Inept Principals

[charger_mike75]

..

[69_500]

Well haven't had any problems with a school as of yet for my son, being as he is only 4. But I do hear the same sorts of things from friends in this area about the schools around here. There are 2 boys that live about 4 house down the road from us, that are constantly playing in the neighborhood. Seems both parents were getting the same kinds of letters about their sons being bullies on the playground, and after months of notes it was finally told that they were playing tackle football during recess with each other. Same things they do in the neighborhood, but getting a letter sent home about it.

[resq302]

If that were me, I would talk to the board of education and file a complaint against the school as they do not seem to be protecting your son to their fullest extent with letting this bully continue in his actions.  What would happen if something bigger happend to your son?  Would they try to cover it up like they have been and put the blame on the victim?  The same thinag kinda happened to me in school and when my parents questioned what was happening, one of the teachers turned in my parents to DYFS (Div. of Youth and Family Services).  It was a complete and total retaliation against my parents.  I really do have to question the politics in schools today as I certainly see a misappropriation and misuse of school funding in my town.

[BigBlackDodge]

Never really seen the bully get beat up much...........they always delt out the punishment.



Makes me wonder if the other kid is some how related to the principal in some way..........friends kid, nephew...etc


BBD

[justin1987]

I would start taking photo's of your son's injuries and get a good lawyer and have a nice little chat with the school board.

[dkn1997]

I gotta agree that if your son is such a bully, how come he's coming home with the marks/bruises/scratches?  sounds like they are afraid to deal with this other kid. bypass this 3 stooges operation up at the school and go for this other boys parents.   If they won't listen to reason, I don't know what you can do.

I have 2 of my own, but no problems like this yet..I feel for you brother.  I cannot imagine how I would react seeing my son with bruises and stuff like that. just reading what you wrote makes me want to get in my car and find some bully's dad and beat the everloving snot out of him.

don't rest until this is resolved because it's hard to imagine this will fix itself.  good luck to you.

[2Gunz]

Never really seen the bully get beat up much...........they always delt out the punishment.



Makes me wonder if the other kid is some how related to the principal in some way..........friends kid, nephew...etc


BBD

I Agree.  If your sons the bully.... why is he taking the beating.


When I was a kid I had trouble with a teacher who would call me names.

And at one point he hit me with a ruler.

I ended up about suspended and having to go to a parent/teacher/principal conference.

My dad was kinda pissed at me because he had to take a day off from work.

But finally in the car I got up the courage to tell the full story and about the teacher hitting me.

That changed everything.

We showed up walked in the room..... my dad looked at the teacher and told him that if he hit be again
he would bust the Fu^&%$ ruler over his head. He then pointed at the principle and told him after that im
going to come looking for you. Then we walked out.

Things changed after that. I wasnt harrassed anymore by the teacher.

More importantly I gained alot of respect for my father.

And was more upfront about things even when I was in the wrong.
Because I knew he had my back reguardless.


I guess my point is...

Make sure your son knows you believe him and your on his side.

[68isgr8]

If that were me, I would talk to the board of education and file a complaint against the school as they do not seem to be protecting your son to their fullest extent with letting this bully continue in his actions.  What would happen if something bigger happend to your son?  Would they try to cover it up like they have been and put the blame on the victim? 

That's exactly my thoughts are and agree with resq302. Reading this is so disturbing. So sorry to hear your son has gone through this. My oldest son is 3 1/2 and will start preschool soon. He has a disability to where he is unable to talk and it worries me that his disablility will be taken advantaged of.
I would go above and beyond and get this settled ASAP.

[Old Moparz]

Just like in everyday life, there are going to be incompetent assholes in charge of things, even schools. Sometimes as a kid, I used to hear that you should respect your elders. I almost agree with that, but the way I see it, I grant "limited respect" to someone & wait until they show me that they are a decent enough human being to get "full respect" from me. (My 8 year old daughter will know this soon as well.) Same goes for teachers, principles, & any other person in the school system, including the maintenance staff.

In this day & age you almost have to start a legal trail from the beginning. By that I mean, put it in writing & send it certified mail requiring a signature. Don't make any threats, but express your concerns with how the problem has been mishandled & that you are not pleased. Something else that you should consider, is to contact your lawyer. Don't mention a word of your lawyer to the school or they will react to it as a threat & be defensive. Besides, if you do need to take legal action at some point, why give them a heads up?

Sadly, it's usually the first person that complains who gets the attention & is seen as the victim. If your son stayed quiet & only defended himself, but the other kid or his parents made a complaint, he is the one who will be labelled the bully who started it. That's even how a domestic dispute, or a fist fight at a bar is seen, & the police are forced to side with the first person who calls whether they started it or not. I'm not a lawyer or have a lot of legal knowledge, but I know enough that you must put things in writing.

Good luck with your son. 

[charger_mike75]

..

[41husk]

First let me say you have some valid points.  I teach high school self contained behavior disorder class and I see many parents that refuse to see that their child is in the wrong.  I am not saying you are your child are at fault.  I am just saying there is always another side of the story, and parents threats of litigation have tied the hands of many administrators.  I guess I am from the dark ages as well,  back in the day that the paddle was used, there was much less petty behavior problems.  All I am saying is gather all the facts before you act.  It may prevent further problems down the road.  Your main issue is the safety and well being of your child, and as long as you keep that your priority you won't go wrong.  Good luck!

[Dave22443]

Reading this kind of struck home with me.  I have a 6 year old son and an 11 year old daughter.  We are very fortunate to have a really good public school here where they are very strict.  My sons teacher uses colored cards.  Green for good, yellow for caution, red for bad and orange sends you to the office.  The kids know what it takes to turn the cards and they are more careful because of it.  Also, if they stay on green all week, they get a treat.

After the first few weeks of school, we started getting the "bad" notes home from the teacher.  So I acted quickly and went in to talk to her.  She was very understanding and explained that I shouldn't be too hard on him but that he seriously needed to calm down.  So now I've expanded on this and my son knows that if his card doesn't stay on green and he doesnt come home with the "good boy" stamp the teacher gives them at the end of the day, then he gets the paddle when he gets home.  Needless to say, this corrected the problems in short order.

My daughter on the other hand is very quiet and gets along with everyone.  A few weeks ago, I could tell something was bothering her when I picked her up from school.  After pressing her about it, she finally admitted in private that there was a boy at school that was making her feel uncomfortable.  Without going into detail here, it was pretty obvious that she was the victom of sexual harrassment.  I took off work the next morning and personally carried my daughter to school.  Once there, we went straight to the principals office where I requested a private conference.

I allowed my daughter to explain what had happened and immediate action was taken.  The boys parents were called in seperately, advised of the complaint and the boy was sent home for the day.  Then, when it happened again a couple of days later, my daughter did as she was told and immediately reported it to her teacher.  By the time I got to the school the boy was sitting in a small room by himself waiting for his parents to pick him up for his 2 days suspension.  The principal then advised me that he would request the police if I desired to press charges against him.  I declined since the boy was only 11 years old but asked the principal to advise the boys parents that should another instance happen, I would indeed be pressing charges.  That was almost three weeks ago and so far, so good.

It never would have occured to me that charges could be pressed against children like that, but apparently they can and they are serious.  What your son is going through is nothing short of assualt and battery.  So if you feel compelled to press things further, it sounds like you have a case for legal action.

Good luck. And please let us know how it turns out.

[Shakey]

I'm so hot under the collar right now it's not funny. But I just have to vent about this anyway. My son started kindergarten this year and from the first week of school he has had little disciplinary notes sent home for one thing or another. We deal with each situation one at a time by talking to our son about how he's not supposed to do this or that and it would be resolved. for the most part. Most of the problems he was having was with one kid in particular. My son was starting to come home with bruises and cuts. Before christmas vacation started he came home with fingernail gouges in his face.  We were constantly getting notes about our son's misbehavior but no explanation for his injuries other than he plays hard on the playground. By the time we got to the gouges on his face it was kinda clear to me that something wasn't right. After christmas break the notes home were more frequent. It was starting to sound like there was a lack of discipline at the school. Notes were sent back and forth from us to the teacher as well as a parent teacher conference was made. Yet things seemed to get worse. Essentially the school was trying to tell me that my son was a bully and a trouble maker. ?  Anyway I start getting my son's side of the story on this stuff and turns out over half of the situations were a result of self defense. The situations got worse untill yesterday we're called by the principal to come get our son because he was being suspended for a few days for scratching another kid. My wife who took the call asked the guy who the other kid was and he claimed he didn't know who it was, it was just a boy he had only seen a couple of times. My wife also asked him if our son was hurt in any way and he told her that he wasn't.
We got there to pick up our son from the office only to see his face is marked up, cheek was swolen and scratched as well as his left eye was swolen too. We asked him there what happened and he told us that the same kid he'd had problems with before had kicked him in the head, twice before he scratched the other kid. I forgot to mention the receptionist was the one who told us who the other kid was. Anyway we had more questions at this point so we waited for the principal to return to the office. The principal finally came back to the office and we went in to talk to this guy.  Well to say the least it was not a pleasant experience. The guy would not answer simple questions that we had, he couldn't because he failed to even bother getting our son's side of the story, he also kept trying to change the subject constantly towards the other kid which is where it went downhill off the cliff. He said he just didn't know what else to do about our son which was why he was being suspended. We asked what methods of punishment he used in dealing with this stuff and he wouldn't answer. So we asked if he made our son stand in the corner or miss recess and he said yes, I asked how long he does this and he says "for days" In the next breath contradicts himself by saying that he has recess duty everyday and tells us our son is a bully on the playground. The kid can't be in two places at once. Anyhow at this point I'm getting flashbacks of watching liberal democrats on t.v. dodging the points and not listening to anything we had to say much less take the suggestion that he might just hafta break out the old paddle, that's what we signed the waiver for. We pointed that out to him and he decided that my wife and i were medievel in our parenting and that we needed to leave. I didn't realize the middle ages were the 1980's
Needless to say we asked our son if the principal made him stand in the corner or miss recess and the answer was no to both. Not to mention the school had no one supervising the kids at the time of the incident, add that to the fact that the principal does not discipline the kids in any way at all accept to just "talk" to them It's no wonder there's chaos at the school. I know my son better than my wife even because I've spent more time with him, I can vouch for the fact that my kid plays well with others.  Anyway thanks for letting me rant, anyone else have issues with their school?

With all due respect, why did you not visit the school after the first note was sent home?

Personally, I feel situations like this need to be dealt with swiftly with face-to-face meetings, not notes being sent back and forth.

I'd consider another school as there are two good reasons fro leaving - a bully that seems to thrive on picking on your son and a dufus principal that is either so stupid, he can't see the forest for the trees of he himself seems to be afraid of the bully as well.

[Shakey]

I would start taking photo's of your son's injuries and get a good lawyer and have a nice little chat with the school board.

What's the lawyer gonna do?   

[Shakey]

I gotta agree that if your son is such a bully, how come he's coming home with the marks/bruises/scratches?  sounds like they are afraid to deal with this other kid. bypass this 3 stooges operation up at the school and go for this other boys parents.   If they won't listen to reason, I don't know what you can do.

I have 2 of my own, but no problems like this yet..I feel for you brother.  I cannot imagine how I would react seeing my son with bruises and stuff like that. just reading what you wrote makes me want to get in my car and find some bully's dad and beat the everloving snot out of him.

don't rest until this is resolved because it's hard to imagine this will fix itself.  good luck to you.

just reading what you wrote makes me want to get in my car and find some bully's dad and beat the everloving snot out of him.

Wouldn't that make you the bully? 

[skip68]

Be very carefull who you let spank your child.  In this day and age it is a bad idea to let anyone touch your children.  I can email you pics of something that happened to our son in TN.    We had some problems with him in school and my wife gave them permission to spank him thinking a SWAT on the butt may help.    Things went wrong and he got marks up his rib's, back and arms.    If I had done this I would be in jail so I wanted the same for them.  There are people in this world that you think would never hurt a child but they do.     As a parent it is your duty to protect your children. We tell our children that NO ONE is to ever touch them, we are your parents and only mommy & daddy or grandma & grandpa can spank you .  My wife will never make this mistake again nor will the principle and Mr. Woodard, The helper in this attack on my son.  I'm not going to tell all of the story other than the school district said it was an accident and things got out of control.  Good luck with them and keep your cool.  Take pictures and notes and try to get in touch with the other parents as you may need them to be friendly combatants.    Chuck..........

[charger_mike75]

..

[dkn1997]

I gotta agree that if your son is such a bully, how come he's coming home with the marks/bruises/scratches?  sounds like they are afraid to deal with this other kid. bypass this 3 stooges operation up at the school and go for this other boys parents.   If they won't listen to reason, I don't know what you can do.

I have 2 of my own, but no problems like this yet..I feel for you brother.  I cannot imagine how I would react seeing my son with bruises and stuff like that. just reading what you wrote makes me want to get in my car and find some bully's dad and beat the everloving snot out of him.

don't rest until this is resolved because it's hard to imagine this will fix itself.  good luck to you.

just reading what you wrote makes me want to get in my car and find some bully's dad and beat the everloving snot out of him.

Wouldn't that make you the bully? 

never said I would do that.  getting angry reading a story like this does not make me a bully. 

[superduperbee]

I would start taking photo's of your son's injuries and get a good lawyer and have a nice little chat with the school board.

What's the lawyer gonna do?   

Rip the school district a new a$$ hole.