A Hillfields mum says driving her five children to and from four different schools each day is causing her severe stress.
Roxanne, who did not wish to give her surname, told Bristol Live the reason for her 80-minute school run is South Gloucestershire Council not letting her children into their first-choice schools.
The mum broke her spine in a 2017 crash, which she says happened because of her stress on a school run. She also crashed during a drop-off in July last year, without injury.
Roxanne, who is exhausted from raising her six-month-old daughter, says her five school-age children often get to school late because of the long journey.
“At the end of the day I feel like I’ve run a marathon,” she said. “I can’t wait for the weekends. It’s not on.”
The school run in full
In Roxanne’s 10-mile round trip, she starts from Hillfields Avenue and drops off her:
- 17-year-old daughter at the Lodge Causeway bus stop so the pupil can travel to St Brendan’s College in Brislington
- 13-year-old daughter at King's Oak Academy in Kingswood
- Nine-year-old son and six-year-old daughter at Stanbridge Primary School in Downend
- Five-year-old daughter at Chester Park Infant School in Fishponds.
Three more miles are added to the journey on two days of the week, when Roxanne takes her six-month-old daughter to Anchor Day Nursery in Fishponds.
How things 'went all pear-shaped' for Roxanne
Roxanne says things “went all pear-shaped” in April 2015, when South Gloucestershire Council brought in new rules.
The change meant Bristol children applying to South Gloucestershire schools where their siblings attended would now always be behind all South Gloucestershire children in the waiting list.
We recently revealed how this left one mum, .
Roxanne, who lives streets from the South Gloucestershire border, saw her two primary-age daughters refused places at first-choice school Stanbridge, despite their brother going there – though the six-year-old was granted a place this year.
For two years Roxanne’s 13-year-old daughter has been on the waiting list for Downend School, where the eldest attended before college.
“It would be a lot easier for me if she went to Downend, and if all the younger ones went to Stanbridge,” Roxanne added.
“It seems like the council didn’t consider the impact on families when they changed the rules.
“People might say, ‘You have chosen to have six kids.’ But we didn’t know the sibling rule wouldn’t apply.
“It’s so hard for me to let my children be independent and make their own way to school, because four of them have additional needs.
“There is also a negative perception of their Islamic faith, which means they shouldn’t be walking alone. My eldest daughter was racially attacked a few years ago when a boy pushed her from behind and fell on glass which cut deep into her nose."
'Mayhem'
The mum took two and a half years to fully recover from her spinal injury following the 2017 crash during a school run. She had to learn to walk again.
None of her children were injured in that accident, nor when Roxanne crashed outside Stanbridge last year, but she fears the stress of her situation will continue to risk her children’s safety.
Roxanne’s husband is a taxi driver who does school runs in South Gloucestershire for a living, meaning he is unable to take his own children to their schools.
She said: “We’ve been on a rollercoaster. It’s been mayhem.
“My six-year-old spent two years at Chester Park, where she made friends and settled, but when she got a space in Stanbridge we took it because it would be easier on me.
“She’s really struggled to make friends there and is not progressing at all. If the council had accepted her into Stanbridge in the first place, she would have settled there.
“Now I’m regretting taking her out of Chester Park because I’m having to go there every day anyway, to drop off my five-year-old.”
Roxanne says she has been receiving complaints from Chester Park because she often gets there late, as it is the last stop on her route.
She added: “It is not nice for my daughter to be sitting in the car for over an hour, going to all these different places.
“The problem is we can’t afford to move to South Gloucestershire. It is not fair on my children.”
South Gloucestershire Council was approached for comment.
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