Student suspended, facing expulsion, for class assignment
SAD 40 to hold expulsion hearing Thursday
Updated 18 April 2005: School cancels expulsion hearing, allows student back after 2+ weeks of detention. Details at bottom of post.
A senior at Medomak Valley High School in Maine School Administrative District 40 did a class assignment too well. The assignment tasked the students to deliver a speech that would “generate attention by making strong points”.
Superintendent Pam Carnahan said the student, a senior, made references to the tragedy at Columbine High School and also described himself as a victim of bullying at the high school.
…
A substitute teacher in charge of the class that day reported the student’s comments to administrators the following day. The student has since been suspended, pending his expulsion hearing Thursday.
Be careful what you wish for. Or, more precisely, be careful what you order your students to do. They told this student to craft a speech that would gather attention by making strong points. He did exactly what they told him and they suspended him for it.
Perhaps there is time to explain the obvious to the school board members before they expel him.
MSAD 40 Board Members:
Craig Cooley
Beth Connor
Ann Donaldson
Daryl Essency
Mary Genthner
John Gibbons
John Lichtman
Bonnie Davis Micue
Stephen Nutter
Richard Pelkey
George Reule
Wesley Richardson
Cathy Trueman
Nancy Watson
Updated 18 April 2005
The quiet kid speaks: Suspended SAD 40 student tells his side
The parameters of the assignment were broad: Choose a topic and deliver a speech that gets people’s attention.
“We were supposed to make it interesting so people would listen to it,” said [Basil] Robinson.
Robinson, a soft-spoken and bearded young man, chose the topic of harassment. As the shy and quiet type, he felt bullied by other students at Medomak Valley, he said. To make his speech interesting, he decided to tackle the bullies head-on.
“I wrote down what I felt,” said Robinson. “I wanted to bring the point that people who are picked on could do something, if they wanted to.”
At one point a student asked him how many guns he had. He replied “I have seven. But it only takes just one”. Basil actually has no guns. His father does but Basil doesn’t have access to them.
So why did he say he owned seven guns?
“I was scared to death; I was shaking,” said Robinson. “I just wanted to get my speech over with.”
And about the comment that it only takes just one?
“That’s what happened in Columbine,” he said. “The kids didn’t each take 50 guns to school, they each had just one. I’m all about the facts.”
There is quite a bit of confusion over just what the contents of the speech were. He was not questioned about them until the next day and by then his terrier pups had destroyed his speaking notes. Basil says the second hand version recited by the principal is completely different from what he said.
Rumors flew around the school, Basil was suspended for two weeks and set to be expelled. Somewhere in the madness an administrator caught a clue and the expulsion hearing was canceled. It was quite a learning experience for Basil.
“I learned not to write down something I’m passionate about,” he said.
(Tip credit to Tori in Texas)
Gotta love it. Even when you do what they want, you end up wrong. It’s lose-lose. There’s absolutely no incentive to do well in schools like this.
Whet else can you say about this? The school administrators there are clearly idiots.
Talk about a “damned if you do, damned if you don’t” situation.
Morons.
Why does a substitute have this kind of influence? If the administrator has an ax to grind parents will not associate it with the school staff and the substitute is motivated by the hope of a permanent position. It’s a good way to recruit your own mean team.
It sounds to me like the substitute didn’t understand the assignment thoroughly, and overreacted accordingly. Hopefully, the teacher who made the assignment will help clean up the mess. I’m curious about what class this is for, and what the nature of the speech was.
As far as I can glean from the article, the student in question referenced Columbine and referred to himself as a victim. True, the young men and women who snap are often victims of bullying. However, this student does not appear to have made any violent threats.
This article demonstrates that the administration has failed to learn from Columbine. If a student feels victimized, give him support and counseling. Don’t make him a further victim of undue disciplinary action.
After the Columbine shootings, there have been many geeks and nerds who have been prosecuted because of their opinions of the incident. They have expressed their understanding of what the killers went through (years of bullying) and school administrators have taken their opinions and interpreted them as ‘threats’ and punished these ‘potential killers’, instead of actually talking to them and finding out why kids kill kids.
If you look at the Hellmouth articles on Slashdot.org, there are many stories of kids who said “I know how the Columbine killers felt” in school and were suspended or ordered into counseling because of these opinions. I am assuming this kid in Medomak said the same thing, and the administrators reacted in the same way I have described above.
In following up at the link for the original story, I found this telling remark:
During a question-and-answer session with classmates after the speech, the student was asked whether he had guns and he said he did have some at home.
So not only did the kid mention Columbine and bullying, but he admitted that (horrors!) he has guns at home. That alone was probably enough to twist the substitute’s panties up into a bunch!
The teacher that day was a substitute who did not report the incident that day. Carnahan said the substitute reported it to the school administration the next morning after giving the matter some thought overnight.
Well it seems pretty obvious to me that this student did not make any threats at all. If he had, I’m sure that the substitute would have been running to the school administration just as fast as she could, instead of waiting until the next day.
I’d love to actually read the kid’s essay.
Here is, purportedly (from the student’s step-father; I found it on another message board) the speech that was delivered:
“Look around! I guaranty that anywhere you go you will find shy timid individuals that are quiet and keep to their self’s. And I can also guaranty that there will be the Louder individuals that aren’t afraid to talk. These louder people pick on and torment these shyer people a lot. Just because they shy people cant or will not defend themselves. The louder people only pick on the quiet people because they are unsure about themselves and feel that they have to prove themselves to their friends. What kind of friend need you to prove anything to them? When these bullies pick and probe these quieter people the quieter people start building up the pain that the bullies are giving them. The shy people build it up until they cant take it anymore and may do something rash. They may do things like hurting someone or maybe even taking peoples lives. But most of these shy people will never ever do anything. They know that is it wrong. In the columbine people picked and tormented individuals just in the manner that happens everyday. But that person could not take it anymore. And this is very sad but true example of what may happen if bullying keeps going on. I am one of these shy and timid individuals. I have been a target of bullying for many years. Although I would never hurt anyone because I know that it is very wrong. So i must ask all of you…. just please stop.”
What a day. Two stories from two corners of the country of kids being abused by the government indoctronation system for doing nothing at all wrong. One did his assignment too well and one made it possible for himself and others to do research more effectivly. The administrators and responsible teachers should be fired and decertified to have any connection with children or hold a job with any more responsibility than a line manager at a fast food joint during slow hours. These fools will ruin a child’s life and future for a false sense of self satisfaction. No weapons. No fights. No threats, sex, drugs. Nothing at all, but two lives ruined.
I do hope these “educators,” and I use that term loosely, read this kid’s speech before they decide to expel him. If what this kid said is all he said, I’m sure he can win big bucks in a lawsuit.
I do a lot of googling for stories to submit to Jim, who in turn posts some of them to this site. I see a lot of stories about kids who get suspended/expelled, and sadly all to often, arrested because they “threaten”. I find fresh stories daily. I don’t send them on unless they show the kids’ side. Only about 5% do. The rest are things like “student arrested for making kill list”, “student arrested for threatening school (other student, teacher, principal, etc)., but they don’t quote what the kid said. I pulled my son out of public school just before he started 6th grade. He was SO unhappy in public school. Are any kids REALLY happy in public school? There are lots that adapt, certainly. One of my kids, my daughter, did make it through 12th grade. But it was a very high price. She now has drinking problems and suffers from depression. We put these kids in prison every day, when they have done nothing wrong. School administrators presume they are guilty of a crime, but have to take a HUGE stretch of the imagination to apply a crime to them (mints as lookalike drugs? scissors as deadly weapons?) I am just so, so, so sad that public schools have come to this.
Nice to see the speech.
Terrible grammar aside, what do you expect the sub to do, really?
The kid isn’t making any threats. In fact, he said fairly explicitly that he has no plans for violence… but that is a pretty serious speech right there. If that kid did snap, would this story come out in the wash? Where would the fingers be pointing then? Would everone be saying that the teacher should have notified the administration? Probably.
Perhaps we could assume that the teacher wasn’t on the warpath, but only that he/she was simple making a notification of a an issue that he/she felt was important enough that the administration should know about and that the administration is mishandling?
Common sense dictates that in this case, the school Psych doctor should sit down with the kid unobtrusivley and just talk with him and make an actual and real threat assesment and note it in the kid’s file.
If the kid ends up snapping and all hell breaks loose, this incident won’t matter, because the school has taken reasonable action and nobody is worse for the wear.
Damn… Garret for Dictator in 2008.
Reasonable action? Suspension and probable expulsion for asking bullies to knock it off is ‘reasonable’?
Garret, good point. The much bigger issue is kids need someone they can trust and turn to in a difficult world. I always thought teachers were there for me when I was a kid, and God knows I did more than my share of stupid things. I wouldn’t make a comment about the unethical use of aides and the manipulation of substitutes except I have personal knowledge of similar events. A system of evil depends on ignorance and a substitute was use to build false reports in my son’s records. My sister-in-law was a substitute who told me, I don’t know why I have to report a kid for a discipline infraction to get him help in reading. But she did get the kid ‘the help he needs’. I hear a lot of that from educators who justify ignoring kids being verbally or physically bullied; “Don’t you think it encourages children to be articulate if they are bullied by articulate children?” (this comment was made about 4 year olds and the community is about 50% foriegn).
If anyone had cared about the truth in my son’s records they would have questioned the source. She wanted a permanent position; she also built a record on a Cuban child each time he transposed the “SH” and “CH” sounds when he spoke.
I think only a small percentage of these stories ever make it to press. My son was removed from his program last week because he skipped class and walked the halls with a girl he likes. His teacher refused to report him so the administration forged the teacher’s signature on the report (although it doesn’t actually say signature). He’s been accepted to a number of colleges as a non-special ed student and we had hope that his tortuous and bumpy road would smooth out. His teachers have all come to his defense and several sent us emails offering to help. Their defense has allowed him to continue school locally. Our local district actually hung up on the day prison/school rep because they were obvious making no effort to indicate they had cause for the action. Right now he will be allowed to finish at the local school. I do appreciate that it is a rare case that anyone working in the school workers actually support these actions. Only school-wide discipline statistics would even make an administrator think they had any value at all. These are not bad people, just a bad policy.
I am afraid, I have been afraid for years and I have fought for years against the abuse of the system. I am sure children die and teachers loose their jobs. I can only tell my son an education is not the most important thing. The truth is important, people are important; the most important thing a teacher can to is teach people not to be bitter or hate when the battle is thick. I’m glad there are teachers who follow this forum.
Garrett, can you or anyone else cite a school shooting where the perpetrator exposed his plans in this supposed manner? Any cases of a kid caught while loading his guns for a rampage based on such a clue? I didn’t think so. It’s like Bill Cosby’s comparison of barking dogs and yelling mothers in whether you’re going to be bit or beat, or Wednesday Addams’ declaration in the movie that “I’m a psychopathic serial killer; we look just like everyone else.” - the reason these incidents happen is that the ones who give warnings NEVER are the ones who do this stuff, and the ones who do it, while they may be stark raving nuts, are not stupid enough to telegraph their intent. Every time they catch a serial killer, you see his neighbors on the 6:00 news, saying, he was just a normal guy.
I remember seeing a 6th grade classmate, whom was not a friend, get accused of breaking a school window during the lunch recess period. I and a friend had seen this individual sitting by himself next to our table in the cafeteria during the entire lunch period, reading, so we knew he wasn’t guilty. However, several “popular-types” claimed it was this person who “they saw” break the window. They didn’t like him, neither did I, but it was so grossly unfair that he was accused AND punished for something he didn’t do. When my friend went to the principal to defend the accused (we saw him the whole time, after all), the principal threatned my friend with punishment as an accomplice, the principal’s reasoning being “…for why else would anyone stick up for the accused unless they themselves were guilty with him?”. It was at this point in my life I began to distrust authority figures unless they earned my trust.
all i wanna do is see the essay!!!!!!!!!!!!!