Today while working my crossing guard shift, I had the misfortune to confront a particularly uppity middle-schooler who would not cooperate.
The intersection I work at has a traffic light, but they assign two guards there anyway because the kids are too brain-dead to understand when it is safe to go. I had just crossed a group of kids, and was walking back to my corner as the light was about to change. This particularly obnoxious girl started to step in the street when I held up my hand and told her, “Stop, you won’t get across in time. Wait for the next one.” But she wouldn’t listen to me. Unwilling to allow her to jaywalk across the street (the traffic and resumed rushing past by now) I stood in front of her to prevent her from blindly just walking into 40 mph traffic. I guess she assumed I would get out of her way, because she kept walking forward, and actually bumped into me.
When she bumped into me she went totally batshit and started screaming, “Dont you touch me! I’ll throw your ass in jail!”. I repeatedly told her to get back on the sidewalk but she stayed put. It was also clear that if I went back on the sidewalk she would dart across traffic, so at that point all I could really do was stand in front of her to keep her from jaywalking.
I felt like I got put in a lose-lose situation- if I physically restrained her, she would have accused me of molesting her or some BS like that. If I let her go, she would have probably gotten hit and I would have gotten blamed for not doing my job. So I am kind of frustrated right now and a little worried she might make cock and bull story to try to get me in trouble :mad: My boss is off on Fridays so I will have to wait until monday morning to talk to her about it. In the meantime, what do you dopers think about the situation?
I’d say that as long as you didn’t touch her (i.e. you didn’t reach out) and did nothing more than stand in her way, you’re fine. If she walks into you, that’s not your fault. And seeing as how you’re the person who is supposed to let people know when it’s safe to cross the street, you couldn’t get into any trouble for blocking her way when it’s unsafe.
My guess is that this was a punk-ass girl who was talking shit and you’ll never have to hear from her about this again. At least not in any serious way.
Report her to the school principal and report the incident to your direct supervisor. Ask you supervisor what you should do if this ever happens again.
Yeah. You’re not a cop, so you can’t throw cuffs on her. However, you should have reported the incident as soon as your shift ended. (Got walkie-talkies or cell phone? Call the school immediately.) What do you do when a driver blows the intersection while you have kids in the street? Get a license and report it, I would guess. Same principle applies.
And you did say there were two guards, right? So even if there were no other student witnesses, you’ve got the word of another adult that you did not assault the brat if you put out an arm to restrain her. (No grabbing below the shoulder, of course.)
I also agree with the basic consensus - you did the right thing. What’s the point in having a crossing guard if they won’t guard against someone crossing at an inopportune moment?
Contact the school and your supervisor. Have one of them call the girl’s parents, although if she’s acting this way to a crossing guard it probably won’t do much good.
Our crossing guards don’t have walkie talkies, phones or any other way of contacting the school, nor will they necessarily know the names of one student out of hundreds.
Maybe it’d be in your own best interest to carry a camera or camera phone to at least be able to get her picture and go the the school admin and say “This one, right here, she’s the butthead!” The principal should also remind the student body what the rules are in regards to crossing guard authority, if you don’t get backup from the school you’re hit.
Hold your big ol’ stop sign in between you and her, she can’t accuse you of molestation if you’re bullying her back to the curb with a stop sign instead of your hands right? I’d be making damn sure the other guard was witnessing the incident, the last thing you need is a he said/she said and the other adult was checking out a Lexus driving by.
Feh, How much does a crossing gaurd make? Minimum wage? Whatever it is I’m sure it couldn’t possibly be enough to put up with this shit. Worse case senario; she gets ran over- you get blamed for it. So what are they gonna do? Make sure you never work in the “crossing guard” industry again? :rolleyes:
Please they’d be doing you a favor.
Of course if it were me I’d probably bend down and whisper in her ear in my best psycho al-la Jack Nicholson vioce “Listen you little bitch. I know who you are and I’ve seen where you sleep. You don’t get back accross that street right fuck’n now I’ll slit your throat from ear to ear.”
I would let the school counselor or principal deal with it. I would let them decide if the parents should be notified. We all have our bad days, I wouldn’t inflate the issue too far. If she’s a chronic problem in school, let the authorities will deal with her parents.
Unfortunately, carrying cameras is a big no-no at my job. They don’t want us taking pictures of kids, no matter how benign it might be. So if I had a camera on me and did this, I would be implicating my self by photographing a student. The ‘no camera’ rule is kind of a drag, because a camera is perfect for catching people who are illegally parked, or running red lights. I guess they’ll just have to take my word for it
FYI, the crossing guards here in San Jose make decent scratch. I make more than double per hour doing the crossing guard job compared to my tutoring job, which is a handful of change above minimum wage. We also always get paid a minimum of 2 hours a day, even if our shifts are shorter than that, and get comped for mileage. So overall its a pretty cushy job, aside from the occasionally uppity teenager.
Hadn’t thought of that, but of course it makes sense.
Are you expected to somehow know all the kids names? I’m picturing a situation where you’re asking the disobediant student for her ID and she’s laughing her butt off at you, what procedures are in place for reporting kids, if any?
The crossing guards who get the least flack are often amiable souls who are friendly around kids and talk with them. This lets them become familiar with the names of students, and sometimes work their way into the ‘inner circles’ of their cliques. This is useful because while an uppity student is probably not going to want the guard to be familiar with them, chances are the guard will know a kid who knows the uppity kid.
The problem is that in order for this to work, the guard has to be in that location/school for a long time. I get sent to many different places, because right now we have a shortage of crossing guards, and being one of the few crossing guards in San Jose that knows both how to read a map and speak english clearly, I often get sent all over the city, working at a different school each week (or even day! :eek: ) Its hard for me to get to know a lot of people from one school in the span of one day/week, and my main priority is making sure they cross safely, not schmoozing with students. With any luck, more crossing guards will be hired, so that they can keep me in one place. Once I am in one place for a decent amount of time, I can get ‘established’ there, by getting to know some students, and also the principal (a VERY useful resource for me! )
