Report: Vt. school district violated civil rights

[trailmonkee]

Source: AP


SPRINGFIELD, Vt. (AP) — Federal investigators say a Vermont school district violated civil rights laws while responding to an incident in which a teacher’s aide threatened an African-American sixth-grader and then used a racial epithet.


After a two-year-investigation, the U.S. Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights has reached a settlement with the Springfield School District. The Valley News reports (http://bit.ly/ONL4PH) the district is required to pay nearly $3,000 in counseling services for the student and increase regulations in training for employees.


The agency says in 2010, an aide at Riverside Middle School told the student if he didn’t stop using a yardstick to sword-fight with another student, the aide would ‘‘shove it’’ into him ‘‘and then used the epithet. The aide resigned. The child now attends school elsewhere.


Read more: http://www.boston.com/news/education/2012/08/31/report-school-district-violated-civil-rights/f3xD9Lsu0IpyAEZEfcPZ7K/story.html

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Racism is almost normal these days.... thank god we still have laws in this country protecting individuals from racial abuse, for now at least...

[naaman fletcher]

1. you think there is more racism now than, 10, 20, 30 years ago? nt

[awoke_in_2003]

5. I think the same...

It went underground for a while, but with the election of Obama they became vocal again.

[naaman fletcher]

6. With all due respect

I think that is ridiculous. Even in Oklahoma where I live, 15 years ago racist jokes were rampant, now I barely hear them.

[awoke_in_2003]

7. I can only go from personal experience...

in my experience, racists were reluctant to say out loud, the way they felt. They used coded language. Since Obama took office, they just say their crap out right. That is my experience on the subject. I respect that yours is different

[naaman fletcher]

9. I respect yours too

I hope you're wrong!

[wordpix]

2. OMG, no teacher should threaten a child like that, & then bringing racism in is worse

I had 6th gr. classes with 30 kids each that I was teaching metric measurements to with metric yardsticks and same thing happened---sword fights. Just take the "swords" away and tell kids involved to sit down and do their reading. It usually worked and if not, call the bouncer (school disciplinarian).

[Did I Just Type This]

3. Don't know what it is about 6th grade teachers...

I had a sixth grade teacher throw a desk at me, and a different sixth grade teacher threaten to "meet me after class". It was the 1st day of school (at a junior high school), after 6 straight opening day "introductions" to the new teachers, I got bored and chased a fly across the classroom ending in it's demise against the window. Realizing how incredibly wrong and stupid my actions were, i caught the sight of a desk sailing across the room at me and ducked just in time. I was then cornered in my final 7th period class and threatened by that teacher not to file a complaint or he would meet me after class and kick the sh!t out of me. I didn't file any complaints and actually enjoyed my time at the school.

[al bupp]

4. Just for context...

I live ~20 minutes from Springfield, and it's a prototypical old New England mill town, where all the old mills have long since closed, and just a few have been renovated & re-purposed. It's pretty depressed, economically, and I'm certain doesn't attract the cream of the school aide crop. Not that this excuses this incident in any way.

[bitchkitty]

8. Not NEARLY as bad as it used to be.

The difference between now and then is stunning.

The racists are certainly out there now, but in the old days, there would be no need to stir up the base with code words. The base was already stirred up, and they were up front and blatant - no need for code.

Your experience could very well be different from mine, but I've lived through the civil rights movement, and let me tell you - it's not as bad as it used to be.

That said, they're still out there, and they're not going away. They're just sneakier now, and it's important to stay on top of them.