All children and adults who initially enter our building through the secured and guarded lobby must successfully pass through a weapons detector. Children are allowed to pass directly to stage 3, which is entrance to the main school building itself, but adults must proceed to stage 2, which is the outer main office. There, they present their driver’s license or state ID, which is run through our Cass security software. If the scan shows no felony record and no warrants and no evidence of child related issues, they are issued a visitor or vendor pass, and they are buzzed into stage 3. There, a paraprofessional or some other school staff member will meet them and escort them to their designation.
The chink in the armor: Last week, a high school student showed up at our school. Apparently, one of our 7th grade boys was bullying his sister, one of our 7th grade girls. He passed successfully through the detector and then proceeded into Cafe 1, where the teachers come to pick up their students. He physically assaulted the 7th grade boy and had to be physically subdued by security before being arrested and taken away in handcuffs.
Because of that, we have had to create yet another level of entrance security. All of the children have been issued ID badges that they must have with them at all times. So now, when children successfully pass through the detector, they must scan their IDs at either of two Cass security terminals manned by the other tech assistant and me. If the ID comes up red, indicating invalid ID, then the student is detained and sent to the office. If the student comes up green, the student passes into the building.
My God, where does it end and when? I guess never. It’s kind of depressing to me that it’s all come to this. It seems to only get worse and never better.
Despite the outcry during the COVID lockdown about the failures of remote learning, I predict in the not-too-distant future some of the metropolitan public schools that continue to expend ever-increasing amounts of time, money, and resources on security are going to try move back toward more remote learning IF their state legislators allow them to do so.
The ongoing escalation of school security measures in many districts will eventually become a bigger deterrent to actual learning than the perceived deficiencies with remote learning, but realistically the politicians (and many of their supporters) will probably be the last to acknowledge this.
This, in essence, is the gigantic road block that is blocking true school reform. A child almost has to commit murder to be expelled, and maybe even not then. If a child is expelled, the SCHOOL is punished by law because the school must pay for an alternate learning environment for that child. Amazing, isn’t it?
The political stance is that all students must attend school until the age of 16, and that has been interpreted to mean that, no matter what in the world they do, no matter how disruptive they may be, they have to be allowed to continue poisoning the learning environment of their poor, unfortunate school. That is their right. It doesn’t matter how much physical, emotional, and educational damage the school and the people around them have to endure.
Big brothers have been protecting little sisters with a well-aimed beat-down since forever.
Why does this event require any reaction by the school whatsoever? Beyond breaking up the fight in progress and telling the interloper to get off campus?
That certainly would have been the extent of the reaction in 1970. It’s not the violence that’s different now. It’s the extent of the overreaction to it.
[quote=“LSLGuy, post:4, topic:997985”]
Why does this event require any reaction by the school whatsoever? Beyond breaking up the fight in progress and telling the interloper to get off campus?
That certainly would have been the extent of the reaction in 1970. It’s not the violence that’s different now. [/quote]
The difference is that government is running education completely, and everything is looked at legalistically from a criminal and civil liability point of view.
In my 11 years here, that is the first time a student from another school entered our school and attacked someone, but it has changed how our entire school does things. So, yeah, “overreaction” is an appropriate discription.
I agree. The other part is how much is security theater a la the TSA. A local school I take my dog to run around at after-hours has built a big wall to block the courtyard from public access. But just around the corner and down 100 feet are five trailers holding ten classrooms, where students walk to and from class and the restrooms with virtually no supervision except during breaks, sometimes.
Good examples. Another one is, while the TSA is carefully (I hope) screening airline travelers, thousands upon thousands of people are entering our country on foot or by bus and disappearing into our society without any documentation or checks whatsoever.
Last week, I had to turn away a parent whose kid already attended our school previously because she didn’t have the proper documentation that allows her to remain in the United States while, AT THE SAME TIME, Springfield has mandated that we take migrant children immediately despite the fact that we have no documentation whatsoever and no records. I guess that parent should go to Mexico and walk across the border.
To be fair, one of the reasons we arrived at this point is because all too often it was black kids who were being expelled for offenses that usually led to less serious sanctions for white students.
That wasn’t the thrust of my statement. The point was that the rules are being applied in a discriminatory fashion, not whether or not they should be applied at all.
Although I’d like to agree with this, I doubt it. This sort of security, insane and perhaps ineffectual as it may be, is now the norm. The current generation was born into a post 9/11 world in which TSA style security and worse is baked in and accepted… unfortunately.
I think it’s quite sad, and I don’t see a way out of it. No politician is going to vote for any relaxation of any kind of security (travel, school, whatever) because they don’t want it to bite them when someone, somewhere gets away with something bad, even once.
We’re stuck with this. And as with many political problems, perhaps we deserve it. We could have made different choices after 9/11, but we elected who we elected and they did what they did. And we’ve largely gone along with it.
Incidentally, I was a teacher during and after 9/11 and was involved in upgrading our school’s security. What I said at the time was we could either have a fully secure building, or one which serves our kids and parents in a civil manner, probably not both. And if it wasn’t possible to meaningfully secure the building, we shouldn’t bother with performative measures. And you can guess how far I got making that case.
This was news to me, at least as it pertains to our local school boards. In checking the policies of our largest school board, there are specific guidelines for suspensions and expulsions, with quite a long list of offenses that justify expulsion.
A student can be expelled from one school and in some cases allowed to attend another, or can be expelled from all schools in the board’s jurisdiction. In the latter case the board is responsible for assigning the student to a special education program for expelled students, though it’s not clear if the board is responsible for costs as all special programs are funded by the Ministry of Education. I imagine the program for expelled students is not pleasant as it apparently includes behavioural remediation, making them eligible to apply to return to regular school if and when they successfully complete the program.
In any case, making it difficult and onerous for a school board to expel a violent or seriously disruptive student has to be one of the most appallingly bad policies I’ve ever heard of. Sure, make it hard to expel a dangerous student, but make it real easy for them to get guns – that’s the ticket!
Three separate incidents I saw in my last six years at a school made me realize it’s not always overreaction. In the first, a high schooler came onto the middle school campus and delivered a “well-aimed beatdown” to a girl who had to be hospitalized with a serious head injury. In the second, an entire family (mom, dad, and adult sister) came onto campus to beat up a kid who they blamed for “snitching” on their middle-schooler and getting her suspended. The third incident took place at a park off campus where two middle-schoolers were meeting to fight. The high school brother of one of them showed up and stabbed the other in the face with scissors.
One thing that led my daughter to quit her school job was when she broke up an impending fight between one of her students and three high school girls. When she chased them off, they ran to a car - that was driven by their parents, who yelled at my daughter that she should mind her own business.
There may have always been older siblings willing to fight their younger siblings’ battles, but it sure seems like the level of violence has ramped up, and schools have a very real responsibility to keep students safe. I think all the security measures are over the top (by the time I retired, everyone had to show an ID at an entry camera and one of the front office staff had to buzz them in a double door), but the alternative isn’t just letting anyone wander into campus unimpeded.
Schools would save a ton more expected life-years by spending the money mandating defensive driving classes, adding a gym class, or having a healthy eating class, or working on suicide prevention, I’m sure.
