Reply to Grand Jury report on LCPS sexual assault cases is unsealed

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Reply to "Grand Jury report on LCPS sexual assault cases is unsealed"

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]This whole situation brings up a number of tricky questions, especially surrounding the rights of the accused.

1)  What should happen to a student who has been observed to be acting in an inappropriate manner, but not in a rule-breaking way?

2)  What should happen if the school has been contacted by family with concerns about the student's behavior?

3)  What should happen to a student who is accused of a serious crime?

I'm not sure that I have a good answer for any of these.  I'm not exonerating LCPS or the cops, clearly there were serious mistakes made, but I empathize a bit with their plight, in that you can't just kick a kid out of school for questionable behavior.  And for #3, what if it was later found that the first encounter was consensual all the way through?  Does the student get to come back?

Remember, under the Title IX rules instituted under the Trump administration, the accused are presumed to be innocent throughout the disciplinary process.[/quote]

I think there has not been enough scrutiny on the admins at that school. The superintendent is the one in the spotlight but the ones running the school basically left their teachers and assistants out to dry.

They’re the ones who knew about the situation and allowed their employees, who knew nothing of the events, to handle a student who had to leave a previous school due to serious accusations. They didn’t give them any support despite having knowledge that the teachers and TAs don’t have any access to.

Did the superintendent forced this school to accept the transfer? Did he force them to ignore the TA? There was the art teacher who reported that 2 female students asked to be moved away because they felt uncomfortable. Did anything else happen? Did anyone follow up with those students who felt uncomfortable?

What is very concerning is that the AP’s response to the TA’s email is that “it’s a classroom management issue.” Basically washing his hands of the situation and implying that the TA is supposed to be able to handle that. If that’s the case, then what is their job? If an employee describes an inappropriate incident that made them feel uncomfortable, and all they get is an admin saying “Not my problem. You just need to have better classroom management skills!” Imagine how demoralizing it is. You bought up concerns and now you’re told it is a YOU problem because you don’t have classroom management skills. Did the superintendent force this AP to ignore the TA and make it sound like it was their fault the kids are acting like that? I doubt it. They acted on their own accord and decided they didn’t care about their employee’s concerns.

Is that why the other TA who went into the bathroom didn’t notify anyone? Because there is a culture of admins ignoring inappropriate behavior?

I think the case doesn’t just highlight issues around the rights of the accused, it also highlights how the people who are lowest on the totem pole like subs, TAs, and teachers are often forced to deal with the toughest situations on their own with no support. And then they get ignored when they voice concerns so they have to continue working in an uncomfortable environment. Meanwhile, where were the administrators?[/quote]

AGREE!!! I think a huge part of the blame lies with BOTH of these principals for doing almost nothing. IANAL but seems criminally negligent to me. [/quote]

It is completely negligent. They are nowhere to be found besides the response to the email where the AP pushed all the responsibilities onto the TA claiming it was a classroom management problem. That’s the only thing they did. It is hard to not put the majority of the blame on them when they ignored a cry for help from a TA. They were in charge of running this school, and yet here they didn’t do anything.

If they were smart, they could pretend to do “something.”  Even if the gestures were meaningless, they could have offered to do something. They could say, “let me talk to the student.” Or “let me have the counselor talk to them.” Or “let me come in and observe your class, and I can give you some strategies on how to handle these things.” At least then, they could have said, “well, I tried to help.”

But they are so lazy that the only thing they did for this TA was say that it’s a classroom management problem. Basically, it’s not their problem at all. There’s nothing they can do to help. Or if there were, they’re not going to waste time following up on a complaint made by an assistant. The way everyone treated the assistant was horrible. Not just the admin, but the teachers didn’t give a hoot. The department chair claiming to be “confused” and thinking that the TA was afraid of Covid was just hilarious. Nope, this TA can’t possibly be concerned about the inappropriate behaviors because they were inappropriate. They must be concerned about the behaviors because they’re afraid of getting sick!! What kind of logic is this??

The superintendent had nothing to do with how this incident was handled at the school level. He had other issues, but I doubt he forced the admins and the other teachers to ignore the email. Or to come up with dumb reasons as to why no one cared enough about a fellow employee to follow up on her complaint.

I don’t know how all these people got off without any scrutiny on their actions and inactions. All the discussions are centered on the superintendent, but I think the vast majority of blame should be on the administrators of the school. [/quote]

Ziegler’s blame lies in how this was handled with the public, the families involved, and in joy insuring that principal number 2 was FULLY briefed. [/quote]

He is being blamed and indicted, and already got fired. So he is being held responsible. My point was that he is the only one. And the spokesperson got a perjury charge. What’s going on with other people involved?

Everyone else involved in the case got off scot free. Zero consequences. The report blamed the superintendent, and had issues with the county lawyer. But that’s it. Where were the admins running the schools? Do they have any responsibilities?

It looks like the superintendent could have avoided blame if he was clever enough to do the exact same thing as the principals and assistant principals. Do nothing and say nothing. Or some variety of meaningless comments like “I cannot comment on that.” [/quote]

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