Re: Finishing School Discipline 3 Spanking Caning Wmv
Raingarda Krzynowek
In 1977, the U.S. Supreme Court legitimized the use of corporal punishment in schools by deciding that the practice did not qualify as "cruel and unusual punishment." Despite the ruling in Ingraham v. Wright, corporal punishment - the use of physical force (usually paddling) on a student intended to correct misbehavior - would soon decline rapidly across the country. Between 1974 and 1994, 25 states would ban the practice, recognizing that it was an ineffective and inappropriate school discipline measure.
Paradox films depict the spanking, tawsing and caning of young women (schoolgirls, nurses, maids, etc.), primarily by men. About one-third of their videos feature female disciplinarians. None of these titles contain overt sexual content. The tone of the stories ranges from The Correctional Therapist and Offender Correction (with stern institutional punishments), to humor and genre parody such as the Finishing School Discipline series.
Similarly, London said that a mother spanking a child is different than a schoolteacher or principal. She added this is detrimental to relationship-building, something that is foundational in keeping students on track.
London said Columbia Public Schools strives to teach students strategies to healthily navigate conflict, compromise and self efficacy. The district this school year kicked off its five-year behavior education plan, spearheaded by London. The plan aims to maintain consistency in the behavior management methods districtwide, as well as level the playing field for students of color, who London said are disproportionately disciplined.
(b) There is no need to wrench the Eighth Amendment from its historical context and extend it to public school disciplinary practices. The openness of the public school and its supervision by the community afford significant safeguards against the kinds of abuses from which that Amendment protects convicted criminals. These safeguards are reinforced by the legal constraints of the common law, whereby any punishment going beyond that which is reasonably necessary for the proper education and discipline of the child may result in both civil and criminal liability. Pp. 430 U. S. 668-671.
Asstudents across the United States return to school each year, they,like their parents, are hoping for academic success. Policymakers and educatorshave the important responsibility of creating an educational environment basedon respect, including an effective disciplinary system. Yet for many students,"discipline" means extensive use of violence.
Students, parents, andteachers encounter obstacles when trying to limit corporal punishment. Forinstance, teachers who work in schools that use corporal punishment may findthemselves without alternative ways of disciplining particularly troublesomestudents. We interviewed teachers who wanted to send chronically misbehavingstudents out of the classroom, but were reluctant to do so knowing they wouldbe beaten. While some teachers believe corporal punishment is an effectivetool, other teachers concur with academic research showing that positive formsof discipline such as counseling and mediation are more effective in addressingthe student's underlying issues. Yet if the school does not support these formsof discipline, individual teachers face obstacles implementing them on aclassroom-by-classroom basis.
Students are sometimes asked to choosebetween corporal punishment and other forms of discipline such as suspensionsor detentions, decisions children should not be asked to make. One elementaryteacher described her pupils' decision process as follows: "I take the fivelicks because I'm nine and I want to go outside and play."[5]Older students choose paddling because they want to seem tough or because theirparents are less likely to find out about the underlying infraction. While itis a recognized principle of human rights that children should have a voice inmaking the policies to which they are subjected (and that participation isincreasingly important as they get older), giving children of any age a starkchoice between being beaten and other forms of discipline is not appropriate.Rather, it is a form of coercion that exploits vulnerable young people withunderdeveloped decision-making capabilities, asking them to trade away theirright to be free from beatings by school personnel.
While corporalpunishment is prohibited in most USjuvenile detention centers and even foster care settings, it continues to beallowed in certain USpublic schools. Many parents and teachers hold to the belief that corporalpunishment in public schools has an instructive purpose, providing thediscipline "necessary" for children to learn. The fact that many people believethat corporal punishment has a genuine pedagogical function does not diminishthe fact that it violates children's human rights.
Poverty and lack of resources help createconditions that lead to corporal punishment in schools. Teachers may haveovercrowded classrooms and lack resources such as counselors to assist withparticularly disruptive students or classroom dynamics. These conditions do notfacilitate effective discipline, and they may explain why teachers feel it isnecessary to subject students to beatings, but they do not excuse such actions.
Better approaches to school discipline areavailable. Effective discipline does not require paddling of students. Nationwide,teachers and administrators increasingly have been using positive disciplinemethods that foster nurturing school cultures, which allow students to thrive.With appropriate funding, training, and support, teachers and administratorscan implement discipline systems that respond to students' fundamental needsand do better at producing environments in which every student can maximize hisor her academic potential.
We chose to focus on Mississippiand Texasafter examining data from the US Department of Education's Office for CivilRights (OCR), which measure prevalence of corporal punishment (and other schooldiscipline and educational tracking data) by school district, by race, and bygender. As discussed in this report, the OCR data likely undercount the numberof incidents of corporal punishment that take place in a year, because someinstances of school corporal punishment are not recorded by schools and thusnot included in these data, and because the data are recorded per student peryear, and therefore do not record occurrences where a student is hit multipletimes in one year. Nonetheless, the OCR data provide the most reliable numbers presentlyavailable on the use of corporal punishment in US public schools. According tothese data, Mississippi has the largest percentageof students who receive corporal punishment each year and Texas has the largest absolute number ofstudents subjected to corporal punishment. We also decided to focus on Mississippi and Texasafter discussions with advocates against corporal punishment and other expertsin educational policy in each state.
Parents may discipline their children on school premises toshow their commitment to the child's education. One teacher and mother in Mississippi reported,"Some parents get called in and they will give their child swats in front ofthe administrators to show that they take discipline seriously."[76]A teacher noted that parents might also volunteer to paddle their children athome for infractions committed at school: "If I call parents about a kid with adiscipline problem, 80 percent of the time the parent will say, 'Okay, I'mgonna give him a few good licks.' It's a way of showing respect to theteacher."[77]It is natural that parents want to engage in their children's education, andshow their commitment to helping their children succeed. However, endorsingthis sort of punishment undermines the learning environment by sending themessage that violence and humiliation are appropriate and tolerated.
In some instances, the administration of corporal punishmentrequires that another adult at the school witness the beating. Neither Texas nor Mississippilaw requires such a witness, since both states delegate responsibility toschool districts for determining the parameters of the administration ofcorporal punishment.[84]However, the school board associations in both states provide sample policiesthat individual districts may use in drafting their discipline policies andthose sample policies call for a witness.
In many districts, students are given a choice of corporalpunishment or another punitive form of discipline. Students in both Mississippi and Texasmay be asked to choose between corporal punishment and detention,[101] in-school suspension[102] or out-of-school suspension.[103] We also heard reports of elementarystudents being asked to choose between getting beaten and losing recess,[104] and of high school students being asked tochoose between being paddled and getting worse grades.[105]
In fact, proponentsof corporal punishment often justify their views by citing the undesirabilityof suspension, and pointing out that corporal punishment means the studentreturns to class faster. For example, one superintendent asked if a student ishome alone, suspended from school, "is that really what's best educationally?"[110] This argument ignores the students' basicrights, and the fact that other options are available. Ultimately, schoolsshould not be forcing students to make this difficult choice, and shouldinstead be using effective positive discipline measures.[111]
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