When school becomes torture
It's time for snack at the time-out centre in Schaffhausen. Leon*, 16, and Tim*, 10, spread jam on their bread at the large wooden table. The seat of Simon* (*name changed), 14, is empty today - which tells you a lot about his story. Simon won't be back until the afternoon. If at all. For weeks, he didn't go to school at all and locked himself in his room. After discussions with parents, teachers and school psychologists, he was diagnosed with school anxiety. Then a stay in hospital to learn how to deal with the anxiety issue. Now the attempt at reintegration, initially via the time-out programme.
In the past, only sixth form students who no longer wanted to go to school came to us.
Claudia Solenthaler-Flubacher, Head of the Schaffhausen time-out programme
The small school with just eight desks is housed in a cosy apartment building. It takes in pupils from the canton of Schaffhausen who find themselves in a difficult situation at mainstream school. These can be behavioural problems, problems with learning - or simply problems with school attendance in general.
Those affected are getting younger and younger
«In the past, we only had sixth formers who stopped going to school because they didn't feel like it. Wrong colleagues, all-night gaming, things like that,» says Claudia Solenthaler-Flubacher, social education worker and head of the time-out programme. She calls this group the classic truants, who need help above all when skipping school becomes a permanent condition. For some years now, however, pupils like Simon have also been coming regularly to the time-out centre, not because they are rebelling against going to school, but because they are afraid of it. These pupils have often not yet reached puberty .
But what makes boys and girls anxious about school? Why do pupils like Simon no longer make it to school in the morning and complain of stomach aches or headaches at home - for weeks or even months on end? Why is this affecting more and more children, often as early as primary school age? What can parents and teachers do to help these pupils? And how can children be strengthened so that they get through their school years well? This dossier explores these questions.
Difficult data collection
Whether you ask teachers, parents, school psychologists or school social workers: girls or boys who are absent from school are a recurring theme in Swiss schools. According to the Pisa study from 2015, around ten per cent of pupils belong to the group of school absentees. Absenteeism is when students regularly miss all or part of the school day without being ill. There are many reasons for this, the most common of which include a dislike of school and school anxiety.
According to the Swiss Federation of Teachers (LCH), there are no more recent data or figures that specifically analyse the phenomenon of school anxiety for Switzerland as a whole. The situation is similar in Germany. The last time the DAK health insurance company published figures on this topic was in 2018. At that time, 3.5 per cent of all schoolchildren in Germany were diagnosed with and treated for school anxiety or school phobia. School psychological counselling centres also report that the numbers have increased massively in recent years and assume that up to 20 percent of all schoolchildren are affected.
Complex causes of school anxiety
According to experts, the poor figures are due to the fact that school anxiety has many different causes: separation from parents, social fear of rejection by classmates or teachers as well as fear of performance and failure. In addition, many of those affected do not seek help or are not open about their fears, which is why the number of unreported cases is likely to be high.
In addition to the daily experiences of teachers, psychologists and parents, there are current surveys of individual schools or cantons that show a trend for Switzerland as a whole. For example, the health survey of 2,000 second-year secondary school pupils published by the Zurich education authority at the end of December 2023. There, 15 per cent of the girls and 12 per cent of the boys surveyed stated that they had missed whole days of school in the 2022/23 school year without being ill.
Anxiety is something terribly contagious. If the parents are anxious, they pass this on to the child.
Irene Fontanilles, Headmistress
10 per cent of girls and 6 per cent of boys have skipped more than one lesson. In the last survey in the 2017/2018 school year, 7 per cent of both genders stated that they had repeatedly and often deliberately missed individual lessons or whole days of school.
Mental disorders on the rise
If you look at the reasons why absenteeism has increased at Zurich schools over the past four years, it becomes clear that it is not because pupils have become lazier or more listless. Rather, there is a significant proportion of children within the group of school absentees who show signs of mental health problems such as depression or anxiety disorders or who state that they did not go to school because of stomach aches or headaches.
This coincides with a sad first reported by the Federal Statistical Office at the end of 2022: for the first time, mental disorders, mainly depression and anxiety disorders, were the most common reason for hospitalisation among 10 to 24-year-olds - more frequently than injuries, accidents or physical illnesses.
What is not clear from the figures is the causal link between the mental health problems and school. Are the affected children not stable, strong and self-confident enough to cope with everyday school life and therefore stay at home? Or are the schools no longer able to support the pupils sufficiently, for example due to a lack of teachers? Are they focussing more on performance than on personal well-being, thereby fuelling fears?
Overprotective parents
The answer lies somewhere in between. If you ask around at primary schools, teachers tell you about first-graders who are brought into the classroom by their parents every morning and cry when they are separated. Of parents who do their child's homework for them and turn up on the playground to resolve conflicts between their children and their classmates. Terms such as helicopter parents and overprotection are used.
«Today we live in a world that has become overly cautious, that tries to control a lot of things. This also affects parents. But because it's not possible to protect children around the clock despite baby monitors, smartwatches, parental taxis and countless insurance policies, anxiety is on the rise,» says Irene Fontanilles. She runs the clinic school at the University Psychiatric Hospital Basel and has been dealing with the issue of school absenteeism for many years, most recently increasingly with school anxiety.
«Anxiety is something terribly contagious. If the parents are anxious, they pass this on to the child. If a child is afraid at school, the teachers also become more cautious. We all need to trust children more again. Children need to be encouraged to remove obstacles themselves,» says the headmistress.
Increased school anxiety since the corona pandemic
Irene Fontanilles has been observing that many children lack independence, self-confidence and self-efficacy for around ten years. However, the number of patients with school anxiety in her hospital school has increased once again since the coronavirus pandemic.
«During the coronavirus lockdowns, a lot of practice in social behaviour has fallen by the wayside. After all, you also have to learn how to separate from your parents. How to make friends in a new group. How to deal with being teased or excluded. How to get the attention of teachers, take a step back or concentrate despite the noise,» says Irene Fontanilles.
I see that many pupils set themselves very high standards and are strict with themselves.
Magnus Jung, Head of Secondary School
In closed kindergartens and schools, however, this social behaviour could not be trained. «And if you don't have any strategies at hand to deal with such situations, everyday school life can quickly become overwhelming and scary,» says Fontanilles.
Children's resilience is declining
Magnus Jung is the headmaster of Befang secondary school in Sulgen TG. Around 190 young people go to school there, three of whom are currently not attending lessons. «The issue of truancy has increased significantly at our school over the past four or five years and has been a constant problem ever since. And it's affecting younger and younger children,» says Magnus Jung.
He also observes that the resilience of young people is steadily declining - partly because parents are very responsive to their children's needs. «But I also see that many pupils today are strict with themselves and place very high demands on themselves. This is certainly also due to social media and can lead to excessive demands if you can't fulfil them,» says Magnus Jung.
On platforms such as Tiktok, Instagram and YouTube, you can always find someone who is prettier, more popular, sportier or happier than you see yourself. Researchers at the Leibniz Institute for Research and Information in Education have investigated this so-called upward comparison on social media and found that it is a real problem: It gnaws away at self-esteem. This in turn can cause a strong fear of rejection or failure. Low self-esteem is also considered a risk factor for the development of various mental disorders, including depression.
The treacherous thing about an anxiety disorder
Simon, the boy with school phobia from Schaffhausen, was ten years old during the coronavirus lockdowns. He also spent a lot of time at home with his parents instead of with his peers. When schools reopened as normal, he couldn't really get back into the school routine; at some point, he couldn't get out of his room at all.
On the advice of the school psychologists, his parents finally persuaded him to stay in a psychiatric clinic. The main aim there is to get the children back to school quickly. «The longer you avoid what scares you, the more difficult it becomes. That's the tricky thing about an anxiety disorder,» says Irene Fontanilles.
The time-out programme is intended to help Simon slowly get used to normal school days and a social community with other children. He also helps with cooking lunch together, setting and clearing the table.
Becoming independent, taking on responsibilities, doing things you don't feel like doing: This is where the social pedagogues come in to equip the pupils with enough tools before they gradually return to their schools and their many classmates. «We also go into the forest once a week, go climbing every Friday and regularly spend the night in the great outdoors, preferably in a cave,» says Claudia Solenthaler-Flubacher.
Switch to public schools
Parents in particular are often amazed at what their children can achieve - if you just let them. And how much they blossom in the small environment with eight pupils, two teachers and two social pedagogues. Following the time-out programme, quite a few parents decide to send their child to a public school instead of a mainstream school - with smaller classes and more personal support.
State schools should be changed so that they offer what many look for in public schools.
David Rapold, teacher Time-out programme Schaffhausen
David Rapold, who works as a class teacher in the time-out programme, understands the parents' decision. However, he does not approve of it. «It can't be right for more and more children and parents to turn their backs on state schools because they no longer fulfil their needs. I see it as our country's responsibility to change state schools so that they offer what many are looking for in public schools today,» says David Rapold.
The role of schools
So is it also the schools that are contributing to pupils now avoiding lessons? If you talk to parents of children with school anxiety, you often hear things like: «The big school, the full classes, my child wasn't up to the challenge.» - «The special needs of my child with dyslexia were not well catered for.» - «The teacher was constantly ill, which made my child feel insecure.»
A teacher from the canton of St. Gallen, who does not wish to be named, admits: «We've had so many problems in the classes since corona, and we're totally overloaded anyway. When pupils who are perhaps a little more difficult anyway don't turn up, we're quite happy.»
The shortage of staff in schools will not change any time soon, nor will class sizes. The Swiss Federation of Teachers recently pointed out that pupil numbers are expected to grow by 8 to 11 per cent by 2030. At primary level alone, there would then be a shortage of 13,000 teachers. Nevertheless, everyday school life will continue for around one million Swiss schoolchildren. And many schools are trying to make the best of the situation - and ensure that as many pupils as possible have a good time at school.
We are totally overloaded anyway. If a troublesome pupil doesn't turn up, we're quite happy.
Teacher from the canton of St. Gallen
This also includes clever strategies for recognising school absenteeism as early as possible and counteracting it. The legal basis for dealing with absenteeism is set out in the cantonal school laws. The starting point everywhere is the general obligation to attend school, for which the legal guardians are responsible. If this is violated, various measures come into force.
Some cantons, such as St. Gallen and Zug, have set out specific guidelines on what these can look like. Beyond that, each school is responsible for its own behaviour. Because: «The situations of pupils and families are always different and the measures have to be adapted,» says Matthias Obrist, Head of the School Psychological Service of the City of Zurich.
1. experience of competence: People want to learn something new and see this learning progress. Applied to school, this means that children are neither underchallenged nor overchallenged and receive good, personalised feedback on their learning progress - not just through tests or grades. «Children are often only shown what they can't do yet,» says Tina Hascher.
2. autonomy and co-determination: This includes things like self-regulated learning, group work or having a say in lesson topics.
3. social integration: friends in the class, teachers who value you, a class community that doesn't exclude anyone - all of this ensures emotional security, which is the prerequisite for being able to engage with the subject matter at all.
In their book «Schulabsentismus», German educationalists Heinrich Ricking and Viviane Albers list various preventative measures to prevent absenteeism in schools. The most important goal is to enable children to participate in learning and development processes at school.
Another powerful preventative factor mentioned is a trusting relationship between teacher and child as well as competent classroom management that prevents social phenomena such as bullying. In addition, there is intensive parental co-operation with mutual trust and structures that can be activated in difficult situations.
Recognising school absenteeism early
The Befang secondary school in Sulgen has introduced a four-stage monitoring system to recognise truancy as early as possible. Among other things, this clearly regulates the number of absences after which contact is sought with parents, school social work or child and adolescent psychiatric services. «The parents in particular are very relieved when we address the issue on our own initiative, take an interest in the children and offer help,» says Magnus Jung. For many parents, it is a difficult step to have to admit that they are unable to motivate their child to attend school. Especially if they give the impression that they are not feeling well.
«It's good for mums and dads to hear from us that truancy is not an isolated incident, but that others are also affected. And it reassures them to hear that most children get back on track, especially if we take action early on,» says the headteacher. However, he has also learnt in recent years that the problem cannot be solved by parents or the school alone. «It only works if we get specialists such as school social work or specialised clinics on board.»
Above all, Magnus Jung talks a lot with his colleagues about how to make the school a place that the pupils enjoy attending. «We can't change the fact that we have to demand a certain level of performance,» he says. However, it is important to him to always see the person behind the pupil and to ensure that they find a learning environment in which they feel comfortable and can experience success. He doesn't hide the fact that this is a challenge with 190 young people and correspondingly large classes.
The most important terms at a glance
Unwillingness to go to school: If young people lack the motivation or discipline to go to school, the term «unwillingness to go to school» is often used. Parents are usually unaware of the absence from school. Experts often observe aggressive character traits as well as social and psychological problems, including depression, in these cases of persistent truancy. It is not uncommon for young people to be pulled along by their clique, which fuels the rebellious rebellion against the rules. Pronounced truancy increases with age and is closely linked to failure at school. Many truants feel frustrated and overwhelmed at school, with negative experiences with teachers and classmates also contributing to this.
School anxiety: The idea of having to go to school makes affected pupils so anxious that they don't manage to leave the house in the morning - or turn back before school. They can't cope with the pressure to perform, have fears of being assessed or failing exams, feel unable to cope with social situations at school, suffer from bullying, self-confidence or don't like staying at school because they miss their parents. In cases of school anxiety, children are often excused from school by their parents or a doctor's note - because they often also have somatic symptoms such as headaches and stomach aches.
