Tag Archives: Parent

This Is Very Concerning

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CBS News reported on Tuesday that Jennifer Crumbley, the mother of the Oxford High School shooter, has been found guilty of four counts of involuntary manslaughter.

The article reports:

Jury deliberations, which lasted 11 hours, began Monday after a week-long trial to determine if the mother bears any responsibility for the Oxford High School shooting, where her son killed four students, Justin Shilling, Madisyn Baldwin, Tate Myre, and Hana St. Juliana, and injured seven other people on Nov. 30, 2021.

The jury foreperson told CBS News Detroit’s Andres Gutierrez that one factor that the jury focused on was that Jennifer Crumbley was the last adult with the gun before her son used it in the mass shooting. 

Jennifer Crumbley is the first parent in the United States to go on trial in a mass school shooting carried out by their child. 

Mrs. Crumbley bought the gun for her son. That was really stupid, but was it any more stupid than a parent who buys a sports car for their high school child who secretly drinks? The school knew the child was troubled. The school asked that the child be taken to therapy (obviously too late). What is the school’s responsibility? Does the school have a responsibility to monitor a troubled child and keep him away from other students?

I really think this is a bad decision. Buying the child a gun was really stupid, but that really wasn’t the problem. Would the child have gotten hold of a different weapon and done the same thing? This will set a very bad precedent.

 

 

 

This Tells Us All We Need To Know About The Current State Of Education In America

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Many years ago, my husband and I took in a refugee from a communist country and her daughter to live with us until they were able to support themselves. The daughter was enrolled in the local public elementary school. The mother took her to the school to register her and was amazed at what happened next. The principal took the mother and daughter around the school, introduced them to some of the teachers, showed them the cafeteria, etc. The mother commented that in the country she had fled, you dropped your child off at the school and were never allowed inside. Sitting in on your child’s classroom is not an option in communist countries. She was amazed at the freedom of American parents. That was about twenty years ago. In many areas of the country, things have changed drastically.

Yesterday BizPacReview posted an article about a recent tweet from a school teacher at a school in Philadelphia.

The article reports:

Meet Matthew R. Kay, a teacher at Philadelphia’s Science Leadership Academy who’s been accused of trying to indoctrinate his students in left-wing thought.

Kay came to the public’s attention Saturday when he posted viral tweets warning his followers that the virtual classrooms slated for this school season will allow “potential spectators,” including parents, to overhear what their kids are learning.

This, he warned his followers, might present a challenge for their so-called “equity/inclusion work,” i.e., their alleged indoctrination of schoolchildren.

This alleged indoctrination includes discussions that “encourage vulnerability,” address “gender/sexuality” and “destabiliz[e] a kid’s racism or homophobia or transphobia.”

Kay further suggested that he’s always taught his students that “what happens here stays here,” but that virtual classrooms will prevent this.

Mr. Kay, I would like to remind you that parents are supposed to be the ones raising their children–that is not your job. Your job is to teach them the academic skills they need to function successfully in our society. If they learn compassion, empathy, and respect for all people, that is a good thing, but theoretically their parents are supposed to be teaching that–it is not your job.

The article includes a few tweets of people who responded to Mr. Kay’s tweet:

However, not everyone had a problem with Mr. Kay’s idea of excluding parents:

“Parents are dangerous.” Wow. Where have we gone?

The article concludes:

Moreover, the fact that Kay and those like him want to hide what’s happening in these so-called “safe spaces” makes it seem as if indoctrination is involved.

The good news is that at least parents are now aware of what’s happening in classrooms across the country. Whether or not they choose to respond by taking some sort of action is up to them.

Before the November election, do some research into your School Board candidates.  Your vote could make the difference between your children being educated and your children being indoctrinated.

Why We Should NEVER Defund The Police

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The police have come under a lot of criticism lately because of the actions of one out-of-control policeman in Minneapolis and the other policemen with him who failed to act to save George Floyd. However, in concentrating on one bad apple, many have forgotten the things that policemen do almost on a regular basis to help those in trouble. Yesterday The Daily Wire posted an article about one such instance.

The article reports:

San Diego K9 Officer Jonathan Wiese has been credited with saving the lives of two young girls after rappelling down a cliff to rescue them from a car their father had driven into the ocean in an apparent murder-suicide attempt over the weekend. 

According to The San Diego Union-Tribune, Wiese was near the San Diego-Coronado Bridge responding to a call the girls’ mother made to police Saturday morning, in which she informed them that her husband was suicidal and planned to take the toddlers, both two-year-olds, to the bridge and drive off it. 

ABC-10 reports that when Wiese arrived at the cliff area, where the man ultimately drove off, he saw the car had flipped over in the ocean below, and started to think-up a quick plan of action. 

“My first thought was jump but I’m afraid of heights,” said Wiese, reports CBS-8. 

“I could see him and he had one of the girls in his arms, and I have a two-year-old daughter at home so I imagined, what if that was my wife and kid down there? You’re not going to stand there on the cliff and watch it happen,” said Wiese, who later recalled the rescue effort, reports the Tribune. 

Wiese grabbed his K9 leash, wrapped it around himself, and gave one end to the other officers arriving on scene. 

“We kind of  held on to each other, I’ve never done anything like that holding on to each other’s belts,” recalled Sgt. Briggitta Belz, one of the responding officers. 

Wiese then repelled down 30 feet to the rocks below and swam toward the man, grabbed him under the armpit, held them above water, and pushed them toward the shore, reports ABC-10. 

San Diego Police Chief David Nisliet called Wiese’s actions “probably the most heroic thing I’ve seen in my 32 years.” Both of the girls were still in the hospital as of Monday, but are expected to recover — a development Wiese said was the “best news you can have.”

“All I care about is that those girls are going to live and have a second chance at life,” said Wiese. 

And that is one of many reasons we should never even consider defunding the police.

How To Stun A Snowflake

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Yesterday the following story was posted at the Leatherneck4Life website:

It was just a matter of time. Local San Diego high school hired a new bus driver recently and he got on the wrong exit and ended up on MCRD.

Having just finished his first cycle as a Drill Instructor, Staff Sgt (Redacted), was pretty amped up. “I just love Making Marines, I lost my bearing a little, I guess” He entered that bus with the intensity of a freight train. One student tried to explain they were lost and obviously was greeted firmly with agreement. “No S*** You’re F****** Lost!!!! But now you’re found, and you belong to ME!” An onslaught of beratement continued for another 15 minutes continued until another Drill Instructor, who had been sitting outside the bus listening and laughing finally felt the children had enough, walked in and dismissed the Drill Instructor.

The Command SgtMaj received a concerned phone call from the High School Principal later that afternoon. The tone quickly shifted when the SgtMaj had heard enough. After several apologies from the principal, the school has sent out a memo to angry parents. “The incident in question was part of a planned recruiting trial” The memo went on to explain, the students were given a unique opportunity to experience boot camp and should be thankful for such a honored experience.

Hot cocoa and warm blankets were passed out at the school, all children expected to have a full recovery. Local recruiters report several students called the next day interested and have begun plans for a joint operation to reroute more buses to the gate.

Love it!

Failed Parenting

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One of the most important things a parent can do is lead by example. Any time a parent does something that is not above board, it is a pretty good bet that their child will learn that it is okay to take shortcuts that may not be entirely honest. Unfortunately there seems to be a group of parents that despite their success has not yet figured this out.

The Associated Press is reporting today that federal authorities have charged a number of wealthy and famous people with falsifying information to make sure their children got into their schools of choice. I understand the desire of any parent to provide the best education possible for their children, but this scheme definitely stepped over the line.

The article reports:

Fifty people, including Hollywood stars Felicity Huffman and Lori Loughlin, were charged Tuesday in a scheme in which wealthy parents allegedly bribed college coaches and other insiders to get their children into some of the nation’s most elite schools.

Federal authorities called it the biggest college admissions scam ever prosecuted by the U.S. Justice Department, with the parents accused of paying an estimated $25 million in bribes.

“These parents are a catalog of wealth and privilege,” U.S. Attorney Andrew Lelling said in announcing the results of an investigation code-named Operation Varsity Blues.

…At least nine athletic coaches and 33 parents, many of them prominent in law, finance or business, were among those charged. Dozens, including Huffman, were arrested by midday.

The coaches worked at such schools as Yale, Stanford, Georgetown, Wake Forest, the University of Texas, the University of Southern California and the University of California, Los Angeles. A former Yale soccer coach pleaded guilty and helped build the case against others.

The article continues:

The bribes allegedly were dispensed through an admissions consulting company in Newport Beach, California. Authorities said parents paid William Singer, the founder of the Edge College & Career Network, the bribe money to get their children into college.

Prosecutors said Singer was scheduled to plead guilty in Boston Tuesday to charges including racketeering conspiracy. John Vandemoer, the former head sailing coach at Stanford, was also expected to plead guilty.

Colleges moved quickly to discipline the coaches accused. Stanford fired Vandemoer, UCLA suspended its soccer coach, and Wake Forest did the same with its volleyball coach.

Several schools, including USC and Yale, said they were victims themselves of the scam. USC also said it is reviewing its admissions process to prevent further such abuses.

This is a sad commentary on where we are as a society. Obviously some parents want to take the guess work out of college admissions. What is the lesson they are teaching their children? I wonder exactly how much of these scheme the children involved were aware of. Certainly if a child is recruited for a sport he has no knowledge of, he might notice that something is amiss. I hope the penalties for the parents are severe. As much as I can sympathize with the stress of getting children into good colleges (all three of my daughters are college graduates, two have advanced degrees), what these parents did is inexcusable–first of all because it is patently dishonest and second of all because of the example it sets for the students.

Fact Meets Theory

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John Sexton posted an article at Hot Air today about some parents who decided to try to raise their children ‘without feeling a lot of cultural pressure related to gender.’ It was an interesting experiment–eventually nature took over.

The article reports

At a time when more kids and teens are raising questions about the meaning of gender, Bonnie and Brian made a point of bringing up their children — Eliot and his sisters Toni, now 10, and Lena, 7 — in relatively gender-neutral ways. “It irked me when people said you can’t play with that because it’s a boy toy, or you can’t play with that because it’s a girl toy,” Bonnie says. They didn’t dress the girls in fancy pink baby clothes, for instance.

But no matter what Bonnie and Brian did, what happened looked a lot to them like nature taking over. The first time the family went to the local children’s museum, the parents laughed as 3-year-old Toni discovered princess dresses for the first time. She pulled them on with astonishment, as if to say, “Can you believe this?” Eliot, not yet able to talk, toddled away from her and right over to the train table.

“It’s funny,” Brian says. “I feel like I read stuff and listen to interviews with people that are like ‘Disney executives are driving little girls to want princess dresses!’ And I’m like, ‘Nope, little girls love this, and Disney’s making money off it.’ ” He laughs. “They just gravitated toward those things. They like what they like.”

Obviously not all little girls or all little boys will gravitate toward the same toys, but it is interesting to know that in most cases, there are some very basic differences between boys and girls. We need to recognize that all children are different and although they will have different strengths, there is more to the concept of gender than just a label.

What Does This Say About The Future Of American Society?

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Today’s U.K. Mail online reported that there has been a spike in fights recently at Chuck E. Cheese restaurants. Now I will admit that it has been a few years since I was in a Chuck E. Cheese–my youngest child turns 39 this year–but I don’t remember fights being part of the entertainment.

The article reports:

The elements within the environment can stimulate aggressive, impulsive behaviors,’ Dr. Dean Leav, told HLN. Not to be underestimated, Leav said, is the indulgence of alcohol.

‘Situations that involve a group of excited people and alcohol can often lead to acts of violence. A classic example is the fights that frequently break out during baseball games,’ she said.

But Chuck E. Cheese hasn’t always been a place where fights routinely happen. According to the company, in its more than 35 years, there has been a relatively small amount of violence.

In 2012, 99.99% of approximately 65 million guest visits at Chuck E. Cheese’s occurred without incident and resulted in smiles,” the company said.

Leay said that witnessing these types of incidents can be harmful to children long-term.

‘Many adults have poor impulse control,’ he said. “They frequently fail to consider the consequences of their actions even when kids are present.’

The last statement above is a bit scary–if adults have poor impulse control, how can they teach their children to have good impulse control.

No one is a perfect parent–they don’t exist, but there are many resources available to help parents with their own impulse control and to help parents become better parents to their children. Chuck E. Cheese should be a place to have fun–fights are totally out of order.

Just a note–as I said–I’m past the Chuck E. Cheese stage, but when I retired, my boss allowed me to have my retirement party at Dave & Busters. I told him I was retiring–I wasn’t dead–and wanted to have fun. That was a wonderful way to retire!

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What Does This Have To Do With Reading, Writing, And Arithmetic?

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CBN News posted a story today about a recent anti-bullying presentation at Linden Avenue Middle School in Red Hook, New York. I would like to go on the record to say that I oppose bullying. I do wonder why it seems to have become such a major problem in our schools in recent years. Back in the age of dinosaurs (the 1950’s and 1960’s) we had bullies too, but somehow it didn’t seem to be as much of an issue. Has the concept of conflict resolution caused us to forget how to deal with a bully? I don’t consider myself a violent person, but I have learned that the only successful way to deal with a bully is to stand up to him. Evidently our schools are suggesting an alternative approach.

The article at CBN reports:

The workshop for 13 and 14-year-old girls focused on homosexuality and gender identity. They were also taught words such as “pansexual” and “genderqueer.”

Parents say their daughters were told to ask one another for a kiss and they say two girls were told to stand in front of the class and pretend they were lesbians on a date.

“She told me, ‘Mom we all get teased and picked on enough. Now I’m going to be called a lesbian because I had to ask another girl if I could kiss her,'” parent, Mandy Coon, told reporters.

What in the world does this have to do with how to deal with a bully? Parents of the students who attended the workshop were not warned in advance or given the opportunity to opt out of the workshop.

The article further reports:

Superintendent Paul Finch told The Poughkeepsie Journal the presentation was “focused on improving culture, relationships, communication and self-perceptions.”

“We may require more notification to parents in the future,” Finch said.

He claimed the sessions are required under the state Dignity for All Students Act, which prohibits harassment and bullying in the classroom.

I would have no problem with teaching the students to report bullying incidents so that the school administration can deal with the bully involved. I would have no problem with teaching the students how to ignore bullying and encouraging all students to be kinder to each other. I would have no problem teaching students interpersonal problem-solving skills that would help end the bullying. I do, however, fail to see how making two young ladies kiss in front of the classroom relates to education. There is a reason parents are fleeing the public schools in favor of home schooling and private schools. This sort of behavior on the part of school administrators is part of that reason.

 

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