School Violence Toleration
by Walter E. Williams
I'm wondering just when parents, especially poor minorities, will refuse to tolerate day-to-day school
conditions that most parents wouldn't dream of tolerating. Lisa Snell, director of the Education and
Child Welfare Program at the Los Angles-based Reason Foundation, has a recent article about school
violence titled, "No Way Out," in the October 2004 edition of Reason On Line (www.reason.com).
Ashley Fernandez, a 12-year-old, attends Morgan Village Middle School, in Camden, New Jersey, a
predominantly black and Hispanic school that has been designated as failing under state and federal
standards for more than three years. Rotten education is not Ashley's only problem. When her gym
teacher, exasperated by his unruly class, put all the girls in the boys locker room, Ashley was
assaulted. Two boys dragged her into the shower, held her down and fondled her for 10 minutes. The
school principal refused to even acknowledge the assault and denied her mother's transfer request to
another school. Since the assault, Ashley has received numerous threats and boys frequently grope her
and run away. Put yourself in the place of Ashley's mother. The school won't protect her daughter
from threats and assault. The school won't permit a transfer. What would you do? Ashley's mother
began to keep her home. The response from officials: she received a court summons for allowing
truancy.
Then there's Carmen Santana's grandson Abraham who attended Camden High School. After two
boys hit him in the face, broke his nose and chipped his teeth, Abraham was afraid to go to school.
Guess what. His grandmother was charged with allowing truancy when she kept him home while she
sought permission for him to complete his senior year studies at home. Lisa Snell reports that "more
than 100 parents have removed their children from Camden schools because of safety concerns. The
school district's response: a truancy crackdown."
Nationwide there were approximately 1,466,000 violent incidents that occurred in public schools in
1999-2000. Violent incidents, according to the U.S. Department of Education, National Center for
Education Statistics, include rape, sexual battery other than rape, physical attack or fight with a
weapon, threat of physical attack with a weapon, and robbery with or without a weapon. Most school
violence occurs in inner city schools. During the 1999-2000 school year, 7 percent of all public schools
accounted for 50 percent of the total violent incidents and 2 percent of public schools accounted for 50
percent of the serious violent incidents.
Students aren't the only victims of school violence. Between 1996 and 2000, teachers were the victims
of approximately 1,603,000 nonfatal crimes at school. There were 1,004,000 thefts from teachers and
599,000 incidents of rape, sexual assault, robbery, aggravated assault, and simple assault.
I'm sorry if I'm out of touch with modern times but this kind of student behavior is completely
intolerable. Moreover, there are no signs on the horizon that things are going to get any better.
Psycho-babblers try to lay the violence at the feet of poverty, single-parenthood and discrimination.
That's nonsense. Years ago, when I attended predominantly black schools (1942-1954), there were
single-parent households, gross poverty and societal discrimination. During those times, today's school
violence would have been unimaginable. Even to curse a teacher was unthinkable.
Today's school violence occurs because it's tolerated. I'm betting that a punishment like caning or six
months incarceration at hard labor would bring it to a screeching halt. You say, "Williams, that's cruel
and unreasonable!" I say it's cruel and unreasonable to permit school thugs to make schools unsafe and
education impossible for everyone else. Short of measures to immediately end school violence, at the
minimum parents should be able to transfer their children out of unsafe failing public schools. Or, do
you believe, as the education establishment does, that parents and children should be held hostage
until they come up with a solution?
Walter E. Williams
c44-04
October 11, 2004
Next
by Walter E. Williams
I'm wondering just when parents, especially poor minorities, will refuse to tolerate day-to-day school
conditions that most parents wouldn't dream of tolerating. Lisa Snell, director of the Education and
Child Welfare Program at the Los Angles-based Reason Foundation, has a recent article about school
violence titled, "No Way Out," in the October 2004 edition of Reason On Line (www.reason.com).
Ashley Fernandez, a 12-year-old, attends Morgan Village Middle School, in Camden, New Jersey, a
predominantly black and Hispanic school that has been designated as failing under state and federal
standards for more than three years. Rotten education is not Ashley's only problem. When her gym
teacher, exasperated by his unruly class, put all the girls in the boys locker room, Ashley was
assaulted. Two boys dragged her into the shower, held her down and fondled her for 10 minutes. The
school principal refused to even acknowledge the assault and denied her mother's transfer request to
another school. Since the assault, Ashley has received numerous threats and boys frequently grope her
and run away. Put yourself in the place of Ashley's mother. The school won't protect her daughter
from threats and assault. The school won't permit a transfer. What would you do? Ashley's mother
began to keep her home. The response from officials: she received a court summons for allowing
truancy.
Then there's Carmen Santana's grandson Abraham who attended Camden High School. After two
boys hit him in the face, broke his nose and chipped his teeth, Abraham was afraid to go to school.
Guess what. His grandmother was charged with allowing truancy when she kept him home while she
sought permission for him to complete his senior year studies at home. Lisa Snell reports that "more
than 100 parents have removed their children from Camden schools because of safety concerns. The
school district's response: a truancy crackdown."
Nationwide there were approximately 1,466,000 violent incidents that occurred in public schools in
1999-2000. Violent incidents, according to the U.S. Department of Education, National Center for
Education Statistics, include rape, sexual battery other than rape, physical attack or fight with a
weapon, threat of physical attack with a weapon, and robbery with or without a weapon. Most school
violence occurs in inner city schools. During the 1999-2000 school year, 7 percent of all public schools
accounted for 50 percent of the total violent incidents and 2 percent of public schools accounted for 50
percent of the serious violent incidents.
Students aren't the only victims of school violence. Between 1996 and 2000, teachers were the victims
of approximately 1,603,000 nonfatal crimes at school. There were 1,004,000 thefts from teachers and
599,000 incidents of rape, sexual assault, robbery, aggravated assault, and simple assault.
I'm sorry if I'm out of touch with modern times but this kind of student behavior is completely
intolerable. Moreover, there are no signs on the horizon that things are going to get any better.
Psycho-babblers try to lay the violence at the feet of poverty, single-parenthood and discrimination.
That's nonsense. Years ago, when I attended predominantly black schools (1942-1954), there were
single-parent households, gross poverty and societal discrimination. During those times, today's school
violence would have been unimaginable. Even to curse a teacher was unthinkable.
Today's school violence occurs because it's tolerated. I'm betting that a punishment like caning or six
months incarceration at hard labor would bring it to a screeching halt. You say, "Williams, that's cruel
and unreasonable!" I say it's cruel and unreasonable to permit school thugs to make schools unsafe and
education impossible for everyone else. Short of measures to immediately end school violence, at the
minimum parents should be able to transfer their children out of unsafe failing public schools. Or, do
you believe, as the education establishment does, that parents and children should be held hostage
until they come up with a solution?
Walter E. Williams
c44-04
October 11, 2004
Next
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