1. "Sometimes, for the good of the class, a student needs to be removed. Sometimes permanently. While I dont think anyone disputes this, I am concerned about recent state Legislature efforts to push back on the suspensions of students.
2. Engrossed Second Substitute Senate Bill 5244, approved by the Senate last week, would reduce the number of days students can be excluded from school due to discipline.
a. Do those in favor of the bill understand how damaging just one incorrigible student can be to a classroom?
3. We must be careful about overemphasizing the needs of the few students who have already demonstrated their antipathy toward their own education. The other students have needs, too.
4. No one wants students to be suspended or expelled. No one wants people to go to jail, either. Sometimes, thats the only option that remains.
5. The U.S. Department of Education is investigating whether Seattle Public Schools discriminated against African-American students because they are three times as likely to be suspended as white students. The disparity needs to be addressed separately from the Senate bill.
6. I had a student this year. ... hardly ever had a pencil. But he always had a cellphone. He couldnt stay seated for more than five minutes, and constantly distracted other students by talking or throwing things at them. He would lose assignments the day I gave them, then ask for another copy, only to find the original one the next week, still untouched....He was suspended at least three times in four months.
7. Naturally, all this led to increased conflict with his teachers (hence the suspensions). Bad language, insulting how we look and swearing at us, arguing, refusing to listen, refusing to follow directions. Oh, and he didnt learn much either.
a. And I had two similar students in the same class. I heard racial epithets more times in four months than I would have heard living in the South in the 1800s.
8. What do schools do with students like this? ...meetings ...Talks ... Dialogues with special-education experts, nurses, counselors, mental-health specialists and tutors. We have full-time employees devoted just to them, the bottom 5 percent. ...we usually send work home during longer suspensions. In 12 years, I have never had a student do any of it.
9. How much opportunity do we owe students like him, at the expense of the other 25? Dont they deserve a conflict-free, respectful classroom that focuses on learning?
10. We live in a country filled to the brim with resources for learning, both in and out of the school building. A time must come when the right to a free education is lost. We dont owe them any more than we are wearing ourselves thin already giving them."
Op-ed: For the good of a class, student suspensions are needed | Opinion | The Seattle Times
2. Engrossed Second Substitute Senate Bill 5244, approved by the Senate last week, would reduce the number of days students can be excluded from school due to discipline.
a. Do those in favor of the bill understand how damaging just one incorrigible student can be to a classroom?
3. We must be careful about overemphasizing the needs of the few students who have already demonstrated their antipathy toward their own education. The other students have needs, too.
4. No one wants students to be suspended or expelled. No one wants people to go to jail, either. Sometimes, thats the only option that remains.
5. The U.S. Department of Education is investigating whether Seattle Public Schools discriminated against African-American students because they are three times as likely to be suspended as white students. The disparity needs to be addressed separately from the Senate bill.
6. I had a student this year. ... hardly ever had a pencil. But he always had a cellphone. He couldnt stay seated for more than five minutes, and constantly distracted other students by talking or throwing things at them. He would lose assignments the day I gave them, then ask for another copy, only to find the original one the next week, still untouched....He was suspended at least three times in four months.
7. Naturally, all this led to increased conflict with his teachers (hence the suspensions). Bad language, insulting how we look and swearing at us, arguing, refusing to listen, refusing to follow directions. Oh, and he didnt learn much either.
a. And I had two similar students in the same class. I heard racial epithets more times in four months than I would have heard living in the South in the 1800s.
8. What do schools do with students like this? ...meetings ...Talks ... Dialogues with special-education experts, nurses, counselors, mental-health specialists and tutors. We have full-time employees devoted just to them, the bottom 5 percent. ...we usually send work home during longer suspensions. In 12 years, I have never had a student do any of it.
9. How much opportunity do we owe students like him, at the expense of the other 25? Dont they deserve a conflict-free, respectful classroom that focuses on learning?
10. We live in a country filled to the brim with resources for learning, both in and out of the school building. A time must come when the right to a free education is lost. We dont owe them any more than we are wearing ourselves thin already giving them."
Op-ed: For the good of a class, student suspensions are needed | Opinion | The Seattle Times
