Students in Trouble (Again)
What's in the water this week? This story comes from the Seattle Times. Apparently there was cyberbullying going on at McClure Middle School. And, apparently, it was proven as the school suspended more than 20(!) students for between 2-8 days.
Sigh. Ah, the old days when there were a couple of bullies and flunkies but now everyone can be (or so they thought) anonymous and tease/torment/bully a classmate.
I'm thinking some or all of this took place at school. Otherwise, I'm not sure how the school managed to link all this together if it was taking place at home (and the school could get the evidence). And it must have been fairly serious language (not "you're fat" which is serious but not the same as "Watch your back; we'll find you" kind of language).
Every kid has to learn to face down haters. But I can only go back in my head to being a middle-schooler and try to imagine it coming from all sides on your computer.
(I was just in McClure this week; I hadn't been in the building before. They had a lot of behavior signs in the halls with a large one in red that said, "We reject aggression, revenge and retaliation." It didn't work.)
Look, I don't look at this blog as a crime blotter for SPS but it's just been a weird week.
Sigh. Ah, the old days when there were a couple of bullies and flunkies but now everyone can be (or so they thought) anonymous and tease/torment/bully a classmate.
I'm thinking some or all of this took place at school. Otherwise, I'm not sure how the school managed to link all this together if it was taking place at home (and the school could get the evidence). And it must have been fairly serious language (not "you're fat" which is serious but not the same as "Watch your back; we'll find you" kind of language).
Every kid has to learn to face down haters. But I can only go back in my head to being a middle-schooler and try to imagine it coming from all sides on your computer.
(I was just in McClure this week; I hadn't been in the building before. They had a lot of behavior signs in the halls with a large one in red that said, "We reject aggression, revenge and retaliation." It didn't work.)
Look, I don't look at this blog as a crime blotter for SPS but it's just been a weird week.
Comments
Actually, Melissa, I think this IS a blog for SPS crimes . . . and everything else that's going on in the district. The truth is, not everyone reads all the same new sources -- we stopped getting the Times years ago -- and I get a lot of information by reading this blog.
This administration does everything it can to do controversial things quietly. Shifting staff, closing programs, taking money from one fund to pay for something else . . . the only way to keep track is to have EVERYTHING posted someplace like this blog. That doesn't mean it becomes the police blotter, but it does mean that families can get some important information that might otherwise go unnoticed.
If I'm trying to choose between two schools, and I find out that one has had a significant amount of bullying, or that it's been locked down every week for two years, or that there are packs of dogs living in the boiler room, this information enables me to make an informed decision.
stu
I'm wondering the same thing! We all need the long weekend.
p.s. I'm glad I wasn't a teen in the age of the interwebz.
It didn't make the news.
I wonder how much else goes on that never makes the news?
Thanks, Melissa, for shining the light on these issues.
Maybe I'm answering my own question - it had to have happened on school time, maybe even with school equipment (yes, there are filters, but I'm sure most students who want to know how to bypass filters)
"The existing record was successfully broken when Portuguese competitor Pedro Matias typed a 264-character message in one minute and 59 seconds"
This is what some students are doing for a large part of their days...some students send, what, 150-200 texts in a day?
This can't be good for them.
Why WOULDN'T you want the school to step in, if it involves a ring of students threatening or harassing other students?
If I mis-read your post, I apologise.
I think Mercermom is right (maybe) when she says that a school can be involved if it impacts the functioning of the school (which is what the Times indicates in today's article about the incident) - That is the justification for taking action, according to the school, that it disrupts eductation.
Keepin' On, of course I take it seriously, but I am also still curious about the "line": Say for instance, that a school merely hears that one student has dissed (or threatened) another student on facebook...what IS the school's responsibility? Reporting, certainly, but action?
What if a school heard that a bunch of kids had taunted a kid at 5:00pm at a park? Would the school suspend those students?
Of course I don't want cyberbullying, and kids should be held acountable. But who does the acounting, that's the quesiton. Where does a school's authority stop and the parent/community's begin? This is a new technology and a new problem - it bears discussion.
I'm just curious as to what this looks like, how a school is to act regarding these gray areas.
Same for cyber bullying. If a kid, after school hours, and off of school grounds, is cyber bullying another kid and it doesn't involve school then that is a parent responsibility. But if the kid threatens violence at school (IE I'm going to get you in the locker room tomorrow) then the parent should report that to school and school should take action to prevent it.
Having had some experience with this in the past, I would guess that the police were called by parents, and the suspensions followed. In cases I have seen before, once the police are involved, the school has to suspend students, so the parents presumably did their job in this case, and the school followed suit.
Quite frankly, our schools so rarely discipline students, that I was stunned any thing happened at all.
Good for McClure.
And to further discuss the line between parent's responsibility and the school's - we already have home visits in certain schools/areas in this district. To be sure, they are to guide a positive outcome, but the school IS interfering in the parent's domain, right? You can't allow school interference in one area, but say it is not allowed in another. The door has already been opened.
Personally, were it my child involved in something that I had no clue about, and the school had knowledge, but didn't tell me? I would be quite upset.
Now, that's terrible. And I don't have a problem with the school stepping in to talk to the students no matter where or when Facebook was accessed, because this is the sort of thing that could make life at school harder for that student and poison the educational atmosphere. But I wouldn't characterize the creation of that group in and of itself as a threat, and unless either the group actually did threaten that something was to happen on campus, or the Facebook group was created/accessed at school, I don't think it's within the school's purview to actually punish the behavior through suspensions.
I'm not sure whether that means I hope there is or is not more to the story.
Bullies have always been around. The problem today is that with a few key strokes lives can be ruined because of false posts that circulate round and round the internet. Once out there, you can never take it back. To deny it or defend against it, must mean you are really guilty.
If cyberbullying is brought to the attention of school teachers or administrators, the police along with the parents of everyone involved should be called immediately. Penalties have to be severe, if only to discourage others from doing the same.
The law hasn't caught up with today's technology.