I’m with Guin on this one. I do recognize that teachers have to make judgment calls, have to make split second, spur of the moment decisions and that many of these decisions can be called into question. I hope that I realize how thin the line between the right and wrong decision can be sometimes.
To me, pulling up girls’ skirts and taking off their shirts in front of their male classmates and teachers is not one of the questionable decisions, it is not a decision that is near the “is this the right thing to do” line. The decision that the vice principal made is a hideously bad course of action. That Ms. Wilson could possibly think otherwise makes me think that she doesn’t have the ability to make the right decision on the other daily judgment calls that a teacher or administrator has to make. That alone should be career ruining (aside from the gross violations of privacy involved).
Sometimes it isn’t right or fair for someone to be villified on just one incident - but sometimes it is.
Well, yes, you DO have to make a whole heap of judgement calls, and risk having it all come down upon your head if you make one wrong judgment. High responsibility = high risk, usually. That’s the breaks, life’s not fair.
That said, I respect any school staff who exercises some judgement, however risky. Like I said, I’d support Ms. Wilson against a whole army of whiny parents had she used other means to address the problem. And I would have been on Wilson’s side had any parent come up saying “you didn’t prevent my daughter from flashing the whole school!” But part of my issue with her is that the actions here were just so, so… desperate? She should not have allowed things to get to the point she saw this as a viable answer.
Manda jo, I could not have said it better. The judgment calls teachers make on a daily basis have to be made without hesitation, and if the judgment call is a bad one, the jackals are waiting right outside the door.
For example, a fellow teacher of mine has a homebound student. She sent the student a copy of A Lesson Before Dying, which the class is reading. The mother wrote a scathing letter to the teacher, the school board, and Governor Barnes stating how disgusted she was that the school would assign pornography to the students. Um, Grant and Vivian have sex in the sugar cane fields. That hardly justifies pornography! But even in the process of doing her job, her worth as a teacher has come into question. It’s a constant assault of judgment calls and accountability for decisions made. Manda Jo, you expressed that aspect beautifully.
Amarinth, do we know for sure that she took the girls’ shirts off? I can’t help but think a strap check would be all that was necessary.
Hastur, extremist much?
I meant to comment on this earlier, and JDelirious’s post reminded me. Yes, the school is responsible for taking preventative measures. If they foresee muff-flashing as a potential problem and do nothing to prevent it, then I would say the parents would have a pretty strong case against them. I’m no lawyer, but an ounce of prevention and all…
Isn’t there supposed to be something about high pay in that equation?
I don’t think anyone is defending what this woman did. Instead, I (and I think Shrew) am attempting to convey why it is that a teacher’s reaction to this story is not “Oh, that bitch”, but rather "there but for the grace of god go I . . . " One week in the classroom and suddenly you remember every story anyone ever told you about some incomprehensible thing a psychotic teacher did, and you start to wonder if there wasn’t a second side to the story: I’ve no doubt I figure in a few “psychotic teacher” stories myself.
Yep, Manda Jo, again you are correct. There but for the grace of God go I is the sublime truth.
Just like the time I threw a stack of papers at a kid simply because he said my name one too many times for me to handle…or the time I grabbed a girl by her weave and yanked her hair out because she was beating a girl’s face in with a locker padlock.
I have never taught, but I have raised 5 children thru their teens, taught teens in Sunday School and coached girl’s soccer. Those experiences only give me a small taste of what teachers have to face on an everyday basis. And you know something? They are doing it because they love the kids. Condemn Ms. Wilson if you must, but also listen to shrew and be a little more understanding.
Again, kudos to shrew for defending her POV so thouroughly… this is what the SDMB is all about, eh?
I’ll have to second Amarinth’s response:
Amen. As shrew says, a teacher will have to make any kind of decision at any given moment. If she can’t field this no-brainer, how the hell will she figure out a proper budget for the semester, how to teach sex ed on a level that her students can respect without getting turned off (no pun intended), or any of these other issues a teacher must face?
I wonder if all the people willing to withhold judgment on Ms. Wilson have been or now are in the teaching profession. If you’ve ever taught, either as a teacher, substitute, student teacher or aide, you will probably withhold judgment. I have taught in the lower grades (3rd and 4th) and though they’re not too bad, teaching in high school has got to be the hardest teaching job of all.
I’m no longer a teacher, but I can remember what it’s like. Kudos to shrew and Manda Jo and any other teachers out there. I appreciate your hard work and dedication.
On your examples, I certainly would defend you in both cases.
Defending a student from having her face beaten in with a padlock is a true spur-of-the moment decision. I have no problem with the way you handled it. Had you pummeled the student after breaking the fight up that, of course, would be another story. As is, your actions were certainly justified.
Searching purses is also okay. The concept of illegal searches does not apply to primary and secondary schools, and you were well within your rights and duties as a teacher to do that.
“Fred Sanford” - well, in my racially-charged high-school, I doubt that comment would’ve passed without debate, but I’ll let it slip.
However, this was NOT as spur-of-the-moment, heat-of-the-battle decision for Ms. Wilson. I assume that her policy was premeditated and, if not, she had plenty of time while performing her dubious “duty” to reconsider her decision. Being a high-ranking school official, she should have realized the consequences of her actions. I don’t understand why we have to make excuses for her. I don’t care how stressed, how good-intentioned or how difficult teenagers are to handle. A teacher should not have the power to ask girls to lift their skirts for them. Especially when there were SO many more acceptable ways of handling the situation.
And I don’t need any more information to come to this judgment. She’s admitted that she did this, citing “a safety issue” as an excuse. No amount of rationalization can alter her actions. She’s done something supremely idiotic and, IMHO, immoral and somebody with a better sense of judgment should replace her. People get fired for much less.
I realize that this isn’t what this thread is about, but others have already said what I didn’t, so I want to reply to this.
Anyway, that isn’t true in every state. In Iowa, where I went to school, searching lockers was relatively easy. They didn’t have to have a whole lot of cause, and you didn’t have to be there for the search. That makes sense, because the locker is theirs. I actually brought my own keyed padlock instead of the combination locks the school had, because it was faster and safer, but I digress.
However, searching anything you were carrying with you was almost as difficult as it would be for a police officer. I think that makes sense too; just because you’re a minor doesn’t mean you should lose all of your constitutional rights.
To do a search of a protected student space (the student and whatever they carry) you have to have both “reasonable grounds for suspecting that the search will produce evidence that a student has violated or is violating either the law or a school rule or regulation” and that the “search is conducted in a manner which is reasonably related to the objectives of the search and which is not excessively intrusive in light of the age and gender of the student and the nature of the infraction.” Anything they find in a search not covered by that is not allowed to be used against you, just like in normal illegal searches.
An interesting bit that is more related to this thread is this, 808A.2 4a-d:
I don’t know how far a search can go before it’s considered a strip search, but I think she’d be screwed (and rightly so, IMO) if she had done that in Iowa.
It’d be a bitch to have a bunch of students like me who actually know their rights, wouldn’t it? I kept up with the code while I was in high school, too, even keeping a copy of it in my bag.
Actualy, for my money, the hardest teaching job of all has to be middle school. The children are still learning about this whole empathy thing, and so are unimageneably cruel, and the hormones role off them in waves. They are young enough that flirting still amounts to hair-pulling, but old enough that they can make it really hurt. I have never in my life done anything as diffucult as substituting in a 7th/8th grade self-contained special ed classroom.
Oh yeah, because we are The Man, and we sit around all day talking about how much we enjoy keeping the people down, and dreding the coming revolution. What teacher want is to provide a safe, structured enviroment for you to learn in, and to keep from being sued. This is an extraordinarily difficult job.
Has anyone ever noticed that in “teacher movies”, like Stand and Deliver, the teachers have only one class? That’s because that is how students see teachers–as someone that they and thirty other students see for fifty minutes a day. It’s a very different perspective when you see 150 students every day.
… unorthodox but effective… … this DJ has the kind of delightfully bent mind we need more of!
But at least we know there are schools that ARE taking notice and taking reasonable, sensible steps to control the situation. Goes with what pulykamell just said about the difference between “heat-of-battle” decisions and things you can plan for. Ms. Wilson did not take sensible, reasonable preventive measures, she took dumb preventive measures.
I will, however, in defense of school staff everywhere, say that I’d rather have them exercising judgement, however flawed. Something like this incident is an affront to student’s dignity, but generally requiring conduct appropriate to the location and to the safety and well-being of all, and imposing penalties for those who fail to do so, is not. And schools should NOT be expected to come up with one-size-fits-all solutions, we’re supremely unfair if we do. Having whiny parents or coworkers threatening to sue teachers for all sorts of minutiae, or for not being able to read minds and foretell the future (or even worse, for disciplining those who NEED disciplining), is what leads to those absolutely idiotic “Zero Tolerance” policies in vogue across the USA.
Wikkit - I think you’ve got it right there! Here in England, the Human Rights Act protects everyone, including minors (because, funny enough, they’re human!). There wouldn’t be a question about her losing her job, she’d be suspended by the next morning! What’s more, she’d quite possibly be being questioned by the police - certainly if complaints were made.
I can’t help thinking that the way to try and prevent some lurid dance craze is not to give it great ‘street cred’ by making a big issue out of it. Mind you, I know that’s how schools work generally (yes, I’ve been a teacher too…very briefly!).
To shrew et al - credence to you for sticking out in a tough profession - it certainly wasn’t for me. However, I do think you weaken your position when you try and justify the unjustifiable… Just MHO.
Been lurking on this thread for a bit, and want to weigh in:
Shrew and Manda Jo - thank you for offering your perspective, both as teachers and, for this purposes of this thread, contrarians to the original intent of the thread, which appeared to be more of a “evidence of our civilization in decline” type of thread. You made it into an informed, and informative, discussion, which is a critical aspect of this board, right?
I have yet to see evidence that anyone posting to this thread condones the specific actions of the teacher in question - let’s just declare that as a bad thing, shall we? The broader question, raised by Shrew is: Given the in loco parentis role that teachers are expected to play, and given the inappropriate behavior of some students, is it reasonable to see that spur-of-the-moment decisions need to be made on a regular basis, and that sometimes teachers make the wrong decision, but that the context of the situation needs to be considered? Granted, the actions of this particular teacher seem to be neither spur-of-the-moment, nor within the bounds of an “oops I went over the line” type of decision (that teacher appears to have gone way over the line), but there is more to the situation than a black and white “hey look at the pervie teacher” soundbite. Shrew appears to be providing that context, and not in any way approving the specific behaviors - this discussion is richer because of it, as it delves more into the gray areas about dealing with teenagers.
Given this context - isn’t there value in getting some insight into the frustrations of a profession on the “front-lines”?. If a police officer does something that is clearly illegal, and everyone acknowledges that clear illegality, that is good - but wouldn’t it also be interesting to hear from a police officer who does not condone the crime of the other officer, but says “hey, lemme tell ya, its rough out there - you don’t know what it’s like”? I am inclined to quickly get past the “Wait - you do agree that what the other cop did was wrong, correct?” part (even if the cop says “yes, given what we know it appears that what they did was wrong; however, please be aware that, as someone in the profession, there are often extenuating circumstances, so I am open to the possibility of other explanations, but for now, yes”) to learn more about what their situation is like - that is what is informative.
Yes and no. Most jobs have their share of hell. From cop to advertising exec to 911 dispatcher, whatever. But we tend to draw clear lines on what is acceptable and unacceptable. Cops beating the crap out of suspects is deemed unacceptable. Soldiers slaughtering entire villages of civilians is deemed unacceptable. Teachers checking out panties is unacceptable, as well. We don’t care how tough your job is and how much stress you handle when you step over the line. Once you’re over, that’s it. Look at the Rodney King incident. Sure, I can sympathise with the cops to some extent, I grew up in a neighborhood full of them. I’ve rode along with them. Sure, I don’t know the streets or need to take on the stress they do everyday, but I suppose I can say that I understand, maybe the adrenaline kicked in and they beat the living crap out of a suspect.
But it’s unacceptable behavior, totally over the line and no matter how clean their previous records are, how much I like them, that would be it for them. At the most, I’d reassign 'em to a desk job.
But she had time to think about it! So she can’t use that as an excuse.
Most jobs have some sort of stress and decision makeing under stress, and in any job if you make bad decisions under stress then you need a different job.
Wha?
I kept up with the code while I was in high school, too, even keeping a copy of it in my bag.
… this DJ has the kind of delightfully bent mind we need more of!