Someone needs to teach the teacher here that kindergarten is not reality TV:
(CBS) A Port St. Lucie, Fla., mother is outraged and considering legal action after her son's kindergarten teacher led his classmates to vote him out of class.
Melissa Barton says Morningside Elementary teacher Wendy Portillo had her son's classmates say what they didn't like about 5-year-old Alex. She says the teacher then had the students vote, and voted Alex, who is being evaluated for Asperger's syndrome -- an autism spectrum disorder -- out of the class by a 14-2 margin.
The stupid, it doesn't just burn, it goes supernova! What's going on here, training future generations to be reality TV contestants?
Further research reveals that this incident appears even worse than the above article makes it sound:
PORT ST. LUCIE -- A 5-year-old kindergartner was "voted out of" his classroom at Morningside Elementary on Wednesday when his teacher asked his classmates to take a vote on whether they wanted him in class, police say.Teacher Wendy Portillo told the boy, who is known to have disciplinary issues, to stand in front of the class that day, according to police.
"The teacher decided to bring him in front of the class and let the other kids tell him what they didn't like about him, kind of ridiculed him," said officer Michelle Steele, spokeswoman for the Port St. Lucie police.
Portillo then had the class take a vote on whether to boot the boy out of the class and send him to the principal's office.
The class voted 14-2 to send the boy out for the day, Steele said.
When his mother found out, she contacted the school's resource officer, Steele said. The officer interviewed Portillo, who admitted she had asked the class to vote, according to police.
The teacher said the boy had been sent to the office earlier that day, and when the office sent him back to class, Portillo asked her students whether they were ready for him to return, Steele said. Portillo said she asked the class to vote because they are learning about taking tallies, police say.
If the two accounts above are accurate, Wendy Portillo is one teacher who should not only be fired, but never allowed to work with children again. There's just no excuse for a teacher humiliating a child, particularly a child with a developmental disorder, in this way. None.
(Hat tip: Ed Brayton.)
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If the reports are accurate then yes, this teacher should loose her job and never be allowed to work with kids again.
What does confuse me though is why the police are involved. Is there an issue of her violating some criminal law ? What she did was outrageous, but criminal ?
Matt, I gather the "police were involved" for two reasons: the onsite police officer (the "school resource officer") is involved with discipline at that school (not uncommon, I gather) and the mother contacted the school resource officer since the boy had spent a good deal of time with him.
The accounts appear to be accurate. The autism community has been all over this -- Maddy, blogging at Whitterer on Autism, has a list of blogospheric reactions..
DavefromQueens, writing at Daily Kos, has a suggested list of actions.
Christschool, writing at Thinking in Metaphors, has an outline of the violations of law that took place.
Young Alex Barton had only been in Ms. Portillo's classroom since January. Ms. Portillo was well-aware that Barton was being evaluated for a disability, which may have affected his ability to communicate and evaluate social interactions in the classroom.
Slate posted a copy of the police report, written by the school resource officer:
http://www.slate.com/id/2192480/
The police were involved because the teacher had the school resource officer remove the kid in the first place. Also, if you read the report, there was an allegation that the teacher scratched and grabbed the student.
I can get the scratched and grabbed bit, but a "school resource officer" is a rather meaningless term. I take it is not a person employed to ensure that teachers have the teaching resources they required. Why would a school employee be writing a police report ? That surely is a job for the police ? Who called them ? I read that report and it simply does not say.
She was not dismissed. Instead, they reassigned her to a different part of the administration.
http://www.suntimes.com/news/nation/972423,oust052708.article
The worst part of this is that the state Attorney's Office says that the incident did not meet the criteria for emotional abuse(!)
Sickening and disgusting! What would they consider emotional abuse, I wonder? As to her being never being allowed to work with children ever again? Amen, brother!
If the appropriate body has failed to deal with the situation properly, and it seems as if they have totally abdicated responsibility then I think it is reasonable to have the police investigate. Had they dismissed her, then I would say the police should be involved.
@ Matt Penfold: A "school resource officer" is a police officer who's beat, essentially, is the school. My middle and high school had them as well, although they were called "liaison officers". They are police officers, so if they are involved in any incidents they may be required to write up a report.
This is seems to be endemic across all school systems. A good friend of mine has a daughter who has learning and behavioral issues.
My friend has put an IEP and behavioral plan on file with the school.
Anyhow a teacher grabbed her daughter because she refused to do something the teacher requested. My friends daughter than swung at the teacher.
The teacher called the school resource officer (A deputized officer no less). The teacher decided to file charges.
My friend came down on them like a ton of bricks when she went to the school that day.
She made it absolutely clear that the resource officer was NOT to talk to her daughter without my friend being present.
The next day what did the resource officer do? Discussed the case with her daughter.
Holy hell has now come down upon not just the school but the police department.
My friend works for a child advocacy entity. Their staff attorneys are VERY interested in this case.
Natalie,
Thank you. Does anyone know why this officer removed the kid from the class ? Strikes me he/she also needs to consider a different career. That the teacher told him/her to does not seem enough.
Matt, the officer's statement is on Slate, but I don't believe s/he give a specific reason other than that the teacher asked him/her to remove the kid from class. I'm not sure exactly what the role of a liaison/resource officer is in elementary schools - the ones I had in school dealt with things like physical fighting, illegal drugs, and underage drinking and smoking.
As I just posted on this Dispatches thread: The woman has a pathological lack of empathy otherwise seen only in libertarian ScienceBlogs trolls -- and only in some of them. I urgently recommend putting her into a closed institution. For crying out loud, she's insane.
What a horrible thing for a teacher to do. I completely agree that the teacher deserves to be fired and never given a job near teaching.
One thing that is interesting was that 2 kids had the courage to vote against the group.
I wonder how the vote was carried out. If its like typical kindergarten it was probably a show of hands system. In that case its even more surprising 2 kids would vote against the group.
I think she should be called before the school board and voted out of teaching.
Full marks to the 2 who stood up for their classmates. Some remedial work is going to be needed for that class to unlearn what the "teacher" taught them.
Yeah, that was cruel. I understand that the teacher was probably trying to get the child to understand that his behavior was making the rest of the class not like him but, boy, how unbelievably cruel. As an adult with Aspergers, I endured a lot of that kind of cruelty as a child myself because of my social and behavioral problems. How dare that teacher be so cruel and insensitive as that.
Note: School Resource Officer = School security officer.
As for the way this child was treated: school kids traumatize each other enough without having the teacher egg them on.
Children can be some of the cruelest entities on earth, and we don't need teachers helping them out with that.
This woman needs to do some serious re-thinking about her behavior, and perhaps seek employment in another field.
(/smarmily polite)
@Jeff Knapp:
I'm guessing out of frustration. I managed to get literally put in the trash (in front of the class) by a teacher after he couldn't handle my behavior any longer.
The difference being that Alex was known have difficulties procession social behavior while that it took about 20 more years to figure out what label to stick on me.
The sad thing about this story is that the answer to this example of symbolic mob lynching is the formation of a huge mob that is planning erect a larger tree to hang the teacher from. Disciplinary action is called for but firing her for (what I see as) a fit of frustration is too extreme.
It is possible that society has been negligent enough to fail to pass a law that would actually allow jail time for what she did. However, I'm quite certain that in a position of authority this would constitute criminal child abuse. Based on my own experiences as a child with ASD experiencing severe bullying and equally destructive but far less audacious dereliction of duty by the administrative staff, if a teacher who sexually fondles a student goes to prison for a decade or two, Wendy Portillo deserves at least a year for this - though whatever punishment she experiences should be humiliating first and foremost.
"A bit of frustration?" This was clearly a premeditated act, and given that she was aware of the student's disability status completely inexcusable.
The actions of the teacher were probably in line with classroom behavior management 100 years ago, with dunce caps and other forms of humiliation [except for corporal punishment]. The criticism session from the fellow students is right out of Mao's Great Cultural revolution without the exile to some distant commune.
I thought teachers would know better.
There was a report recently about girls with autism, and how we tend to miss them because we think autism is a boys disease. One part of the story covered a girl of eight and her troubles dealing with the frustrations of life, and her inappropriate reactions to those frustrations.
During this segment we got to see how a teacher mishandled an incident, because she didn't take the time to observe, and learn what the problem was. We also got to see a ten year old girl take the time to observe, learn why the younger child acted the way she did, and present a solution to the autistic child's problem. A solution that worked and produced a happy third grader instead of the upset child the teacher's reaction produced.
My son had something similar happen to him, twice. It appears to be some personalities that can't deal with children that don't shower them with admiration, or necessarily look at them when they talk. He was kicked out of a preschool and an after-school program by individuals who were "uncomfortable" with him, and apparently more uncomfortable because he still passes the academic criteria without being social. Never mind that I observed negligence, and the failure to punish another child who threw toys at the head of a third child's head while my son was guilty of "not listening" and additionally not under the arduous observation the individual claimed was necessary for him. And, by the way, in each case it was one individual in the program that caused the problem, and he was fine with no complaints until these individuals showed up.
Bunch of crap. It's ape-brain "odd behavior means disease and might be contagious" primitive thinking. Same teachers would bitch up a storm at children singling out a kid for his looks.
@Azkyroth:
Only way to claim this as premeditated is if she did this regularly. An impulsive action to vent frustration fits better.
That said the follow up is just plain wrong with the school just transferring her to another place and taking cover hoping that the storm of indignation will subside.
The damage is already done and irreversible, the only time damage control could have worked (that is the damage being done to Alex) was in the hours after the incident. An eye for an eye mentality is not going to repair that.
The teacher shouldn't get of free (and neither the school for the behavior afterwards) but only if it is shown she's a bad teacher should she be fired, let alone be ruined through a trial (seeing how expensive they can be in the USA).
Clearly she doesn't belong in a classroom. If she can't handle anything but perfect widdle NT compliant angels (and 5 year old boys of any neurology are none of these, btw) then she has no business teaching. All classrooms have children with disabilities now, and her job was to teach the class she had, not the class she wished she had.
She failed. Badly. She should be nailed to the wall for it. She may have destroyed a 5 year old. That is so severely not OK that there aren't words in English for it. Teaching intolerance isn't acceptable. Bullying kindergarteners isn't acceptable. She should never be in a classroom again, EVER.
Something like this happened to me in second grade. I was deeply humiliated and didn't really understand what was going on (I admit to having been a bit of a loose cannon, but it was more a mix of ADHD and not really getting the whole "authority" thing than anything else). I was "put on trial" in front of the whole class by a teacher who wound up leaving at the end of the year. (In 1982 apparently a single teacher getting pregnant was quite the scandal...)
To this day I still don't really remember what went on as I've blocked most of it out. But it sucked bigtime.
"The actions of the teacher were probably in line with classroom behavior management 100 years ago"
Not that long ago, I assure you. But in the old days teachers were the absolute authority. They might have _ordered_ the rest of the class to join in with humiliating another pupil but they would never have given them the freedom to _vote_ on it. There's a special sadistic twist in that.
Oh man. I blogged about this teacher on Friday, and I'm still quivering with rage over this story. As a student in the education program myself who studied autism specifically in my special education classes, it's simply revolting what happened in this case.
Perhaps the school and police didn't find sufficient grounds for instigating criminal procedures against Ms. Portillo, but I would not lay odds that this doesn't find its way to court in a civil suit. A more knowledgeable lawyer may be able to find violations in the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, or the Americans with Disabilities Act, as well as certain civil liberties violated by this egregious behavior, not to mention good old fashioned pain and suffering.
One thing I will say is that, given all the accounts I have read, there should be no animosity toward the resource officer. His handling of the child appears respectful and familiar, as opposed to the teacher's. Hell, he even managed to get the kid to pick up his mess, which seems to be an act the teacher couldn't handle.
As to why he was the one to remove the child, that's often a standard policy. You don't send a little kid out alone, the teacher should not leave the classroom unattended if possible, and the principals often have other work to do, so the resource officer is the person most consistently available to escort a (perhaps unruly) child to another area. This officer was familiar with the kid and, apparently, the issues surrounding the situation, and knew how to handle the boy in a reasonable manner that the child found non-threatening.
Based on accounts, I'd crucify the teacher, though.
I've thought about this a few more days now... I think the parents of the 14 children who voted the kid out of class should demand that a counselor of some sort help their children recover from this so they don't turn into future gang members and bullies. The school board, of course, should pay for this, as well as more concentrated work for Alex, and a big "good school citizen award" for the 2 that voted no. Never too early to teach the "Speak truth to authority" slogan.
There are so many ways to mistreat those who ought to belong somewhere. These means of intolerance, of expressing prejudice, range from the most passive to the most active. But even the passive ones are cruel when they are intended to be exclusionary. The outright active ones are the most vile.
You can be snubbed, shunned, pitied, bullied, and worst of all, you can be outcast, singled out in such a manner that you denigration and ostracism is deemed an appropriate treatment, or even a necessary treatment, by the Powers-That-Be.
The real problems that must be overcome are not intrinsic to Alex, but are due to the others' lack of acceptance of him, and of not knowing how to work with him and the difficulties he has, rather than working against him. The usual reasoning goes, If you have problems, it is your fault. Because it is your fault, you should have to deal with the consequences. That sounds reasonable on the surface, but what it really means is that people are often punished for having problems.
In television game shows or "reality shows", the "weakest link" is cast out, leaving each of the successively smaller set of players struggling to become the remaining "winner". Although there are elimination rounds in sports to find The Winner, education is not a competition. The competition model for education sucks. In such models, there is only one winner, and even that winner must in turn become a loser when they are dethroned by the next winner. In such situations, everyone is ultimately a loser.
In real life, what we want are people who can play and work with others. In real life, we want everyone to win, because winning means that everyone is succeeding in learning the scholastic and social goals.
Natalie:
The purpose of "resource officers" is to indoctrinate children from a very young age that police officers are the ultimate authority, that whatever they say goes, and that any deviation from authorized behaviour results in being hauled off in shame by the police.
Glad I could help.
M
SM, I would say the purpose of "resource officers" is to provide a last line of defense against a generation of youth who have reached epic highs in unruliness. Parents these days don't know how to raise their kids right, and even if teachers knew something about discipline, their hands are tied by laws and the threat of litigation. These kids grow up in the belief that they can do what they want, and drugs and violence seem to encroach earlier and earlier in their lives.
Yes, it's sad, and I'd rather see cops gone from the schools myself. But the problem ultimately begins at home.
M/SM,
You have your opinion of the real purpose of resource officers. Good for you. That is really beside the point in this particular discussion. Their stated, official purpose is as I have described. Would the phrase "job duties" make more sense to you?
This brought back some extremely unpleaseant memories from third grade, of being literally dragged to the principal's office by the worst teacher I ever had.
I don't remember what I did to piss her off, but it can't have been anything serious, considering that I was a total goody-twoshoes. Anyway, I sat down on the floor and wouldn't budge because it was so unfair.
I spent the next two days in the office because I was terrified of the teacher and refused to go back to class. Finally my parents came down to the school and arranged for me to be transferred to another class.
The teacher ultimately admitted that she hated her job and really wasn't any good at it, and retired at the end of that school year. But I had nightmares about that incident for several years afterwards, and I still get angry when I think about it 48 years later.
Natalie:
Yep, it would. :)
I should add that the report filed by the officer in the case in question indicates that he is probably an extremely empathetic resource officer. His apparent compassion and sense of equity are quite commendable.
In my opinion, sadly, that also makes him a very *unusual* resource officer.
I agree that it's too bad that we need armed militias in our schools, and I further agree that the problem begins at home. However, despite whatever additional training they may get, the purpose of police is to prevent crime and detain lawbreakers, and that is fundamentally incompatible with the mission of a public school. Their presence is an indication that the school has given up and basically considers itself a juvenile detention facility.
M
...
Are you actually contending that it is remotely credible that a person would contrive such an act on a moment's notice, in an already emotioanl state? This was clearly calculated to deliberately humiliate the child in question. Anyone whose "fits of frustration" are sufficiently intense and long-lasting to allow him or her to contrive and execution ritual humiliation and abuse of this sort without coming to his or her senses is unfit to be placed in charge of children.
It will send the message, both to Alex, the other children, and her successors, that what she did was WRONG. It will, in fact, help Alex by underscoring the fact that SHE should be ashamed of what happened, and that it is not something that HE should blame himself for. This is a message bullied children need to hear. It will also, hopefully, make other teachers think twice before going beyond standard operating procedure of turning a blind eye to bullying to the point of actually joining in.
Under what circumstances would you not consider gross dereliction of duty and malicious abuse of a disabled minor in your care acceptable?
You'd be wrong. The problem is that we're using an 1800's authoritarian educational system in the 21st Century. In the 1800's, my grandfather (and his classmates) was a sub-human wretch who was supposed to be seen and not heard and any deviation from the late Victorian standards to be punished severely.
My children are humans and they've been taught far differently. Including the inherent fallibility and dangers of authority and that respect must be earned by competence and reason, not by shouting at kids and humiliating them.
I guessing that you probably don't get it. That children are humans, only small and inexperienced, and need guidance to flourish.
It doesn't matter if this attack on the child was premeditated or a moment of frustration; it happened, it was heinous, and anyone who would consider such a thing under such circumstances has no business being a teacher.
Well said, Liesl. It's especially infuriating for me as an education major who has done work in his special ed classes on autism spectrum disorders to see this kind of thing going on. If anyone knows of an Internet letter campaign, I'd be more than happy to drop a line to the school board, urging for dismissal.
@Azkyroth:
Yes this is a way to vent frustration at a kid who apparently is ignoring accepted social behavior. People have done worse then this by making spure of the moment decisions.
How long would this have lasted? A few minutes at most. That isn't excessively long.
You can achieve the same without firing the teacher or sueing.
It is to late for that. That should have happened the same day, the longer the time difference between what happened and Alex being notified about action against this teacher the less chance that he makes the connection between the two events.
And what will we do next time something like this happens (seeing that this is NOT an isolated incident, just look on the blogs of people with ASD)? Not only fire the teacher but also force the teacher to pay for the schooling of the kid somewhere else? And if that not works since and someone else snaps? Jail time? And if that isn't an deterrent because a person just snaps and does something similar? Death penalty?
Deterrents only work if something is premeditated and the chance of getting caught is considered too high.
If someone should be sued it is the school for trying to cover this up. And the teachers history should be gone through to see if she is a good or bad teacher, then depending on that action should be taken.
That is a horrific story. Though the tiny silver lining: two *completely awesome* little 5 year old kids bucked the crowd and their teacher's serious psychopathology and said something very simple but profoundly important: No. Every time I read something about Abu Ghraib or the Stanford Prison Experiment it depresses me that nearly all of humanity is so willing to participate (or even just stand by) during the systematic abuse of others.
Harvard or Yale needs to give them both college scholarships and pre-acceptance for the class of 2025. And a big hug, pizza, ice cream, and stickers.
NickG:
I know, those two little dissenters are the aspect of this sad story that I keep going back to. Thank God they, and people like them, exist! That little seed of hope . . .
Hey. I was dredged up in the 60s in Australia and suffered ADD. Not even the behavioral problems stuff. All it took was to be just slightly different. Being humiliated in front of the class were some of my fondest memories of my school years. They even use to call the headmaster down to do it some times. Apparently I had way too much imagination to go round.
I'm sorry. Removing this teacher from teaching? How about being made to suffer a life time of indignity for being too much like who she is. That's always a good place to start any serious public humiliation. It doesn't matter who she is, she needs to be taught a lesson not to be like that. And if she changes, she shouldn't be like that either. Maybe then accuse her of not being the person she use to be. And you only have to look at Australian media to see where it leads.
And they wondered why I never wanted to have kids. Just having to watch them come up against teachers who were more childish than the people they proposed to teach, would be sickening all over again.
The worst part is that in Australia, nothing much has changed in the past 40 years. It's just become more cautious of being caught out. Wouldn't want to be labled as prejudiced now would we? The threat and implide violence is now institutionalized. Now they train teachers in the gentle art of peer group manipulation and let school yard voilence do the job for them.
On the other hand, given there is already enough suffering in the world, perhaps she did the kid a favor by showing him what he can expect from the wider world. Maybe he'll just give up and kill himself now and save a life time of Anguish. As one of my friends did in grade 2.
I vote they remove this persons's breathing rights. I'm sorry I'm upset and angry but you have no idea how much damage has already been delt this child. Imagine spending your entire school life where this outrageous behavior by school teachers is considered "Normal." And "Bob" help you if your skin is remotely dark in this country.
Be absolutely Icebox.