VSP says BFA hindered police investigation

[mrome]

Hey, don't forget it's your elected officials that create the laws and it's often a "jury of your peers" that determine guilt. The lawyers just feed off what "we" create. Somewhere along the way, and we continue to see this evolving, personal responsibility has gotten watered down. Kids learn entitlement. In fact, now it's almost an art form!

School personnel acted responsibly in making the police get their paperwork in order. It's the damn newspaper that created the problem by using inflammatory language (i.e., "hindered"). If the reporter had asked for the school's side of the story, and been responsible in their journalism, this whole thread would never had to be created, the school wouldn't have had to defend it's actions, and the world would be a better place.

There. That's my soapbox. Blame it on the media!

Margo

[slpott]

Ed, I think we should love her. It makes perfect sense to me. Thank you Margo

[rod anode]

i didnt say nothin ,what am I being blamed for now?

[cedarman]

I find it interesting reviewing the postings.  It seems like at one time in our society, things were "handled between two people", which sometimes involved fighting.  While the occassional fighting was necessarily accepted, it wasn't made as big a deal as we do now.

Now, some people are happy fighting is HIGHLY discouraged and the police are getting involved, as well as lawyers and judges determining everything. But at the same time, people seem frustrated that "kids" (and an increasing number of adults) these days act entitled and have less personal responsibility.

If you build a society where the wants of individuals are catered to, and someone else resolves differences between individuals (they don't resolve them personally), then judges and lawyers really will (already do) run everything, and nobody has to have personal responsibility because if you have the better lawyer, you can push the blame to someone else.

Welcome to the "Nanny State" in which we live.  This condition has been built over the last 40 years or so  by parents who spent a lot of time "protecting" their kids (from everything), and making sure they didn't go without (anything). 

I guess the question now is, can we change the direction of our society to push responsibility back onto ALL parties involved in an issue?

Are there enough people who have a problem with the general lack of personal responsibility to make a change?

[Stand Alone Defense]

I find it interesting reviewing the postings.  It seems like at one time in our society, things were "handled between two people", which sometimes involved fighting.  While the occassional fighting was necessarily accepted, it wasn't made as big a deal as we do now.

Now, some people are happy fighting is HIGHLY discouraged and the police are getting involved, as well as lawyers and judges determining everything. But at the same time, people seem frustrated that "kids" (and an increasing number of adults) these days act entitled and have less personal responsibility.

If you build a society where the wants of individuals are catered to, and someone else resolves differences between individuals (they don't resolve them personally), then judges and lawyers really will (already do) run everything, and nobody has to have personal responsibility because if you have the better lawyer, you can push the blame to someone else.

Welcome to the "Nanny State" in which we live.  This condition has been built over the last 40 years or so  by parents who spent a lot of time "protecting" their kids (from everything), and making sure they didn't go without (anything). 

I guess the question now is, can we change the direction of our society to push responsibility back onto ALL parties involved in an issue?

Are there enough people who have a problem with the general lack of personal responsibility to make a change?

AMEN COULDN'T HAVE SAID IT BETTER!!!!!!!

[7F24]

When I was in school most fights were started by one person, not both.  Usually it was the person that won the fight, they wouldn't have started it if they thought they would lose.  The people that start most (not all) fights, are in my mind "bullies".  I believe in right and wrong, and I don't blame anyone that fights defensively.  I just think that no one (not even me) has the right to hit someone else.  If reviewing the tapes shows bulling, then someone should have to answer for it.  If that makes me a Nannie, so be it.

[7F24]

bullying...not bulling.

[sdogallen]

Changing society will have to start at the top. Thats your cue Mr. President! How low will it go?

[Loctavious]

Actually - changing society has to start at the bottom - unless you want bigger government - Big brother, and that socialist state everyone's been talking about that Obama wants.

Parents and parenting is where you change society - not by having politicians make decrees or new laws... though that's the only way it seems that oen can affect change with some parenting philosophies.

It starts with Parents..... knowing what their kid(s) are doing... What they're saying on Facebook.... in School, to their peers, their teachers... WOA - Parents need to actually get to knwo their kids - instead of dictate what they should be like and hope it happens.

The most difficult thing though - is that the PARENTS need to lead by example; can't tell your kids not to speak rudely to others when mom and dad speak rudely to them or others in front of the kids.  Can't tell your kids to not text so much - when i'm sendign a text... or not be on the phone so much - as i cradle it b/w my shoulder and neck.

this isn't a new idea or radically liberal - it's common sense and A LOT of people choose to ignore it as it means that someone somewhere will have to look in the mirror for blame instead of anywhere else. 

[ohhman]

I agree parents need to be involved, but I can tell you that not all kids agree, let alone listen & follow what their parents try to teach. Some kids are very influenced by their peers rather than parents & no matter how hard parents try to do as you say "lead by example", some kids just aren't going to be that way! Facebook can be a great thing, but it also can be very damaging. I notified FB of an incident & got a generic note that they received my note & would be checking -HA!-  that didn't happen as it still continues & as a parent, sure you can know what kids are saying, but you can't stop it as kids will find a way to continue some behaviors.  Some of us aren't lucky enough to have children that go with the grain & "get it";  yes I speak from experience!  Kids DO have to take ownership of their behaviors & there DOES need to be consequences!
Back to the way Mr. Clark handled this: I have talked with him on different issues & I have ALWAYS found him to be  very fair!! He offers ideas, really talks like he does care, because personally, I believe he does.  I am very glad he is in our school system.

[Loctavious]

So are you suggesting that others do the job of the parents?  That others restrict kids access /use of FB?  of texting?  that others discipline kids for rudeness, violent or inconsiderate behavior?  That others - such as The president in some form, intentionally affect change in society?  What type of change?  i was commenting on the poster before me's suggestion that the president be the one to change society - society can't be changed by one person - or by our politicians - that has to come from a shift in thinking by ALL of us - and beyond that practicing that shift and not just talking about it.
Funny - parents have debated for a logn time - both for and against, anyone else but them, being able to teach, discipline, or otherwise affect change in their children that they do not agree with ( look at the debates out west over teaching about homosexuality in schools - or about bible studies...).  Yet it seems there's a suggestion here to in fact have governement/schools take responsibility for the ills of some students.
Sorry - do not agree with that.  Kids gather their bent on life and their place in it in the few short years they have before they enter school.  I agree that exposure to other students behaviors can and does seem to 'contaminate' some students minds.  But again - it's way beyond the schools scope of influence given the current structure and budgets of how schools operate.  Pay teachers more, revamp the entire approach to education, take a real close look at providing parenting classes and partnership initiatives b/w parents, teachers, and school administrators and perhaps that could change.  until then - parents need to take responsibility for their part ( or lack there of in some cases) in the upbrining of their children. 
I frimly believe that 99% of what people deem to be 'wrong' with a child or kids - is actually a result of something the parents did or didn't do right.  The other 1% is genetics.( caveat: this statement omits that percentage of kids that have genetic, physical, or mental affliction).

[Stand Alone Defense]

The problem is you can't discipline your kids now a days!! When I was a kid and I stepped out of line or talked back and was disrespectful, I got dads belt across my butt!! If you do that now and your kid tells someone you get child services knocking on the door.  I have a friend thats 14 year old kid just got suspended from school for drugs.  Well he said if you are not in school you're going to work splitting wood with dad so that’s what he did for 3 days.  Now he is going to court because the mother of the child is saying that it is child abuse to force your child to do manual labor for 8 hours a day as a punishment.   Will she win? I'm hoping not but the fact is that the court system is entertaining the fact that she could and he did something wrong.

It's not just parenting it's our society as a whole even in the Military things are getting soft.  When I was in boot camp your drill instructors could put there hands on you and did it a lot!! If you did something dumb you got dropped and they made you PT till you puked!! Now kids get stress cards!! When you feel like you can't do anymore just pull out your stress card and they have to stop for 5 minutes!! Are you kidding me!!?? This is Military boot camp we are talking about.  What does that teach someone? Are we going to implement stress cards in battle to when you're getting shot at? Or even after the Military when you get back into your civilian life?

Loctavious, you say that by us saying things need to change from the top it means we want more Government?  No it means there is too much Government right now and the only thing they do is take away parent's rights. This whole "it takes a community to raise a child" is a crock of you know what.. My parents raised my brothers and sister Catholic and raised us to be patriotic also and I think that they did a great job!  Now here is an example of what I think the problem is with society.  When I was on my first tour in Iraq in 2003 my sister would come home from school crying because not because a kid was bullying her...but because she had 1 teacher said that "the only reason young men join the military is so they can come home and brag about killing people after. It makes them feel tough" and another teacher saying that "our president has the IQ of second grader" every other day.  Now it is there right to say this, freedom of speech right? Now what if a teacher said at the beginning of class "lets bow our heads and say a short prayer for our troops fighting over seas" That is in no way shape or form right according to our society today!!

I guess what I'm trying to say is that today’s problems in Society have very little to do with bad parenting and more to do with bad policy and bad politics

[Loctavious]

This hyper-sensitivity you speak of.... this is isn't a product of this adiministration or the one before it or the one before that or the one before that - it's been steadily creeping in for a long time - over the last 20 years or more.

i was raised catholic as well - and got more than my fair share of corporal punishment - as i went to legit catholic schools - by that i mean - not the watered down ones here in vermont - where they could swat your rear if you did something wrong.  I went to ones in NY - where they could bo pretty much anything they wanted to: slap, spank, pinch cheeks, pick you up by your tie, hit you with switches, pointers, etc.  And that was just the school - i can remember Dads belt too.

And to a degree - i agree that with you that that sort of discipline DID keep a child in line.  Not that i ever imagined disciplining my daughter that way - nor did i - and she is just as well-behaved as i was... but also isn't messed up from trying to reconcile why this person who supposedly loves me is inflicting pain on me to teach me a lesson.  that's a topic you and i can discuss later if you like.
to the point of our discussion.  The poster before me inferred by their comment, "Changing society will have to start at the top. Thats your cue Mr. President! How low will it go?" - that the president shoudl start chainging society by what?  changing laws so parents can hit their kids again? is that really the direction we want to go - backwards - will that make anything better?  bring back some sort of glory days? 
Truth is that children can be discilined without corporal punishment and it can be just as effective as hitting or the threat of violence.  so i don't think that's the answer.

what did that poster mean?  That governement needs to start getting involved more or backing off?  it's not clear by that post alone - but reading into your comments - i get the sense that the blame is being put on government or laws passed by such that have parents thinking they can't be parents.  where does it say you HAVE to hit your kid to discipline them?  do parents actually say to themselves, " O h well - if i can't hit my kid or threaten it, then i might as well give up trying to discipline them?"  no they find ways.

Government SHOULD Start snooping into those really GREAT parents - who obviously have no idea what it means to be a parent.  Snooping isn't a good word.... 'offering assistance' ( is a better term perhaps) in the form of free education....perhaps mandatory free education as i DO NOT think it's ok to allow parenting that borders on neglect and child endangerment - such as no supervision what so ever, and no involvement in the child's daily life.  it sends a pretty clear message to the child when mom and dad care more about themsleves then how their day at school was or how they felt about something that happened to them.

i don't think are view points are as far apart as we think they are - we both agree a change is needed.  Both agree that the current system ( which is actually an older system that's been updated and modified so many times instead of instituting a new one that it's drastically dysfunctional - and we put our faith in it being able to work for our kids....) doesn't work to well and could use a revamp.  Let's focus on what we DO want to see or what we DO think is right and take it from there.

[mirjo]

Josh, you were fortunate to be raised in a loving home that gave you and your siblings all you needed including discipline. You have wonderful parents and the fact that you recognize and appreciate this, is testimony to your upbringing. Sadly, not everyone is as fortunate and I have to agree that much of the problem lies with parents who simply aren't as involved as they should be, for one reason or other.

With parents either  having  or choosing to work longer hours to bring home the income needed to support the family,  a lot of valuable 1:1 time has been sacrificed. Couple that with guilt the parents feel and the rapid rise of techno-gadgets and what you have is a generation of kids totally absorbed in their own little world and parents feeding it with guilt. With my own kid, what I see is a general lack of a willingness of parents to say "no," because it's hard, it takes far more energy and will to stand against the onslaught of dissatisfaction than it does to give in to a demanding, whiny teen, who is yelling "I hate you!" In the past year, I've seen kids who have been in trouble in school allowed at the dances! Why is this happening on the school's part in the first place and in the second where is the parent taking any responsibility here?
If you're in trouble at school, you shouldn't be attending any extracurricular function. These students are only learning their actions don't matter, there is no accountability.

I'm not a fan of the "lead by example" school of thought unless that is  the global concept of the golden rule "do unto others..." I lead by example in trying to be a good citizen, showing caring and empathy for others, doing my part in being a good steward of the planet, etc., but that's as far as it goes, I think anything more personal is what gives kids this entitlement power. I'm a firm believer in the  "do as I say" rule. I've earned the the right to be an adult, which comes with certain expectations of maturity and propriety, lessons I try to pass along. I don't understand the logic behind allowing kids to dictate what parents can and can't do. I think this is how we got here.

The way I see it, I graduated from high school and earned a couple of post-secondary degrees, I have therefore done the time. If  I'm giving my kid a directive to put the cell phone away and do homework, I don't think I need to refrain. Sorry, that's just nuts.

Kids really just want to know they're cared for and valued. A little time spent doing something low-tech goes a long way. I recently spent a weekend working on a quilt project with my daughter--not the fancy expensive kind you buy at JoAnne's with all the pre-cut matching pattern pieces, but a real fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants project cutting old t-shirts she'd kept and sewing the "applique's" onto blocks of material she had handy. It's the first time I have ever seen her do something for an extended period w/o her texting every few minutes or checking her phone "just in case." For two days straight, she didn't even utter the word facebook. I was more than amazed, because she was planning for the next time, before we finished.

She doesn't like all of my rules and we butt heads a lot. I've learned that I'm "old fashion," because I don't allow sleepovers on school nights--even though I'm pretty liberal about them on non-school nights. I'm also ridiculous, because I don't allow her to "hang out" at the school for hours if she doesn't have a specific (supervised) purpose for being there. I insist on knowing where she's going and with whom. When I grounded her for 'forgetting' to call me and tell me her plans to go to a football game had changed (and I found out at the end of the day she had spent the time at her friend's house instead of the game where I thought she was) I heard for months how over the top that was and how everyone (including some faculty members) thought so, but she hasn't forgotten to tell me her plans since. Lesson learned.

Being involved and present isn't easy. Neither is being the one to say no to things that seem so important in a melodramatic moment, but really aren't. I remember when my son was young a friend of his couldn't come to his birthday party because they were going to pick up his older brother at college. I offered that he could come to the party and stay as long as needed, but the answer was still no, because it was a family day or something like that. I'm guilty of not having stressed the "family-time" aspect when my kids were younger and admire those families that did and do. I now realize the importance of instilling that concept of "family first" at an early age. Without planting the expectation, you can't expect it to be there. The same is true of everything this thread is about: respect for authority, self control, etc.

[Chris Santee]

Follow-Up on the Search Warrant Executed at Bellows Free Academy
Captain Dan Troidl, Commander Troop A, Vermont State Police - 802-524-5993

Fairfax, VT 6/27/2011 – On June 3 members of the St. Albans Barracks executed the search warrant at the Bellows Free Academy in Fairfax, Vermont. During the execution of the search warrant, troopers met with the school officials and obtained footage integral to an investigation into a fight which had occurred between two students on May 25. 

The press release issued by the state police on June 3 implied school officials from Bellows Free Academy were uncooperative, however the Bellows Free Academy was advised by legal counsel to withhold the video in accordance with Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) (20 U.S.C. § 1232g; 34 CFR Part 99).

As a follow up to the June 3 search warrant, school officials met with Captain Dan Troidl, Troop A Commander of the Vermont State Police, to discuss future interactions between the school and law enforcement officers. The Vermont State Police and Bellows Free Academy look forward to positive interactions in the future when coordinating public safety and the educational rights of students.