Wednesday, October 07, 2009

Why do school officials even care how a student arrives?

It is such a funny world. New York school officials, with nothing better to do, decided that students can not bike to school. New York Mom Fights Middle School That Banned Her Bike Rides With Son explains:

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A New York mother is fighting back against her school district after administrators and officials told her she and her son didn't have the right to bike to school together — and that his safety, even beyond school walls, was out of her hands.
Janette Kaddo Marino said their 3-mile rides to and from school in Saratoga Springs have been met with stiff opposition from officials and even a state trooper who claimed it was unsafe — and illegal — for her 12-year-old son Adam to travel on his own pair of wheels.

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It is mind boggling to me that the school even has a policy in place designed to control what happens to "their" students off the campus.

The mother is fighting this. I think she will win.

(Hat tip: Joanne Jacobs)


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Technorati tags: children, education, government schools, children, public school, public education

9 comments:

Mommydew said...

When my brother and I were in middle school we lived two miles from school. Our bus was horrible with weekly fights so we decided to bike to school. We got pulled in to the principles office, our mom was called and they told us it wasn't safe for us to bike to school. Apparently they had gotten some complaints. My mom fought and said there was no rule we couldn't ride, she didn't back down and she won!

Henry Cate said...

That seems so weird. The school bus wasn't safe. The school has some control over that.

But they are all worried about you biking on your own to school.

This is a classic case of fussing over other people's motes rather than fixing the beam in their own eye.

I'm glad your mom won.

Anonymous said...

Gotta love this paragraph from the linked article: "Since Marino's concerns first went public in May, the school board has been considered her appeal but has been slowed by bureaucratic gridlock, organizing a transportation safety committee to advise a school board policy committee to advise the school board itself, which is expected to consider the bike policy at an Oct. 13 board meeting." A committee to advise a committee to advise the board. Ah...bureaucracy.

Sebastian said...

I simply have difficulty comprehending where the school gets the authority to regulate how the child gets to school.
Certainly they can regulate behavior on buses, and even under what conditions bus service is offered (distance from school, special needs requirements etc).
But where does the authority stem from that lets them say a student may not walk or ride a bike? If they can regulate that, can they regulate who may carpool? Can the school officials regulate who may stay home alone after school (school officials vice city or state government).
What is the limit of the authority of the school officials?

Anonymous said...

Oh you got to be Kidding me, The schools ought to be glad Kids arrive at all not about How they arrive.

Luke Holzmann said...

Well, they do claim that there is a policy against riding a bike to school (completely with a contradiction further down the policy)... so there is some merit to saying, "This is against our school policy."

To which a correct response would be, "Okay, I'll take my child elsewhere. ...like, home [smile]."

On the other hand, I can see why such policies would be in place: Schools don't want to have to deal with the potential repercussions of a kid who got hit on his bike on the way in to school. Of course, like many regulations, the restriction wasn't well thought-through.

~Luke

Henry Cate said...

Luke says: To which a correct response would be, "Okay, I'll take my child elsewhere. ...like, home [smile]."

I agree!


Part of the problem is in today's society government schools are asked to do so much. School officials don't stop and think about the boundries of responsibilities.

Anonymous said...

This kid isn't even biking alone, his Mom rides with him. I think it's crazy that the school has a problem with that and good for her for fighting to get rid of this ridiculous rule!

Ben's Mom said...

This cracks me up, but doesn't surprise me. Schools are so worried about law suits that they have lost all common sense.