Posted on 11/12/2004 8:53:47 PM PST by BattleBorn
An 11-year-old girl in West Covina, Calif., was suspended from her school from doing "dangerous" cartwheels and hand stands during lunch time, according to a Local 6 News report.
Deirdre Faegre, who is a Student of the Month at San Jose-Edison Academy in West Covina was dismissed from the school this week after school authorities warned her for the last time to stop doing gymnastic stunts during lunchtime.
(Excerpt) Read more at local6.com ...
Also, I hate when educators find an excuse to stop educating.
This is terrible! I think the government should start giving away free cartwheel locks to every parent with a child of tumbling age.
What do they do in gym class these days, other then pole dancing?
this was posted earlier... turned into a 500 post thread about homeschool...
I did a search, could not find anything on it.
Heard about this on Rush. The safety Nazis are at it again.
WTF??????????? Another PC insanity. How can a cartwheel be dangerous? Who does it harm?
I hate it when kids in school repeatedly disobey teachers. She was asked to stop her behaviour on a number of occasions.
I did a search on the word "suspended":
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1278044/posts
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1278515/posts
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1278555/posts
A cartwheel in a school lunchroom could be harmful, if you are a kid walking with a tray to eat lunch, and you get kicked in the head by a show-off.
If she wanted to cartwheel, surely there's a playground?
At my kids school they are not allowed to RUN on the playground. It's fear of lawsuits.
When she gets hurt and her parents' scum-waffle lawyer sues the school system for $100 million, courtesy of the taxpayers.
There's more to this entire story than meets the eye, if you ask me.
Regardless the child was asked repeatedly to stop.
I was educated by Irish Catholic nuns...when they told you to stop...you stopped.
Period!
Thanks for the search info.
I was educated with folks who had common sense. If you weren't hurting anyone, the teachers had better things to do with their time. This smells like a teacher who had a beef with the kid or the kid's parent.
Funny it smells to me a child who may possibly have problems with discipline.
Anybody can sue anther person for anything at anytime. So think of another reason.
Yeah. I've been following this on the other thread. This girl didn't stop as she was told. She should have quit while appealing this rule.
Maybe she wants to be a gymnast. It is during lunch, while other kids are playing. I don't get why she was singled out and told to stop playing. If all of the kids were told to stop doing their activity, I could understand it.
This is insane. Our educational system has sunk to yet a new low.
Neither is it conservative, to make a decision without FULL facts.
Personally, I don't think this is a case where Little Miss Gymnast was innocently cart-wheeling and then got slapped with a suspension out of the blue.
I don't need to. I strongly suspect that the reason the girl was suspended was 1) ignoring repeated requests to stop due to 2) fear of liability.
Don't think for one minute that had that child injured herself, the parents wouldn't be filing a lawsuit. If anyone can sue another person for anything at any time, as you say, the school did the right thing.
The kid got what she deserved. And the taxpayers will be breathe a sigh of relief.
Me too. But I was that bratty little kid with the grin on his face that they couldn't rub off. I tormented them for eight years, and they tormented me. At the end it was a draw. But I know deep down that I got to them. Not many did.
"I strongly suspect that the reason the girl was suspended was 1) ignoring repeated requests to stop due to 2) fear of liability."
1. Unless there was a rule against doing gymnastics on the playground at lunch, the teacher had no authority to tell her to stop. I'm all for making the kids obey the rules and enforcing discipline in school but we should not be training them to be mindless automatons.
2. If we live by that theory, the kids will never be allowed to walk around.
I think the place was a playground, not a cafeteria. I think there is a big difference between a playground and a cafeteria. Children play on the playground.
I agree that this rule is insane. But the only problem I have with the whole thing is that the girl did not listen to the rules she was warned to follow.
As an adult, it is appropriate to break the rules to get things done as long as you are willing to face the consequences. I teach my son, though, to follow all rules, (unless he would be endangered, such as fighting back) and if he has a problem with the rules, to tell me and if reasonable I will talk to the school about it. I doubt that I would defend him if he disobeyed school officials, but I would take issue with the rule itself if it was as ridiculous as this. I do not want him to think that I will be there for him whenever he decides to break the rules.
My comments:
1.- I think kids have to be kids. They should be allow to run (like the ones who were playing basketball) and do gymnastics outside during their brake. Come on!, who never broke a bone as a child?.
2.- I also think kids have to learn to be obedient.
3.- I also think that the adults have to be consistent and reasonable when imposing a rule on a kid. My child is 2 years old, and I already tell him reasons why he must or mustn't do things (in veeeeery plain words: that hurts, that bothers people, that's not yours....).
4.- Therefore, the solution is: the girl gets punished for disobedience (not for gymnastics), the teacher(s) who told her not to do it should get punished (for being arbitrary and unreasonable), the rule of not letting her doing her cart-wheels is removed.
5.- And parents and everybody finally understand that ACCIDENTS exist and stop sueing. Sueing looks like the pasttime of this country. There are no ACCIDENTS, there is only NEGLIGENCE.
Why didn't the child go home and tell her parents that she's not allowed to cartwheels at recess?
Why didn't they speak to the school authority?
Why was the child ignoring teachers, and blatently carrying on with her behaviour?
Like I said already....A LOT more to this story than meets the eye.
And the fact that a childs suspension is making national news in the US is fairly sorry.
This is the story of how dangerous it is to take political science class in high school.
http://www.cnn.com/2004/EDUCATION/11/11/school.fight.ap/index.html
Another question might be, why didn't the school talk to the parents of the 11 year old before suspending her.
I have three kids in school, and if there was ever a problem, I would get a phone call.
So why didn't the school notify the parents that there was a dicipline problem? Something is not right with this story.
If the parents don't like the rules the parents should petition the school board. The fact remains, the girl deliberately disobeyed and now she's facing the consequences.
Look, you can dislike it all you want but we live in a society run by lawyers and fear of litigation, and schools are just as vulnerable. We DO live by that "theory", sadly. Your beef shouldn't be with the school, it should be with an out of control tort system and idiotic people who use lawyers as a huge wealth transfer system, which results in stupid rules like this one.
And it sounds more like the former than the latter to me.
When I was in school, I did what I was told.
If I was disgruntled by a decision made by a teacher - I voiced it at home.
My Mam and Dad either told me to behave in school, or followed through by approaching the teacher.
This child was asked repeatedly to STOP. She should have stopped, and asked her parents to intervene on her behalf.
On face value, it sounds to me like the child was being defiant.
The sooner the left coast of CA moves northward along its transverse fault and is subducted and subsequently melted under the Alaskan plate, the better.
Although I agree that the teacher may have had some other issues, I do not believe that an eleven year old girl should be making that call.
I couldn't imagine telling my son to obey the rules unless he thinks the rules are idiotic or if he believes the teacher is on a power trip. And he is fifteen! He would always have an excuse to not listen even though he is a pretty good kid, but he IS a kid. He is told to tell me about incidents and that I will handle it. I explain how I will handle it so he can see how to deal with situations he wants to change when he is older.
I think this little girl is a pain in the butt of these teachers and she has a listening problem. I am no defender of public school teachers in many cases, but I also know that parents have problems disciplining their children now.
Hey, some of us here have some common sense and helped contribute to Bush's popular vote win!
Although I agree that the teacher may have had some other issues, I do not believe that an eleven year old girl should be making that call.
I couldn't imagine telling my son to obey the rules unless he thinks the rules are idiotic or if he believes the teacher is on a power trip. And he is fifteen! He would always have an excuse to not listen even though he is a pretty good kid, but he IS a kid. He is told to tell me about incidents and that I will handle it. I explain how I will handle it so he can see how to deal with situations he wants to change when he is older.
I think this little girl is a pain in the butt of these teachers and she has a listening problem. I am no defender of public school teachers in many cases, but I also know that parents have problems disciplining their children now.
I agree, the school definitely should have, but we do not know that they did not. The point of view is the parents'.
Where do we draw the line. Just remember, the kid you train to reflexively obey idiotic orders from any authority figure will someday have to deal with the DMV, IRS and the rest of the alphabet soup of our government. They have to be able to have some discretion.
Honestly, I think this is about the 1000th time I've seen this article posted here. If already posted articles were cartwheels, this thread would be banned.
San Jose-Edison Academy Principal Denise Patton said she's warned Deirdre numerous times, talked to her parents and given her lunch detention, but the 90-pound gymnast won't stay on the ground, so she had to suspend her.
Doesn't sound like a teacher who went nuts on a power trip. No wonder so many children these days are spoiled, disrespectful brats. Just like their parents.
No kidding. We won the election, but there's still a lot of rolling back to do.
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