Jump to content

No "diversionary" program for a kindergartner with a finger


Euler

Recommended Posts

Insider

A Pennsylvania family is pleading with their school board to reconsider its policy on "threat assessments" for students, after their 6-year-old daughter with Down Syndrome was reported to police for pointing her finger like a gun.

 

Margot Gaines, a kindergartener at the Valley Forge Elementary School in Tredyffrin, Pennsylvania, made the gesture in November and told her teacher, "I shoot you," according to her mother, Maggie.

...

Maggie said the teacher perceived the response as a "threat" and brought Margot to the principal, who realized that Margot was no danger to the teacher or her classmates.

 

But instead of dropping the incident, the principal followed a school district policy requiring a "threat assessment" team to be convened and decide whether disciplinary action was warranted.

...

Maggie said school officials called the police department and provided authorities with the Gaines' personal information, as well as information on the incident. Maggie said in her statement that an officer told her the information would be entered into the department's database and would be publicly available.

 

"Because the school staff and administration chose to blindly follow this policy, an incident that resulted in no disciplinary action ... is part of her permanent school record," she said. "What's more, her personal information has also been recorded at our local police department, where it is noted, without any context to the situation or her disability that she 'threatened' her teacher. How or if this information will be used against her in the future, I can't say for certain."

...

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Not to change this stupid train wreck of thought by adults

But didn’t a kid get in trouble at school for making his pop tart in a L shape line a gun and got suspended

 

Why won’t adults who are supposed to be more mature and skater than small kids, why won’t they let them be kids and grow up

 

Because they are too many communists in the system pushing an agenda. I recall a time when principles in private schools had a paddle and the kids knew about it, don't want to get the paddle.... Don't ____ around. Now the schools call the SWAT team on a 6 year old child with down syndrome.

Yes, the pop tart case is real. ( I don't want to pick one stupid article about it, so here is a whole search engine worth of articles on it )

 

https://duckduckgo.com/?q=pop+tart+gun&t=ffab&ia=web

Link to comment
Share on other sites

If I was the cop who responded to this, the person reporting it would have been the one who got arrested (I would figure out some charge beside being stupid). If it was my kid, when I got done suing the teacher, the administrator, school board etc, I would OWN everything they own and would also get to tear up their credentials so they could never work in a school again.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

We spoke about this in class actually (I am an education major). I am not sure why this report differs from the other ones, but in the other reports the teacher said they never felt like there was a threat. Because of policy they had to report to administration, who then also felt like there was no threat but had to convene a safety committee, which involves the police, due to policy.

 

For what it’s worth, at least for my class, everybody thinks this is a terrible policy. My opinion is that this incident will harm the child more than it will help anybody.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Not that simple unfortunately.

 

At least in Illinois, law enforcement is now at the table with these threat assessment teams. It is a new mandate that says LEO is to be a member of the threat assessment team, and they are contacted at the very least, and notified of any identified/percieved threat. If no crime is committed, law enforcement may walk away from that table, but as pointed out in the article, they are going to typically generate a report about the incident as a means of cya. And just cause they walk away does not mean the student is not still evaluated or assessed in some form or capacity on the school side. The schools will basically force a threat assessment/evaluation or say no re-entry to school for the student. Each scenario is unique of course, but just in general, that is why LEO is going to be called on anything the threat assessment team might meet on, cause by default, LEO is a member of said team.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Archived

This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.

  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
×
×
  • Create New...