An E-mail Conversation
This is an exerpt from an e-mail about child-related issues (specifically abuse) that I recieved:
"Right now, my school is under investigation by the Welfare Dept because I asked a teacher to come into school clean, on time, and prepared to teach, and she quit and then called the Welfare Dept and made erroneous complaints. Should this be allowed? Using the state as a means to take revenge on a former employee is a class A misdemeanor. Is there a balance there someplace?"
My response:
"I am terribly sorry that your school is under investigation by the Welfare Dept. Interestingly that situation is similar to a discussion in a class I just finished at school. It sounds almost like the concern of a false accusation of rape. There is really no easy way to verify that it is false and once the accusation is made much of the damage is done -- even if it is shown to be false later. Just as with the rape situation, however, it is scary to make the reporting more difficult because in actual instances of abuse (or rape), it is important to have reporting taken seriously. Really it is a lose-lose situation."
"Right now, my school is under investigation by the Welfare Dept because I asked a teacher to come into school clean, on time, and prepared to teach, and she quit and then called the Welfare Dept and made erroneous complaints. Should this be allowed? Using the state as a means to take revenge on a former employee is a class A misdemeanor. Is there a balance there someplace?"
My response:
"I am terribly sorry that your school is under investigation by the Welfare Dept. Interestingly that situation is similar to a discussion in a class I just finished at school. It sounds almost like the concern of a false accusation of rape. There is really no easy way to verify that it is false and once the accusation is made much of the damage is done -- even if it is shown to be false later. Just as with the rape situation, however, it is scary to make the reporting more difficult because in actual instances of abuse (or rape), it is important to have reporting taken seriously. Really it is a lose-lose situation."
posted by eponcz at 2:01 PM
1 Comments:
My school is the one mentioned on Elisa's blog. Since we wrote, our school has been cleared of all charges, and the case worker said, "You have a wonderful place and you do a job much needed in the city."
We take a lot of kids who other places wouldn't touch. It's a battle every day.
Here's a question to ponder: How much disruption should well behaved children have to suffer at the hands of poorly behaved children? If a teacher by law cannot say "no" to a child, put a child in time out, what does that mean for the child who is beautifully behaved and trying to learn? Who has the rights?
Judy
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