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In early September, an 11-year-old boy from Virginia was suspended after waiting two hours to report a bullet that a classmate had shown him. Despite objections from his parents, school officials defended the one-and-a-half-day suspension, stating that it was necessary to reinforce a culture of safety. The mother of the boy has now filed a lawsuit against the school for breach of contract.
Watch the video above as Straight Arrow News contributor Adrienne Lawrence argues that children should not be punished for delays in reporting and explains how such disciplinary approaches may backfire.
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The following is an excerpt from the above video:
Our society puts far too much of a burden on children, and then punishes them for responding like children. Kids should get to experience as much of the whimsical aspects of childhood as they can. They shouldn’t have to do annual school-shooter safety drills or grapple between whether to finish a test or go file a report with the principal.
Kids should not be compelled to take on the responsibilities of adulthood, to fix problems that we adults created, like access to guns. It’s one thing to expect children to say something if they see something, and it’s another thing to punish them for failing to speak when they’re scared.
We need to create environments where they know that they can come forward and that they feel safe and comfortable in doing so. Let’s let kids be kids, and as adults, let’s make a better effort to keep the kids safe.
