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Well, I seem to be at wits end right now and need some advice. Maybe some of you parents out there have been in my position and can help me out.
Situation: my 10 year old has been getting picked on at school and it has escalated into verbal name calling and threats. It has been going on now for about 4 months and this has been brought to the teachers and schools attention and the other student has been talked to by the asst. principal, teacher(s), and the school counselor at various times.
The counselor told my son he needs to stick up for himself without being a tattle-tale and I asked the asst. principal what is their (schools) definition of my son sticking up for himself, was it to ignore the other student, lower his standards down and return the name calling and threats, or was he to finally use physical assertiveness.
It reached a point last week where my straight A son told me he no longer wishes to go to school and doesn't understand why the adults will not help him. I immediately set up a meeting with the asst. principal and she then did an in house one day suspension for the other student.
What gets me is all the students and at least one parent of each student must sign a "contract" out of the student handbook to not participate in bullying. I even said to the asst. principal that they have all this visual aids (bullying section on their online website, and posters all over the school about respect and bullying) out there for the community but they do not take it seriously. I was told that the other student does not have a father figure. I told them that as sad as this is, this does not give the other student an excuse to behave like this. I also said to the asst. Principal that I am not a difficult parent to get along with at all but I will hold the school to the standards that they set and will expect them to maintain those standards through out the school year.
I said that if this is not taken care of, I will request a meeting with the school superintendant and have him explain to me why they will not handle the problem. I even asked that the two kids be separated but they do not feel that would help the situation. I also asked for a group meeting with both parents of the students, the principal, asst. principal and the school counselor but they said they feel that would not foster a good environment. I must confess that I am physically imposing at 6’2” and 265 lbs. very muscular with a shaved head and a goatee minus the mustache. I think what really floored the counselor was after meeting me he could not get over the fact that I hold a masters degree in engineering and in fact, I am one of the senior aerospace engineers at work.
I even thought about having an attorney draft up a letter and have it delivered to the school but that may be overkill at this point. GOSH! if only I could change bodies with my son for one day!!!! LOL
So, like I said, the other student still is calling names and is trying to get my son into a physical confrontation. Luckily for me my son walks away and gets the teacher but I do not know for how long he will do that until he takes matters into his own hands.
If you have read everything up to this point, thank you for your time, I need help........PLEASE!
I would start documenting every altercation your son has with this bully and the times you have gone in and talked with the pricipal and the asst. principal and bring it to the attention of the superintendant. If nothing comes from that I would go to the police dept. and file a complaint against the bully and possibly get a restraining order against him. Because of the various shootings that have taken place at various schools, schools are now supposed to have a zero tolerance for bullying. If the school is doing nothing about it I'm sure the police dept. would love to hear about it, becaue I'm sure they do not want to have to respond to a shooting in their town because the school failed someone.
It reached a point last week where my straight A son told me he no longer wishes to go to school and doesn't understand why the adults will not help him. I immediately set up a meeting with the asst. principal and she then did an in house one day suspension for the other student.
What gets me is all the students and at least one parent of each student must sign a "contract" out of the student handbook to not participate in bullying. I even said to the asst. principal that they have all this visual aids (bullying section on their online website, and posters all over the school about respect and bullying) out there for the community but they do not take it seriously. I was told that the other student does not have a father figure. I told them that as sad as this is, this does not give the other student an excuse to behave like this. I also said to the asst. Principal that I am not a difficult parent to get along with at all but I will hold the school to the standards that they set and will expect them to maintain those standards through out the school year.
I even thought about having an attorney draft up a letter and have it delivered to the school but that may be overkill at this point. GOSH! if only I could change bodies with my son for one day!!!! LOL
If you have read everything up to this point, thank you for your time, I need help........PLEASE!
Up until this year my oldest daughter has had all sorts of problems at school. Verbally mostly. Finally, last year I was at my wits ends after being called to the Principals office 9 or 10 times in the same year. I called my lawyer and asked him what to do. He says "You are chewing on the wrong end of the cow. Start at the TOP and go down, instead of the Principal and work up." The last time I was there, I had a letter ready for the Principal. I also dropped one off at the Superintendents office. I called EVERY member of the school board and mailed them a certified letter also. I cc'ed it to my lawyer (who everyone knows in this little rural area) and to the state Superintendent. Basically, I said you have a bullying policy in the handbook on page # 15. I WANT IT ENFORCED NOW!!!!! Not later. NOW. I do not want to hear Kids will be Kids, BLAH BLAH BLAH. That isn't helping my child. She is scared to come to school. The adults around her who are SUPPOSED to be protecting her are NOT. They are failing in their jobs. They are letting her down through not protecting her. She maybe at fault partially, granted. I never said she was totally innocent nor will I ever. BUT. I do not agree that she should be physically and verbally taunted in every class, in the hallway, after class, on the bus, and basically anywhere else they can find her without an adult standing RIGHT OVER HER and sometimes with an adult watching. All they have to do is MAKE IT CLEAR this type of behavior will not be tolerated by anyone, to anyone. Enforce it. If you see it, stop it. It is the responsibility of every employee of the school system to enforce this policy. As an adult, it is YOUR responsibility.
Our school system has been sued before and probably will again. Hopefully not by me. But they are on notice that I am at the end of my rope. There isn't a knot.
I haven't had any more calls. I haven't been down there at all this whole year and from what I am hearing, things have changed somehow..
Don't get me wrong. Before I wrote that letter, I put both my girls in Tae Kwon Do. It didn't seem to help much. I have had talks with both of them about standing up for themselves. All it takes is ONE bully getting whipped. The rest are usually on notice. I told them to do it. When they push you, push back. Do not take their crap. Well, they wouldn't do it. The rules are stacked against you in our school system. One fight and basically you are on ISS for 5 weeks. So the kid that is picked on who WANTS to stay in school is afraid to fight back. I told them if you get suspended you can sit home and eat ice cream for 2 weeks or however long.
Now the different story is my youngest daughter. She rarely had any problem and the one she did have she handled. She is GOOD at Tae Kwon Do. She round-housed him, dislocated his jaw, bloodied his face all up. No one bothers her now. At all.
Tell your son he has three choices: 1. walk away (which is what it sounds like he's doing, which is great), 2. speak up and tell the kid to cut it out (this can be done in a funny way - comedy is a great way to diffuse bullying), or 3. tell an adult.
It is important for kids to learn to stand on their own two feet. Bullies seek out those kids who make it easy for them to pick on... or who react in a way that feeds their need for control and attention. There are some great books on bullying that teach how to "bully-proof" your child. You can go to the library and ask the librarian for some good recommendations.
Also - in the past, when it first began happening (we have two boys and they each at different times have faced similar situations with bullies) I went up to the school and observed. This requires a good relationship, though, between you and the teacher... I have always made sure to get on the teacher's "good side" so that when things come up like this they are willing to work with me. Anyway - I spent a lot of time in the classrooms volunteering, so I knew these kids that were "bullies" BUT WHEN I was there they didn't try to pull anything. I worked it out with the teacher so that I could observe from a distance - watching at recess, watching at lunch, to see if I could spot any of the bullying behaviors going on. This helps to see first-hand what your child is having to deal with. Otherwise, it's just your child's word against the other kids. Sometimes kids say crazy stuff!
Local police departments and fire departments, too, sometimes have camps and workshops to help kids learn to deal with bullies. Maybe you could even talk to the school about inviting a police officer or someone to come talk to the class about bullying?
Sometimes kids just need to be told that their behavior is inappropriate. They see all kind of negative behavior on the sports fields and watching sports games and those wrestling shows and whatnot. The bad influences are everywhere. We need to teach our kids that those behaviors are NOT OK even though we see adults doing them on TV or in the movies or whatever. We also need to teach them how to tell their friends or other kids at school to not behave that way around them. My youngest son is 9, and he's only recently been able to build up the courage to say "Come on guys, let's cut it out before we all get into trouble!" I've heard him use this several times and it seems to redirect and help the situation. In their class, bad behavior gets them a "yellow card", so kids often will also say "Stop! Or we're going to get a yellow!" Teach your son to say "Stop!" With his hands up and MEAN it. That sometimes works, too.
Thats a hard one. I don't tolerate it and its hard for me as a parent not to want to protect my kid and get physical, but that would get me in jail. I agrtee with what Haggard (above) said with the choices. Also teach your kids to stand up for themselves and that self-defense is okay (even if you get in trouble of it, its never good to be a pushover).
Well, I seem to be at wits end right now and need some advice. Maybe some of you parents out there have been in my position and can help me out.
Situation: my 10 year old has been getting picked on at school and it has escalated into verbal name calling and threats. It has been going on now for about 4 months and this has been brought to the teachers and schools attention and the other student has been talked to by the asst. principal, teacher(s), and the school counselor at various times.
The counselor told my son he needs to stick up for himself without being a tattle-tale and I asked the asst. principal what is their (schools) definition of my son sticking up for himself, was it to ignore the other student, lower his standards down and return the name calling and threats, or was he to finally use physical assertiveness.
It reached a point last week where my straight A son told me he no longer wishes to go to school and doesn't understand why the adults will not help him. I immediately set up a meeting with the asst. principal and she then did an in house one day suspension for the other student.
What gets me is all the students and at least one parent of each student must sign a "contract" out of the student handbook to not participate in bullying. I even said to the asst. principal that they have all this visual aids (bullying section on their online website, and posters all over the school about respect and bullying) out there for the community but they do not take it seriously. I was told that the other student does not have a father figure. I told them that as sad as this is, this does not give the other student an excuse to behave like this. I also said to the asst. Principal that I am not a difficult parent to get along with at all but I will hold the school to the standards that they set and will expect them to maintain those standards through out the school year.
I said that if this is not taken care of, I will request a meeting with the school superintendant and have him explain to me why they will not handle the problem. I even asked that the two kids be separated but they do not feel that would help the situation. I also asked for a group meeting with both parents of the students, the principal, asst. principal and the school counselor but they said they feel that would not foster a good environment. I must confess that I am physically imposing at 6’2” and 265 lbs. very muscular with a shaved head and a goatee minus the mustache. I think what really floored the counselor was after meeting me he could not get over the fact that I hold a masters degree in engineering and in fact, I am one of the senior aerospace engineers at work.
I even thought about having an attorney draft up a letter and have it delivered to the school but that may be overkill at this point. GOSH! if only I could change bodies with my son for one day!!!! LOL
So, like I said, the other student still is calling names and is trying to get my son into a physical confrontation. Luckily for me my son walks away and gets the teacher but I do not know for how long he will do that until he takes matters into his own hands.
If you have read everything up to this point, thank you for your time, I need help........PLEASE!
Two things....have an attorney send a letter to the school putting them on notice and teach your son how to fight...I don't believe in kids fighting but sometimes ya just gotta do what ya gotta do..
When I was your kids age I was the small kid in school and I was bullied until one day I started kicking a little butt..funny how the bulling stopped..
Two things....have an attorney send a letter to the school putting them on notice and teach your son how to fight...I don't believe in kids fighting but sometimes ya just gotta do what ya gotta do..
When I was your kids age I was the small kid in school and I was bullied until one day I started kicking a little butt..funny how the bulling stopped..
I didn't want to encourage that, but sometimes standing up to the bully tends to scare them off as they aren't expecting that. Bullies tend to be cowards that are trying to make themselves feel better about themselves. If your not easy game they'll go somewhere else.
I used to get picked on in grade school because I was small, too. But when I filled out in my teens and started going to the gym and got in afew people's faces, they tended to back down and life got better, confidence went up, girls seemed to notice me more. Sometimes you only have to "act" upset and ticked off at the bully to scare them off. I once acted like I was gonna kick this guy's butt for just walking into our dorm room all the time without knocking and helping himself to our food. I wasn't really THAT angry, but he bought it and it took that level to get him to stop doing it. Hey, whatever it takes. When my roomate saw me smiling right after that, he knew I'd been acting, laughed and called me crazy. lol
I didn't want to encourage fighting, though, but it is true that that is sometimes what it takes unfortunatly. Whether its physical or just a nose-to-nose shouting match.
Last edited by Jackyfrost01; 04-02-2009 at 03:18 PM..
That is a frustrating thing to deal with, isn't it? I have always told my son, who is now almost 12, to first try to ignore it and walk away, or tell him to knock it off (or whatever needs to be said - without calling names), and then if all else fails, confront him and say something like "Do you really want to fight me, you know we will both get in alot of trouble, is it worth it?".
Not that it always turns out this way, but my son actually had an experience with this last week. There had been a kid calling him names and saying he would beat him up for awhile (I didn't find out until last week). My son had been trying the first two options to no avail, so last week when the kid started his crap, my son said "Since you want to fight so bad, let's just get it done!" The other boy backed down and walked away, and now won't even look at my son! Some kids think they can intimidate others with their talk, it's all a tough act. I am glad that my son didn't have to fight, because I try to stress that fighting is not the way to handle things, but I also understand that you can't be a push over.
Now the different story is my youngest daughter. She rarely had any problem and the one she did have she handled. She is GOOD at Tae Kwon Do. She round-housed him, dislocated his jaw, bloodied his face all up. No one bothers her now. At all.
My ten year old daughter is a gymnast, and all anyone has to do is look at the muscles in her arms - - no one messes with her!
I agree with the poster who suggested documenting all of the incidents, your attempts to get the school to respond, and their lack thereof. Reconstruct what you can from the past and then put it together in written form. I also agree that you seem to have done what you can at the school level and it may be time to "up the ante." I would suggest writing a letter to the County (find out who the appropriate person is) briefly outlining the problem in factual language. CC the principal on the letter and have it delivered to both the County and your child's school via certified mail, return receipt requested. I would ask for the opportunity to meet face-to-face with the appropriate person at the County to get clarification on the bullying policy, as well as the steps that administration is supposed to be taking in order to prevent and stop bullying. It sounds like it might be time to make a nuisance of yourself. Unfortunately, that is often what's needed in a public school setting (not a slam against public schools, just my experience) in order to make changes happen. If you have a lawyer, cc him on it too.
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? I have always told my son, who is now almost 12, to first try to ignore it and walk away, or tell him to knock it off (or whatever needs to be said - without calling names), and then if all else fails, confront him and say something like "Do you really want to fight me, you know we will both get in alot of trouble, is it worth it?". 
!
