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

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

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]There's no reason for any teacher or staff member in any type of school to take kids to a basement and lock the door.  Just think of the PTSD impact on those kids. 8 years? Unreal.[/quote]

All the kids went to the basement, pretty regularly (according to my LAMB kid from that classroom) to help Mr Fernandez retrieve or put away 'science materials.' The kids understood it to be part and parcel of the Montessori curriculum where students help care for the classroom environment.

So far as my kid will admit, nothing happened when he was down there with the teacher. But I still worry.  [/quote]

I've been a special ed teacher and now a school psychologist for many years. We're not allowed to take any students of any age to a place like a basement---and certainly now with a closed door--much less a locked one![/quote]

certainly not[/quote]

Sounds like the entire school was well aware that Fernandez took these basement trips all the time. Why was that permitted?! Overnight trips? Field trips where he's the sole chaperone? How does this happen today? [/quote]

I'm the PP who mentioned this.

I didn't know about the basement trips until 2 years later when the arrest was reported in the Washington Post. And I asked my DC about whether he ever went to the basement storage at LAMB and he said -- 'yeah, we had to help Mr Manolo get science materials from there.'

Clearly it set off an alarm with another faculty member -- because a teacher reported two incidents of this to the administration.

There were annual overnight camping trips for older children at LAMB. Multiple faculty and admins went -- parents did not. But it seems that LAMB didn't follow the standard 'no adult should ever be alone with one child' rule.  But Fernandez actually seems to have assaulted a child in the presence of a second. The 'going out' field trips around DC are a Montessori thing -- [b]and usually involved one adult taking 2-4 children someplace that the children planned an excursion to[/b].

[/quote]

Clearly the school needs to rethink that. NEVER offsite with a single adult alone with children. I don't buy the "it's a Montessori thing"[/quote]

+1 absolutely. unreal. [/quote]

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