to play/practice are a big fear of mine, notwithstanding the IMPACT testing, policies, protocols, etc. DS has had some injuries of varying degrees but it was his one mild concussion (last year) that was the most troubling.

Wow, that stinks. While I don’t know that there is anything you can do to help your son…I think documenting this and filing a formal complaint with the school could help protect future students from risking this sort of injury/treatment.

Thank you. This is very helpful. He does have a neurologist but I didn’t think about having him go again before college starts. Concussions are just so frightening. We never let him play football because of concerns about it, but his worst one was from fainting in his room and hitting his head - just a fluke. And I had no idea how much of a concussion risk wrestling was until after the fact. Many regrets. The school has a long concussion policy but it is hard - a lot of kids and parents want them to keep playing sports, as do the coaches.

I am so, so sorry. What a horrible situation.

Just to reiterate, my main question is, if you wrote to the deans and Head with the above complaint, would you expect to hear back?

No, I would not expect to hear back. I am very sorry you went through this, OP, and hope for better things in the future. I don’t think the school will respond, certainly not in writing, to minimize any liability issues. It might in the future undertake some corrective action, like asking parents to sign off on their student’s playing certain sports, or speak to the coach. But I don’t think you will hear anything more.

Yes, I would expect a follow-up. Of course, as advice for the future, always best to include a question or two in there or a statement that you wish to have follow-up so they know a response is anticipated.

I would have no qualms with resending and asking for a follow-up and even CCing someone higher up in the administration.

This can be categorized as “business correspondence” and IMO a lack of response is very poor protocol.

You better believe I would expect a follow up. And I wouldn’t stop until I got one. My son has had 3 or 4 concussions, and still has two years to go. He is banned from playing football, but still would like to manage the team next year. I will be keeping as close o an eye on this as I can.

What kind of response are you looking for, OP? I understand that ideally you might like the school to acknowledge wrongdoing and apologize, but I think that’s highly unlikely for legal reasons. I don’t think the school is going to investigate the other boy involved-presumably, he didn’t mean to cause a concussion, it was accidental, and I’m not sure what his responsibility would be to another participant in a voluntary athletic match anyway. The incident was also 5 months ago, and is just being raised now. The coach seems most at fault, and I would expect the school to speak with him, but he may have another story as well. Perhaps there are more facts-maybe your son was over 18, or you were aware of the nature of his participation and the risks inherent in the sport, or the coach never got the message that your son was only the manager, or whatever. I’m not sure what the school can do to make it better for you now, at this date. I do hope the future brings much brighter things.

As I mentioned somewhere on the threads on the sexual assaults and harassment, if there is a conflict between the perceived best interests of a school versus those of a student, the school will choose its own best interests. Every school, every time. It’s the nature of institutions.

I would sue, but that’s just me. They’d settle.

Yes. and it is not likely to be in the school’s best interests to respond in this case. The student will depart in a few weeks in any event, and the relationship between the school/family is likely already irreparably tarnished by the other incident involving the student. Other than acknowledging the correspondence, I’m not sure what the school would gain by responding to the OP. Internally, yes, more may be done to mitigate these situations in the future. But not publicly.

I would expect a response but wouldn’t expect much more than we will discuss the matter with the coach. I wouldn’t expect any action against the other student involved. I’m not sure you can conclude any malice on the part of his sparring partner and sports have inherent risks but if the coach knew he wasn’t supposed to participate that’s another story. The response I would expect is thank you for bringing this to our attention and we will review and remind the coaching staff of the concussions protocols.

I would expect a response as well- how long has it been since you asked? I am shocked that the school would let him practice at all, with a history of 4 concussions. Having gone through this with one of my kids, I was under the impression that the concussion protocol was that you may not return to activity until symptom-free.

I would expect an acknowledgement as @123Mom456 suggested - “thank you for bringing this to our attention…”

In addition, something to consider related to OP other post - there have been several studies suggesting that teenagers with traumatic brain injury are more prone to risky behavior.

I’m with whoever said this was a matter to be discussed with the head of school. However, I wouldn’t expect anything other than a promise to investigate and to try to prevent anything like that from happening again.