Bullying-My daughter's experience

[Robyn66]

I have an amazing brilliant beautiful 13 year old daughter who has Aspergers Syndrome. She has been mercilessly bullied since first grade in the local school system. Not only did the teachers look the other way, they at times joined in because she was "annoying" at times. This school was illequipped to help a child with an autism-spectrum disability. We tried to do everything to get help for the school to get training for aids that were unqualified, tried to organize workshops to promote understanding and bought books and videos to teach staff that our daughters triggers and phobias were real and not dramatic or just bad behavior.

Nothing changed . She would be bullied in the same places in the same hallways from 1st -5th grade. I would literally beg them to have a teacher walk down the hall with her to protect her because it was clear where it was going on- and they said they couldn't do it and my daughter needed to learn how to handle it. She is desperately afraid of bees so kids would whisper to her in the lunch line that there was a bee on her so she would freak out screaming and crying and running around so they could have a laugh and the "teachers" would yell at her. It got to a point when she was in 5th grade that she was so stressed and sick over going to school, I pulled her out after yet another meeting with the special ed staff and the principal. The reason was we finally brought in an outside independent observer to see what was happening to our daughter in the school and guess what. EVERYTHING our daughter said was happening was TRUE! They had been saying it was her imagination for years but every abuse by the kids, her aide, and the teachers was right there in front of us. The school district special ed coordinator reamed out our observer from the state agency for going "outside the proper channels" and we pulled our daughter out of school and had her tutored for the last six weeks. I know we should have sued the school district but by that time we were so worn out we just wanted our daughter out of there and safe.

Middle school was better because there was a real autism program but for 6 and 7th grade she had to spend lunch and recess in the special needs room because the kids were so rotten to her she would be in tears every day.

So some parents and I got together with the Superintendent of Schools to address this problem. And all we heard about was how we had to have compassion for the bullies and how they have hard lives and we can't punish them. My feeling was to bring in the parents and be very clear about what their kids were doing and force the parents to be accountable but apparently that is not an appropriate way to handle things!

My younger daughter has a lot less trouble fitting in and has a lot of friends but at the same time there are a lot of "Apostolic Lutherans" in our town. They are Fundies on steroids! My little one is in 4th grade and one of the girls in her class came up to her and told her that my little one's "heart was black" because she hadn't accepted Jesus Christ the way she had.

So it doesn't surprise me that kids are killing themselves because in this culture we don't protect those who need protecting. We don't clothe the poor or feed the hungry. In our society we protect bullies, and leave their victims exposed.

Robyn

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

1. What's this business about an outside observer?

How'd that work?

[Robyn66]

3. observer

You have a right to have anyone come in to observe your child at school as long as you know and you let the school know they are doing it. We had a caseworker through Monadnock Developmental Services who was working with us at the time who really put herself out there on a limb to report honestly what she saw.

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

4. So why did the school have an issue with your observer?

[Robyn66]

9. Because she reported things they had been

denying were true.

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

10. How does that "go outside the proper channels?"

What bullying did the observer actually witness?

Were you paying this person?

[Robyn66]

13. She observed

My daughter being treated harshly and inappropriately by her aide, the kids teasing and making fun of her in front of the teacher. She was in the middle of a group of kids who were being noisy but she was the only kid spoken to. Her IEP also wasn't being followed. According to the Special Ed dept we were supposed to go through them- again. We had countless meetings and phone calls to try and make things better. Our biggest mistake was that all of these meetings and phone calls were not official meetings documented with minutes so "they never happened" so the people in the special ed department at the school could look the dept heads in the face and lie and say they knew nothing about anything and we had never met about anything. We tried for years to "work" with the school but it never got better.

[MineralMan]

2. There is a solution, but it's fairly drastic.

Document everything you can regarding the school's treatment of your daughter, then find a good progressive attorney in your community and let him or her take over. It will help if you have any written communications from the school dismissing your complaints.

It's amazing what an "encouraging" letter from an attorney can do.

[Robyn66]

5. We knew that but...

lawyers cost money and we couldn't afford a lawyer. Beleive me I wanted to get one. At one point they kept two sets of note-books on my daughter. The one they sent home and the one they kept and they were very different. It was a nightmare. From what I understand there have been some improvements at the school. There is an autism program there now but I know someone who just pulled her son out of that school a month ago because a kid stood up in the caffeteria and yelled out that her son was a "red headed homo" the whole place thought it was the funniest thing they ever heard. And the teachers did nothing. THis same kid had been bullying her son for years. Its an all too common event in that school.

[mentalsolstice]

11. Contact your state's protection & advocacy system

Their services are usually free, and most of them have a spec ed. division. This site will get you started, http://www.napas.org/.

[mbperrin]

14. Thank you! Many schools seem to think that special ed is somehow optional.

Much cruelty is promulgated by that attitude.

[MineralMan]

16. That's very sad to hear. I wonder if the

ACLU would be interested in such a case. They just might be.

[HelenWheels]

20. You are right--document

When you meet with anyone in the school about your child sit right in front of them with a yellow legal pad and make notes on every thing. The same thing happened in our family. My grandson was being bullied for years. His mother, father and I went in more than once to complain. When it finally went to the Superintendent of Schools, the school principal denied he had ever been approached about this.

[madaboutharry]

6. I am so sorry for you and your daughter, Robyn.

I have come to the conclusion that there are many small minded people in this world who are wedded to their own world view and are not willing or not capable to see anything outside of the way they define it.

I agree that bullies are protected.

My children attended ONE school where a bully was actually expelled. It was a private school with a huge endowment that didn't need the money and the boy was a psychotic. It had to be that extreme. Other schools they have attended have been schools where nothing was ever done.

I do need to add that the middle school where my son now attends did severely punish a boy after he called my son a Kike. Other than that, they really do nothing about the basic bullying that goes on with other kids.

You seem like a very loving mother and need to just follow your instincts about what is best for your daughter.

[bluestateguy]

7. We need harsh anti-bullying laws

Throw 'em out!

I have no compunction, none at all, about throwing the bullies out of school and ruining their futures for life.

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

8. Bullies should be pantsed in front of the hot girls!

That'll learn 'em!

[timtom]

31. Wouldn't that be de-pantsed?

Or, perhaps de-briefed?

[mbperrin]

12. Complain to the state! The school is breaking the law. They are not improving functional outcomes.

http://idea.ed.gov/explore/view/p/,root,dynamic,TopicalBrief,24,

The reauthorized Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) was signed into law on Dec. 3, 2004, by President George W. Bush. The provisions of the act became effective on July 1, 2005, with the exception of some of the elements pertaining to the definition of a “highly qualified teacher” that took effect upon the signing of the act. The final regulations were published on Aug. 14, 2006. This is one in a series of documents, prepared by the Office of Special Education and Rehabilitative Services (OSERS) in the U.S. Department of Education that covers a variety of high-interest topics and brings together the regulatory requirements related to those topics to support constituents in preparing to implement the new regulations.1 This document addresses final regulatory requirements regarding monitoring, enforcement, and state performance plans.

IDEA Regulations

1. Establish requirements for state monitoring, enforcement, and annual reporting.

The State must monitor the implementation of Part B, enforce Part B in accordance with the provisions at 34 CFR 300.604(a)(1), and (a)(3), (b)(2)(i) and (b)(2(v), and (c)(2), and annually report on performance under Part B.

The primary focus of the State’s monitoring activities must be on:

Improving educational results and functional outcomes for all children with disabilities; and
Ensuring that public agencies meet the program requirements under Part B of the Act, with a particular emphasis on those requirements that are most closely related to improving educational results for children with disabilities.

[MADem]

15. File a police report if anyone fucks with her again. Seriously.

And compassion? Compassion, my ass. Bullying is assault, and when they start pushing and shoving, it's assault consummated by battery.

That school system sounds like it's run by a bunch of dumbass rubes. The superintendent is plainly an ass.

Force them to RESPOND to charges as they arise. If there's video cameras in the school, insist that they preserve the tapes that document the bullying. Tell them suing isn't your wish, protecting your kid is your wish, but if they don't "get it" they are gonna get it, one way or another.

And stick with the other parents of the bullied kids--the thing about bullyers--their parents generally are blowhards just like the kids, and they don't get too involved in their kids' lives, unless the kids get in trouble. Then, they'll either try bullying themselves (and that will ice their cake) or they'll crack the shit out of their kids, which is a shame, but it will get the kids off your kid's back.


Did you get a chance to see this--it's interesting: http://abcnews.go.com/Video/playerIndex?id=5055644

[AndyTiedye]

19. Bullies Turn into Republicans When They "Grow Up"

[hendo]

17. Apostolic Lutherans are like fundies?

I resent that remark. I am not a fundie. In fact, I am far from it.

[Robyn66]

27. I apologize

I shouldn't have made a generalization like that. All I know is the ones around me

Hate gay people.

Believe that everyone who is not like them is going to hell.

Have no respect for the environment.

No respect for the town or their fellow towns people.


I live in a very small town and we know who does what and its not pretty. The churches around here act more like a cult than a church. I don't mean to offend you but its what we live with here.

[JCMach1]

18. I have an almost identical tale with our 13 year old daughter

We didn't have many problems in the states thank goodness. Teachers were outstanding and students were thoughtful and she didn't have many problems.

When we arrived in the UAE, we put her in a British Curriculum school with largely spoiled expats. Unfortunately, bullying is often an accepted behavior in British schools. The bullying was unending and frequently we were told she needed to 'learn to deal with her anger'... Well, these kids were harassing her 24/7 because some of the bullies also lived on our University campus where I work and everyone lives.

It finally came to a head when literally our daughter was going to walk out the door with a knife after some horrible incidents at the school. The school was very little help. After her 2nd year at this school, we moved our girls to a largely non-western population (emiratis, other Arabs, Pakistanis, and more) British curriculum school. It is funny their cases are so similar... She has trouble some time because she is the only atheist in a sea of Muslims. And while I won't say the kids are angels (they are not), there hasn't been the bullying at least.

She still finds it difficult to make friends and I believe her experience with her old school causes her severe problems with trusting anyone outside our family.

With our daughter, it was grasshoppers (instead of bees)... and the food issues... don't even get me started.

[Odin2005]

21. OMG, I have Asperger's and that sounds almost exactly like my experience.

Including being accused of making up excuses and the bee thing. Constantly being accused of making excuses really left nasty psychological scars. It's also why I have no love for the teachers unions and public schools in general.

[Robyn66]

28. I'm sorry you went through that.

The good new is that in the three years since elementary school she has had a fantastic teacher in the Autism Program in the middle school that has helped heal the damage that was done and she is much better. At least she enjoys learning again and has ambition to go to college. She wants to be an Oceanographer. You Aspergers kids are wonderful, and a joy to be around. Its just sad that more people don't understand that.

[Kat45]

22. You're in New Hampshire? Southern or Northern?

I'm in Massachusetts and it amazes me at how different things can be just a short distance away. That is so sad for your daughter and totally maddening that the adults involved in the school would act that way. There's a teenage boy with Aspberger's who goes to my church and his situation is world away from your daughter's. He had helpful aides in school. He has friends, he's involved in Boy Scouts, he gets put in leadership positions among his peers, he even got to go to the Democratic Convention last year. Of course I don't know the details of his experience but it appears that his needs are looked after.

I hope your daughter has a much better experience in high school.

[Robyn66]

29. Southern NH

Its all about money here. The tax payers are responsible for everything and there is a hostility toward special needs kids that translates into the schools themselves I think. Our property taxes are very high and we still can't support the needs of our towns. Our daughter was lucky in middle school and I am hoping high school goes as well. I haven't met the head of the Autism dept at the High School yet but I am hopeful.

[applegrove]

23. That must have been so hard to go through that. Your poor child.

[benEzra]

24. Too many schools don't give a crap about special-needs kids, in particular.

Our son is now 10 years old, and has 22q11.2 deletion syndrome, aka DiGeorge Syndrome or VCFS, with serious cardiac and developmental sequelae. He has sensory integration dysfunction, significant ADHD, speech impairment due to congenital velopharyngeal insufficiency, and is very small for his age.

In our experience, some schools just DON'T CARE about special-needs kids; they are more work and cost money that would be better spent on administrators' salaries, I suppose. As I understand it, special-needs-kid performance isn't tallied by the No Child Left Behind bean-counters, and since NCLB has become the primary yardstick that matters to the educational establishment, a lot of schools feel free to neglect special-needs kids as long as they can get away with it.

In our son's case, the problem wasn't bullying, just academic neglect. Obviously in your daughter's case, the neglect extends to lack of basic safety. But I think treating kids with special educational needs as second-class students is systemic at many schools.

And it boggles my mind why we protect the bullies instead of the kids they are abusing. I wasn't bullied much in school, but my wife was bullied mercilessly and she STILL bears the emotional scars of that, to this day. And kids who do find the courage to stand up against bullies will often find that the system is set up to punish them for resisting the abuse, rather than punishing the abusers.

[Robyn66]

30. Its very easy to dismiss

what the child is saying by using an excuse like. "Kids with this disability always say their aid is mean" "Kids like this always exagerate" That is what we found. I felt horrible for years after about the times we beleived the school over what our daughter was telling us. There was a tremendous amount of academic neglect going on as well. I was bullied as a child too and I remember the people who did it. I am almost 43 years old and I still hate those people for what they did to me.

I had to drop out of the anti-bullying group this year because I found I had breast cancer. I have come through treatment and am at the re-construction part of the process so I will be able to get back in to it in time for next fall when my daughter starts High School.

[TexasObserver]

25. Another clear example of teachers and administrators failing to meet their duties.

All those who wail that "it's the parents fault" for bullies miss the point, entirely. The school has a duty to protect students from those poorly parented bullies. One would think that is obvious and doesn't need stating, but it does.

Sorry to hear about your daughter, but am not surprised at all. For every good teacher, there's a bad one. For every good administrator, there's a bad one.

[Joey Liberal]

26. I've never understood why bullies are tolerated

Bullying is something that needs to be stopped. I feel for you and your kids, Robyn. I wonder why kids are so cruel.

[timtom]

32. Here is one solution:

http://www.summerhillschool.co.uk/pages/freedom.html

(Please note the comment about bullying.)

[SheilaT]

33. My older son, now 26, also has Asperger's Syndrome.

However, we didn't figure that out until half way through his senior year of high school. We switched him from the local public school to a small independent (private) school when he started 7th grade, mainly because he was being bullied in the public school. He was very small for his age, and also had (still has) alopecia areata, an auto-immune disorder which causes hair loss. He was, and still is, totally bald. We thought that perhaps his very different appearance was the source of the bullying.

We moved him because our public school system had a 7th and 8th middle school where bullying was a huge problem. We knew that he would never survive it, and had the financial resources -- generous grandparents -- to make the switch. At the new school bullying wasn't tolerated. His small size and different appearance wasn't very important, and kids respected him for being so smart. He was the main reason his science bowl team went to the national competition during his junior and senior years.

As others have expressed, the fact that bullying in schools is tolerated is beyond outrageous. There are no words strong enough to express how completely inappropriate it is.

There's also a huge fear on the part of parents not to do anything about it because it will only get worse. I disagree. We had an incident with our son while he was still in the elementary school that had my husband go over to the kid's house and speak with the parents. They seemed genuinely horrified to learn that their kid had behaved that way. And I think that's the case with many parents of bullies. No one tells them, they never see their kid doing those things, and as far as they're concerned they have a good child. Most parents will do their best to squelch the bullying from that side.

This is also an aspect of the funding issue. One reason the bullying ceased at the private school was that the classroom sizes were much smaller -- no more than 15 students. Many classes were smaller than that. Also -- and I think this is far more important than many may realize -- this was a pre-K through 12 school. The littlest kids saw the biggest kids at various points during the day. No age group was isolated, the way it happens in public schools, and so the intense little societies of those age-mates just don't pop up. The big kids spent time with the little ones, and so tended to feel somewhat protective of the little ones.

But public schools are organized for administrative and bureaucratic efficiency, and the needs of the kids come last.

[carlyhippy]

34. I feel so bad for your daughter

I was always the mom who would see a brat making fun of another kid and would step in, even if they were not my kids. I was hell on wheels I guess according to the mom circles, but that's ok, I had the guts to stop something that could emotionally wreck a child later on, and that is worth it to me.

[etherealtruth]

35. I am so sorry

These kind of stories sicken me.