Violence in Kindergarten- Sligo Creek Elementary

[Anonymous]

MCPS has lost a lot of trust. Many people including the council, which decides how much money MCPS gets but not what they spend it on, have questioned how effective it is to give MCPS more money given the outcomes they are getting. They are $40 million in the hole in the employee benefits trust, some very high poverty schools lost Title 1 funding and they gave a $1.3 million payout to McKnight who promoted a known bully and sexual harasser. MCPS central staff frequently lie and obfuscate to the BOE, the council and the public. If they feel like funding for MCPS is like throwing money out the window, they will direct those funds to many of the community's many other important needs.

[Anonymous]

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us Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:And the person who was injured yesterday and has staples in her head is a paraeducator, not a classroom teacher.

Then she wasn't doing her job, assuming she was in room to help with that student.

If, of course, any part of this story is true at all.

What in the f?

Why would you assume she was in the room as a 1:1 to that student?

Why would you assume that someone doing their job as a 1:1 aide can’t be harmed by a kid?

Are we all living on the same planet where a 6 year old shot a teacher last year or were you at your home base on Mars for that?

Why? Because MCPS's standard for getting a 1:1 is far less than what has been described in this thread.

And an adult that is paying attention should be more than capable of preventing a 6 year old from obtaining and throwing an apparently heavy object. Again, if this story is actually a true story, which seems less and less likely.

You have absolutely no idea what you are talking about. You think it is so easy that you stand next to the child and say -no, please stop, go back to your seat - and the out of control child automatically follows your directions?

That’s not how it works -you are trying to block getting bitten, kicked and hit at the same time to you are trying to prevent other kids from being attacked. You can’t physically restrain the out of control child like you could your own son or daughter. You really can’t touch the out of control child either. How do you prevent the child from obtaining heavy objects when the room is literally full of heavy objects. So the kid picks up a chair and you grab the chair, then get kicked in the shins at the same time and try not to fall over or get kicked again or stomped on. Meanwhile the kid rushes away from you and grabs a stapler and chucks it. Or a water bottle or heavy book. Or a pencil and tries to poke another kid.

It’s ridiculous you think it is so easy and keep denying teachers and staff members are being seriously assaulted all over the country by elementary aged students.

Very creative. But again, we're talking about a kindergartener. An adult assigned to a child should be able to prevent that child from obtaining and throwing an object like a water bottle. And a good paraeducator would be able to guide the child to calming strategies before a situation escalates to that level. That's literally the job.

You never answered the question how the adult prevents the child from obtaining an object. You can't restrain the child in any way, so don't include that in your answer. Teachers have been seriously injured by kindergarten and first grade students. you magically think someone getting paid $18 an hour is a kindergarten whisperer who is going to calm the student down when no one else can? You have very obviously never seen a raging out of control student and/or you are an administrator who does an awful job or parent who thinks your child can do no wrong.

This is the type of gaslighting from administrators and parents of out of control kids that make special education teachers and general education teachers quit
Administrators who tell teachers-
if you only build a relationship with the kid, he or she wouldn't have bashed you in the head with a water bottle, so the 8 staples in your head is basically your fault.
Oh it's just a kindergarten student, they don't kick that hard or bite that deeply.
What did you do to make the student so upset? You should let him have whatever he wants.
Why aren't you calming the student down, you should be able to do that before the student escalates
Why aren't you providing the student with rewards (of course they are never provided by the school, the teacher has to spend his or her own money)?

Really?

You grab it before they do. Or take it away from them before they throw it.

It's time for you to retire.

NP. Surely you're aware that there are ~25 kids in these classrooms. There's no way a teacher is grabbing something away if she's across the room. Are you always this obtuse? I suggest you spend some time volunteering in the classroom to see what the realities are.

Oh, and as teachers retire, there isn't a fresh crop to replace them. Think about that for a minute.

It sounds like this child has a 1:1. Did you miss that part of the thread?

No, it does not sound like this child has a 1:1. It sounds like there was an aide present in the classroom and she got hurt. There is one who floats in K at SCES; she’s not 1:1 with a specific student.

The main thing it sounds like is that you really have no idea how bad the staffing situation is.

If that's true, then it is even more outrageous how much this school is failing this student. It's not hard to fill paraeducator positions. They're highly desired positions among child care workers.

Again. It really sounds like you do not understand how bad the staffing situation is.

You don't seem to understand where the bottleneck is. There are plenty of people that want these positions.

For the purpose of the discussion above, it does not matter where the bottleneck is. There was no 1:1 adult assigned to this child.

It does matter, because it sounds like this is exactly the kind of student that needs a 1:1. The principal should have put in a request for critical staffing months ago. The central office may have wanted to send someone to observe the classroom behavior. If it is anything like what has been suggested in this thread, then it would have been approved.

Glad to see others came and took care of this nonsense argument. I cannot even.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:MCPS has lost a lot of trust. Many people including the council, which decides how much money MCPS gets but not what they spend it on, have questioned how effective it is to give MCPS more money given the outcomes they are getting. They are $40 million in the hole in the employee benefits trust, some very high poverty schools lost Title 1 funding and they gave a $1.3 million payout to McKnight who promoted a known bully and sexual harasser. MCPS central staff frequently lie and obfuscate to the BOE, the council and the public. If they feel like funding for MCPS is like throwing money out the window, they will direct those funds to many of the community's many other important needs.

The level of incompetence among MCPS staff is both baffling and alarming.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Critical staffing is temporary part-time and extremely difficult to fill. There are no benefits and no job security. There also is no paid leave. The jobs are hard and at the lowest end of the pay scale.

Honestly, that just makes MCPS look even worse here.

The problem isn't the kids-- it's the school district.

DP. Then we need to pay more taxes to fund higher pay for those positions.

Yes. And/or cut from elsewhere in the budget. It's a >$3 billion budget. We can pay for health insurance for paras.

Health insurance claim cost rose 13% this year creating an even further deficit in the employee benefit plan to the tune of $40M projected deficit. It’s a $3Billion budget that covers 25K employees and services to school and kids.

There are going to be cuts, changes to insurance(at the next contract) and likely project delays.

Go watch the budget meetings.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Critical staffing is temporary part-time and extremely difficult to fill. There are no benefits and no job security. There also is no paid leave. The jobs are hard and at the lowest end of the pay scale.

Honestly, that just makes MCPS look even worse here.

The problem isn't the kids-- it's the school district.

DP. Then we need to pay more taxes to fund higher pay for those positions.

Yes. And/or cut from elsewhere in the budget. It's a >$3 billion budget. We can pay for health insurance for paras.

Health insurance claim cost rose 13% this year creating an even further deficit in the employee benefit plan to the tune of $40M projected deficit. It’s a $3Billion budget that covers 25K employees and services to school and kids.

There are going to be cuts, changes to insurance(at the next contract) and likely project delays.

Go watch the budget meetings.

For the price of McKnight's settlement, MCPS could have covered health insurance for nearly 200 paraeducators.

MCPS absolutely has the money to pay benefits to paraeducators if they wanted to address the kinds of problems referenced in this thread.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Critical staffing is temporary part-time and extremely difficult to fill. There are no benefits and no job security. There also is no paid leave. The jobs are hard and at the lowest end of the pay scale.

Honestly, that just makes MCPS look even worse here.

The problem isn't the kids-- it's the school district.

DP. Then we need to pay more taxes to fund higher pay for those positions.

Yes. And/or cut from elsewhere in the budget. It's a >$3 billion budget. We can pay for health insurance for paras.

Health insurance claim cost rose 13% this year creating an even further deficit in the employee benefit plan to the tune of $40M projected deficit. It’s a $3Billion budget that covers 25K employees and services to school and kids.

There are going to be cuts, changes to insurance(at the next contract) and likely project delays.

Go watch the budget meetings.

The whole issue of the health insurance deficit is very interesting. The reasons they gave (inflation, weight loss drugs) are not unique to MCPS. While cost increases in premiums are always common, multi million dollar deficits are not. What happened here? And who will pay for it? Right now it seems like students are paying through the budget freeze. Will they raise premiums on next year's teachers to pay for this year's claims? Will they cut services for students to pay for this year's claims?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Critical staffing is temporary part-time and extremely difficult to fill. There are no benefits and no job security. There also is no paid leave. The jobs are hard and at the lowest end of the pay scale.

Honestly, that just makes MCPS look even worse here.

The problem isn't the kids-- it's the school district.

DP. Then we need to pay more taxes to fund higher pay for those positions.

Yes. And/or cut from elsewhere in the budget. It's a >$3 billion budget. We can pay for health insurance for paras.

Health insurance claim cost rose 13% this year creating an even further deficit in the employee benefit plan to the tune of $40M projected deficit. It’s a $3Billion budget that covers 25K employees and services to school and kids.

There are going to be cuts, changes to insurance(at the next contract) and likely project delays.

Go watch the budget meetings.

The whole issue of the health insurance deficit is very interesting. The reasons they gave (inflation, weight loss drugs) are not unique to MCPS. While cost increases in premiums are always common, multi million dollar deficits are not. What happened here? And who will pay for it? Right now it seems like students are paying through the budget freeze. Will they raise premiums on next year's teachers to pay for this year's claims? Will they cut services for students to pay for this year's claims?

Interesting. So MCPS has self-funded plans, as opposed to simply paying premiums to the insurance companies and having them take on the risk?

I would think the reserve requirements for self-funded programs would prevent a true deficit. At least, without horrible mismanagement.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Critical staffing is temporary part-time and extremely difficult to fill. There are no benefits and no job security. There also is no paid leave. The jobs are hard and at the lowest end of the pay scale.

Honestly, that just makes MCPS look even worse here.

The problem isn't the kids-- it's the school district.

DP. Then we need to pay more taxes to fund higher pay for those positions.

Yes. And/or cut from elsewhere in the budget. It's a >$3 billion budget. We can pay for health insurance for paras.

Health insurance claim cost rose 13% this year creating an even further deficit in the employee benefit plan to the tune of $40M projected deficit. It’s a $3Billion budget that covers 25K employees and services to school and kids.

There are going to be cuts, changes to insurance(at the next contract) and likely project delays.

Go watch the budget meetings.

The whole issue of the health insurance deficit is very interesting. The reasons they gave (inflation, weight loss drugs) are not unique to MCPS. While cost increases in premiums are always common, multi million dollar deficits are not. What happened here? And who will pay for it? Right now it seems like students are paying through the budget freeze. Will they raise premiums on next year's teachers to pay for this year's claims? Will they cut services for students to pay for this year's claims?

Interesting. So MCPS has self-funded plans, as opposed to simply paying premiums to the insurance companies and having them take on the risk?

I would think the reserve requirements for self-funded programs would prevent a true deficit. At least, without horrible mismanagement.

Yes, like many government institutions, MCPS is self insured. And yes, this whole situation points to horrific mismanagement.

[Anonymous]

Let’s talk about the adults at this school that YELL at him , call him stupid and try to hold him. My kid tells me this and that kid needs more help, let’s not assume what we do not know .

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Let’s talk about the adults at this school that YELL at him , call him stupid and try to hold him. My kid tells me this and that kid needs more help, let’s not assume what we do not know .

This is categorically untrue.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Let’s talk about the adults at this school that YELL at him , call him stupid and try to hold him. My kid tells me this and that kid needs more help, let’s not assume what we do not know .

Let’s remember that a child’s retelling of a story is not always exactly accurate and oftentimes can be exaggerated. “Trying to hold him” sounds like blocking or restraining for very obvious safety reasons. School staff members are not hired nor paid enough to be physically assaulted by 5 year olds, or students of any age for that matter. The child needs more support and neither the parents nor principal are seeming to have any urgency on getting them placed somewhere that they will receive that support. It’s very hard to believe any of the teachers at SCES would ever call a child stupid. The safety of the students and staff is priority, and when you have a child as unpredictably violent as this one, sometimes physically removing or blocking the child is the only option to ensure that safety.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Critical staffing is temporary part-time and extremely difficult to fill. There are no benefits and no job security. There also is no paid leave. The jobs are hard and at the lowest end of the pay scale.

Honestly, that just makes MCPS look even worse here.

The problem isn't the kids-- it's the school district.

DP. Then we need to pay more taxes to fund higher pay for those positions.

Yes. And/or cut from elsewhere in the budget. It's a >$3 billion budget. We can pay for health insurance for paras.

Health insurance claim cost rose 13% this year creating an even further deficit in the employee benefit plan to the tune of $40M projected deficit. It’s a $3Billion budget that covers 25K employees and services to school and kids.

There are going to be cuts, changes to insurance(at the next contract) and likely project delays.

Go watch the budget meetings.

The whole issue of the health insurance deficit is very interesting. The reasons they gave (inflation, weight loss drugs) are not unique to MCPS. While cost increases in premiums are always common, multi million dollar deficits are not. What happened here? And who will pay for it? Right now it seems like students are paying through the budget freeze. Will they raise premiums on next year's teachers to pay for this year's claims? Will they cut services for students to pay for this year's claims?

Interesting. So MCPS has self-funded plans, as opposed to simply paying premiums to the insurance companies and having them take on the risk?

I would think the reserve requirements for self-funded programs would prevent a true deficit. At least, without horrible mismanagement.

Yes, like many government institutions, MCPS is self insured. And yes, this whole situation points to horrific mismanagement.

Sounds like something someone should file a complaint to the OIG about.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Critical staffing is temporary part-time and extremely difficult to fill. There are no benefits and no job security. There also is no paid leave. The jobs are hard and at the lowest end of the pay scale.

Honestly, that just makes MCPS look even worse here.

The problem isn't the kids-- it's the school district.

DP. Then we need to pay more taxes to fund higher pay for those positions.

Yes. And/or cut from elsewhere in the budget. It's a >$3 billion budget. We can pay for health insurance for paras.

Health insurance claim cost rose 13% this year creating an even further deficit in the employee benefit plan to the tune of $40M projected deficit. It’s a $3Billion budget that covers 25K employees and services to school and kids.

There are going to be cuts, changes to insurance(at the next contract) and likely project delays.

Go watch the budget meetings.

The whole issue of the health insurance deficit is very interesting. The reasons they gave (inflation, weight loss drugs) are not unique to MCPS. While cost increases in premiums are always common, multi million dollar deficits are not. What happened here? And who will pay for it? Right now it seems like students are paying through the budget freeze. Will they raise premiums on next year's teachers to pay for this year's claims? Will they cut services for students to pay for this year's claims?

Interesting. So MCPS has self-funded plans, as opposed to simply paying premiums to the insurance companies and having them take on the risk?

I would think the reserve requirements for self-funded programs would prevent a true deficit. At least, without horrible mismanagement.

Yes, like many government institutions, MCPS is self insured. And yes, this whole situation points to horrific mismanagement.

Sounds like something someone should file a complaint to the OIG about.

I can write your OIG report for you:

MCPS did not set premiums correctly. They need to increase premiums or decrease benefits in order to provide health insurance for employees while still providing funding to schools for basic items like paper and desks.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What in the holy hell???

OP if this were my child’s kindergarten class, I would become that principals worst nightmare of a parent.

Good luck, y’all. MSM won’t touch this. It’s going on everywhere in public schools. It’s part of their overall agenda. If you truly don’t like it, you had better vote differently next time. Remember when you assumed this crap would never happen in your school? High time to wake up.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What in the holy hell???

OP if this were my child’s kindergarten class, I would become that principals worst nightmare of a parent.

Good luck, y’all. MSM won’t touch this. It’s going on everywhere in public schools. It’s part of their overall agenda. If you truly don’t like it, you had better vote differently next time. Remember when you assumed this crap would never happen in your school? High time to wake up.

Is this agenda in the room with us right now?