Bathroom security announcement

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:“During transition periods and more unstructured times, like before school, after school and lunch periods, schools may limit access to designated restrooms.”

So, at the impacted secondary schools, when do kids use the bathroom? During class only? Or wait during lunch for the only open restroom? Will teachers always allow kids to use the bathroom during class?

It would help if you found a new hobby. Obsessing about bathrooms seems unhealthy.

Okay, boymom

FTR, I am a boymom and the bathroom situation infuriates me. My son avoids going to the bathroom also and it’s ridiculous.

School bathrooms were sketchy when I was in school 30 years ago, and I avoided them. I guess nothing really changes.

Kids were overdosing and dying or getting shot in the bathrooms 30 years ago?

Kind of hard to believe since Magruder was the first-ever school shooting in MCPS history....

It's good to know that a rare thing then.

How many bathroom shootings will it take for you to feel MCPS should alter its security strategy and posture with regard to bathrooms? 10 dead kids? 20? How much collateral damage are you ok with so you can preserve the status quo and why are their lives worth that to you?

A better question might be how many school shootings do there have to be until common Sense gun legislation is enacted. This isn't about bathrooms or MCPS. Anyone who says otherwise is a moron.

If the previous poster is concerned about school shootings like they claim, then gun control legislation makes perfect sense to but I have the impression they have a different political agenda.

Clearly YOU have a political agenda.

Reading this thread, there seems to be plenty of parents posting who do not have a political agenda, but who want their kids to be able to use the restrooms at school during the day.

That is not an unreasonable expectation.

I am happy to support whatever will help improve the situation. Bathrooms have become a ‘safe’ place for kids to use and distribute drugs. All kids of drugs. This needs to be fixed, they can deal/use drugs elsewhere, but get them out of our schools.

Station a teacher outside each bathroom. No more than 2 or 3 students at a time allowed to enter bathroom. No backpacks, jackets, or hoodies. It works.

Security is not teachers' job. Why are we lobbing yet another responsibility onto teachers?

Teachers are hired to teach. Security personnel should be hired to provide school security.

Get the right resources for the right job. Stop expecting teachers to be superheroes. Enough.

Teacher here. It's what we do in our schools, plus a resource officer. Our schools aren't overrun with drugs. It works! It's called a work day.

How are you checking the bathrooms throughout the day if you are teaching? Are you checking the bathrooms before and after school, and during lunch?

PP here. I should add that I'm retired and part-time. I'm talking about between classes. Yes, someone is stationed outside the bathrooms before/after school. We have duties, including bus duty, hall duty, early morning and after school duty. We have alternating schedules throughout the year.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am livid that they restrict bathroom use when girls on their periods or kids who have intestinal issues MUST get to a bathroom quickly without needing to explain themselves to all and sundry.

My DD at Westland MS already says there are days when teachers don't have enough bathroom passes in class, or get angry and suddenly issue a moratorium on going to the bathroom. I have told her to go between classes, and that I don't care if she's late to class, but if they start restricting access then, what are kids supposed to do???

It's like a badly managed prison.

This is called collective punishment and it is a really bad way to manage anything. If some kid goes to the bathroom and vapes or does drugs or fighting or whatever, punish that kid. But do not punish the entire community.

THIS

It sucks that they are punishing ALL our kids for the (bad) actions of just a few kids.

I want the schools to get a handle on the drug use and everything else that goes on in the school bathrooms, but this ain’t the way to go about it.

They should do a crackdown campaign and bust the kids vaping in the bathrooms. Give everyone a warning tomorrow in the announcements at school, send an email to parents, and let them all know the consequences (first offense x; second xy and much more substantial). Then do it. It won’t be persuasive for all students but it will be for some. This is ridiculous and impacting every single kid.

who cares if they vape ... they're only hurting themselves

Not true. They’re using the stalls in the girls bathrooms. With some bathrooms now closed, the waits are even longer. We’re going to have health ramifications. My girls already try not to drink anything all day at school. It’s completely unacceptable.

True. My MS daughter is telling me that she will no longer drink water during the day bc of the teachers are not allowing them to go during class. She has health issues that require her to stay hydrated.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Why not cameras in the public area of the bathroom and smoke monitors? This is so easy IMO.

Smoke monitors, yes.

I think you'll run into a shit ton of privacy issues and lawsuits with cameras in the bathroom, even in the public parts of the bathroom. So I'm not sure it's worth the political capital to fight for that right now. If the situation doesn't improve, then yes. But there's gotta be a really high bar to justify that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:“During transition periods and more unstructured times, like before school, after school and lunch periods, schools may limit access to designated restrooms.”

So, at the impacted secondary schools, when do kids use the bathroom? During class only? Or wait during lunch for the only open restroom? Will teachers always allow kids to use the bathroom during class?

It would help if you found a new hobby. Obsessing about bathrooms seems unhealthy.

Okay, boymom

FTR, I am a boymom and the bathroom situation infuriates me. My son avoids going to the bathroom also and it’s ridiculous.

School bathrooms were sketchy when I was in school 30 years ago, and I avoided them. I guess nothing really changes.

Kids were overdosing and dying or getting shot in the bathrooms 30 years ago?

Kind of hard to believe since Magruder was the first-ever school shooting in MCPS history....

It's good to know that a rare thing then.

How many bathroom shootings will it take for you to feel MCPS should alter its security strategy and posture with regard to bathrooms? 10 dead kids? 20? How much collateral damage are you ok with so you can preserve the status quo and why are their lives worth that to you?

A better question might be how many school shootings do there have to be until common Sense gun legislation is enacted. This isn't about bathrooms or MCPS. Anyone who says otherwise is a moron.

If the previous poster is concerned about school shootings like they claim, then gun control legislation makes perfect sense to but I have the impression they have a different political agenda.

Clearly YOU have a political agenda.

Reading this thread, there seems to be plenty of parents posting who do not have a political agenda, but who want their kids to be able to use the restrooms at school during the day.

That is not an unreasonable expectation.

I am happy to support whatever will help improve the situation. Bathrooms have become a ‘safe’ place for kids to use and distribute drugs. All kids of drugs. This needs to be fixed, they can deal/use drugs elsewhere, but get them out of our schools.

Station a teacher outside each bathroom. No more than 2 or 3 students at a time allowed to enter bathroom. No backpacks, jackets, or hoodies. It works.

Security is not teachers' job. Why are we lobbing yet another responsibility onto teachers?

Teachers are hired to teach. Security personnel should be hired to provide school security.

Get the right resources for the right job. Stop expecting teachers to be superheroes. Enough.

Teacher here. It's what we do in our schools, plus a resource officer. Our schools aren't overrun with drugs. It works! It's called a work day.

How are you checking the bathrooms throughout the day if you are teaching? Are you checking the bathrooms before and after school, and during lunch?

PP here. I should add that I'm retired and part-time. I'm talking about between classes. Yes, someone is stationed outside the bathrooms before/after school. We have duties, including bus duty, hall duty, early morning and after school duty. We have alternating schedules throughout the year.

So you're a part-timer and you have a resource officer at your school? Are you working in an MCPS high school?

Your part-timer status makes sense for why you might have free time to do extra assignments, but full-time teachers who might be a sponsor of a club or activity certainly aren't in the same position.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:“During transition periods and more unstructured times, like before school, after school and lunch periods, schools may limit access to designated restrooms.”

So, at the impacted secondary schools, when do kids use the bathroom? During class only? Or wait during lunch for the only open restroom? Will teachers always allow kids to use the bathroom during class?

It would help if you found a new hobby. Obsessing about bathrooms seems unhealthy.

Okay, boymom

FTR, I am a boymom and the bathroom situation infuriates me. My son avoids going to the bathroom also and it’s ridiculous.

School bathrooms were sketchy when I was in school 30 years ago, and I avoided them. I guess nothing really changes.

Kids were overdosing and dying or getting shot in the bathrooms 30 years ago?

Kind of hard to believe since Magruder was the first-ever school shooting in MCPS history....

It's good to know that a rare thing then.

How many bathroom shootings will it take for you to feel MCPS should alter its security strategy and posture with regard to bathrooms? 10 dead kids? 20? How much collateral damage are you ok with so you can preserve the status quo and why are their lives worth that to you?

A better question might be how many school shootings do there have to be until common Sense gun legislation is enacted. This isn't about bathrooms or MCPS. Anyone who says otherwise is a moron.

If the previous poster is concerned about school shootings like they claim, then gun control legislation makes perfect sense to but I have the impression they have a different political agenda.

Clearly YOU have a political agenda.

Reading this thread, there seems to be plenty of parents posting who do not have a political agenda, but who want their kids to be able to use the restrooms at school during the day.

That is not an unreasonable expectation.

I am happy to support whatever will help improve the situation. Bathrooms have become a ‘safe’ place for kids to use and distribute drugs. All kids of drugs. This needs to be fixed, they can deal/use drugs elsewhere, but get them out of our schools.

Station a teacher outside each bathroom. No more than 2 or 3 students at a time allowed to enter bathroom. No backpacks, jackets, or hoodies. It works.

Security is not teachers' job. Why are we lobbing yet another responsibility onto teachers?

Teachers are hired to teach. Security personnel should be hired to provide school security.

Get the right resources for the right job. Stop expecting teachers to be superheroes. Enough.

Teacher here. It's what we do in our schools, plus a resource officer. Our schools aren't overrun with drugs. It works! It's called a work day.

How are you checking the bathrooms throughout the day if you are teaching? Are you checking the bathrooms before and after school, and during lunch?

PP here. I should add that I'm retired and part-time. I'm talking about between classes. Yes, someone is stationed outside the bathrooms before/after school. We have duties, including bus duty, hall duty, early morning and after school duty. We have alternating schedules throughout the year.

So you're a part-timer and you have a resource officer at your school? Are you working in an MCPS high school?

Your part-timer status makes sense for why you might have free time to do extra assignments, but full-time teachers who might be a sponsor of a club or activity certainly aren't in the same position.

I was just trying to explain why I was posting during the day. I was a full time special ed teacher. I totally understand what you're saying, but it's what we do. No, I'm not an MCPS employee but work in a very large public school system -- middle school. We are not unionized.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:“During transition periods and more unstructured times, like before school, after school and lunch periods, schools may limit access to designated restrooms.”

So, at the impacted secondary schools, when do kids use the bathroom? During class only? Or wait during lunch for the only open restroom? Will teachers always allow kids to use the bathroom during class?

It would help if you found a new hobby. Obsessing about bathrooms seems unhealthy.

Okay, boymom

FTR, I am a boymom and the bathroom situation infuriates me. My son avoids going to the bathroom also and it’s ridiculous.

School bathrooms were sketchy when I was in school 30 years ago, and I avoided them. I guess nothing really changes.

Kids were overdosing and dying or getting shot in the bathrooms 30 years ago?

Kind of hard to believe since Magruder was the first-ever school shooting in MCPS history....

It's good to know that a rare thing then.

How many bathroom shootings will it take for you to feel MCPS should alter its security strategy and posture with regard to bathrooms? 10 dead kids? 20? How much collateral damage are you ok with so you can preserve the status quo and why are their lives worth that to you?

A better question might be how many school shootings do there have to be until common Sense gun legislation is enacted. This isn't about bathrooms or MCPS. Anyone who says otherwise is a moron.

If the previous poster is concerned about school shootings like they claim, then gun control legislation makes perfect sense to but I have the impression they have a different political agenda.

Guns in bathroom are rare in MCPS. But we know that drugs are ubiquitous.

The drug problem IN MCPS schools is well-documented and dangerous.

I want SROs back to help manage the drug problem.

If the police are unable to enforce the laws, it's unlikely SROs will do any better. It's not like they were effective at Parkland or Uvalde.

Agree this is a policing issue, that needs to be addressed. We need public hearings to establish why the police aren't enforcing our laws first.

I'm not saying the police are blameless here, but it is my understanding MCPS is not even referring these incidents to the police in the first place. So we can't blame MCPD for cases and incidents that aren't brought to their attention.

I HOPE MCPS is alerting MCPD to instances where they catch dealers distributing in school, but according to many students, many administrators turn a blind eye to that as well.

THIS

It reflects poorly on a school when the police are called, so MCPS leans heavily on NOT involving the police. How can MCPD do anything when MCPS isn’t involving the police.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:“During transition periods and more unstructured times, like before school, after school and lunch periods, schools may limit access to designated restrooms.”

So, at the impacted secondary schools, when do kids use the bathroom? During class only? Or wait during lunch for the only open restroom? Will teachers always allow kids to use the bathroom during class?

It would help if you found a new hobby. Obsessing about bathrooms seems unhealthy.

Okay, boymom

FTR, I am a boymom and the bathroom situation infuriates me. My son avoids going to the bathroom also and it’s ridiculous.

School bathrooms were sketchy when I was in school 30 years ago, and I avoided them. I guess nothing really changes.

Kids were overdosing and dying or getting shot in the bathrooms 30 years ago?

Kind of hard to believe since Magruder was the first-ever school shooting in MCPS history....

It's good to know that a rare thing then.

How many bathroom shootings will it take for you to feel MCPS should alter its security strategy and posture with regard to bathrooms? 10 dead kids? 20? How much collateral damage are you ok with so you can preserve the status quo and why are their lives worth that to you?

A better question might be how many school shootings do there have to be until common Sense gun legislation is enacted. This isn't about bathrooms or MCPS. Anyone who says otherwise is a moron.

If the previous poster is concerned about school shootings like they claim, then gun control legislation makes perfect sense to but I have the impression they have a different political agenda.

Clearly YOU have a political agenda.

Reading this thread, there seems to be plenty of parents posting who do not have a political agenda, but who want their kids to be able to use the restrooms at school during the day.

That is not an unreasonable expectation.

I am happy to support whatever will help improve the situation. Bathrooms have become a ‘safe’ place for kids to use and distribute drugs. All kids of drugs. This needs to be fixed, they can deal/use drugs elsewhere, but get them out of our schools.

Station a teacher outside each bathroom. No more than 2 or 3 students at a time allowed to enter bathroom. No backpacks, jackets, or hoodies. It works.

Security is not teachers' job. Why are we lobbing yet another responsibility onto teachers?

Teachers are hired to teach. Security personnel should be hired to provide school security.

Get the right resources for the right job. Stop expecting teachers to be superheroes. Enough.

Teacher here. It's what we do in our schools, plus a resource officer. Our schools aren't overrun with drugs. It works! It's called a work day.

What district are you in? MCPS got rid of resource officers due to a political environment that is anti-police.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why not cameras in the public area of the bathroom and smoke monitors? This is so easy IMO.

Smoke monitors, yes.

I think you'll run into a shit ton of privacy issues and lawsuits with cameras in the bathroom, even in the public parts of the bathroom. So I'm not sure it's worth the political capital to fight for that right now. If the situation doesn't improve, then yes. But there's gotta be a really high bar to justify that.

Couldn’t they put cameras up in the hallway pointed at the bathroom door so that they could watch who was entering and exiting the bathroom. If there are multiple people in the bathroom it might be difficult to know which was smoking/vaping, but if they analyze multiple occurrences they should be able to narrow it down.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why not cameras in the public area of the bathroom and smoke monitors? This is so easy IMO.

Smoke monitors, yes.

I think you'll run into a shit ton of privacy issues and lawsuits with cameras in the bathroom, even in the public parts of the bathroom. So I'm not sure it's worth the political capital to fight for that right now. If the situation doesn't improve, then yes. But there's gotta be a really high bar to justify that.

Couldn’t they put cameras up in the hallway pointed at the bathroom door so that they could watch who was entering and exiting the bathroom. If there are multiple people in the bathroom it might be difficult to know which was smoking/vaping, but if they analyze multiple occurrences they should be able to narrow it down.

That they can and I believe they already do?

The thing is, MCPS is rightfully coy about saying WHERE they have cameras in place because they don't want to alert bad-behaving students who'll then use that info to do things where there aren't cameras.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:“During transition periods and more unstructured times, like before school, after school and lunch periods, schools may limit access to designated restrooms.”

So, at the impacted secondary schools, when do kids use the bathroom? During class only? Or wait during lunch for the only open restroom? Will teachers always allow kids to use the bathroom during class?

It would help if you found a new hobby. Obsessing about bathrooms seems unhealthy.

Okay, boymom

FTR, I am a boymom and the bathroom situation infuriates me. My son avoids going to the bathroom also and it’s ridiculous.

School bathrooms were sketchy when I was in school 30 years ago, and I avoided them. I guess nothing really changes.

Kids were overdosing and dying or getting shot in the bathrooms 30 years ago?

Kind of hard to believe since Magruder was the first-ever school shooting in MCPS history....

It's good to know that a rare thing then.

How many bathroom shootings will it take for you to feel MCPS should alter its security strategy and posture with regard to bathrooms? 10 dead kids? 20? How much collateral damage are you ok with so you can preserve the status quo and why are their lives worth that to you?

A better question might be how many school shootings do there have to be until common Sense gun legislation is enacted. This isn't about bathrooms or MCPS. Anyone who says otherwise is a moron.

If the previous poster is concerned about school shootings like they claim, then gun control legislation makes perfect sense to but I have the impression they have a different political agenda.

Guns in bathroom are rare in MCPS. But we know that drugs are ubiquitous.

The drug problem IN MCPS schools is well-documented and dangerous.

I want SROs back to help manage the drug problem.

If the police are unable to enforce the laws, it's unlikely SROs will do any better. It's not like they were effective at Parkland or Uvalde.

Agree this is a policing issue, that needs to be addressed. We need public hearings to establish why the police aren't enforcing our laws first.

I'm not saying the police are blameless here, but it is my understanding MCPS is not even referring these incidents to the police in the first place. So we can't blame MCPD for cases and incidents that aren't brought to their attention.

I HOPE MCPS is alerting MCPD to instances where they catch dealers distributing in school, but according to many students, many administrators turn a blind eye to that as well.

THIS

It reflects poorly on a school when the police are called, so MCPS leans heavily on NOT involving the police. How can MCPD do anything when MCPS isn’t involving the police.

So now you want MCPS calling the police because kids are vaping in bathrooms?? Yeah that’ll go over well with McPs, the county council, and state as a good use of the police time. Not to mention, can’t wait to see the uproar when some kid gets caught and mommy and daddy are all up in arms worried about this small thing being in their permanent record and how that will look for colleges. Everything sounds like a great punishment right up until it’s your kid staring down the consequences.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:“During transition periods and more unstructured times, like before school, after school and lunch periods, schools may limit access to designated restrooms.”

So, at the impacted secondary schools, when do kids use the bathroom? During class only? Or wait during lunch for the only open restroom? Will teachers always allow kids to use the bathroom during class?

It would help if you found a new hobby. Obsessing about bathrooms seems unhealthy.

Okay, boymom

FTR, I am a boymom and the bathroom situation infuriates me. My son avoids going to the bathroom also and it’s ridiculous.

School bathrooms were sketchy when I was in school 30 years ago, and I avoided them. I guess nothing really changes.

Kids were overdosing and dying or getting shot in the bathrooms 30 years ago?

Kind of hard to believe since Magruder was the first-ever school shooting in MCPS history....

It's good to know that a rare thing then.

How many bathroom shootings will it take for you to feel MCPS should alter its security strategy and posture with regard to bathrooms? 10 dead kids? 20? How much collateral damage are you ok with so you can preserve the status quo and why are their lives worth that to you?

A better question might be how many school shootings do there have to be until common Sense gun legislation is enacted. This isn't about bathrooms or MCPS. Anyone who says otherwise is a moron.

If the previous poster is concerned about school shootings like they claim, then gun control legislation makes perfect sense to but I have the impression they have a different political agenda.

Clearly YOU have a political agenda.

Reading this thread, there seems to be plenty of parents posting who do not have a political agenda, but who want their kids to be able to use the restrooms at school during the day.

That is not an unreasonable expectation.

I am happy to support whatever will help improve the situation. Bathrooms have become a ‘safe’ place for kids to use and distribute drugs. All kids of drugs. This needs to be fixed, they can deal/use drugs elsewhere, but get them out of our schools.

Station a teacher outside each bathroom. No more than 2 or 3 students at a time allowed to enter bathroom. No backpacks, jackets, or hoodies. It works.

Literally what was done at my HS in the 90s. Just do it already!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:“During transition periods and more unstructured times, like before school, after school and lunch periods, schools may limit access to designated restrooms.”

So, at the impacted secondary schools, when do kids use the bathroom? During class only? Or wait during lunch for the only open restroom? Will teachers always allow kids to use the bathroom during class?

It would help if you found a new hobby. Obsessing about bathrooms seems unhealthy.

Okay, boymom

FTR, I am a boymom and the bathroom situation infuriates me. My son avoids going to the bathroom also and it’s ridiculous.

School bathrooms were sketchy when I was in school 30 years ago, and I avoided them. I guess nothing really changes.

Kids were overdosing and dying or getting shot in the bathrooms 30 years ago?

Kind of hard to believe since Magruder was the first-ever school shooting in MCPS history....

It's good to know that a rare thing then.

How many bathroom shootings will it take for you to feel MCPS should alter its security strategy and posture with regard to bathrooms? 10 dead kids? 20? How much collateral damage are you ok with so you can preserve the status quo and why are their lives worth that to you?

A better question might be how many school shootings do there have to be until common Sense gun legislation is enacted. This isn't about bathrooms or MCPS. Anyone who says otherwise is a moron.

If the previous poster is concerned about school shootings like they claim, then gun control legislation makes perfect sense to but I have the impression they have a different political agenda.

Guns in bathroom are rare in MCPS. But we know that drugs are ubiquitous.

The drug problem IN MCPS schools is well-documented and dangerous.

I want SROs back to help manage the drug problem.

If the police are unable to enforce the laws, it's unlikely SROs will do any better. It's not like they were effective at Parkland or Uvalde.

Agree this is a policing issue, that needs to be addressed. We need public hearings to establish why the police aren't enforcing our laws first.

I'm not saying the police are blameless here, but it is my understanding MCPS is not even referring these incidents to the police in the first place. So we can't blame MCPD for cases and incidents that aren't brought to their attention.

I HOPE MCPS is alerting MCPD to instances where they catch dealers distributing in school, but according to many students, many administrators turn a blind eye to that as well.

THIS

It reflects poorly on a school when the police are called, so MCPS leans heavily on NOT involving the police. How can MCPD do anything when MCPS isn’t involving the police.

So now you want MCPS calling the police because kids are vaping in bathrooms?? Yeah that’ll go over well with McPs, the county council, and state as a good use of the police time. Not to mention, can’t wait to see the uproar when some kid gets caught and mommy and daddy are all up in arms worried about this small thing being in their permanent record and how that will look for colleges. Everything sounds like a great punishment right up until it’s your kid staring down the consequences.

I think tiering is a good strategy, and something MCPS does often with regard to student discipline. It could look something like this:

Tier 1: Nicotine, marijuana

First Offense: No police involved, referred to MCPS administrators and disciplinary measures such as detention or RJ
Second Offense: No police involved, but now escalated to in-school suspension
Third Offense: Out of school suspension
Fourth Offense: Police referral

Tier 2: Opioids, heroin, cocaine, crack

First Offense: EITHER no police involved but INTENSE and HANDS-ON MCPS supervisor, including counseling, recovery and close monitoring, or refer to police

With marijuana and nicotine, you can be more forgiving since it's less likely to be life or death. In that category of drugs, only the undeterred repeat offenders should be handed over to law enforcement. For opioids and other hard drugs, you've got to either envelope the student with comprehensive, intensive responses and resources, or hand it over to the county government agencies and law enforcement to deal with if the school district is ill-equipped to solve the problem.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:“During transition periods and more unstructured times, like before school, after school and lunch periods, schools may limit access to designated restrooms.”

So, at the impacted secondary schools, when do kids use the bathroom? During class only? Or wait during lunch for the only open restroom? Will teachers always allow kids to use the bathroom during class?

It would help if you found a new hobby. Obsessing about bathrooms seems unhealthy.

Okay, boymom

FTR, I am a boymom and the bathroom situation infuriates me. My son avoids going to the bathroom also and it’s ridiculous.

School bathrooms were sketchy when I was in school 30 years ago, and I avoided them. I guess nothing really changes.

Kids were overdosing and dying or getting shot in the bathrooms 30 years ago?

Kind of hard to believe since Magruder was the first-ever school shooting in MCPS history....

It's good to know that a rare thing then.

How many bathroom shootings will it take for you to feel MCPS should alter its security strategy and posture with regard to bathrooms? 10 dead kids? 20? How much collateral damage are you ok with so you can preserve the status quo and why are their lives worth that to you?

A better question might be how many school shootings do there have to be until common Sense gun legislation is enacted. This isn't about bathrooms or MCPS. Anyone who says otherwise is a moron.

If the previous poster is concerned about school shootings like they claim, then gun control legislation makes perfect sense to but I have the impression they have a different political agenda.

Clearly YOU have a political agenda.

Reading this thread, there seems to be plenty of parents posting who do not have a political agenda, but who want their kids to be able to use the restrooms at school during the day.

That is not an unreasonable expectation.

I am happy to support whatever will help improve the situation. Bathrooms have become a ‘safe’ place for kids to use and distribute drugs. All kids of drugs. This needs to be fixed, they can deal/use drugs elsewhere, but get them out of our schools.

Station a teacher outside each bathroom. No more than 2 or 3 students at a time allowed to enter bathroom. No backpacks, jackets, or hoodies. It works.

Security is not teachers' job. Why are we lobbing yet another responsibility onto teachers?

Teachers are hired to teach. Security personnel should be hired to provide school security.

Get the right resources for the right job. Stop expecting teachers to be superheroes. Enough.

Teacher here. It's what we do in our schools, plus a resource officer. Our schools aren't overrun with drugs. It works! It's called a work day.

What district are you in? MCPS got rid of resource officers due to a political environment that is anti-police.

I'm in Georgia, and we appreciate our resource officers!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why not cameras in the public area of the bathroom and smoke monitors? This is so easy IMO.

Smoke monitors, yes.

I think you'll run into a shit ton of privacy issues and lawsuits with cameras in the bathroom, even in the public parts of the bathroom. So I'm not sure it's worth the political capital to fight for that right now. If the situation doesn't improve, then yes. But there's gotta be a really high bar to justify that.

Yea, you can't do cameras in the bathroom.

As for smoke monitors, I don't know that those would work for vaping. Plus, my DC told me that the kids will blow the vape into under their shirts so it the plume isn't as big.

The only way to stop it is to have a human there monitoring the bathrooms very regularly.

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Anonymous wrote:“During transition periods and more unstructured times, like before school, after school and lunch periods, schools may limit access to designated restrooms.”

So, at the impacted secondary schools, when do kids use the bathroom? During class only? Or wait during lunch for the only open restroom? Will teachers always allow kids to use the bathroom during class?

It would help if you found a new hobby. Obsessing about bathrooms seems unhealthy.

Okay, boymom

FTR, I am a boymom and the bathroom situation infuriates me. My son avoids going to the bathroom also and it’s ridiculous.

School bathrooms were sketchy when I was in school 30 years ago, and I avoided them. I guess nothing really changes.

Kids were overdosing and dying or getting shot in the bathrooms 30 years ago?

Kind of hard to believe since Magruder was the first-ever school shooting in MCPS history....

It's good to know that a rare thing then.

How many bathroom shootings will it take for you to feel MCPS should alter its security strategy and posture with regard to bathrooms? 10 dead kids? 20? How much collateral damage are you ok with so you can preserve the status quo and why are their lives worth that to you?

A better question might be how many school shootings do there have to be until common Sense gun legislation is enacted. This isn't about bathrooms or MCPS. Anyone who says otherwise is a moron.

If the previous poster is concerned about school shootings like they claim, then gun control legislation makes perfect sense to but I have the impression they have a different political agenda.

Clearly YOU have a political agenda.

Reading this thread, there seems to be plenty of parents posting who do not have a political agenda, but who want their kids to be able to use the restrooms at school during the day.

That is not an unreasonable expectation.

I am happy to support whatever will help improve the situation. Bathrooms have become a ‘safe’ place for kids to use and distribute drugs. All kids of drugs. This needs to be fixed, they can deal/use drugs elsewhere, but get them out of our schools.

Station a teacher outside each bathroom. No more than 2 or 3 students at a time allowed to enter bathroom. No backpacks, jackets, or hoodies. It works.

Literally what was done at my HS in the 90s. Just do it already!

Which teachers at schools have free time to double as bathroom monitors?