This moving article was written by a white liberal ivy-leaguer, who chose to teach in a bad Washington D.C. school. One of his problems was allegations of corporal punishment for merely protecting the children from each other.
Eventually he was criminally tried for a false allegation of corporal punishment. Although he was acquitted, the child’s family obtained a substantial settlement form the school. Lying pays.
He says there’s a lot of violence in elementary schools.
He says false accusations of corporal punishment are common, but efforts are made not to publicize them.
Questions for debate:[ul][]Is this description accurate?[]Is the problem widespread?[]Are there efforts to not publicize this sort of thing?[]Should tort rules be changed?[]Should corporal punishment rules be changed?[]What else ought to be done to remedy this situtation?[/ul]
Here are my recommended remedies:[ol][]Change the law to permit moderate corporal punishment. The disadvantage of allowing teachers to hit students will be more than offset by the advantage of allowing teachers to protect students from each other. Also, the law change will permit greater discipline, which is essential so that education can take place.[]Prohibit lawsuits by students against public schools. These suits harm the students by interfering with necessary discipline. They drain money away from education. They reward dishonesty.Institute school vouchers. Students should not be trapped in hellholes like Emery Elementary School.[/ol]
I don’t know if I’d go far enough to allow “moderate” corporal punishment, because who get’s to define “moderate”. I think I would allow teachers to be able to defend themselves though.
I would say that in addition to number 2. I would also make lawsuits against the students a viable alternative. I would also make expelling violent disruptive kids a lot easier.
School should be a place of education, not a daycare for hellbeasts.
Define “moderate.” How soon will it be before we start seeing teachers abusing students, administrations alternatively defending abusive teachers or punishing competent teachers based on poor assessment skills by the administrators? Oh, we have that now!
Yep. Let’s make sure that schools are not liable for their actions and that people injured by schools have no recourse.
Ahh! Wave the panacea wand of vouchers so that, following the Clevelenad model, the kids who are already being sent out of the district at parent expense will escape from the district at taxpayer expense while the kids who are truly trapped by poverty and crime can be written off as hopeless.
Based on a medical examination. If there’s no (or slight) medical harm, it’s “moderate.”
No doubt we would see some of this. It’s a question of who you trust – the teachers or the students. Based on the cited article, the students would generally be better off if we gave the teachers more leeway.
We sure do. I will never forget the enormous harm done to my daughter by her 2nd grade teacher in Berkeley, CA many years ago. Everyone knew he was a problem, but the tenure system made it difficult to fire him, so he was tolerated. He was eventually fired when it was finally discovered that in addition to his other failings, he was taking 2nd grade boys home and molesting them.
There is recourse outside of the tort system. The school administration has the power to enforce proper conduct by the staff.
I attended elementary school in the Bronx 55 years ago – an area that’s now a “blackboard jungle.” At that time, there were no lawsuits; I don’t think they were legally permitted. We students were much better off than students of today. Our school wasn’t physically attractive, but we did get a decent education.
Do you have any cites showing that the Cleveland voucher system did overall harm? I have seen none. Voucher studies have differed on whether they helped a lot or a little.
Your point about truly poor kids still being trapped is right on. Today, most vouchers are considerably less than the cost of a year’s education, so supplemental money is needed. The solution is to increase the voucher amounts.
Teachers should not be allowed corporal punishment. My aunt (in-law, if there is such a thing) was a teacher in a place that permitted it, and she was (and still is) Evil Incarnate. Too many people cannot handle such responsibility, and after it happens is too late to address it.
I’m not going to pretend to know how to empower teachers when parents won’t take responsibility for their children. It’s bad enough that many don’t want to learn, but when they interfere with those who do want to learn, it’s time to remove them from the classrooms and if necessary the premises. Teachers are not social workers, nor are they miracle workers. If parents do not work hand-in-hand with the school with delinquent children, then the school should have the right to boot said student until both student and parent get their acts together. On the other hand, if a parent works with the school regarding a delinquent child, then every feasible effort should be made by the school to give the child the opportunity to learn.
I don’t know about that. I mean a lot of damage can be done that isn’t easily detectable by a medical examination. I’m not suggesting that a teacher would go out of his/her way to do such a thing, but it is possible.
I don’t know, maybe if we allow the teachers to apply “moderate” physical pain to students, and the principal and administration can apply “moderate” physical pain to the teachers, everyone will be smarter and we can toss that silly voicher system. What do you think? Good for the goose, good for the gander.
Even for you, this is such a huge failure of logic as to need to be read to be believed you posted it.
I have not suggested specific harm–and, in fact, I am not resolutely opposed to vouchers as one of many approaches to helping kids.
However, in Cleveland, at the end of the first year of vouchers, there were no improvements. At the end of the fifth year of vouchers there were “small but measurable” improvements in reading and (elementary school) science–none in social studies and, significantly, none in math.
More to the point, the majority of schools that popped up to “help” the kids in the first year failed or closed under pressure to provide education instead of simply accepting money, and the remaining schools are the parochial schools that were always an option–but still limited in their capacity to accept more kids. Roughly half the kids in the Cleveland voucher program were already attending either parochial schools or schools in nearby communities before they were given the tax money. (Only 31% of kids in the voucher program transferred out of the Cleveland’s system, the remaining kids are entering kindergartners (many of whom are following their older siblings into the parochial schools they would have attended anyway).
While I think we should consider vouchers, your magic wand approach to vouchers simply has nothing to support it beyond your desire to punish any aspect of society that is connected to civil service.
This is simply stupid. I am not even a trained master of interrogation techniques and I know three or four ways to inflict excruicating pain (or fear, which amounts to the same thing) without leaving a bruise or an abrasion.
Why is it that the silver bullet that cures all problems in inadequately funded and understaffed schools is to bang the kids around a little? It is, of course, a simplistic answer to a loaded question, similar to the simple minded schemes that hold that worship of (insert the name of your favorite deity here) in public schools, or public funding of private schools, or a program with a fancy acronym will instantly transform public schools into efficient factories for producing well behaved kids and docile workers. It is patent balderdash. Worse than that it is balderdash put out by people who have never seen the brutalization of kids in a system that authorizes or tolerates the use of the “board of education.”
Nope. Even the magical IEP should not shelter a disruptive student–and in Ohio it does not seem to be a shelter.
My son was expelled from the Severe Behavioral Handicap program for unacceptabel behavior beyond that tolerated even by the special class. The school district was required to assist us in finding an alternative method of education–which eventually helped him straighten out and return to public school–but he was bounced right out of the school where he was being disruptive.
[QUOTE]
*Originally posted by december *
[li]Institute school vouchers. Students should not be trapped in hellholes like Emery Elementary School.[/list] **[/li][/QUOTE]
I fail to see how this is a remedy to the problem of violent kids/poor oversight described in the OP.
Education is a privilege as well as a right. You divide the students into 4 groups. Honors, standard, remedial, and disciplinary, and you seperate them as much as possible.
Honors and standard can participate in extracurricular activities, and this is where the bulk of your resources are spent. This is where a quality education occurs. Those that are having problems keeping up, or who are troubled go to remedial. Those that are disruptive go to disciplinary.
The idea of honors is to take the very best and most motivated students and ensure that they get all the education and learning that they can handle.
Standard would be for average students.
Remedial would be to get kids back on their feet and get them back to Standard.
Disciplinary would contain almost no education. Disciplinary is basically a boot camp in classroom manners. You can fail out of disciplinary and that’s it. You’re out of school. You’ve lost your right to an education, and you will have to earn it back.
The goal is to move kids as high in this tracking as high they can handle. There is plenty of opportunity for mobility through the tracking, based on merit, both up and down.
I agree that corporal punishment is not necessary, nor even desirable. My point is that it’s also undesirable to have laws prohibiting all corporal punishment and permitting a right to sue for damages when it occurs.
These POVs may appear contradictory, but in the real world, they’re not. It’s not always possible to distinguish amoung false claims, dealing with fighting students, and genuine claims. As a result, the laws against CP have a substantial cost – a cost that it borne by the inner-city students in particular. It would be better to discourage CP, but without the severe remedies IF those remedies were not needed to protect students from the occasional monster. My own experience in the 1940’s and 1950’s shows that the tort remedy wasn’t necessary. CP was not a problem.
ISTM that this is a case where do-gooders have done harm to the very children they wanted to help. They got laws and legal remedies against CP. which were unnecessary, but which had adverse consequences. Now, we’re stuck. What politician could fail to oppose beating children? In addition, there is now are a group of lawyers who have a monetary interest in maintaining the right to sue.
Mojo, even if vouchers didn’t help violent kids with poor oversight, vouchers might help their classmates. Based on my kids’ public school, one disruptive kid in a class makes teaching difficult; two or more destroy the chance of teaching. I’m glad that tomndebb’s son was immediately removed from the class where he was disruptive. Unfortunately, that was NOT the practice in Berkeley when my daughters were there.
Spavined Gelding, the Washington DC school system is not underfunded; it has high per-student spending. Furthermore, eliminating the tort suits would make more funding available for education.
Furthermore, when I attended an inner city school 50 - 55 years ago, the funding was a tiny fraction of what it is today, but the education was fully adequate. Why can’t today’s educators accomplish what educators were able to accomplish in 1950 with a lot less resources?
That’s a remarkably refreshing perspective there, Scylla. Seriously.
My wife is a teacher in a low-income school with lots of diffcult kids (abuse at home, transient families, etc.). I think she would prefer your solution (by a far cry) to december’s knee-jerk jump to corporal punishment and vouchers. I’m going to ask her about it tonight when I get home.
She’s at a demonstration today, thanks to our governor’s attempt to overturn two voter initiatives supporting lower class sizes and a cost-of-living wage increase for teachers and school staff, or I’d ask her now. I’m sure she’ll be quite glad to talk about it tonight.
Scylla, the problem with your method is the parents. Too many parents are loathe to admit that their child is anything less than angelic. Schools would have too many fights on their hands as students are moved into remedial and disciplinary status; fights which take resources away from the school’s primary purpose of educating students.
I am loathe to give any teacher the ability to mete out any type of corporal punishment (note that physically breaking up fights should not be considered corporal punishment or harassment absent extenuating circumstances).
I have no silver bullet suggestion, nor do I think there is any. I think the best available solution would be greater funding of all educational levels, resulting in lowering student-to-teacher ratios and providing clean, well-stocked, not overcrowded classrooms. I don’t know from where the money will come, although.
I’m glad you agree… so, since you agree, we can consider the debate over? If it’s not necessary, why have corporal punishment available as an option at all?
Why? You’d rather give teachers the opportunity to abuse children? Where exactly do you draw the line, december? you haven’t defined “moderate” adequately. In your concept of “moderate” corporal punishment, can a teacher pull a child away by the arm? Pinch their ear? Slap the child? Spank the child? Punch a child in the stomach? Hit them with a switch?
Note that all of these fit into your definition of causing no or “slight” medical harm. At what physical act do you draw the line?
Cite?
Seriously, december, your “less resources” claim needs to be backed up. Be sure you adjust for inflation, cost-of-living changes, geographical differences, and the effects of different societal norms, OK? That’s a rather broad statement to make, and IMO, flagrantly inaccurate… but if you can prove it, do so. I’ll give you a hint, though, a flat dollar figure doesn’t convince anyone.
