LOUISA, KY. — A total of five parents spoke at Monday night’s Lawrence County, Ky. Board of Education meeting during the public comments session.
Marla Spillman, Tessa Baisden, Jeremy Ratliff, and Bill Morehead spoke as well as a fifth speaker whose name could not be determined on the live broadcast of the meeting on YouTube. See the entire meeting here:
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCeObmWjYrXWRbaqkBEyznxg
(Warning: The BOE does not have acceptable video or audio of meetings and the Supt. has his back turned to the camera)
Stories of a teacher’s child beating up on smaller children, another incident resulting in a broken collarbone of the smaller student. The parent alleged teachers and administrators were notified of all of the incidents involving that student and others that had been “covered up” by the teachers and principal and in most cases, Dr. Rob Fletcher the Supt.
The parents demanded action on the problem which, they say, is getting worse instead of better.
Dr Fletcher had a different view of the incidents and overall handling of the problem.
“I cannot comment on specific details of the situations that were brought forth during the public comment section of the Board meeting,” Fletcher told The Lazer. “I will say that each situation has been addressed, and actions were taken.”
Fletcher offered the following explaining actions the school system
‘s policy against bullying:
“Here are some of the things that we do as it relates to bullying, character education, and social emotional learning:
- Terrace Metric Surveys: Each student takes a private survey with questions related to bullying, harassment, self-harm, etc. The Terrace Metrics program reviews all of the answers of each student and creates warnings for our guidance counselors and principals. For example, if a student answers questions in a manner that signal that he/she is getting bullied, then the guidance counselor personally interviews the student to determine next steps, whether it be contacting parents, disciplining a potential bullying, providing mental health supports for the student, etc.
- Restructuring the duties of guidance counselors: Prior to this year, guidance counselors had a wide range of duties in the special education world. We have moved many of those duties over to district resource teachers who are better trained in special education. This gives our guidance counselors more time to work one-on-one with students.
- Discipline of Students: Over the years, we have suspended students out of school, placed them in in-school suspension, counseled students, discussed issues with parents, and/or reported aggressive behaviors to the police.
- PBIS (Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports) Systems: Systems where we recognize positive behavior of students and provide incentives for students to avoid inappropriate behaviors like bullying.
- Character Counts: This is a curriculum that is taught at least 30 minutes per week in every school. Character Counts provides information on topics such as grit, integrity, etc. in a way to encourage positive behaviors that will discourage bullying.
- Partnerships with Pathways and with Mountain Comprehensive Care: We have memoranda of agreements with both organizations so they may provide school-based mental health services.
Bullying has never been condoned, allowed, supported, or hidden within our school system by the Board nor the Superintendent. I believe that our principals investigate situations to the best of their ability and take appropriate actions as a result of the investigation.
With that being said, every school system can improve. In the upcoming weeks, we will put together a committee (which will include those speakers and Monday’s BOE meeting*) to discuss what we have implemented thus far and what we can do to improve our processes as it relates to bullying. While educating each child is a priority, providing a safe environment is the first priority.”
Those 6 bullet points are useless. How about straight up busting their a*s?That would be a great start!!!
I think the day paddling was taken out that’s when the bulling started. So many kids are raising themselves due to parents having drug addiction issues or are single parents working two jobs, not to mention the children that are born in addiction. Until we get a handle on the drug situation and bring busting behinds back the issues will continue
Totally agree with that but here’s the problem most of the bullies are teacher’s children or top of the sports team players so honestly don’t think any of those would get the paddle and the problem would still exist. I’m thinking parents need to teach their children how to fight let them defend themselves!
First that is Jeremy standing there talking not Bill.. Second, it’s not that they are bullying smaller students, it’s the bullying itself.. bullying has become a major problem.. yes I agree that it’s due to “lack of interest” from parents. Or maybe the parents are not informed of the actual facts of what their child is doing..and folks, some kids are just down right mean..but when nothing or very little is being done to handle these problem children, the problem is growing bolder and meaner. We as parents have to take a stand. We aim to find a better solution to protect our children from being bullied. Please parents, know what your child is doing. Please teach them how to treat others. Let them know that they will have true consequences when mistreating others. Parents, do not allow this behavior from your children. #ParentsAgainstBullying#PAB
I am a sister to 3 autistic brother who has been bullied for a while. We go to the school for help and one of my brothers gets lock in a psych ward for 6 days bc of it. He was interrogated for over a hour being forced to say he wanted to die. And then his older brother gets stabbed by another girl that said the voices in her head told her to can stay in the school. Bus drivers even tried to help without centering them out but there was not a thing they can do about what goes on in the school. We went to principal counselors and all and bc the boys that were doing the bullying said they didn’t do it nothing was done. So yeah the school really needs to work on it. I told my three brothers in high school to just start fighting back.
I have a few grandchildren who attends Lawrence county and there have been instances when they we’re being bullied and it was children of teachers when the principal was contacted he said and I quote Boys will be boys!! and laughed my grandson hates going to school but I can’t blame him who wants to be picked on and pushed around all day the bullying needs to STOP and parents need to put a foot down it’s sad a child can’t get a education or just enjoy a day at school without worrying who will pick on them today I sure hope something is done about it and parents will teach their children better it’s not ok to bully other children!
Teach your kid to do the right thing. If you’re being bullied, break their damn jaw. If you see anyone being bullied then step in and do whatever it takes to stop it. Quit watching, quit being afraid, quit holding back and beat their ass off and they’ll quit real quick like. Nothing new about bullying, only thing that’s changed is people’s reaction to it. Whoop the bullies ass. Problem solved. Do the RIGHT thing, stand up, take up, be aware, take action.