If You Can’t Stand the Heat….

It may be old news, but I was really taken by the incident in Greece, New York, where a school bus monitor was “bullied” by four middle school boys, which the media sensationalized to the point that said school bus monitor got more than a fair remedy, and the middle school boys, and their families, pretty much had to go into hiding.

It is understood that anyone who watched the video clip of this incident would feel instant revulsion for what took place. I too felt sorry for the lady who came under fire by the vulgar, brazen tongue lashings of these kids.  She was no doubt emotionally stricken by what was said, but she herself understood that they were just kids, and felt it was unjust to press criminal charges, and that the school and parents should be responsible for taking action against them. And they rightfully did.

I have some experience with this type of situation. One, I used to be a middle school kid, and as some of my classmates will confirm, I was prone to putting teachers through quite a test. Two, I have been a middle school teacher, and had training on dealing with them. Those middle school years, for girls and boys, are the most difficult psychological, sociological, and physiological periods of their childhood. When they don’t fit in a certain social group, they look for another, and sometimes that means being nasty to get attention. In many cases they are not mature enough to handle the situations in which they land without someone to supervise them. A school bus is a cesspool of bad behavior because it is grossly unsupervised, and if you put middle school kids in a group, unsupervised, you’re going to get this sort of thing. It’s like my dad used to say, “Put a bunch of tom cats in a sack you’re gonna have a ruckus.”

We didn’t have school bus monitors when I was a kid, and I understand that today they are there for several reasons, but primarily to deal with issues so the bus driver can focus on driving. To me any job working in a school district, around kids of any age, one has to be prepared and able to deal with immaturity, meanness, cruelty, harassment, and sometimes downright terrorism. Remember, “Sticks and stones….” Yeah, yeah. You get the point. Working with kids takes certain stamina. If you can’t stand the heat, get out of the kitchen. Okay, enough of the old sayings.

Yes, it was an appalling moment and like the lady who was harassed, I also felt bad for those kids’ parents. What we learn later was that those kids and their families—because of our age of technology and mass communication—received more than a fair share of harassing calls and even death threats. Our human character has an instinctive, but flawed reaction to hang people and not to get to the heart of what is really going on. Did those kids do something terrible? Yes, it was appalling. Are the authorities dealing with it? Yes, they are. Do those kids realize they did something very, very wrong? You bet they do. Do they deserve death threats? No, they don’t.

On the flip side of things I am trying to find the positive of all the “rewards” being presented to said school bus monitor. Yes, I felt sorry for her and what she had to endure. But, people have endured worse things and received no remedy. Now if they would have physically assaulted her, or beat her to a pulp, then that would have been a different issue. But these were just words. Harsh, yes, but still words. I would think the media attention and the emotional suffering brought back to the kids and their parents, in spades, was justice enough. But someone, in Canada if I remember correctly, thought it necessary to do a fund raiser to buy the school bus monitor a vacation…that after all that she endured she deserved one. Wait a minute…don’t most people who work in school districts get summer’s off?

The fundraiser was meant to raise $5,000 for her to take her and eight other family members on a trip somewhere fun, and Southwest Airlines came forward and gave her ten tickets to Orlando, Florida, and ten passes to Disney World. Are you kidding me?

You know what, I’d take a worse tongue lashing than that from an entire bus load of twelve year-olds for a McDonalds value meal! But let’s make it a chain restaurant so they can at least have the global publicity. Good grief!

But that’s not even a fraction of it. The fundraiser is now over half a million dollars, and it’s meant to go to the school bus monitor. She truly seemed like a nice lady, and I appreciated her forgiving nature and discouragement of criminal charges for the boys, but I am disappointed with her accepting the trip or any of the money. What she endured goes with the territory, and though she may have been in a rough verbal situation, she did endure it. I am waiting to see now where the half a million dollars raised goes. She says part of it is supposed to go to a research charity, but how much "part of it is" I have not heard. She even admitted she doesn't feel like she deserves it, that there are people with worse problems than her. But?

There’s a lot that can be learned from this. It’s okay to make an example out of what these kids did to try and prevent it from happening to others. This creates an awareness situation for parents and educators, and even a better one for the kids. If someone truly wants to come forward and help the situation, I’m all for Samuel L. Jackson stepping in to take the bus monitor’s place while she’s on her paid recovery. Yeah, he could read them a bed time story. That would do the trick.

 

Comments

[Zona Crabtree]

I agree, Steven. I have taught, subbed, and chaperoned. You have to be sure enough of yourself to deal with young people. They are testing their wings, and they will test anyone they think they can bluff. It is rewarding, but is not a job for the faint of heart.

[G. Aliceson]

I thank you for this post. As a recently retired middle school teacher I too, was dismayed by the degree of disrespect shown to the bus monitor. I honestly did not experience anything of that level in my twenty-six years of teaching. I know it exists, obviously, and I feel sympathy that any person would have to endure it. I didn't think throwing money at the problem was helpful.

These were students who should be held accountable for their behavior. But they are still kids who are learning how to act. They are in middle school in the middle of learning how how to make good choices to help them determine their character. It takes some people longer than it does others.

Were these students wrong? Yes! Were they bullies? Yes. And should they be disciplined? Absolutely! But that should be up to the school and their parents, not by other people making hateful phone calls and death threats.

And really would many of us look much better if we would have filmed how we truly acted in middle school?

Hopefully when we did those things we were caught, corrected, and learned not to do it again.

As for the woman, I am happy people want to show their support for her. A note or an email or a kind comment in person would suffice.

Words were the weapons used against her and words would be a good way to address the situation.

[Steven]

There were quite a few follow-up video posts on this, Larry, where they talk about what they are doing. Some of the parents, especially, and though the administrators mainly spoke at press conferences, which is all talk, they acted like they were taking it very seriously.

[Larry Wood]

Steven,
I generally agree with you on this, although I'm not informed enough on the issue to know exactly where I stand on every part of it. For instance, you say the school authorities and parents have stepped up and dished out punishment to the boys, but I don't know what exactly that punishment was. At any rate, like you, I feel sorry for the lady but agree that she probably didn't go through all that much worse than what a lot of middle school substitute teachers, for instance, go through almost every day. And, as you say, if they can't handle the situation, they get out. The only qualification I might add, however, is that I think teachers (not just substitutes), bus monitors, etc. probably don't receive the same level of backing from administrators that they once did, which is partly why I was curious as to exactly what punishment was meted out to the boys.