LAMB Sued for $20M by 2 families of sexual abuse victims

[Anonymous]

Heartbreaking.

Schools have a problem dealing with accusations against teachers. Their first response is always "it's a misunderstanding."

A few years ago when our child was in preschool, he stated that his teacher hit a classmate. We agonized over whether to tell the school administrators. We eventually did tell the administrators, and the immediate response was "How can that be? We have a zero-tolerance policy."

They investigated and quietly talked about retraining and education. We left the next year.

Our children need to know that we will listen to them and advocate for them.

[Anonymous]

I ws one of the original people who posted after reading the lawsuit. I I resent being called a troll or saying i am delighting in this. I am horrified that children were abused for years and adults failed them. And I'm even more horrified that the Board is continuing to employ one of the people involved. That is egregious, to me. She was asked to leave and said no, but said she'd leave at the end of the school year? Um, no. That is beyond the pale.

I understand why there is at least one parent (or administrator?) of LAMB vociferously defending the school. I sympathize. This whole thing sucks. But to continually call people names, call posters trolls, say we're ignorant or have pitchforks - dude, you're not helping. You are making it seem that LAMB is powerless (well, we wanted the board to do something and they finally did even if it was slow and incomplete, and Diane is crazy but she'll be gone soon, there's nothing we can do about that......). I think you should step back and think about the things you are typing. you're not helping LAMB at all here.

LAMBhandled this badly. LAMB continues to treat it as a problem that will go away (when all the affected kids are promoted out? and Diane leaves on her own terms?)

This is a sad, sad story, all around, But the victims are the kids. Secondary victims are the school teachers and staff who tried to do the right thing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I am tempted to be depressed and feel guilty.... but I want to keep it in perspective.

Guys-- is this a DC Public School problem? (My Monkey brain goes: What am I doing to my child putting her in DCPS?! before I rein it in). Or can this sort of thing really happen anywhere.... what are your thoughts?

I want to say this can happen in a lot of unpredictable places under a lot of circumstances. And to take standard care and keep up the communication with our kids.

It can and will happen anywhere, but I think it will especially happen in places that lack a professional work environment because the principal or head is also the founder who thinks of the school has his/hers and is personal friends with the teachers. I assume that the teacher was allowed to continue because the head/principal thought he was a great guy who would never do such a thing. We they personal friends? It is hard in a work environment, but as a boss, you want to be friends but still have a critical distance from employees so that you can fire someone when rules are broken (basement play) even if you think them a great guy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I am tempted to be depressed and feel guilty.... but I want to keep it in perspective.

Guys-- is this a DC Public School problem? (My Monkey brain goes: What am I doing to my child putting her in DCPS?! before I rein it in). Or can this sort of thing really happen anywhere.... what are your thoughts?

I want to say this can happen in a lot of unpredictable places under a lot of circumstances. And to take standard care and keep up the communication with our kids.

Abusers are everywhere. And even in good public and private schools, in Fter cre programs and summer camps.

But institutions usually fire the suspected abuser — if they aren’t arrested — the second they commit a fireable offense. LAMB didn’t — and is now facing a multi-million dollar lawsuit.

[Anonymous]

The filing doesn't really go much into what the administrators communicated to the Board and what it did not. Is that the sort of thing that will be revealed during this case? Did the principal and Cottman hide stuff from the Board? What was the communication loop between them?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:LAMB families who can’t handle the understandable reactions from observers that there must be something fundamentally broken at their school need to step away from threads like this. Telling people they can’t have opinions or to “stop talking” is pretty telling. It screams “nothing to see here” which is precisely the attitude that allowed this tradedy to happen. Most parents get it. You have sent your child to a school so you have to believe it’s a good place, a good environment otherwise you’re a bad parent. So you have to convince yourself that you’re doing right by your kid. And I’m sure Lamb does have a strong community and committed teachers but you’re being naive to assume it will be able
weather the storm of lawsuits it’s about to get hit by. Insurance has limits.

Thanks for this uninformed opinion. The next time you start ranting, consider using spellcheck or learning some basic principles of grammar.

This thread is really painting the LAMB community in an awful light.

There are lunatic trolls actually hoping the school shuts down. The lamb community is trying to weather this storm, but these sad haters feel joy in destroying a community. If anyone is looking bad, it's them.

The lamb community is trying to weather this storm

Translation:

We are trying to brush this under the rug and move on as quickly as possible so we can pretend like it didn't happen.

Actually (and you would know this if you knew a damn thing about the school and weren’t just talking out of your ass), the parents were loudly and constantly calling for the administration to be fired after this came to light last year. The Board took way too much time to get there, but it has now happened.

And yes, random trolls who know nothing about LAMB, it’s financial situation, the victims, the parents or the law, should really stop gleefully posting nonsense in an effort to stir things up. Children were molested. People are hurting. Stop capitalizing on that for your entertainment. It’s gross.

LAMB parent here. The school won’t be able to weather this. I would be surprised if the charter board doesn’t pull the charter after reading these accusations. The administration failed. The board failed. They have pulled charters for financial issues and this is 1000xs worse. We have tried to get our kids out but unable to. Will do the lottery again this year but don’t have high hopes. Really weighing the damage to my kids of leaving them there or putting them in our no good st all IB school. Yes the teachers HAVE been great. The parents are generally good but to see in plain writing the failings of the administration and to know they Board wouldn’t fire them really makes me uneasy. I don’t think enough lessons have been learned.

That’s laughable. The charter board isn’t going to yank the charter of the #1 charter elementary in DC. LOL.

Isn't the #1 charter YY? After this LAMB scandal, it's #1 for sure now.

Nope. This year it’s LAMB.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I ws one of the original people who posted after reading the lawsuit. I I resent being called a troll or saying i am delighting in this. I am horrified that children were abused for years and adults failed them. And I'm even more horrified that the Board is continuing to employ one of the people involved. That is egregious, to me. She was asked to leave and said no, but said she'd leave at the end of the school year? Um, no. That is beyond the pale.

I understand why there is at least one parent (or administrator?) of LAMB vociferously defending the school. I sympathize. This whole thing sucks. But to continually call people names, call posters trolls, say we're ignorant or have pitchforks - dude, you're not helping. You are making it seem that LAMB is powerless (well, we wanted the board to do something and they finally did even if it was slow and incomplete, and Diane is crazy but she'll be gone soon, there's nothing we can do about that......). I think you should step back and think about the things you are typing. you're not helping LAMB at all here.

LAMBhandled this badly. LAMB continues to treat it as a problem that will go away (when all the affected kids are promoted out? and Diane leaves on her own terms?)

This is a sad, sad story, all around, But the victims are the kids. Secondary victims are the school teachers and staff who tried to do the right thing.

You are no better than someone who stands around gawking at a bad car accident.

-LAMB parent who supports the victims and their families and thinks Diane and Cristina should be in jail, but is tired of the trolls.

[Anonymous]

It's really sad how a handful of LAMB supporters are misdirecting their anger and sorrow on this board at people who have taken the time to read the filing and are responding to the catastrophic failings that they read about.

[Anonymous]

New PP here. So, who is allowed to comment on this? Everyone has something to learn from this experience. Or would you rather everyone sweep this under the rug? Don't worry, your school'd reputation will be just fine.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I ws one of the original people who posted after reading the lawsuit. I I resent being called a troll or saying i am delighting in this. I am horrified that children were abused for years and adults failed them. And I'm even more horrified that the Board is continuing to employ one of the people involved. That is egregious, to me. She was asked to leave and said no, but said she'd leave at the end of the school year? Um, no. That is beyond the pale.

I understand why there is at least one parent (or administrator?) of LAMB vociferously defending the school. I sympathize. This whole thing sucks. But to continually call people names, call posters trolls, say we're ignorant or have pitchforks - dude, you're not helping. You are making it seem that LAMB is powerless (well, we wanted the board to do something and they finally did even if it was slow and incomplete, and Diane is crazy but she'll be gone soon, there's nothing we can do about that......). I think you should step back and think about the things you are typing. you're not helping LAMB at all here.

LAMBhandled this badly. LAMB continues to treat it as a problem that will go away (when all the affected kids are promoted out? and Diane leaves on her own terms?)

This is a sad, sad story, all around, But the victims are the kids. Secondary victims are the school teachers and staff who tried to do the right thing.

You are no better than someone who stands around gawking at a bad car accident.

-LAMB parent who supports the victims and their families and thinks Diane and Cristina should be in jail, but is tired of the trolls.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:New PP here. So, who is allowed to comment on this? Everyone has something to learn from this experience. Or would you rather everyone sweep this under the rug? Don't worry, your school'd reputation will be just fine.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I ws one of the original people who posted after reading the lawsuit. I I resent being called a troll or saying i am delighting in this. I am horrified that children were abused for years and adults failed them. And I'm even more horrified that the Board is continuing to employ one of the people involved. That is egregious, to me. She was asked to leave and said no, but said she'd leave at the end of the school year? Um, no. That is beyond the pale.

I understand why there is at least one parent (or administrator?) of LAMB vociferously defending the school. I sympathize. This whole thing sucks. But to continually call people names, call posters trolls, say we're ignorant or have pitchforks - dude, you're not helping. You are making it seem that LAMB is powerless (well, we wanted the board to do something and they finally did even if it was slow and incomplete, and Diane is crazy but she'll be gone soon, there's nothing we can do about that......). I think you should step back and think about the things you are typing. you're not helping LAMB at all here.

LAMBhandled this badly. LAMB continues to treat it as a problem that will go away (when all the affected kids are promoted out? and Diane leaves on her own terms?)

This is a sad, sad story, all around, But the victims are the kids. Secondary victims are the school teachers and staff who tried to do the right thing.

You are no better than someone who stands around gawking at a bad car accident.

-LAMB parent who supports the victims and their families and thinks Diane and Cristina should be in jail, but is tired of the trolls.

it actually won't be fine. it's going to be litigated out of existence and that's tough for LAMB families to fathom.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The filing doesn't really go much into what the administrators communicated to the Board and what it did not. Is that the sort of thing that will be revealed during this case? Did the principal and Cottman hide stuff from the Board? What was the communication loop between them?

The letter from the school's board to the community got into this a little.

The Board was told that there was an incident reported to police, and that the police were not going to press criminal charges. The Board knew he was being reinstated and that a workshop on preventing sexual abuse was being held for all staff upon his return.

The Board was not told that some teachers continued to express concerns about Fernandez's affect and interactions with students (although none witnessed explicit sexual abuse).

Whether the Board proactively asked about his behavior upon his return -- we don't know. We know that in 2015 the Board did not direct an external review of school policies or an external review of how the case was handled by the administration.
After the 2017 incidents, the board did those two things.

[Anonymous]

"it actually won't be fine. it's going to be litigated out of existence and that's tough for LAMB families to fathom. "

Among my cohort, it remains a very desirable school among those looking to enroll PK3ers. I don't see that changing. That's what I mean by reputation.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It's really sad how a handful of LAMB supporters are misdirecting their anger and sorrow on this board at people who have taken the time to read the filing and are responding to the catastrophic failings that they read about.

LAMB families are responding to the trolls who are gleefully posting about how the school is going to close. Which is ridiculous but annoying nonetheless.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:LAMB families who can’t handle the understandable reactions from observers that there must be something fundamentally broken at their school need to step away from threads like this. Telling people they can’t have opinions or to “stop talking” is pretty telling. It screams “nothing to see here” which is precisely the attitude that allowed this tradedy to happen. Most parents get it. You have sent your child to a school so you have to believe it’s a good place, a good environment otherwise you’re a bad parent. So you have to convince yourself that you’re doing right by your kid. And I’m sure Lamb does have a strong community and committed teachers but you’re being naive to assume it will be able
weather the storm of lawsuits it’s about to get hit by. Insurance has limits.

Thanks for this uninformed opinion. The next time you start ranting, consider using spellcheck or learning some basic principles of grammar.

This thread is really painting the LAMB community in an awful light.

There are lunatic trolls actually hoping the school shuts down. The lamb community is trying to weather this storm, but these sad haters feel joy in destroying a community. If anyone is looking bad, it's them.

The lamb community is trying to weather this storm

Translation:

We are trying to brush this under the rug and move on as quickly as possible so we can pretend like it didn't happen.

Actually (and you would know this if you knew a damn thing about the school and weren’t just talking out of your ass), the parents were loudly and constantly calling for the administration to be fired after this came to light last year. The Board took way too much time to get there, but it has now happened.

And yes, random trolls who know nothing about LAMB, it’s financial situation, the victims, the parents or the law, should really stop gleefully posting nonsense in an effort to stir things up. Children were molested. People are hurting. Stop capitalizing on that for your entertainment. It’s gross.

+1000

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:"it actually won't be fine. it's going to be litigated out of existence and that's tough for LAMB families to fathom. "

Among my cohort, it remains a very desirable school among those looking to enroll PK3ers. I don't see that changing. That's what I mean by reputation.

$100 says applications are at an all time high this year.