I’m a little uncomfortable with the classification of special needs students here. Having a learning or developmental disability does not predispose one toward violence. I don’t think we should be afraid of those children who often don’t stand out in one way or another to the untrained observer.

I DO think there are children who have or need behavior intervention plans who have the potential to be violent. Many of these children and their families fault ADHD for the behaviors. However, the symptoms I have observed are cruelty and manipulation, which are much more consistent in personality disorder than anything having to do with ADHD. Granted, I am not an MD, so my assessment is not medical.

I worked at a school where we had a child who was emotionally cruel to other children for years, then sexually inappropriate. In middle school he escalated to low-level acts of physical aggression —things he could deny being intentional but that happened with too great frequency to be an accident. He then made a non-specific spoken threat to bring firearms to school with the intent to commit a violent act. It was surprisingly difficult to get the administration and child’s parents to take this threat seriously. It was also difficult to figure out the legal options to deny the student access to campus.

As an educator, I would really appreciate if doctors and lawmakers could work together on bills that balance families civil rights with public safety. Often someone does see or hear something suspicious but it’s not enough to get a restraining order or to deny a child access to education. We need a temporary “panic button” we can hit when a student makes a gun threat.

With regards to Sandy Hook, Adam Lanza’s mother was a huge part of the problem. The school system and outside providers recommended things that would help him and she refused to do any of it because it made him uncomfortable. The report from the Office of the Child Advocate had a laundry list of interventions he should have been getting but wasn’t because she was just letting him stay in his room 24/7 and catering to all his obsessions and refusing all advice. And then she taught him how to shoot.

School systems legally can’t do anything without parent buy-in.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:As much as you can go on and on about certain sped rights, where are the rights for the normal kids? This is causing underlying resentment and anger among kids, parents, and teachers.

OMG, this, this, this. The rights of kids with special needs, diagnosed or undiagnosed, trump everything else in schools. I have been teaching a log time and I think when it comes to violence or behaviors that disrupt others, the law needs to support a MUCH quicker turn around time in terms of providing a 1:1 aide (I'm thinking within days, instead of months or years as it stands currently). And then if that doesn't help? Two weeks with the 1:1 and then to outplacement. You don't get to screw up everyone else's right to FAPE simply because you have needs. Nope.

+1. I am seeing this sentiment all over educational websites and blogs. People are also noting, correctly, that school districts in major cities are not going to have an easy time recruiting even minimally qualified aides unless they significantly up the pay.

Anonymous wrote:As much as you can go on and on about certain sped rights, where are the rights for the normal kids? This is causing underlying resentment and anger among kids, parents, and teachers.

OMG, this, this, this. The rights of kids with special needs, diagnosed or undiagnosed, trump everything else in schools. I have been teaching a log time and I think when it comes to violence or behaviors that disrupt others, the law needs to support a MUCH quicker turn around time in terms of providing a 1:1 aide (I'm thinking within days, instead of months or years as it stands currently). And then if that doesn't help? Two weeks with the 1:1 and then to outplacement. You don't get to screw up everyone else's right to FAPE simply because you have needs. Nope.

As much as you can go on and on about certain sped rights, where are the rights for the normal kids? This is causing underlying resentment and anger among kids, parents, and teachers.

I think most parents and teachers underestimate how hard parents of kids with special needs like dyslexia, anxiety and other issues beg the schools for services and are denied. Teachers who try to get their kids help are often shut down or even reprimanded for telling the parents about the issues.

So a child with a learning disability who isn’t helped becomes a behavior issue, then they are punished for the behavior and it escalated as they feel isolated and misunderstood. Estimates are that 80% of people in prison have an unaddressed learning disability like dyslexia. This cycle is less likely for affluent kids because their parents can afford reading tutors and counseling for social skills etc.

I absolutely agree there should be consequences for behavior in school. But I think we first have to ask what have we done to contribute to the behavior especially in elementary school.

Retired teacher here. Taught middle and high school 1979-2016. As to one of the PPs points, in the late 70s at the rural high school where I started my career, kids drove to school with gun racks on their pickup trucks. The first day of hunting season was a school holiday. Kids got into fights, girls gossiped about each other, but the notion of bringing a gun to school to murder your fellow classmates was beyond unthinkable. Every "expert" out there has an opinion and a solution: Ban guns, punish bad behavior more harshly in elementary school, more school psychologists, let teachers carry guns, more security quards...etc.,etc,. Public schools are simply a microcosm of the larger society. I grew up in the suburbs in the 50s and 60s. Families were stable, and so were the schools. Social media, video games, smartphones, have destabilized the culture. Not sure where we're headed as a country, but I'm not optimistic.

Believe me, most teachers would be delighted if the law supported them more.

One of the parents has written a book about the Parkland shooting. The laws and policies protected the shooter. Also, lack of follow up on what laws they do have.