What You Tolerate You Encourage(3/30/2014)

The Philadelphia Daily News recently reported some disturbing incidents that took place at Bartram High School.  A conflict-resolution specialist suffered a fractured skull and was knocked unconscious after a student grabbed him by the arm and pushed him into a wall after a verbal dispute.  Bartram also had an occurrence where a teacher was injured by a book that was thrown by a student.   

According to the Philadelphia Inquirer, an incident of "forced oral sex" occurred in October. Through December, Bartram had nine assaults on students. One teacher reports the need to keep his classroom door locked to keep those roaming the halls from barging into his class. Another staff member reported that a school police officer was assaulted and his badge snatched by a student. Many Bartram students are late for school and come to class whenever they please.

Several weeks ago teachers throughout the Philadelphia School District have complained of similar incidents.   These situations have been reported by teachers referring to a column titled, District orders school police to stay out of level 1 offenses.  This article appeared on the “thenotebook” website (http://thenotebook.org/blog/147042/district-orders-school-police-stay-out-level-1-offenses).   Following are some examples of what teachers are describing:

• "I had kids play music through speakers in class and not stop.”
• “The student is walking around my class, refusing to sit down. He is cursing me out and yelling as I attempt to teach. He starts banging on the walls. He refuses to leave.”
• “I had been punched, slapped, kicked, bitten and (far too frequently) threatened.”
• “The last time I assisted in trying to remove TRUANT students from the halls, they decided to run me over and nearly dislocated my shoulder so there is NO WAY I will be dealing with that scenario again!”
• “Students roaming the halls.”

Many blame these episodes on staffing cuts - Bull!  The high school that I attended had one person in charge of discipline and that was not his only function.  He would check the halls randomly and if a student was caught out of the classroom without a hall pass that student was issued a demerit.  Demerits were used to discipline students and our school never had the problems that are described above.  A demerit system should be implemented in every school.

Students should be issued demerits based on the level of infraction.  One demerit should be issued for a minor infraction while major infractions would incur 5 demerits.  Students committing sever infractions should be issued 10 demerits.  A total of 5 demerits warrant an in-school detention.  If a student accumulates more than 20 demerits they are expelled from school.  Essentially a student would have served at least 4 detentions before they were expelled. 

Detentions are for 2 days and are 2 hours long. They should be served after school.  If the student is well behaved during the first day of detention he/she is excused from the second day of detention.  However, if the student misbehaves during the second day of detention or does not attend a detention he/she is issued a Saturday detention.  Misbehavior for a Saturday detention yields an expulsion.  Detention is a punishment.  Students can bring school work or sit quietly.  Any other actions during detention should not be tolerated.

An expelled student is transferred to another school.  If he/she is well behaved they are eligible to return to their original school the following year.  If they are expelled from the new school they are required to stay home for the entire school year under the supervision of their parent/guardian.  That means that if he/she is expelled in September he/she will not be able to return until the following school year and must repeat the grade.  If a student voluntarily transfers to a different school during the school year, their demerits transfer with them.

The demerit system should be enforced starting from day 1 until and including the last day of school.  If the school year ends and the student has a balance of 10 demerits he/she will be issued a summertime detention.  These detentions will last for one week.  Failure to attend prevents the student from being promoted to the next grade or graduating.   All school staff members whether they are secretaries, cafeteria workers, or school maintenance, should be able to issue demerits.  An individual staff member should be limited to 10 demerits for a particular student.  Up to 5 demerits could be vetoed by the principal’s office.  

It’s time to put some “teeth” in the schools disciplinary process.  If that means that we have a 40 year old sitting in a 9^th grade class then so be it.

It is appalling that students are using drugs in school buildings.  Lockers should be randomly checked.  Any drug paraphernalia found, should be reported to the police department.  By mid-year it is usually known who the school trouble makers are.  Their lockers should be inspected frequently.

Each school should dedicate one of their vice principals to school discipline.  An extracurricular job (EC) should be created to staff school detentions.  Funding should not be an issue.  If there’s money for athletics and other after school activities then funds should be available for safe schools.

I paid a recent visit to my old high school.  Hanging above the principal’s office was a sign that read, “What you tolerate you encourage”.  We can take these measures to put discipline back in our schools or we can build more prisons.  Pay now or pay later.