Melissa Barton said she is considering legal action after her son’s kindergarten teacher led his classmates to vote him out of class.
After each classmate was allowed to say what they didn’t like about Barton’s 5-year-old son, Alex, his Morningside Elementary teacher Wendy Portillo said they were going to take a vote, Barton said.
By a 14 to 2 margin, the students voted Alex — who is in the process of being diagnosed with autism — out of the class.
This is also another example of why my children will never attend public school in the US. I know that most public schools are not like this, but it’s a risk you run with the bureaucracy and the union power in public education. You don’t have this risk at a private school because not only are the standards typically higher, but the school has to answer to the parents. If something like this were to happen at a private school, and the teacher wasn’t immediately fired (especially after admitting that the account is true), enrollment would drop, and the school would feel the pressure.
And who does something like this, anyway? I don’t have to think to hard to wonder what this teacher would feel like if the principal had her stand at the front of a classroom or assembly and required each one of her colleagues to tell her what they didn’t like about her, then allowed them to vote her out of the faculty. Not only would she be emotionally devastated, as any of us would, but she’d get the union and (rightfully) sue the pants - or pantsuit - off of the principal and the school district.
There’s something to be said - and other teachers are saying it - about the way the other students were affected. Alex’s presence probably made class more difficult for all of them. But If the teacher thought he shouldn’t be there, that his presence was too much of a disruption, she should have pushed her administration to put him in special ed classes. She was quite aware of his situation, and even though he hadn’t been officially diagnosed, it should have entered her mind that maybe, just maybe, she couldn’t strong-arm him into behaving.
Despite her glowing evaluations over her career, she may have proved herself to be “past her prime”. How many more decisions might she make like this? She has enough experience to know better. Maybe an desk is where she ought to be, rather than a classroom.
The carnal side of me wants someone to parade her in front of people she respects and have them insult her and vote her out, so she can experience a small part of what she inflicted on this boy. I’m praying through it.
Technorati Tags: autism, crazy, fired, progress, student, teacher, vote
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