State of Public Education

 Sometimes I get angry thinking about some of the experiences I've had since I've been working in the public school system. For the past several years, kids in public schools have had NEARLY NO DISCIPLINE! Thanks to restorative justice practices like PBIS. Maybe the theory sounds good but from what I've seen and heard, nothing is done about the bad behavior. The students just fill out a form and talk about what happened with the teacher. After the form is filled out the students rejoin the class. They don't really understand how what they've done has impacted others. They just say the right answer to avoid dealing with the problem and being blamed. 

I have had some experiences with students that continuously behave badly which make me angry when I think about them.  Their parents don't do anything about their behavior: either don't want to deal with it or they trivialize it with "we'll talk about it". For example, I had a student who would refuse to follow my classroom activities and she would get her friends to move around the class during activity time. She also brought toys from home which she would get her friends to play with in class. When she was mad, she would rage and attack other students either with her hands or by biting. When the afterschool director told her grandmother, she said they'd talk about it. HELLO, she BIT ANOTHER KID! Talking about it is ineffective. She needs SERIOUS PUNISHMENT! 

There was another student in a different school who liked to antagonize other kids. There was another kid who was his goon that would blindly antagonize along with him. I heard this kid had a history of behavior referrals since kindergarten. I also heard he had altercations with different kids in 1st grade. He was in 4th grade when I knew him which means nothing was done for 4 years. My co-worker said his mom said, "tell his uncle" when told about his behavior. My co-worker said he told her, "he doesn't live with you." One day he got his goon to tell his dad I was cussing in Arabic and his dad yelled at me in front of the whole school. Later I read that this kid and his goon rammed another kid into a wall calling him gay.  In my case, other students said I should tiptoe around him. I thought about and decided I'm not gonna walk on eggshells because they can't discipline him. What's worse is that the administrators blame the teacher saying they have poor classroom management. When the teachers try to discipline the kid, the administration says the kid is coming from an unstable home, is autistic, can't emotionally regulate, the teacher is yelling at the kid.  

When I was a kid, we didn't use positive discipline. You misbehaved, you got in trouble at school.