Last year a teacher in Florida had her class vote a boy out of kindergarten:
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Five-year-old Alex Barton was voted out of kindergarten class by his fellow students in Port St. Lucie, Florida. Before the vote, his teacher told classmates to say what they didn’t like about Alex: He was labeled “disgusting” and “annoying.” They voted 14 to 2 to kick him out of class.
The boy apparently has Asperger’s Syndrome, a form of high-functioning autism that’s linked to poor social skills. Children can learn how to function in a group but they need to be taught explicitly and they may always be awkward, withdrawn or odd.
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Often when atrocious events like this happen in public schools I wonder what will happen?
I found out what happened with this event, and I wish I hadn't. The teacher got her job back:
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Wendy Portillo, the Kindergarten teacher infamous for permitting neurotypical students to vote a boy with a form of Autism out of her class, will keep both her contract with the St. Lucie County school district and her tenured status after a unanimous vote by the School Board. Portillo is "overjoyed" by the ruling and hopes to return to teaching.
In May of 2008, Ms. Portillo led her students in a reality TV-like exercise in which Alex Barton, then 5 years old, was made to stand in front of the class while classmates listed reasons they didn't like him. Classmates called Alex "disgusting" and "annoying," among other things. Then, the class took a vote and by a margin of 14 to 2 chose to exclude Alex from class. He was made to leave the Kindergarten classroom and spent the rest of the day in the school nurse's office.
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(Hat tip: reddit.com)
In my opinion this woman shouldn't ever be allowed to teach in any school, ever again. What she did showed complete lack of common sense. There was no sensitivity. I expect that she's inflicted other long lasting scars on more children, but probably not as public.
As I've mentioned before when you have six million teachers in government schools I recognize you'll some times get a few flakes, or even evil teachers. I understand this. It is hard to sift through large numbers of individuals and always pick the good teachers.
What I don't understand is how school officials will keep and defend obviously bad teachers. There are some people who shouldn't be allowed in front of children. Some adults are clueless, and some adults are evil. Neither of these should be permitted a second chance. Yet too often they'll get a slap on the wrist, and maybe moved to another school.
The result is we have thousands to maybe millions of children who are suffering.
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Technorati tags: government schools, public school, public education, education
9 comments:
That is crazy.
Good grief.
~Luke
I wonder how many more children she will scar for life?
How about a petition to grant an award to Wendy Portillo...perhaps something like "The Most Harmfull Teacher on the Planet" Award?
Since the school district is impotent to speak on behalf of their own students and the parents are just as guilty as their children for going along with it, maybe we are the only ones left to do something?
Mimi Rothschild
CEO and Founder, Learning By Grace, Inc.
I am so sad, angry, and disappointed. I can't believe the school district cares so little for its students.
Luke - it is crazy.
Alasandra - I agree. I've known of several teachers who did horrible things to students, and yet were allowed to keep teaching.
Mimi- I don't think that would make a different. Wendy probably thinks she is a good teacher. She might admit that she made a mistake, but that it isn't that big a deal.
Katya - It is sad. The public school system is a broken system. People have tried for years to reform it, but it only gets worse. At this point I think the best thing we can do for the next generation is to encourage peoples to walk away from government schools.
That breaks my heart! My best friend has an autistic son, and I can't imagine how this would have affected him. Sad, just so sad!
And their reinstating her with seemingly no penalties! Shocking! It seems that the teacher isn't the only clueless/evil one!
I agree with the decision to reinstate the teacher. It is good to see that they took a decision to rectify the injustice meted out against the teacher. Those who advocate her permanent dismissal are heartless and probably biased as well.
I have Asperger syndrome myself, and if such happened to me at age five (undiagnosed at the time) my mother would have well taken care of the situation. I don't believe in minimizing consequences for this teacher. She should have lost her license to teach. You have a child who is going to struggle even worse when he's older, and marginalization will only reinforce that he isn't like everyone else which will cause profound depression.
It is surprising to me how protective society is of teachers. Taking away their teacher's license is not a prison term, it is just saying they are not qualified to teach. Yet way too often horrible teachers keep teachering.
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