Monday, June 15, 2009

From the archives - Reasons to homeschool

Several years ago John Whitehead of The Rutherford Institute wrote about some classic problems with government schools:


In Zero Common Sense School Discipline Rules Cheapen Students' Humanity John wrote about instances of horrible acts by school officials in the name of "zero tolerance." I thought the worse was:

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... a high schooler commended for his valor in taking a knife away from a suicidal friend—although he was then suspended for violating the school’s zero tolerance policy against weapons possession.
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In The Lockdown in America’s Public Schools John write about how typical boy behavior of games like Good Cop / Bad Cop is now treated:

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But in a new twist on an old game, it’s not the good cop who gets the bad guys. Now, the game ends when the school officials call in the "good" cops, who arrest the "bad" kindergartners for engaging in juvenile crime
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But the most egregious act by public school officals John documented was in his column Forced Genital Exams of Children--Nothing Strange or Unusual Here?

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Strangers entered two different elementary schools in Tulsa, Oklahoma on two separate occasions. They forcibly removed the clothes from numerous children between the ages of three and five—over their cries of fear and desperate attempts to resist—and proceeded to probe the genitals of the now-nude children.
Most schools now have elaborate procedures to screen and account for visitors. However, this sounds like a situation where school safety precautions failed horribly. What happened to these children is much worse than mere negligence because authorities at both schools actually arranged for and supported these outrageous events.
The strangers who entered the elementary schools were LPN nurses assigned to the schools to take blood samples and perform genital exams on behalf of the Head Start program that is associated with the schools. The great majority of the children were of African-American or Hispanic descent. Ostensibly, the nurses were looking for signs of child abuse or other health problems among the youngsters.
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Words fail me.

I did a little digging and found several references to this, but I wasn't able to find any more recent news to this 1998 event. Does anyone know if there was a successful lawsuit? Did some of the officials get fired?


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1 comment:

Christi said...

Thank You, Lord, that we homeschool! But for the grace of God there go I! I canNOT imagine if that had happened to one of MY children. I think my hubby would've taken his rifle out of the closet over that!