When a foster child is being bullied: what actually helps

A child comes in, says nothing, and goes straight upstairs. The blazer has a footprint on it. This is the bit of fostering nobody warns you about, so here is what to say first, what the school actually has to do, and what to do when it does not.

Please note: general information about schools in England, not advice about a particular child or a particular school. Correct at November 2026, drawn from the Department for Education’s advice Preventing and tackling bullying and the gov.uk guidance on bullying at school. Always talk to your supervising social worker and the child’s social worker before you act.

Why a child in care can be an easier target

Bullies do not pick the weakest child. They pick the child with nobody to sit with. The Department for Education’s own advice names it plainly: children in care who move often can be vulnerable because they are always the newcomer. A child who has changed school twice in eighteen months walks into a playground where every friendship group was settled in September, and that is a fact about the timetable rather than about the child.

Then there is the thing that makes it sting. Being in care is visible. A different surname, a social worker at parents’ evening, a lift to family time on a Saturday. Some children get teased about exactly that, and it lands harder than the usual playground nonsense because it goes at something the child did not choose and cannot change.

The first conversation, and the mistake almost everyone makes

You will want to go up like a rocket. Do not. Your face in the first ten seconds is the whole conversation, because a child watching you get furious learns that telling you costs them something, and next time they will save you the trouble. Say it was right to tell you. Say it is not their fault. Then stop talking and let them finish.

The next bit is the one carers get wrong, usually out of love. Ask the child what they want to happen before you do anything at all. Then never act without telling them first. If you ring the school on Monday morning having promised nothing, the child walks into a room where something has changed and they do not know what, and you have taken the one thing bullying already took from them, which is knowing what happens next. Do not promise to do nothing either. Say what you will do and when you will do it.

If they will not open up to you yet, that is not a failure. Point them somewhere else: a teacher they like, or Childline on 0800 1111, free and open all night. Some of it will come out sideways anyway, in the car or over the washing up, which is how most of the real conversations with a child happen.

Write it down, and keep the proof

A record is not a complaint. It is the thing that makes a complaint work six weeks later, when the school says it was a one off and you cannot remember whether the shoe incident was the Tuesday or the Thursday. Put it in your daily recordings the same evening while you still have the detail.

• date, time and where it happened
• what was said or done, in the child’s words rather than your summary
• who else saw it, including any member of staff
• photographs of damaged clothing, a broken bag, any marks on the child
• screenshots of messages, posts, comments or videos, taken before anything gets blocked or deleted
• what you did, who you told, and what they said they would do

Record what happened, not what you think the child is. On a bad week those notes are the only evidence that anybody raised this in October.

What the school actually has to do

More than most carers realise. Every state school in England must have a behaviour policy with measures to prevent all forms of bullying among pupils, under section 89 of the Education and Inspections Act 2006. Academies and free schools carry the same obligation through their own standards. So an anti-bullying policy is not a nice extra you are asking for as a favour. Ask to see it, and ask who the named person for bullying is, because most secondaries have one.

Two more things worth knowing. Schools can discipline a pupil for bullying that happened off the premises where it is reasonable for them to regulate it, so “it was on the bus” is not the end of the conversation. And where a child is targeted because of their race, religion, disability, sexual orientation or gender identity, staff have to act to prevent discrimination and harassment, rather than simply keep the peace. Racist bullying of a child from a different cultural background to yours, or homophobic abuse of an LGBTQ+ young person, sits in a different category from a fallen out friendship.

A child in care also has two things working in your favour here. Every school has a designated teacher whose job covers children in care, and that is who to go to rather than the form tutor. And the personal education plan is the right place to get the response written down where the virtual school head will see it. That is worth doing as part of promoting a child’s education generally, not just in a crisis.

If the school does not act

Push, in order, and in writing. Raise it informally with the designated teacher or head of year first and give them a fortnight. If nothing changes, ask for the school’s complaints procedure and make a formal complaint under it, because every state school has to have one. Only when that is exhausted do you go outside the school, and the route is the Department for Education or Ofsted rather than the council, which surprises people about council-run schools as much as academies.

Cyberbullying is a different job

It follows the child upstairs, which is why a child can be safe all day and miserable by nine at night. Screenshot first, then block, then tighten the privacy settings on the account, then report the content to the platform. Doing it in that order matters, because blocking first loses you the evidence.

If the platform ignores the report, Report Harmful Content at reportharmfulcontent.com is the next step. It is run by SWGfL as part of the UK Safer Internet Centre, it is for anyone in the UK aged 13 or over, and it will chase a report that has gone nowhere. Keep phones out of bedrooms overnight while you are at it, though be honest with yourself that a filter only buys you time. Filters buy time; disclosure keeps a child safe, which is the same argument as the rest of online safety with a child in care.

One more thing to resist. Do not take the phone away as a response to cyberbullying. To the child it reads as a punishment for telling you, and it cuts off the friends who are on their side.

When the child in your care is the one bullying

It happens, and it is not a verdict on your fostering. Start by finding out whether they are being bullied themselves, because the two go together more often than not. Then get them to think about the other child rather than about the punishment, which is slower and works better.

Be straight about language at home, including your own. Casual use of an offensive word teaches a child that the word is available, so say plainly that it is not, here or anywhere else. If the school contacts you, work with them, and ask to see what they have got.

And hold the line on one thing. Schools sometimes reach for permanent exclusion quickly where a child in care is involved. Statutory guidance says education is a protective factor and that the designated teacher should contact the virtual school head as soon as possible so extra support can be considered, so ask whether that has happened. A child who is bullying needs something to change, and being at home all day is rarely it.

You won’t have to do this alone

None of this is a thing you work out on your own at half past four on a Thursday. Tell your supervising social worker early, before the child is refusing school and you are three letters into a complaint. They know the borough, they know which schools respond to what, and they can bring the child’s social worker in.

At Greater London Fostering you get a supervising social worker who knows your household, out of hours support, and training that covers this properly. GLF pays 479.50 pounds a week for a child under 11 and 507.50 pounds a week for a child aged 11 or over, per child, for as long as they are living with you, with an enhanced fee of roughly 100 to 200 pounds a week more where a child has higher needs. Ofsted inspected us from 21 to 25 July 2025 and rated us Outstanding in all three judgements.

Three numbers for the kitchen drawer. Childline, 0800 1111, for the child. Coram Family Lives, 0808 800 2222, free, Monday to Friday 9am to 9pm and weekends 10am to 3pm, for you. YoungMinds’ Parents Helpline, 0808 802 5544, which names foster carers explicitly, for when this has started to show up as something bigger in a child’s mental health. The Anti-Bullying Alliance has the best free material for talking about it at home. Anti-Bullying Week runs from 16 to 20 November 2026 on the theme Break the Silence, opening with Odd Socks Day on the Monday.

Frequently asked questions

The child has asked me not to tell anyone. Do I have to respect that?

Usually yes, and saying so is what keeps them talking to you. Work out a plan together instead, and go back to it in a few days. The exception is real: if you believe the child is at risk of serious harm, you have to pass it on, and the fair thing is to have told them at the start that this is how it works rather than springing it on them.

Should I contact the other child’s parents myself?

No. Go through the school, even where you know the family. The school can act without it becoming a dispute between two households, and a child who has to share a corridor with the other child on Monday will pay for anything that goes wrong on a doorstep.

Can a school permanently exclude a child in care for bullying?

It can, but statutory guidance treats it as a last resort and expects the designated teacher to contact the local authority’s virtual school head as soon as possible, so that extra assessment and support are considered first. Ask whether the virtual school head has been contacted, ask what support was tried, and bring your supervising social worker in early.