Bully problem continues

[wade3504]

I got home from work today and my husband let me know what had happened with my daughter at school today. The original bully at school is gone. He and his best bud have moved farther away so they don't go to my daughter's elementary school anymore but they still have friends at her school. Today, while they were playing a game in class he was sitting by her seat and stole pencils out of her backpack while looking for her cell phone to steal. Other children in her class let her know what was going on and she got her pencils back from him and said nothing to the teacher as she is afraid of what he'll do if he sees her talking to the teacher. Later in the day several classmates heard him saying that he was going to rape her. They told her and she again said nothing to her teacher and waited until the end of the day to tell a guidance counselor. The school police will be there on Monday as will we to make sure something is done about him. We found out that he has already been suspended once for having shot a girl with a b.b. gun on the way home from school. We also found out that all of these boys will be back together in the same middle school that she will be going to in the fall. Needless to say, she will not be going to that middle school no matter whether we still currently live in the same place as we do now and I will most likely be pulling her from school for the last two months if at all possible and I will do everything I can to make that possible as well. We are considering breaking out lease now and moving much sooner rather than later.

We will be at the school first thing Monday morning and will not be leeting our daughter out of our sight until they come up with a solution that we agree with.

 

[Gini]

Amanda

You are an awesome parent to get to the bottom of this before something extreme happens. I watch the news daily and can't believe what kids go thru these days.

This is horrible and this shouldn't be happening..... I wish more parents would take the time to listen to their children like you are..

 

[Dee]

OMG! What child says that? how old is this boy? What kids even knows what that is?

It would be a hard choice, but can you change her schools? Kids pick up on bullying and with the other boys having frineds there maybe it is best to put her in another school for a fresh start.

Good for you for going there on Monday. I hope this kids parents take it seriously!! As if anyone has the right to threaten someone like that let alone a kids. i don't agree with yelling at another parents kids, but when it comes to someone threatening to rape my child i would make it very clear to this little boy if you mess with my kid...you will be messing with me. Ugh you must be sick. I'm thinking of you guys!

 

[wade3504]

The boy that we are dealing with this time is ten just like the others. My sister in law asked me if he even knew what rape was and I told her unfortunately kids these days know way more than they should and I am certain he knows exactly what he was talking about.

As far as the parents go, I am guessing they will be just like the others and either not believe their child would do that or believe their child when he lies to them like the previous ones did even though we have several witnesses this time as long as they aren't afraid to speak up on Monday.

Most likely I will be pulling her and my son on Monday as even if he is kicked out there are several more in the school who are friends with the original bully and they will see it as my daughter's fault if he is kicked out. Last time this happened things got uglier and uglier when she stepped up and told people what was going on. Right now I work at a preschool and my boss told me I could bring her up there. I think she's tinking for a temporary amount of time but if need be I will talk to her and see if I can do so until the end of the year and either homeschool her or get her work from school. I no longer want to leave her at that school no matter whether he is kicked out or not and she will not go to the local middle school in the fall no matter what we have to do to keep her out of it.

Both my husband and I are very upset and angry and unfortuately my husband has the flu on top of all this so this just makes him feel even worse. I am guessing that soon my daughter will start having upset stomach like she did before when all this went on and I can totaly understand as I do as well.

 

[Watcheye]

This is so sick and frustrating. I am very sorry to hear such rotten things are going on for your family.

 

[Jill]

Absolutely sounds like a situation to get the police involved with... forget the school officials.

 

[wade3504]

We are told that the school police are the real police but we will see on Monday. Even if they are, with the last incident before this one they did nothing (situation happenened at home but the boy was in her previous class). We also called the local police back then and even though the boy had run at her with a baseball bat yelling he was going to kill her they did nothing but talk to the kid, even though they told us that a baseball bat is considered a lethal weapon. The cop that day basically told us boys will be boys but then also told us since he threatened her wit a lethal weapon, and admitted to the cop that he had, that we could use all force necessary against him to protect our daughter in the future. Well Hello! He admitted what he did to her should't you be doing something to protect our daughter like taking him away? So, we basically know we will be the ones dealing with this on Monday and doing what we need to do. We are looking for places to move to this weekend.

 

[miniwhinny]

What's the name of your school district and the name of the school where this is happening?

 

[Marty]

SAY WHAT!!!!!!!!!!

Ok Amanda I've about had it up to here with this bully stuff. Its so dangerous!

FIRST AND FOREMOST: You and your family should not have to be the ones to break a lease and move and relocate and take your kids out of school and go through all that! Why should you go through all this trouble cause of them? And to up-route the kids with only 2 more months to go.......I'd be beyond furious! I'm not a fighter, we all know I'm a weenie, but well, I never used to be but by golly I've had no other choice than to stand up against WRONG and fight the evil in this world.

Its a good thing the school police will be there. You have got to stand your ground firm and let them all know you mean business too. They have to clean up their act and get rid of the bullys. IT IS THEIR JOB AND THE LAW to protect your kids. But I would also let them know if you have to break your lease and move you will sue the daylights out of them for expenses. Enough is Enough.

FURTHERMORE: At this point I would not hesitate to get the media involved AND a lawyer. Have the media there at school when the school police arrive.

This is BS to the highest degree.

 

[wade3504]

Marty, the problem is that the original bully's friend's keep popping up and we don't know how many there are or what they will do next at this shool and the school can't just kick kids out who are friend's with this bully. I am afraid that something will happen to her by someone else after Monday who is left in the school. We are considering lawyers and taking it to the news people depending on how they deal with it. My father has friends who are lawyers who will step up and help us and my cousn's wife is also a lawyer.

As far as the moving goes we planned on doing that come October anyway as even without the bullies the school is horrible to begin with.

 

[susanne]

This is so horrible -- you truly are between a rock and a hard place.

I would be half tempted to line up an older, bigger boy to have a "Come to Jesus" talk with these little punks, leaving no doubt that he'll beat the crap out of them if ANYBODY so much as looks wrong at her.

Seriously, though, I think home schooling is probably your best bet for now. Even with another school, kids and even teachers will have friends there and will talk. Keep her involved in activities that will build her self-esteem, but keep her away from the thugs (including the school administrators) who are undermining her self worth.

On the bright side, it sounds like she has made some good, loyal friends. Hopefully she can maintain contact with some of them.

Things change drastically between 4th grade and high school, and hopefully by then she can attend [a better] school.

Hang in there, and stay strong on Monday!

 

[Marty]

http://www.drphil.com/shows/show/1518

 

[Katiean]

My 10 year old nephew was being bullied. It was reported to the teacher. It didn't help. Bullied again,told the counselor and teacher. It didn't help. Bullied again after he kept coming up with reasons to not go to school. Teacher, counselor and principal all knew about it. They did nothing. My brother enrolled my nephew in home schooling and kept him home. The principal came to their home and threatened to bring CPS with him on Monday if my nephew was not back in school on Monday. My brother told him to bring them because he was enrolled in home schooling.

They even have a segment on the news to try to stop bullying. Not that this helps because there was a boy on the middle school (I think it was middle school) wrestling team that was bullied beyond belief. They were at a match in Vegas. The boy was stripped by other team members, duct tapped to a table from one of the rooms they were staying in. He was placed on this table naked on the walk way of the motel and urinated on and left there. The coach knew about. The counselor knew about it as did the principal. NOTHING WAS DONE TO THE ADULTS THAT KNEW ABOUT THIS. It was a loophole about reporting abuse. They are bound to report abuse if it is at the hands of an adult. This was at the hands of other children. I think the school board is now addressing it but in my opinion, they ALL should have lost their jobs the day it was discovered they knew about the "hazing". I think from public outrage they did suspend the students.

 

[wade3504]

Well, we will be taking this public if the outcome is not in the best interest of our duaghter tomorrow. She will no longer be at that school as of tomorrow no matter what they will (or most likely won't do to this kid). I talked with a middle school counselor at an Easter egg hunt yesterday and she says since it was only a verbal threat they might or might not suspend him for 10 days. With past experience with this school it will be might not. They'll ask for an apology from him and that will be the end. We will be there tomorrow with our daughter. She will not even be allowed in the same room with this kid when they call him up to the office. I am not sure they will allow us in the office when they call him up but she will stay with us at all times. We will be demanding that she be allowed to be placed in another school of our choosing or we will fight them to pay for homeschooling or private school.

It blows my mind that they might not do anything since as they say, it's only a verbal threat. What is it going to take, someone actually getting raped? We watched The show World's Dumbest yesterday and they kicked a kid out of school for jumping from a balcony onto a Christmas tree at school and knocking it over but it's perfectly OK to bully or threaten to rape someone since it's only verbal? Cannot believe this!

 

[wade3504]

We went to the school this morning and found out that the school police had never been called on Thursday so we talked to the principal and told her that we wanted to be notified when the police arrived. The principal tried brushing it under the rug trying to make it out like it was no big deal that she would be safe and she could go to class and they would deal with him. We said no that she was not coming back to class and that we wanted her moved from that school to another school. She refused saying it was too late in the year to move her. So, basically she did nothing. So, we went home and called the local police and told them what was going on. We have dealt with this officer before when the bully incidents went on before and he was basically like, well it's just a ten year old boy using words he probably doesn't even know. His comment last time when a boy ran at her with a baseball bat yelling I am going to kill you was that boys will be boys so as soon as he walked intooe house I knew we'd get nowhere with him. He spoke to us about us having to contact the school police and that they are the real police like he is and that it is their jurisdiction. He also tried telling us that she would be safe as the schools have police there all day. The school police didn't get to the school until about 11 oclock this morning. Anyway, we went back and spoke to that police officer and he said he spoke to the boy (the principal tried telling us the boy wasn't there earlier), had yet to speak to the parents and that the school would give him consequences which will basically be a suspension for a few days and then he will be back. Thy tried telling us that they would move him from the class but this kid has 3-4 friends in the same class and all the fifth grade classes are all right next door to each other. They were trying to get us to let her stay trying to tell us that she was safe as their are adults around at all times and they would deal with the situations as they arose. So, both my husband and I are already highly upset and I say, How can you gaurantee that she is not going to be hurt? You say that you will deal with the incidents as they come. What if that is too late by then? What if you have to deal with a child that killed my daughter? My daughter is not going to be that child that changes things around here and gets you to do something. I told them they couldn't gaurantee that one of those kids wasn't going to bring a weapon to school and use it on her. This kid already shot two other children with a B.B. gun on the way home from school. She had nothing to say after that as she knows full well they can't gaurantee her safety. She also got real nervous and wanted to know how we heard about that incident. My daughter basically told her that kids talk and we'd also talked to her teacher when we went to get her stuff from the classroom and he said how he was done with the kids in that school and no one doing anything about it and that he was leaving and going to another school in the fall. So, now we have been calling the area superintedant every hour waiting to be heard and we will be contacting the news. I will also contact parents to have them calling the school and making it quite uncomfortable for them and we are contacing a lawyer. We are told that we can't press charges as he is a ten year old boy and it's only words but we are going to make sure of that as well. So that is what is going on so far.

 

[SampleMM]

Your really need to get the SCHOOL BOARD involved. I think I told you this last time. I had a very bad bullying situation that went on for a year. Like you, I went through the principal and superintendent. You must realize, that these type of situations make them look BAD so they are going to sweep it under the carpet. You need to call every SCHOOL BOARD member................NOW!

 

[MountainMeadows]

As well as calling - it would be prudent to put all your feelings & worries in a letter and send it to each School Board member, the principal, all school officials, teachers, etc that are involved in this situation - send the letters CERTIFIED so that there is NO MISTAKE about whether they got the information - I would copy the police dept. You can also look into an attorney and see if you have grounds for a Civil Lawsuit agains the school, the school board and the parents of the boy -- in many cases such as these bullying is being handled as a Civil case.

Perhaps if the nitwits get sued they will understand that "boys will be boys" will NOT be tolerated in this day and age -- that kid has a problem and needs to be dealt with - unfortunately a lot of these type of things escalate rather than just go away - I am sure you are well aware of that.

Good luck to you - my thoughts are with you, your daughter and your entire family.

 

[bevann]

I would also get some media involved.With all the press going on now regarding "BULLYING"I am almost certain you will find some reporter (either newspaper or TV)who would love a story.The school will not like the bad press especially since taxpayer dollars fund our school systems.Be sure you have everything documented with an exact time line of incidents involving your daughter.I do agree that she is no longer safe in that school.Sounds like there are several children with major behavorial issues.Even try contacting DR PHIL show.Good luck and keep us posted.

 

[wade3504]

Thank you for the ideas. I will be contacting the school board members and we have already contacted a news station. I am also calling all parents that I know and having them call. The assistant area superintendant called my husband and basically said the same thing the principal did and also says that other public schools most likely will not accept her transfer so late in the year and even if they did it would take 2 to 3 weeks. By that time school would pretty much be over and we can't keep her out of school for that long so we are homeschooling her. The assistant superintendant was afraid that we were trying to come after the school for being liable for what happened off school grounds but we told them that no they weren't liable for what happened off school grounds but this was happening ON school grounds. So we were basically blown off by her as well. Even though we are homeschooling her we are not dropping this. We are contacting lawyers and we were also told that we could not press charges against him as he is ten years old and they were only words. I am sooooo tired of hearing "they were only words", "I'm going to rape you" is not just only words. tHat is a huge threat to my daughters safety and health. She is playing outside right now. She is not happy that my husband is out there with her but one of us will be with her at all times now since they know where she lives. Unfortunately the good ones are the ones who get punished these days for doing the right thing.

 

[SampleMM]

I truly feel that once the School Board is involved, you will get somewhere. Right now, you are dealing with the wrong people. It is there job to make the school look good and keep bad things like this shoved somewhere for no one to see. That is why they are all blowing you off. The School Board members are their boss..............please get them involved. Board members are volunteers, who usually care about students and their community. Superintendents and principals are paid positions and this whole bullying situation makes it look like they are not performing their job duties.....kapeesh?