Editorial: The war on young boys

Submitted by Mastodon on Sat, 2014-01-25 23:20

Article here. Excerpt:

'The Obama Administration, through Secretary of Education Arne Duncan and U S. Attorney general Eric Holder, have issued new guidelines designed to end or at least restrict "zero tolerance" disciplinary policies in schools.
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About every month some story surfaces in "The Week" or "Reason" magazines, detailing how some young child is tossed out of school for a minor offense. A kindergartener kisses a girl on the hand and gets disciplined for sex abuse. A plastic two-inch ultra-small toy gun in the paws of a stuffed bear gets the owning student punished. And so on.

Why have schools gone this way? Well, parents and administrators overreact and codes are drawn up that allow no wiggle room. It's like mandatory sentencing in courts. It mostly works, but not always. It used to be, a generation ago, that the teacher's word was law. Now, one of the staples, in many school districts, is the appeal of discipline to the school board. The board had better be "lawyered up" and better have a written policy covering the transgression.

But the Obama administration policy is designed to stop what they call the "school-to-prison" pipeline. The immediate target was to show concern about the high numbers of African-American students who get expelled. In Chicago, for example, African-American students make up 80 percent of all expulsions. That seems both incredible and unfair.
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Moreover, race is not the real key here. Gender is the key.

That's gender as in fathers and gender as in sons. Watch "Raising Cain."

In schools today, boys constitute two-thirds of "special education." A boy is five times as likely to be diagnosed as "hyperactive." A boy is 30 percent more likely to flunk out of school.

The Fatherhood Coalition says that a fatherless boy is 10 times more likely to wind up in the juvenile justice system. Ouch. And what happens when these boys with no men at home get into the public schools system? They enter an environment where 91 percent of the teachers are women. They only men they may see are often the janitors and the gym teachers.'

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When I was in one of the early grades, like 1-3, I took to drawing on one of the desks with my pencil. Well, this is of course a no-no, and for good reason. But I got caught, and it hadn't been my first time. Having Mrs. _____ tell me to stop wasn't working. And while she could have sent me to the principal, maybe she thought that was overkill. But maybe not; maybe she knew there was a more effective way to put the fear of God into me. See, the principal was an abstraction. I knew he existed somewhere, but I didn't know where, since I never saw him. This was because maybe he was usually busy dealing with kids who were being *really* bad in some way, or perhaps dealing with school business. Or maybe she knew he was out that day. But anyway, in my small K-3 school, we had teachers, a principal, and a F/T janitor. I don't recall his name but he was a quiet fellow who had his own "office": a room with a boiler in it, and a coffee-maker. At least it had a window. His Sceptre of Office was a broomstick. And while he was not an intimidating-looking man (well, in hindsight), I saw him around. I had never said anything to him before, but today would be the day: Mrs. _____ told me that since the janitor had to deal with problems like defaced furniture, I would have to go tell him personally what I had done, and apologize.

Nearly scared the $hit out of me. Apologizing to mom (Mrs. ____) was one thing, but going to tell dad (the janitor)? YIKES!!!

Eventually I did. I dodged him the first time, chickening out. But I screwed up my courage and went and confessed. He just nodded his head and went on about his business. Didn't need to say a word.

I never f*cking drew on another desk after that. Never. Not 'til this day. And I doubt I ever will. =)

Yeah, we could use more men in schools.

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Submitted by Matt on Sat, 2014-01-25 23:46