Letter to the CPS CEO - a true story

This is an account of something that recently happened to a close friend of mine and her daughter.  If you are as appalled as I am about the incident below, I urge you to write a letter of complaint to Arne Ducan, the CEO of the Chicago Public Schools.

CAST OF CHARACTERS 

aliases have been used to protect the identity of the youth & their families involved in this matter

MH - 4th grade girl, 9 years old, relatively well-behaved, academically consistent, fiesty, loveable, loves monkeys

JS - 6th grade (?) boy, school bully, beat up MH's friend a week ago right in front of her, is currently undergoing anger management therapy

MH's Mom - PTA member, professional, literate, politically active, burgeoning writer, knows where to get the best ribs in Chicago

MH's Auntie - artist/demi-activist, mezzo soprano, hula olapa, community advocate, has a cat that weighs more than most small dogs

THE SHORT STORY 

paraphrased from actual events

MH's Mom: Guess what?

MH's Auntie: What?

MH's Mom: MH got suspended from school.

MH's Auntie: What? Why!

MH's Mom: Because George Bush is an idiot and so is his zero tolerance gun policy.

MH's Auntie: What does that have to do with MH getting suspended from school?

MH's Mom: JS, the school bully, threatened to "smash her face in" if she didn't kiss him.

MH's Auntie: That's awful! That's also harassment.

MH's Mom: It gets worse. He also told her that if she didn't want to kiss him that meant she was a lesbian.

MH's Auntie: What a horrible thing to say.

MH's Mom: Yes, very anti-gay.

MH's Auntie: What did MH do?

MH's Mom: Well, obviously she was frightened especially since she just saw JS beat up her friend last week.

MH's Auntie: That boy has problems.

MH's Mom: Yup, which is probably why he's in anger management therapy right now. So anyways, MH was really scared but she knows better and tried to use her words instead of her fists to get that boy to stop bothering her.

MH's Auntie: Good for her.

MH's Mom: Well- sort of- the word choice she used wasn't exactly the best choice, but it was  the only thing she could think of to say to protect herself.

MH's Auntie: What did she say?

MH's Mom: She told the boy that if he tried to do anything to her that she would bring a B.B. gun to school the next day and hit him over the head with it.

MH's Auntie: Oh no.

MH's Mom: Oh yes. And their teacher overheard it. Dubya's zero tolerance policy was enough to get MH written up for a suspension.

MH's Auntie: But what about that crazy little boy with the anger management issues and the anti-gay slander and the beating up kids and the sexual harrassment? This was a one time outburst for MH while he has a history of violent and intolerant behavior.

MH's Mom: Oh that's where this all gets even crazier. The administration at their school is completely dismissive with these kinds of things. Instead of investigating the incident to find out what happened they just wrote both kids up for suspension for the same amount of time.

MH's Auntie: But that's so unfair. MH was just trying to defend herself from a boy that was older, bigger, and more aggressive than her.

MH's Mom: Yes and funny enough no detail of his aggressive behavior made it into the suspension report and yet the B.B. gun comment did.

MH's Auntie: What is wrong with the school administration?

MH's Mom: I couldn't tell you. But I can tell you that after looking at the suspension report, aside from all that detail being omitted, there wasn't even an incident number assigned, the principal's signature was missing and there were a lot of grammatical errors.

MH's Auntie: What are you going to do?

MH's Mom: I've already lined up an interview with a reporter from the Windy City Times, I'm speaking at a press conference for mayoral candidate Dorothy Brown next week on the issue of violence in school, gay bashing and bullying, and columnist John Kass at the Chicago Tribune is reviewing the situation.

MH's Auntie: Sounds like you got alot covered. Is there anything I can do?

MH's Mom: Actually, I'm recommending that any family or friends that are concerned write a letter to the CEO of the Chicago Public Schools on our behalf.

 MH's Auntie: I can totally do that!

THE FOLLOW UP LETTER 

pretty much word-for-word minus the alias-ing of the kids names

February 5, 2007

Arne Duncan, Chief Executive Officer, Chicago Public Schools
125 South Clark Street, 5th Floor
Chicago, IL 60603

                                    RE: A.N. Pritzker Elementary Discriminatory Suspension

Dear Mr. Duncan:

I am writing in response to the recent bullying and sexual harassment incident that occurred at A.N. Pritzker Elementary on January 29, 2007 involving M.H. and J.S. As a woman, a city resident, a friend to M.H.'s family, and a member of a community-based anti-sexual violence organization (the APIA Safespace), I am deeply disappointed in how this incident was handled by the teaching staff (Ms. Pfister) and administration (Ms. Kidd and Dr. Reece) of A.N. Pritzker Elementary.

Overlooking the reporting inaccuracies (misspellings and incomplete information in the Suspension Report) and hostile reaction from the Pritzker staff (misleading a parent in the suspension appeal process, denying the option of mediation between the parents of the children involved, and asking an investigating member of the Chicago Police Department to leave the school grounds), what concerns me most is the hostile environment that has been created by Ms. Pfister, Ms. Kidd, and Dr. Reece at A.N. Pritzker.

Should the suspension be expunged from M.H.’s record (which is the very least I would expect to be done in rectifying this aberration), the teachers and staff themselves have already set a precedence for the children that physical threats, anti-gay slurs, and sexual coercion are MORE permissible (as none of these threats were detailed in the suspension report) than trying to verbally diffuse an escalating situation that could have resulted in a physical altercation. With staff that is setting an example like that, how can the children be expected to do any better? And if these children are not challenged to be better- where does that leave kids like M.H. who are now marked as targets by the bullies at school? Where does that leave the state of the social contract that our schools have with our children to provide a safe space for them to develop and grow?

Believe it or not, I am sympathetic to the hardships that educators face in our school systems. I have a number of colleagues who work both in and out of the system as educators who I respect and admire. I do not envy the position they are placed in everyday as authority figures that have this great responsibility over the children they oversee. In an era of dwindling educational funds, virtual babysitters (i.e. the internet, television, video games, etc.), and a crippled economy that is forcing parents to spend more and more time in the workplace than at home- our teachers become the adult figures that children spend the most amount of time with during the week. I know this is not an easy job, but then again neither is being a kid. At least as adults we have some kind of influence over the direction of bad decisions that are being made around us– children do not have that kind of influence in their world and are completely reliant on us to help protect them.

This incident should have been managed by the adults and the staff at A.N. Pritzker. Instead, sadly, it has become one in a list of many poorly addressed issues (like previous bullying incidences, fights, and a flippant response to the documented inquiry of domestic abuse that a parent made on behalf of another student at the school) that this administration continues to dismiss. I urge you to employ the necessary measures that will ensure this environment of hostility, apathy and intolerance is eradicated from the Pritzker administration.

I thank you for your time and attention to this matter.


Sincerely,

Czerina Salud
http://czerinasalud.wordpress.com/

cc: Alderman Manuel Flores, 1st Ward

AFTER THE SUSPENSION 

• A report was filed against JS (the bully) with the Chicago Police Department for simple assault
• Both JS & MH were suspended from school
• JS was allowed to return to school after only having served half his suspension
• MH had to serve the entirety of her suspension
• MH's mother was inerviewed by the Windy City Times & her story is slated to run the 1st week of March
• Despite the letters of support that have been sent to the CPS office there has been no response from them regarding this incident
• The Chicago Commision on Human Relations, Vernita Gray (Cook County State's Attorney's Office), and the Lamda Legal Defense and Education Fund have all been alerted to this issue