I told my son many years ago that the first rule in the “Mommy hand book” was “Mommies are required to embarass their children as often as possible” I see that you got the memo. 
(I enjoyed that other thread, too - like it better when we’re on the same side 
)
Hey Biggirl, here is a site that you might find helpful. Its full of resources for both parents and teacher, school administrators(sp), and kids too.
Hope things are better for your daughter.
I am a 5th grade teacher. One of the first things I do when I encounter an incident of bullying is to contact the parents of both parties involved. (Well, the first thing I do is make sure that the bully knows that this will not be tolerated). The parents of the victim usually are cooperative and willing to do anything necessary to help their child deal with the situation. I usually get one of two basic responses from the bully’s parents: hostility towards me, the school, their child, the victim, and any other convenient target, or apathy in the form of “it’s just kids being kids” or “boys being boys”.
Do you really believe that children learn bullying behaviors from their teachers? I have to strongly disagree with you here. There are too many teachers who tolerate bullying, yes, and most need more training in how to deal with it properly, but you’re way off beam if you think that teachers regularly exhibit bullying behaviors in front of kids. Especially in elementary school, which is where such behaviors would have been learned.
Oh, sorry biggirl, I missed the bit about how this was a past event, I skimmed over that and assumed it was an ongoing problem and that you had not been able to stop the harasser. My mistake.
But I think you misunderstand what I meant by involving a lawyer. I was suggesting what is known as a “lawyer’s letter” which is just a stern letter with not much legal force. It is not a threat of a lawsuit, just a tactic to get desired results from someone who refuses to do their duty.
And yes, it IS the school’s responsibility to intervene in these problems.
It is the responsibility of a school to make sure that the pupils have a decent environment to learn in.
If the school doesn’t have a policy on bullying, it’s much harder for an individual teacher (no matter how well-meaning) to do anything effective.
Although parents (or any adults) should try to sort out situations in public, it’s usually better to get the teachers to help if the problem occurs in school. Staff can be seen as neutral, whereas some parents will instantly assume another parent is biased.
I was bullied at school, and the teachers just said things like ‘be a man’ and ‘why don’t you stand up for yourself?!’.
This was decades ago, but it’s an excellent reason why I want to tackle bullying whenever it occurs.
I have to, in a rare moment, agree with ChasE.
Although it is pathetically sad that our society is this way, it is 100% true that a letter from a parent does not get near the attention of a letter from a lawyer. No school bureaucrat is going to lose their job over an angry parent - but they might if said angry parent is seriously considering taking them to court.
And as long as the school has taken charge of your children for 8 hours of the day, they do have certain legal responsibilities. Even if you think they don’t, they still do. One of those is protecting your child from harassment and violence while in their care and on their grounds.
There’s really nothing one can do about school bullies. I should know; I’ve tried many tactics against those who harrassed me. Some worked on certain people, and some had about the effect of poisoning a town’s water supply with a bottle of aftershave. Just deal with the fact that people have become more selfish and narrow, and their children are growing up in their footsteps. Add to the pile the increased standard of living, breeding a standard of greed and ‘have verses have-not’, and you have today’s situation. The competitive social structure of today’s school system is also a fueling factor to this fire, and these combined factors crush the independent-minded, the non-Borg, the innocent.
Homeschool your children, if you can. Keep them away from the public school system. You can give your children a better education than what Uncle Sam provides, and they’ll turn out far better people than those herded into hallways. It’s very unlikely that your child will not take matters into her own hands (by that, I don’t mean machinegunning her homeroom, I mean dealing with her own emotional problems like some were forced to do.).
Here’s a little concept I read about in an article, the URL of which I cannot find right off the bat. They came up with a plan to ‘community school’ children. The gist of the article was the idea of one person homeschooling their children, and the children of the community as well.
It may look good on paper, but I have yet to hear of this in real life. It’s still a pretty little dream, though, and who knows? It may just work. Perhaps when the diploma hits my hand, I’ll be the brave little fool that tries it.
As a victim of bullying, I believe (unfortunately) that often the only recourse is non-verbal retaliation.
Bullies care nothing for talk, and that is all that teachers and parents have to offer, in too many situations. Some people are not paying attention until it hurts.
I was repeatedly bullied over a period of months by an older, much bigger bully. I did all the right things - talked to my parents, my teachers, ignored it, stood up for myself (verbally) - with zero effect.
Then one day, for no reason I can figure out, he knocked a book out of my hand, and I rose up righteous and beat the bloody s***t out of him. I was punished, both by my parents and my teacher (I was suspended for three days - he was “counseled” and sent home to have two teeth replaced). My first action upon returning to school was to look him and promise more of the same and harder if he ever bothered me again.
I was not and am not sorry for what I did. He never bothered me again.
I wish I had dealt with it sooner, and it may not have been as bad. My mistake.
Regards,
Shodan
In order for a school to perform it’s job, the children need to be and feel safe. This is (or should be) a mutual goal. Establishing an adversarial relationship between the school and the parent is not the best way to reach this goal.
Frankly, I’m shocked that so many think putting the fear of lawsuits into school administration is an effective way of dealing with bullies. The “we” in the OP was meant to include parents, teachers, andministration and students.
Litigation should be the very last step in addressing a dangerous situation where the school is being clearly neglegent. This was not the case with my daughter. This is usually not the case in general.
There should be a more effective policy dealing with bullies. Suing and threatening to sue is not the way to go about finding one.
It seems that some of the problem here rests with the interpretation of the OP. As I understand it, the question was not “What should I do about bullying.” but “What can be done about bullying.” Although I have a problem with parents suing schools at the drop of a hat, I do agree that a letter from a lawyer is often the best way to get a school to act. Lawyers, however, cannot address the more fundamental question of what can actually be done about bullying.
IMHO, we need to stop looking to the schools to solve every problem. I am always amazed that many who claim to be conservative, who and who decry government solutions to social problems, are so quick to attack schools for failing to solve all of societies problems. The solution is for everyone to back away a little from their obsession with monetary advancement and sensual titillation and start paying attention the truly important things in life - family and community.
Nobody suggested you threaten the school with a lawsuit. I certainly didn’t. I suggested you send a “lawyers letter.” No lawyer ever threatens to sue, they just sue. A lawyers letter is merely a convenient way to indicate that you COULD sue but you AREN’T going to. It is intended as a mechanism to get someone’s attention to a problem.
You know, I was just reading a letter to the editor in today’s local newspaper about a woman who wanted to join her local high school track team, but was prohibited because the school board had a rule against allowing women to participate in running events over 2 miles. She had to get a lawyer to write a letter and inform the school board about Title IX, and she became the sole member of the women’s track team. She won her rights without suing anyone, but it did take some pressure.
These sorts of problems seem to have one common origin: ignorance. Ignorance of the law by schools, and it appears in your case, willful ignorance of your child’s rights. Things will not improve if parents do not see to it that they improve. Your child was harassed because YOU allowed it to continue. You admitted as much, your poor child had to get expelled due to fighting because you wouldn’t stand up for her rights. As long as there are spineless parents who don’t want to rock the boat, bullying will continue.
Well, from my field research I can say the following:
Debating does not work. You can’t debate with someone who’s walking away.
Being bigger’n them DOES work. Hoo boy. Not that I used this much except to indulge myself for a few brief moments of “finally I am not the shrimp getting pushed around”. Plus this guy had been giving my brother grief for a while.
Wearing a sleeveless shirt does, too, when you have the arms for it.
If you can pick up big things and throw them, people who used to make fun of you will possibly leave you alone. Especially if you throw your 110-lb brother. With his permission, of course:)
Kids can be total jackasses.
Thank you, thank you, thank you!!!
Simple. Run the school like a corporation.
If you were at work, and a co-worker was taunting you, humiliating you, and otherwise making the workplace uncomfortable, you would complain to the HR department, to your boss, to your co-worker’s boss. If it did not stop immediately, you could complain to other government agencies.
This should be the same at school. If a bully troubles you, you file a complaint with your teacher and with the principal’s office.
I don’t think anyone in the modern American workplace isn’t fearful of their job because something they may say may offend someone and they may be disciplined for it. Sure it sucks, but we don’t have to put up with bullies in the workplace, now do we?
If the school would be run like a business, wherein bullies could be “fired” (read: suspended or even expelled) as a consequence for their actions, maybe harrassment would be taken more seriously.
The main reason that bullies do what they do is because they can get away with it. If they can no longer get away with it, then they will most likely stop.
Or something.
The biggest problem with “firing” bullies is that in our society the right to an education is seen as an absolute. Personally, I have begun to wonder whether we shouldn’t have disciplinary schools run more like the youth authority schools. If a student refuses to respect the rights of others, he or she is choosing to switch to a highly disciplined school with no tolerance for such behavior. I recognize that this is fraught with problems, but one of the problems no is that the ultimate punishment in most districts seems to be a “alternative” programs in which students do less for for more credits and choose their own schedule.
Just a few suggestions for you, BG.
STEP ONE: As soon as the child informs the parent, the parent shall inform the school’s attorney that any future harassment of the child by anyone either employed by the school district or for whom the district is responsible (i.e., ALL THE MINORS IN SCHOOL) shall result in both a civil case claiming unspecified damages and a criminal complaint alleging harrassment.
STEP TWO: Inform the school’s attorney that said teacher’s level best is not accomplishing the school’s obligation and if effective and immediate correction does not occur within ONE SCHOOL DAY of notification to said attorney, STEP ONE will follow.
STEP THREE: Inform the school’s attorney that failure to suspend the bully within ONE SCHOOL DAY of notification to said attorney will result in the course of action described in STEP ONE.
STEP FOUR: Inform the school’s attorney that you are suing the district for (a) emotional distress inflicted on the child, (b) physical harm inflicted on the child by (i) the bully who instigated the event and (ii) the teachers who laid hands on the child, © incompetance of staff and teachers, and finally (d) malpractice.
STEP FIVE: Inform the school’s attorney that failure on the part of the principal to rescind your daughter’s suspension will result in the course of action described in STEP ONE.
Now, I think that in the normal course of events, violence is uncalled for. However, since the school was obviously derelict, your daughter only had two options: (1) suffer, or (2) retaliate. I think she chose the right action.
A thought I’d toyed with often when my niece and nephew were bullied at one time by a deputy’s brat yers ago (funny thing, that kid didn’t continue to grow and ended up being bullied in later years) is: You might also want to inform the bully’s parents that you understand and even respect the whole idea of someone older, bigger or stronger beating the shit out of someone younger, smaller or weaker just for the hell of it and by the way, where is your darling little bully child right now?
Back to reality: I think the whole idea of informing the school’s attorney and following through is the best bet.
Please tell me you are kidding.
YOU try maintaining a class of 30 kids. You have to make sure you teach the state mandated benchmarks, (ie teach the test), use the latest educational practices that you read about in a magazine you had to buy or your principal will yell at you, modify instruction for special ed kids, take care to respect the students’ diversity, watch for signs of abuse and other personal problems, be on alert for guns/drugs/etc, be able to quickly evacuate students in the event of a bomb threat, be able to go into lockdown if a gun is found on campus. be ready for the schedule to be changed at anytime, I could go on and on
And you want me to pay attention to just 2 kids or you are going to sue me???
GET REAL.
Yes, malpractice. And I am not kidding.
First: If you are not up to performing what you are obligated to, time to switch careers.
Second: Many times I hear teachers and school administrators say “we’re not babysitters.” Correct. But you are still entrusted with the care, for a few hours of the day, of every single minor in that school. You are responsible for taking care of those minors. Because you think the task is overwhelming does not justify your abdication of that obligation.
Third: I couldn’t care less how many times your boss yells at you. If he or she is yelling, you have both administrative avenues and a union to which you can appeal for resolution. The child does not have a union.
A note: It appears that it’s not okay for the boss to abuse the teacher but it is okay for the student to be abused on campus. A quite enlightened approach you have there.
Fourth: Teaching is a profession. Peform your duties and obligations in a professional manner or get sued for malpractice.
Last: Exactly how many times in your career have the following actually occurred at the schools where you taught while you were there:
[ul]
[li]guns found on campus[/li][li]drugs found on campus[/li]bomb threat[/ul]
Yeah, you expel one person for carrying a broken gun to school and there aren’t that many gun found afterwards. Drugs, well they aren’t that hard to find but most teachers ignore them. Bomb threats are fun every once in a while too:)
Really the teachers make their own work. If a teacher is overworked its because that teacher wants to be. Teachers who complain about all the stuff they have to do don’t have to do half of it. They generally do it out of their own time.
In addition to the situations mentioned above, we have had a lot of vandalism and a lot of gang activity this year. In the past, I have taught pregnant girls and mothers (keep in mind, I teach 7TH GRADE). I have had kids fall asleep during class because they didn’t get any sleep the previous night because the cops were called because Mom’s Boyfriend beat Mom up (Mom took him back in a few days later). I’ve had kids that have been sexually assaluted at a young age. I’ve had kids that were afraid to go home, because they were afraid of either how drunk or high their parent (notice I didn’t say parents. A lot of my kids only have one, some live with grandparents or other relatives) will be or they are afraid of how bad the beating will be that night. I’ve had kids that the only meals they get are the ones the school offers. I’ve had kids whose parent is incarcerated. I’ve had kids that were homeless because either the caretaker couldn’t pay rent or Mom got thrown out by the Boyfriend. I’ve had kids with Dahmer tendencies. I’ve had kids whose parent(s) had AIDs or Hepatitis, and we weren’t sure if the kid was infected (Legally, it’s private info and we aren’t let in on that). I’ve had kids that have assaulted their parents. I’ve had kids whose parents were either younger or the same age as me (I’m a few weeks away from 28) Most of my kids have some sort of parental role with their siblings either for the forementioned reasons or the fact that the parent works at night.
We have contacted the proper authorities about these situations, sometimes to no avail. They’ve given up on the kids in that area.
Wanna come teach at my school? Let’s see how long you’d last… I don’t think you would continue to go back to them even after 5 years because you love them, would you?