Kids assaulted at school: WHY!

G

Glamdring

New member
What action could be taken to get schools to take some control over violence in public schools? I am not talking gun violence but the "normal" everyday violence that many kids suffer thru every school day.

I drove school bus for 3 years. I also for one summer drove a special city bus for disabled and elderly people. Another summer I drove for summer school program--at risk kids and disabled programs.

On my main school year route I had a set of twins who were liveing with their father because they had assaulted and injured their mom's "boyfriend". They were 12 or 13 when they assaulted the boyfriend.

These twins dealt in drugs. Made terrorist threats every time they were on the bus. One tried to get off my bus to go kill a teacher (pre columbine). Oh the reason he wanted to kill the teacher was because that teacher had stopped him from harrasing/groping a female student.

Took the school a month before they even talked to me about the kid trying/wanting to kill the teacher. I am fairly certain the kid would have assualted the teacher that day if I had let him off my bus. And another 3 weeks after talking to me about the incident before they removed him from the bus and that school.

I dealt with several kids that lived in fear of the violence and abuse they were exposed to at school. Many of these kids were labeled as ADD or ADHD and given drugs. When what the kids needed was someone to listen to and help them with their real problems IMO. I mean if the kid's parents were doing to them what the other kids were the "authorities" (an oxymoron) would have removed the kids from the parents.

I know I am not the only one to see this because of conversations I have had with some parents. And one or two School Liason LEO.
 
Students are untouchable, period. A few years back a fellow teacher (he is 6'6" and 240 lbs) had a confrontation with a violent student. The kid hits the teacher and is posturing for another swing. The teacher grabs the kid and shoves him up aginst the wall just as an administrator rounds the corner.

Couple of days later the teacher and I (acting as a representative) end up in the office. The teacher is placed on an action plan and told if he ever touches another kid for as long as he works in the district, he will be subject to dismissal. I am told the same holds true for me.

Two months later the same kid is involved in another confrontation away from school, this time he has a gun. A friend of mine with DCI responds to the incident and is manuvering for a clear shot, he is going to waste the punk. A State Trooper (who is on the school board) manages to sneak up behind the punk and proceeds to thump the little twerp into submission. Patrolman is cited for bravery. DCI agent is releived he doesn't have to kill the kid.

What's wrong with our society anyway. Teacher defends himself and is threatened with his job and is "written up". LEO beats the same kid silly and is given a medal. I give up...
 
For some reason the LEO have a totally diferent set of options.

I know that the twins I had to deal with the only person they "respected" more than me was the Liason officer at their school. He could use real force if he needed to. And the kids knew it.

Don't get me wrong, he was a very nice guy. I remember talking to him a lot after Columbine. He got to deal with parents all day long asking him if he could protect their kids from such an event. He was honest with them and told them that he couldn't prevent someone from starting something like that but he would do everything he could to protect ALL the kids in the school.
 
Ron, this whole issue of violent kids in schools is something that has had me confused for years. When I was in the sixth grade in the early sixties, there was a kid (actually he was sixteen) who was a problem for the whole class. The bully, the loudmouth, you get the idea. Our teacher was an ex-Marine drill sergeant and didn't take any lip from anybody. One day the kid went a little too far, and the teacher took him out into the hall. We could hear bodies slamming off the lockers, and the kid never returned to class.
After that, even the greasers showed that teacher a good measure of respect.

Why can't people see the linkage in all of this?

Dick
 
Monkeyleg, nowadays, you'd never see the teacher again, and the student would be back in class the next day.

Things have changed in the last 20 years.
 
I don't know if they have changed all that much. I lost one of my favorite gym teachers back in the late 60's. A student took a swing at him. He was a retired drill instructor from the marines. He did not hit the kid, but the kid ended up flat on his back on the gym floor with the wind knocked out of him. The teacher was dismissed for using excessive force. Go figure.



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Richard

The debate is not about guns,
but rather who has the ultimate power to rule,
the People or Government.
RKBA!
 
<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Monkeyleg:
Ron, this whole issue of violent kids in schools is something that has had me confused for years. When I was in the sixth grade in the early sixties, there was a kid (actually he was sixteen) who was a problem for the whole class. The bully, the loudmouth, you get the idea. Our teacher was an ex-Marine drill sergeant and didn't take any lip from anybody. One day the kid went a little too far, and the teacher took him out into the hall. We could hear bodies slamming off the lockers, and the kid never returned to class.
After that, even the greasers showed that teacher a good measure of respect.

Why can't people see the linkage in all of this?

Dick[/quote]

One thing I have always wondered about is why do we keep the major trouble makers in school? I noticed that after they hit age 16 and could stop going to school almost all of the real problem kids stopped going. And school was much more pleasent all the way around.

My understanding is that at least here in MN you can always go back and get a GED if you want one so you would not be depriving them of "their" education if they actually want it.
 
Dunno guys. I'd posted a few days ago about the stories of how the schools have a zero tolerance of "violent behavior". The common thing in all this it seems, is the ones now punished for so-called violent behavior, are grade school kids playing, and pretending to play cops & robbers, etc.

These are little kids, and they're being manipulated to get at the parents. They aren't doing much about the young adults (punks) causing problems in school. I wonder why that is, and what message is being delivered by that action.

Best Regards,
Don

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The most foolish mistake we could make would be to allow the subjected people to carry arms; history shows that all conquerers who have allowed their subjected people to carry arms have prepared their own fall.
Adolf Hitler
 
Part of the problem is that we need to do away with compusary education after the 6th grade. That way school becomes an at-will proposition that may terminated by either party, student or school, at any time for any reason.

Kick the bad apples out. If they want to rot on the street, that's their problem. Let's teach the kids who want to learn.
 
I'm a high school teacher and I can answer why this is happening:

1) School budgets are made before the school year starts. The school is paid by a formula that counts the number of kids attending that school. If too many kids are expelled from school, the school loses too much money. The only person who usually worries about this is the principal. They get graded on how well they run a school, and fiscal mismanagement doesn't look good to their superiors. Guess who makes the final decision to expell a student?

2) Here in Florida, the State Legislature has decided to decrease the dropout rate by taking away student's driver's licenses if they miss too much school or drop out. The same trouble makers that used to drop out of school are being forced to stay in school until they turn eighteen.

3) Most people in education are very well-meaning people who really care. Too many of these educators think that the student will be okay if we just give them one more chance.

4) School systems, being beaurocracies, don't promote the most qualified people into management positions. Usually, the person who becomes an administrator is the politically minded "up and comer" who doesn't want to do anything to make the system (and their superiors) look bad. Most administrators turn a blind eye to trouble instead of attacking it head on. Rocking the boat does not lead to career advancement. I've rarely met a school administrator with a backbone.

5) There is a fear that many expelled students would be out breaking into our homes while we are at work. Judges commonly give youthful offenders parole, but they MUST return to school as part of the court orders. This forces some of the worst student back into school.

Sorry to sound so negative. The thing that really makes me mad is that it really isn't difficult to have a well run school. But the system works against this, as I'm sure every beaurocracy does.
 
There are too many "parents" today who are unworthy of the title. They turn their precious children into "defective units" by ignoring, desensitizing and/or terrorizing them. When you build up the "self-esteem" of these defective units, this uncontrollable mess is the result.

As was posted above, kids are now untouchable, and they know it. There is no meaningful leverage against the worst of the worst, so they have a free reign. The only kids who are afraid of punishment are the ones who don't need it in the first place, like the kids who got suspended for playing war or pointing their fingers and saying "bang." The hardcores couldn't care less if they got suspended, and neither do their parents.

There is no reason why parents should send their children to school with these defective units. Our schools are run by local political boards whose members usually have no experience in education or discipline. All they want is to enjoy the prestige of their office while preserving business as usual in the school district. What's needed is a whole bunch of lawsuits against school districts by parents whose children are getting terrorized by defective units or getting a substandard education from a teacher who spends all the school day trying to outshout the defectives.

The defectives should all be sent to a "continuation school" which is what happened to them where I grew up. They got all the education they wanted and so did I.

Bottom line: spend our educational resources on kids who want an education, and after a defective unit gets his three strikes, he's out of real school and let his parents worry about what to do with him when he gets home from "gangsta daycare."
 
Then the flip side...my brother was assaulted at 15 in his small "Christian" school by the teacher. My brother is up to a whole 140 or so, about 4 years later, so I figure he weighed about 125 at the time, and the teacher (in his late twenties) twice that.

After deflecting the initial assault, and holding the teacher against the wall until he quit struggling (all the while, my brother's thinking, If I don't hit him, they can't expell me, if I don't hit him, they can't expell me-), my brother was "called into the office" by the teacher. A repeat occurred. My brother left, with the teacher saying, in front of several students, that he would kill my brother if he saw him on the street.

My brother was expelled, because, of course the principal was the teacher's mother.

I don't think we have a youth problem, I don't think we have a teacher problem, I don't think we have a parent problem-

I think we have a societal problem. We will continue to have this problem until individual responsibility for actions is taken by the majority. I think Darwin is the only one winning currently, and not nearly fast enough.
 
Spectre, I agree.

Society no longer tells people that certain actions are "wrong." I remember when I was a little kid in the 70s. If anyone, adult or child, said "sh!t," or some other fowl word, the nearest adult would be sure to repremand that person... especially if there was a child present. God help you if you said "f*ck."

No one does that anymore. No one yells at anyone when they throw trash from their car. No one says anything to people who push past them in public. Every year, we up the ante on what we'll say nothing about, because "it's none of our business," or "I'm not getting shot so I can tell some kid not to litter."

I know this seems petty, but everyone tries to push their limits. Once cursing, littering, being rude, and pushing people out of the way are allowed, there are people who will try to go further to see where their limits are. Once you're beyond pushing people, you're into assulting them, and if you get away with that, you'll kill to suit your needs.

This is where we are. If we don't stop these people from doing this OURSELVES, then they'll keep doing it. I don't like to carry a gun, but there are too many people testing their limits this way, and it's the only way to say "no."
 
Thank you.

I see a depressing tendency for this type of behavior from authority figures (government, LEO) as well, if left unchecked. I have a certain friend, known to many here, that has called LEO on this. I know George Hill has done the same. If we accept encroachments on our freedoms (or morals/finances/etc), we can expect repeat occurrences and further deterioration.

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Save us from arrogant men, and all the causes they're for!
 
Back in 1981, when my oldest son was in kindergarten, he was assaulted on the school bus by an older child.
I went to the superintendent, the school board...tried every avenue to ensure this would not happen again, but was met with nothing more than a shrug.
I decided this was not acceptable, and enrolled both of my sons in M/A training. Best investment I ever made.

The boys came across several of these "misfits" during their school years, but after the infliction of severe pain on one or more occasions, it was determined that discretion was the order of the day when it came to the J. brothers.

The administration abhorred the violence that my sons were able to inflict, and had their "NO TOLERANCE POLICY" regarding fighting (which meant BOTH the aggressor AND the defender would be suspended if caught), but I informed each and every one of them that if and when my child was suspended for defending himself, I would personally take him to Disneyland, and inform the media of the facts regarding the suspension along the way.
For some strange reason, the word "media" turns administrators apoplectic ;) ;) ;)
 
<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by jensenfarm:

The administration abhorred the violence that my sons were able to inflict, and had their "NO TOLERANCE POLICY" regarding fighting (which meant BOTH the aggressor AND the defender would be suspended if caught), but I informed each and every one of them that if and when my child was suspended for defending himself, I would personally take him to Disneyland, and inform the media of the facts regarding the suspension along the way.
For some strange reason, the word "media" turns administrators apoplectic ;) ;) ;)[/quote]

LOL!!!
:D :D :D :D :D
 
I will ALWAYS encourage my kids to use common sense self defense if they need to. I will never fault my kids for standing up to someone, and that includes teachers. I do agree, most teachers are well meaning folks who don't do that job for the money.

My dad and I disagree in the discipline thing. He believes in paddling. ( I got one once, and I had it coming). I have never and will never sign a corporal punishment waiver. No officer of the school EVER hits my kids unless it is in self defense. They have that right in my book.
If a discipline problem ever comes up, I want to be notified, and I will take the appropriate measures. That is MY job, and I take a great interest in that job.

I have to agree with MIKUL on his point. Society has become jaded in their opinion about what is acceptable and what is not.
I think we all talk too mean to each other.
I get on my kids about name calling, and smarta<< comments. Sometimes their whole conversation is about how to make each other look stupid. My oldest boy does that all the time to my daughter. I can't stand it. So when I call him out on it, they both say they mean nor take no offense. I think it sets her up for self esteem problems later on.
I saw this in the Army on an ammo guarding detail at NTC. The NCOIC was bantering back and forth in a rude way with a PFC and it got out of hand with the NCO pulling rank about what he had a hand in.
Playing grab a%% is another of my pet peeves.
We start out with gluing someone's pen to their desk, and end up with someone keying a car.
I think we all just need to start respecting each other again.

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"I learned a thing or two from Charlie,don't you know. You better stay away from Copperhead Road" Steve Earle
 
This is long, but bear with me...
There was another incident that discussions on this board have brought to mind, which occured in the fall of 1995:
A new band director had been hired by the high school, a man who had some impressive credentials, but had moved very often in the past 12 years....many teaching jobs in different schools/states.

I thought this may be due to the fact that he was trying to better his position, but a tiny hair stood up on the back of my neck when I saw him in action with the students when he thought parents weren't around.

My sons came home with stories regarding the statements this teacher had made, regarding the parents being nothing more than " Dumb Cash Cows" for the operation of the marching/concert bands, but I let this slide as well.

Following an away football game (which the wife and I attended), the band (while on a school bus) was leaving the parking lot of the opposing school, when the bus abruptly pulled over. The door flew open, and the teacher exited, dragging a student half his size by the scruff of the neck. The teacher threw the kid up against a chain-link fence, and cocked back his right fist as if to punch. I laid on the horn, jumped out of the car, and asked this supposed adult whatinhell he thought he was doing. He mumbled some reply, hurried the kid back on the bus, and off it went.
We met the bus back in the parking lot, but the band teacher had hurriedly unlocked the doors to the band room, tossed the keys to the bus driver, and split.
I informed the administration about this on the next Monday, and a meeting was arranged in lightning fashion. Every one of the administrators blamed the kid for "mouthing off" and that the band director had no intentions of hitting the kid, just wanted to scare him (my sons said all the kid did was parrot something the teacher said to the group). In front of over 50 parents, I told these lame brains that this guy was a powder keg waiting to explode,and had it been my kid they would be ass deep in attorneys, but they assured everyone this jerk would undergo anger management (whatever that is!) and it would not happen again. Nedless to say, my sons quit band.
Less than 4 months later, this bozo jack-slapped a 14 year old boy across a room. He was allowed to resign (no black mark on his record), and is currently teaching in his umpteenth school district. The kid was given carte blanche equivalent to a "get out of jail free" card....sounds kinda like what they did for po' li'l ol' Rodney King!
I know ther are many fine, dedicated teachers out there who really do care, and to you my hat is off, but from talking to other parents, stuff like this is not an isolated incident.....a sad commentary on our public school administrators though....
 
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