Kevin Francois lives in Columbus, Georgia. Since I work at an Evil Corporation in Columbus, I'm not that far from him, and could do those things if he'd like. And I'm serious about the offers.
You see, while I don't know much about Kevin, I know a few things:
- He's a junior at Spencer High School in Columbus.
- He's a 'C' student, if he works at it.
- He's serving a ten-day suspension from school for disorderly conduct.
What about those things are worthy of praise? Well, not much, taken by themselves. But there's one other thing about Kevin:
- His mother is SFC Monique Bates of the 203rd Forward Support Battalion, 3rd Infantry Division. And she's in Iraq.
Oh, one more thing:
- His suspension for talking to his mother on his cell phone while at school.
Really. The whole story was in Friday's Columbus Ledger-Enquirer.
Now, I don't take kindly to student's disobeying a teacher or school
official. But I also don't take kindly to mindless idiots harassing the
children of our fighting men and women.
Like I said, I don't know much about Kevin. But the picture in the
newspaper shows a clean-cut young man holding a dogtag with a picture
of his mother. I've seen newspaper photo-shoots, and they don't always
reflect 100% accuracy. However, there is no dispute about the facts of
this situation.
The incident happened when Francois
received a call from his mother at 12:30 p.m., which he said was his
lunch break. Francois said he went outside the school building to get a
better reception when his mother called. A teacher who saw Francois on
his phone told him to get off the phone. But he didn't.
Francois said he told the teacher, "This is my mom in Iraq. I'm not about to hang up on my mom."
Francois said the teacher tried to take the phone, causing it to hang up.
The student said he then went with the teacher to the school's
office where he surrendered his phone. His mother called again at 12:37
p.m. and left a message scolding her son about hanging up and telling
him to answer the phone when she calls.
Did Kevin violate school policy? Yes. Should he be punished? I say
no. Not if the policy is wrong. And, if the policy makes no allowance
for exceptions, then it's wrong.
I don't know the motivations of the teacher. The teacher was told
who Kevin was talking with and why. Several thoughts come to mind, but
I'm trying to give the teacher the benefit of the doubt. So I'm
assigning the best motivation I can: stupidity. I can't think of another word for the situation being handled as it was. Well, I can, but not a nicer word.
This episode brings to mind the famous question: "Is our children learning?"
I hope not. Not from these school teachers, anyway.
UPDATE: Suspension reduced to three days.
Other coverage
Too bad you can't fix that situation. It's already past. I certainly hope something is being done for the future. That just has no reasonable reasoning behind it from what I can tell.
ReplyDeleteStupidity knows no bounds. It can be found in great abundance in the teaching profession.
ReplyDeletevery nice post
ReplyDeleteStudent forced to hang up on his Mom calling from
ReplyDeleteSmash has a good round up, but doesn't incude basil's thoughts. Normally basil talks about light hearted things like Sweet tea but he gets serious with this one
Thank you, all.
ReplyDeleteHope Kevin hears about your offer & takes you up on it--sounds like he could use a big brother to fill up his off-school hours.
ReplyDeleteI, myself, had a husband who recently returned from deployemnt and NO ONE came between me & the cell phone.
Had they tried, they'd probably still be lying in a hospital bed somewhere.
I too am in Columbus (well Phenix City) and heard about this. I was stomping around the house like a mad women. My poor hubby, but he's a 1SG out a Benning and understands. Glad to see they've reduced the suspension to 3 days, but wish it had completely gone away. According to the LE, the switch board was almost shut down from all the calls. Love the internet.
ReplyDeleteMelinda:
ReplyDeleteThanks for the comments. I understand what you mean. I nearly wrote the same thing, but toned it down quite a bit, what with me being the huge role model for kids and all.
Jo:
Thanks for the heads up on the Ledger-Enquirer update. We don't take the paper (they still owe us for 6 weeks paid for, but that's a whole post in itself), so I missed it until you pointed it out. Thanks.
I hope Kevin hears of your offer. You're a great Little Brother (who's 6'2"), so I'll bet you'd be a great Big Brother (who's still 6'2")
ReplyDeleteThanks.
ReplyDeleteYou are right on Basil. If Kevin was my son I'd fire those teachers after I blistered their ears back. Then I'd put Kevin in a school that believes in America and supports the troops. And to hell with those stinking commie bureaucrats. If you can contact Kevin, I'd like to donate $100 to his Mom for long distance calls. My # is 503-230-9338.
ReplyDeletekevin is so cute, definately if i could get a date,it would lead to a...well lets just say,we'll have fun.
ReplyDelete