A gaping hole in school security or am I being an over reactive parent?

[SA Friday]

Unfortunately, I'll let you in... Your kid will now be bullied and put on the blacklist of teachers. Since they can't to you for causing waves in their protected lives, they will now make life for your child even harder!

Welcome to the progressive, liberal/(insert own vocabulary here) school indoctrinations!!!

*** Please don't get me wrong, I LOVE teaching. It is truly my calling in life... However, the redtape, good ol' boy networks, beaucracy, money allotment, paperwork, etc has just gotten to the point of being ridiculous.

Oh, I don't know. I have a little more faith in teachers than that. We had an incident with my step daughter a few years back when she was in the local elemetary school. I like to believe the school fixed the problem because it was the right thing. It doesn't hurt for the kid's parents to be a paralegal who sued people for a living and a federal agent though.

[bullpup]

Some of you guys sure are pretty tough on teachers. I think the problem with home schooling is that most parents aren't involved enough in their kids' lives. Also, I think it takes a pretty motivated parent and student to make it work. I'm a school teacher and I would like to think the kids I teach walk out of my class room with more knowledge than how to interpret Shakespeare or write an argumentative essay with properly cited sources. But, then again, I grew up in a very small town. The same town that I teach in.
And by no means am I meant to offend anyone but I would imagine a lot of people would struggle trying to teach a classroom full of teenagers whose biggest concern is "what dress am I going to where for prom."
As far a security, I guess that our kids will just have to deal with me and the other "pussy" male teachers in the building. We are the ones that ask people who they are and why they are there. And if I ever needed a gun I could probably find one behind the seat of one of my football players that went coyote hunting before school started. LOL
Seriously though, public education has its faults. Some teachers become lazy with tenure and others just lose their passion. I'm in the business because I'm motivated to help students think for themselves, not to force an ideology on them.
To the original poster, I am certainly glad that your daughter was alright.

[theGinsue]

I hope that no one took my negative comments to be directed toward teachers. My issues with public K-12 education is with the administrators; at the school level to some degree but mostly at the district level.

I also have issues with the whole "we need more money" shouts. I believe that there is no money for the schools because the district administration is so bloated that they suck up all of the money and it doesn't get to the schools.

[BigBear]

It doesn't hurt for the kid's parents to be a paralegal who sued people for a living and a federal agent though.

FTW!!!

I believe that there is no money for the schools because the district administration is so bloated that they suck up all of the money and it doesn't get to the schools.

+1 Median salary for teachers = $40K (high school)
Median salary for admin = $90K (high school)

Teachers do all the work... admin does nothing but piss on teachers and play golf, lol. I'm not really upset with admin salary, lord knows I'd LOVE to make that much. I have a problem with how they USE the money they are given. The school needs updated computers (some using old DOS systems) to remain technologically informed as the super keeps yelling at everyone to be up to date on tech stuff, but they'll take that money and give half a million to the facilities people to returf the football feild... (no offense meant bullpup).

[bullpup]

...but they'll take that money and give half a million to the facilities people to returf the football feild... (no offense meant bullpup).

No offense taken. It's definately true that when it comes to sports, most schools don't have a lack of money or they find the money. I'm pretty lucky; the school I work in does a pretty good job of finding money to keep technology current. Although, I still believe that technology isn't the end all of education.

[Glock Shooter]

So I met with some District officials, BVSD Security Head, and the Principal. Overall I was satisfied with the meeting, but the CYA mentality of the Principal just made me mad and I told em. I could see from about 10 minutes into the meeting the "higher ups" were on my side but the Principal just wanted to make sure she covered her ass. Bottom line I stated was that this "stranger" told my daughter that he was in charge of protecting all the students then why didn't the Music teacher recognize him? i.e BECAUSE HE WAS AN INTRUDER!!! The schools position, since he didn't say anything threatening like "want to come with me" was that he was not a threat. The "higher ups" were not so convinced and there will be immediate changes to the protocols should anything like this happen again. They admitted a mistake was made and that impressed me. We were almost done but the Principal just had to open her mouth to make sure I heard her say again that she "followed existing procedures blah blah blah" so I then said something to the effect of "well so did I, I gave you 3 days to reply to my voice mails, you didn't, I wrote you an email letting you know I would go the press at noon and my phone didn't stop ringing from all of you!!!" I then let them know that I was a XXXXhair away from walking and calling Channel 7 For Help!!! The "higher ups" stepped in and admonished the Principal for being what he called "insensitive to my personal feelings in this situation". I got the feeling that if left to her own the Principal would make my daughter the problem but the higher ups wouldn't stand for it. I think we'll be looking into other schools just in case.

[Irving]

Thanks for the update.

What he actually said to your daughter is very frightening to me.

[Glock Shooter]

Followup to my followup:

Just received an email that the Principal is "retiring" hummmm....wondering if "retiring" is a euphemism for "YOU'RE FIRED!"

[Marlin]

Interesting development..

[cmailliard]

Reading a few pages of this thread I may have missed some comments so excuse me if I repeat something.

GlockShooter I would still go to the press with this event. After Platte Canyon and Deer Creek this is something that every parent, teacher, administrator should be made acutely aware of.

My daughter is 3 1/2 and not yet in a public school, her daycare/school is pretty tight on security with key card access and parents being "talked with" if they let somebody else in.

I just returned from West Virginia where I talked about this very topic during my Mass Violence Planning and Response to LE, Fire, EMS and other responders. We even did Threat Assessments on a few schools while we were down there. We need to teach our kids what to do. We are the parents and school officials. Schools, Hospitals and other facilities have a see no evil, speak no evil attitude towards these events and mass violence events.

Let me ask all of you this - We have the Fire Code for public buildings and how many times a year must a school do a fire drill? How many kids have died in a school fire in the last 20 years? ZERO. How many have died in a mass violence event? How many schools talk about this with their students? Bring this up at your next school event.

New York City has See Something Say Something - Very simple rule to live by. Schools are way to behind the times in dealing with these events and they will come around until one of two things happen - 1) Parents scream loud enough and in enough numbers or 2) it happens to them.

Talk with your kids and educate them. Stay Safe.