Archive for the ‘Professional Conduct’ Category

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Treating Children Like Old Shoes

September 19, 2012

Shoes belong in boxes, not children:

An Arizona couple is suing their son’s former school district for allegedly throwing him in a tiny, windowless room for bad behavior they say was caused by officials ignoring his severe allergies and feeding him foods packed with sugar.

Leslie and Eric Noyes of Glendale, Ariz., filed a lawsuit in Maricopa County Court last week against Deer Valley Unified School District No. 97 and Desert Sage Elementary School, where their son attended second grade last year.

The complaint, obtained by Courthouse News Service, charges school officials with assault and battery, false imprisonment, gross negligence and intentional infliction of emotional distress on their son.

The couple is seeking compensation for their son’s medical treatment and transportation costs to send him to a school outside his district as as well as general damages.

The use of cool down rooms in the same county whose controversial sheriff Joe Arpaio has forced prison inmates to wear pink underwear isn’t unique to Arizona. School officials across the country have used seclusion rooms, most often for special education students or those diagnosed as autistic. The practice is controversial. In 2004, a 13-year-old Georgia student hanged himself after his parents said he was traumatized by being put in a time-out room.

These “scream rooms” are absolutely abhorrent. They should never have been allowed on a school premises. It disgusts me that we are incorporating torture techniques to deal with classroom behaviour issues.

Click on the link to read The Rise of Teacher Approved Bullying (Video)

Click on the link to read Students Allegedly Asked to Draw 9/11 Devastation Pictures in Class

Click on the link to read “Teacher of the Year” Award is a Farce

Click on the link to read There’s a lot You Can’t Do in Ten Days

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Students Allegedly Asked to Draw 9/11 Devastation Pictures in Class

September 14, 2012

The teachers allegedly involved in conjuring up this activity have made a very poor judgement call:

Hughey Elementary School Parents in El Paso, Texas are furious over a questionable class assignment that asked students to draw pictures depicting the September 11 terrorist attacks.

According to KDBC, the fourth graders were told specifically to “draw the boom clouds, the planes hitting the towers, and people jumping out of windows.“

“That’s something that kids should get in trouble for drawing,” parent Ivie Gremillion told KFOX-TV. “That’s people being murdered, committing suicide.”

Student drawings portrayed the heart-wrenching images, some with speech bubbles saying, “help,” “I love you” and “one way ticket to heaven.” Gremillion tells KFOX-TV that the classroom teacher also told her students that “the Afghans did this because they hate all of us and want to kill all of us.”

One student, Gremillion says, was under the impression that the tragedy occurs every September 11 and was too afraid to leave his house to go to school.

Talk about a dangerous dose of stupidity!

 

Click on the link to read Coloring Book of the 9/11 Tragedy is in Bad Taste

Click on the link to read Don’t Even Try to Huminise James Holmes

Click on the link to read How Can Facebook Allow James Holmes Tribute Pages?

Click on the link to read The Need to Blame Anything and Everything for the Colorado Shootings

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“Teacher of the Year” Award is a Farce

September 5, 2012

Reader and teaching expert, John Tapscott, wrote the following pointed comment about individualised teaching awards:

I believe teaching is a co-operative, collegiate, collaborative pursuit to varying degrees. The very idea of singling out a teacher for some sort of specious award is an insult to every other teacher. The whole idea is so much crap.

It didn’t take long before another example came to light to further raise questions about the merit of such awards:

What a difference a year makes.

Erica DePalo, 33, won the Essex County, N.J. Teacher of the Year award in 2011. Last Friday, she was arrested and accused of having a sexual relationship with one of her 15-year-old honors English students, according to CBS New York.

Many of the students that the station spoke with were blindsided by the allegations.

“I was kind of shocked,” Arnold Ajondo said. ”I was a little surprised. She was really close with the students and we all liked her. She was always there after school if you ever needed any help.”

DePalo was charged with first-degree aggravated sexual assault, second-degree sexual assault and endangering the welfare of a child, according to the Star Ledger.

Click on the link to read ‘Educator of the Year‘ isn’t Much of an Award

Click on the link to read The Cure for Suicide Isn’t Another Educational Program 

Click on the link to read Sick Teachers Need to be Arrested not Fired!

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There’s a lot You Can’t Do in Ten Days

September 3, 2012

A teacher is caught bullying a 13-year old boy. The punishment: a ten day sabbatical!

What is the point of a ten day suspension? What can be achieved by such a useless consequence?

Ten days wont fix the scars of the bullied teen, it wont restore confidence in students, parents or colleagues, it wont provide the teacher with enough time to learn new strategies and it wont deter other teachers from doing the same.

This shocking video shows the moment a Washington middle school teacher allegedly joined bullies in beating a 13-year-old boy to the ground and physically abusing him.

Shot by a fellow student, the disturbing footage begins with the boy being dragged across a classroom floor by his arms and legs, a sock stuffed in his mouth.

One of the bullies can be heard giggling and yelling ‘pull his pants down’ to a chorus of laughter from the others.

Students sit around watching, some visibly entertained, not one of them stepping in to help as the boy cowers on the floor.

But what’s more shocking to the boys devastated mother, Karla Kinney, is that the teacher, John Rosi, stands idly by and is even seen getting stuck in himself.Rosi, an 18-year classroom veteran was suspended from his post for 10 days in an agreement that allowed him to avoid losing his job.

 

So let’s measure the level of rehabilitation that this meagre punishment has produced:

In a letter to investigators Rosi said he did not consider the incident to be bullying.

‘I can honestly say that at the time I did not believe that any of the children were at risk of harm during their interactions.

‘Nor did I view the incident as anything more than harmless childhood horseplay,’ he wrote. 

Welcome back Mr. Rosi!

 

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Our Real Heroes are Not Celebrities or Athletes

September 3, 2012

The real heroes are our family members, the person down the street who works two jobs to feed his family or the lady who works at the bank who greets you because she wants to rather than has to. Our heroes are not necessarily the footballer who wins an MVP or the actor who takes home the Oscar.

Last month “Blade Runner” Oscar Pistorius became a heroic figure to many who watched the Olympic Games. As an amputee, competing in the able body Olympics, many saw his feat as remarkable and looked up to him as a source of inspiration. Some queried that his custom-made blades might give him an unfair advantage over the others, but those arguments were quashed by the outpouring of love and respect from the general community.

To hear Pistorius’ unsportsmanlike rant post-race of the Paralympics 200 meter event just reminds us to look up to heroes that we know, rather than those appointed by spin doctors and television executives looking for a ratings boost:

‘Blade Runner’ Oscar Pistorius suffered a shock defeat at the Paralympics tonight, and immediately claimed that the man who beat him had an unfair advantage.

The South African athlete, who became the first double amputee to run at the Olympics less than a month ago, came second behind Brazilian sprinter Alan Oliveira in the T44 200m event.

Pistorius began the final as the big favourite, and the result stunned the 80,000 spectators inside London’s Olympic Stadium into silence.

But the race was surrounded by controversy after Pistorius claimed that he was at a disadvantage because the carbon fibre prosthetic blades he uses to run are shorter than some of his competitors’.He complained that athletes with longer blades are assisted because their stride lengths are greater.Oliveira, one of the athletes who uses longer blades than Pistorius, won the race in 21.45secs.

Pistorius, who had led for most of the race, finished in 21.52secs.

Immediately after the race, Pistorus said the International Paralympic Committee (IPC) did not ‘want to listen’ to his concerns, adding: ‘The guys’ legs are unbelievably long.

Even if he does have a point, this is not the time to raise it. Heroes are not bad sports. The real heroes are all around us. We just don’t seem to notice them.

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The Rise of Teacher Approved Bullying (Video)

August 31, 2012

When a teacher decides to be circus ringmaster to a bullying free for all, one wonders how the authorities can do anything less than ban him from the classroom indefinitely.

Instead, they point out his record. This is his first blemish.

I would argue that this is not a blemish – it’s a gaping scar.

Click here to watch video.

 The parents of a Washington state teen want their son’s teacher fired after learning that the student was terrorized in a bullying attack by peers — and at some points, by the teacher.

The incidents occurred in February at Gig Harbor Middle School, but cell phone video of the attacks surfaced just this week. Footage shows more than a dozen students dragging the then-eighth-grade boy around the classroom, carrying him by his arms and legs, burying him under chairs, writing on his feet and stuffing his socks in his mouth. The antics last about 15 minutes while teacher John Rosi watches, and later joins in.

Rosi pokes the teen in the stomach and pretends to sit on him, chiding, “I’m feeling kind of gassy.” The class Rosi was supposed to be teaching is a half-hour course for reading and math preparation, The News Tribune reports.

After district officials learned of the incident in February, Rosi was suspended for 10 days without pay, given new classroom management training and moved to a different middle school.

But that’s not enough for the boy’s parents, Randall and Karla Kinney, who have requested a criminal investigation and are calling for Rosi’s termination. Joan Mell is representing the victim, who was 13 at the time of the incident.

“It was a teacher-led bullying incident of epic proportions,” Mell told KIRO 7.

Acting Superintendent Chuck Cuzzetto said he was horrified by what he saw in the video, but contends that while Rosi displayed “inappropriate classroom management,” it was an isolated incident in an 18-year career, and the district acted appropriately in disciplining Rosi.

“We took what we think is pretty significant disciplinary action against the teacher,” Cuzzetto told the station.

 

Click on the link to read Explaining the Colorado Movie Theater Shooting to Children

Click on the link to read Don’t Even Try to Huminise James Holmes

Click on the link to read How Can Facebook Allow James Holmes Tribute Pages?

Click on the link to read The Need to Blame Anything and Everything for the Colorado Shootings

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Posted in Bullying, Professional Conduct | 4 Comments »

An Educated Form of Graffiti

August 30, 2012

This could be the first word “arbitrary” has been used in an act of vandalism:

Victims of graffiti commonly find themselves painting over misspelled profanities or scrubbing out obscene drawings.

But when the residents of Northumberland Gardens woke to find their luxury cars had been vandalised, the tone was rather more – polite.

Words including ‘very silly’, ‘really wrong’ and ‘arbitrary’ had been scratched into the paintwork with a screwdriver.

Not that the choice of vocabulary will be much consolation. The late-night wrecking spree caused £20,000 damage to the 24 cars targeted in the affluent suburb of Jesmond, Newcastle.

Hours later, Professor Stephen Graham, 47, was arrested and questioned by police. An academic at Newcastle University, he lives in the next street from Northumberland Gardens, where most of the attacks were carried out.

Professor Graham, a graduate of Southampton University, is based at Newcastle University’s school of Architecture, Planning and Landscape, and specialises in the study of cities and society.

The author, editor or co-author of seven books, he  also looks at the sociology of technology, researching urban aspects of surveillance.

Click on the link to read Who Said Grammar Isn’t Important?

Click on the link to read Why Spelling is Important

Click on the link to read No Wonder Children Hate School

Click on the link to read the Lenient Punishments for Teachers Who Have Sex With Under-Aged Students

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Teachers Who Cheat are “as Dumb as Hell”

August 30, 2012

Maths teacher Shayla Smith is accused of providing the worst excuse for allegedly giving her students the answers on their state exams – they were “dumb as hell.”

Atlanta math teacher Shayla Smith is accused of giving students answers to state exams because they were “dumb as hell.”

A tribunal hired to investigate a widespread cheating scandal among Atlanta Public School teachers and administrators is recommending that the school board fire Smith by not renewing her contract. She was a fifth-grade teacher at Dobbs Elementary School, and is one of about 180 Atlanta educators accused of various improprieties related to the administration of state exams — including erasing wrong answers on students’ multiple choice exams and replacing them with correct ones.

Dobbs fourth grade teacher Schajuan Jones taught in a classroom across from Smith, the Atlanta Journal Constitution reports. Jones testified during the hearing that she had overheard Smith speaking with a teacher in the hallway about administering a test for her students.

“The words were, ‘I had to give your kids, or your students, the answers because they’re dumb as hell,'” Jones said.

 

Click on the link to read Standardized Tests for Teachers!

Click on the link to read Oops, We Seem to Have Lost Your Exams

Click on the link to read I’m Just Gonna Say It: Standardised Tests Suck!

Click on the link to read Too Many Tests, Not Enough Teaching

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Lenient Punishments for Teachers Who Have Sex With Under-Aged Students

August 29, 2012

I have argued, and will continue to argue that teachers who have sexual relations with their students should be sent to prison. It is a terrible breach of trust and must be stamped out.

But our courts don’t seem to want to deter teachers from committing this crime. Time and time again they give out nothing more than a slap on the wrist,

Take the case of a PE teacher who was unrepentant when found to have been involved with his 15-year old student. Did he get a prison sentence?

Nope.

What about the maximum suspension of 5 years?

Nope.

Why not?

The court ruled that he was provided with an “insufficient ethical training.“

A HIGH school physical education teacher who had an intense sexual relationship with a female student has received a softer punishment because of insufficient ethical training.

Queensland’s Civil and Administrative Tribunal has resisted imposing a full five-year suspension on Daniel Kyei, 25, despite the teacher expressing little remorse for the 19-month affair, which began with kissing and sexually charged text messages when the girl was only 15.

Mr Kyei admitted arranging sexual encounters with the girl around her 16th birthday in December 2010, which took place at the teacher’s home, at school during school hours, by webcam on the internet and at a park near Mr Kyei’s Brisbane home.

The Queensland College of Teachers lobbied the tribunal to impose a five-year suspension on the man, but the tribunal argued there were “mitigating factors” and suspended him for three years only.

“These include Mr Kyei’s youth and inexperience as a teacher combined with an apparent lack of practical support and ethical training provided to him, and his co-operation with . . . this disciplinary action,” the tribunal said on Monday.

“He has not expressed in his submissions to QCAT any remorse for the impact that his conduct may have had on (the student) or any regret over his conduct. However, in the course of interviews during the investigation . . . he acknowledged that his actions are ‘inexcusable’.”

Mr Kyei taught the girl in Year 9 in 2009 and Year 10 in 2010 at a Christian-affiliated school in suburban Brisbane.

This story makes me so angry!

 

Click on the link to read Child Commits Suicide Due to Alleged Systematic Bullying and Inept Teachers

Click on the link to read The Cure for Suicide Isn’t Another Educational Program 

Click on the link to read Sick Teachers Need to be Arrested not Fired!

 

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‘Educator of the Year’ isn’t Much of an Award

August 25, 2012

I can’t tell you the number of times an award winning teacher has been found to be a less than acceptable teacher:

Special education teacher Willie Swindle, named 2011 educator of the year in California’s North Bay school district, is still teaching in the same classroom following allegations that he physically struck students.

Michael Delgado is one of Swindle’s students at Santa Rosa High School. He tells KGO-TV that Swindle would take him into the hall for a “pow wow,” during which the 67-year-old teacher would use both hands to smack the teen’s ears with force.

Swindle is denying the allegations and calls them unfounded. When the district was pressed to look into the matter, witnesses said Swindle tickled students and would “flick,” “pinch” and “pull” Delgado’s ears.

The report notes, “One witness also reported seeing Mr. Swindle clap Michael on both cheeks with his open palms while they were standing facing each other in the classroom. … Michael said, ‘Ouch’, and then no more than five minutes later, Mr. Swindle came back to Michael from behind and slapped his cheeks again,” according to KGO-TV.

Click on the link to read The Daycare Centre With a Boxing Ring

Click on the link to read The Cure for Suicide Isn’t Another Educational Program 

Click on the link to read Sick Teachers Need to be Arrested not Fired!

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