Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Blair Crew uses an app for all communications, where rowers and coaches can communicate and broader messages can be sent. We have no reason at all to believe that this alleged misconduct was sexual in nature. In fact, we really have no specifics at all because the school will not communicate directly with the organization, which is very very odd.

Yeah, I think after all the horrific Shipley stuff, everyone around here hears "crew" and immediately jumps to "sexual misconduct." But there's nothing in that message to indicate this is a similar situation. For all anyone knows, the alleged misconduct could be financial, or a whole host of other criminal stuff.

The point of the letter was to make it clear that Blair, and by extension MCPS, will not maintain their relationship with the organization as long as there's a criminal matter under investigation. Which I think is absolutely fair. It's entirely possible they were instructed not to communicate directly with the organization, either by police (to avoid corrupting the investigation, or seeming to influence it) or by their own internal counsel (to protect Blair/MCPS from appearing complicit with the activity).

It’s more than just the Shipley case and crew. The principal’s letter is similar to other community letters sent out to school communities for child abuse investigations. If that’s a false assumption, then there should be clarification from MCPS.

I agree that there should be some clarification is in order. I know the team is practicing and planning to compete. Will they have to change the name of the team in order to do so?

Let's try that again: I agree that some clarification is in order. I know the team is practicing and planning to compete. Will they have to change the name of the team in order to do so?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Blair Crew uses an app for all communications, where rowers and coaches can communicate and broader messages can be sent. We have no reason at all to believe that this alleged misconduct was sexual in nature. In fact, we really have no specifics at all because the school will not communicate directly with the organization, which is very very odd.

Yeah, I think after all the horrific Shipley stuff, everyone around here hears "crew" and immediately jumps to "sexual misconduct." But there's nothing in that message to indicate this is a similar situation. For all anyone knows, the alleged misconduct could be financial, or a whole host of other criminal stuff.

The point of the letter was to make it clear that Blair, and by extension MCPS, will not maintain their relationship with the organization as long as there's a criminal matter under investigation. Which I think is absolutely fair. It's entirely possible they were instructed not to communicate directly with the organization, either by police (to avoid corrupting the investigation, or seeming to influence it) or by their own internal counsel (to protect Blair/MCPS from appearing complicit with the activity).

It’s more than just the Shipley case and crew. The principal’s letter is similar to other community letters sent out to school communities for child abuse investigations. If that’s a false assumption, then there should be clarification from MCPS.

I agree that there should be some clarification is in order. I know the team is practicing and planning to compete. Will they have to change the name of the team in order to do so?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Blair Crew uses an app for all communications, where rowers and coaches can communicate and broader messages can be sent. We have no reason at all to believe that this alleged misconduct was sexual in nature. In fact, we really have no specifics at all because the school will not communicate directly with the organization, which is very very odd.

Yeah, I think after all the horrific Shipley stuff, everyone around here hears "crew" and immediately jumps to "sexual misconduct." But there's nothing in that message to indicate this is a similar situation. For all anyone knows, the alleged misconduct could be financial, or a whole host of other criminal stuff.

The point of the letter was to make it clear that Blair, and by extension MCPS, will not maintain their relationship with the organization as long as there's a criminal matter under investigation. Which I think is absolutely fair. It's entirely possible they were instructed not to communicate directly with the organization, either by police (to avoid corrupting the investigation, or seeming to influence it) or by their own internal counsel (to protect Blair/MCPS from appearing complicit with the activity).

It’s more than just the Shipley case and crew. The principal’s letter is similar to other community letters sent out to school communities for child abuse investigations. If that’s a false assumption, then there should be clarification from MCPS.

No Board members are employed at Blair and the coach who left is on a leave of absence for person reasons. Not fired, not asked to resign, etc.

MCPS needs to create better ways to provide oversight and ethical monitoring of staff/teachers who act as coaches for outside organizations that have MCPS participants.

One question I had, which is tangentially related to the Shipley matter, which was complicated by the fact that he was both a coach of the club team and a teacher at the school, and was in a position of influence over some students in both in the MCPS classroom and the non-MCPS boat house.

Are any of the current leadership of Blair Crew, either as a coach or board member, also an employee at Blair? In other words, are there any links to the school other than the use of their facilities? Besides it being made up of primarily Blair students, of course.

Anonymous wrote:Blair Crew uses an app for all communications, where rowers and coaches can communicate and broader messages can be sent. We have no reason at all to believe that this alleged misconduct was sexual in nature. In fact, we really have no specifics at all because the school will not communicate directly with the organization, which is very very odd.

Yeah, I think after all the horrific Shipley stuff, everyone around here hears "crew" and immediately jumps to "sexual misconduct." But there's nothing in that message to indicate this is a similar situation. For all anyone knows, the alleged misconduct could be financial, or a whole host of other criminal stuff.

The point of the letter was to make it clear that Blair, and by extension MCPS, will not maintain their relationship with the organization as long as there's a criminal matter under investigation. Which I think is absolutely fair. It's entirely possible they were instructed not to communicate directly with the organization, either by police (to avoid corrupting the investigation, or seeming to influence it) or by their own internal counsel (to protect Blair/MCPS from appearing complicit with the activity).

I heard one of the coches quit

Anonymous wrote:"All communications should be accessible to parents."

This is true, but for how many teams is this the case?

This is general information for child safety -

For an MCPS athletics team, a coach is allowed to use an MCPS email to communicate with student athletes directly because those are not private accounts. However, in reality, how often are they monitored? A safer form of communication would be group emails and cc’ing parents.

Students should be trained that a coach/teacher texting them individually is unprofessional and violates the MCPS code of conduct. Same for private social media messaging. Parents, talk with your children to keep them safe. Report suspicious behavior.

Grooming starts out with ambiguous behavior that is not illegal but the predator is testing how far they can go with a child. Gifts, special rewards/positions, and attention is how a predator gains the trust of children and parents. Child predators do not look like the boogie man. They are popular and well liked by the community. They may have taught/coached for decades.

Club teams such as crew have even less oversight than MCPS athletics. As a parent board, it would be advisable to set up codes of conducts for coaches and athletes to keep children safe if you have not already. Coaches caught violating the rules would show the parent board when they have someone who should not be working with their children.

"All communications should be accessible to parents."

This is true, but for how many teams is this the case?