Some time back, I was having coffee with a registrar from a prominent Sydney school who told me about an overseas student, who arrived in Australia with her mother, who would live in Sydney with her and had enrolled with that school.
It was months later that the registrar realised that the mother had returned home for “work” and the student had been left in the care of a nanny, who was not the legal guardian and/or taking on responsibilities other than feeding and clothing this child.
I then shared a story of one of my previous international students. I recalled a student many years before who, while living in a homestay, began the disturbing behaviour of, rather than going to the toilet at night, he began to relieve himself out a second-story window of his homestay bedroom. It’s the kind of thing you can’t make up.
The homestay parents were obviously upset about this.
The issue was the 15 year old boy’s cry for help. This student had been “sent” overseas as the parents were too busy to care for him and felt he was a burden on his grandparents. They had the means to send him overseas, and he felt abandoned in the process.
When counselled, he simply answered, “I want to go home.” He missed his grandparents, who had been the primary caregivers. That is, in the end, what he did.
Maria Strauss of Farrer & Co’s Safeguarding Unit in the UK has done considerable work on this. “It is a common misconception that children who grow up in affluent families do not experience adversity and neglect. We know that both independent and public schools are supporting children who, for one reason or another, have experienced neglect and harm despite being from otherwise affluent families.” She said.
Safeguarding and Pastoral care are such important topics and concerns in the school system. Teachers and school staff are clear on protocol and the duty of care involved when they see a child in unclean clothing, not eating well or showing signs of physical trauma or abuse.
However, emotional neglect can be just as scarring and given language and cultural barriers, affluent neglect is something that schools accepting overseas students need to be aware.
According to TES (Times Education Supplement), “Affluent neglect can be difficult to spot. This may be due to preconceived conceptions about what neglect actually is and who can be impacted.”
Researcher Cladia Bernard in Neglect in Affluent Families created a very insightful paper in 2019 to help schools recognise, categorise and deal with affluent neglect.
33 designated safeguarding leads from fee-paying schools in southern England took part in open and free-flowing roundtable conversations, guided by some specific questions. Participants were asked about the biggest challenges that they face in their work, what issues arise if they need to raise concerns about abuse and neglect with parents, what factors encourage and enable effective partnership with children’s social services and whether there are specific challenges when working with international students.
This study found the following:
- emotional neglect was the most common category of abuse in the school setting.
- parents from affluent families are more able to openly resist children’s services interventions by either downplaying or minimising concerns, using professional language or legal representation, and only communicating by email, all of which can prevent proper scrutiny of the situation.
- parents’ expectations that their children will achieve and perform in order to access elite universities can lead to adverse consequences on the children’s mental health.
- international students might also see culturally specific parenting behaviours and beliefs about discipline and upbringing.
We all know that money cannot buy love, but we often assume students from wealthy families will have their needs met. As schools, school advisors, counsellors, and teachers of international students, we need to be on the look out for affluent neglect and be prepared to intervene as required.
Key take aways and advice for team members, teachers or support staff who are worried about this.
- pay attention and do not ignore the warning signs.
- don’t be afraid to ask other for help and get the school and professional partners to help you support the student.
- read the research about being able to identify signs of emotional neglect.
- make sure you cover affluent neglect signs and treatment in your school support staff training.
- help to educate parents on what they can do to support their children better.
- promote good family live and open communication through modelling good communication at school.
- help busy parents to understand the importance of warm interactions with their children and how attuning to their interests, opinions and feelings will boost their self-esteem and self-efficacy.
