Student Safety Concerns us ALL

photo retrieved from amazon.com pin for sale 

It is SAFE to say that the safety of our children and students is a huge concern in public schools.  Parents send their children daily via bus, car, daycare van, or on foot with a huge amount of trust in the school system to keep them safe while also providing them with an equitable education.  Teachers are on the front lines when it comes to keeping students safe.  They must maintain a safe classroom environment while being aware of any signs that may be shown of an unsafe environment outside of school. When most people think of safety in schools, though, they picture an intruder causing havoc with a weapon because that is what we hear about on the news.  Unfortunately, threats to children’s safety comes in many other forms.

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“I’m working at a school where a mom is asking all teachers to keep any snacks, any candy, anything, away from her kid (he is adopted). Is it okay to do this? 

(Anonymous, 2018)

I receive emails from Quora through a weekly digest format.  I typically delete the emails when they pop-up in my inbox because of the amount of emails I receive daily.  However, this past week, the question above caught my attention.  I was quickly drawn into the argument vortex by this question posed within the body of the email. Before I knew it, I had been reading responses (mode – opinion column) for over an hour.  I read each of the 63 direct responses to the posed question, (media – alphabetic text).  The question drew in the opinions of a variety of people (audience) including parents, school counselors, special education and general education teachers, camp counselors as well as anonymous respondents.  It is evident that the question was intended to stir up conversation through argument (purpose – goal was to get a dialogue going from many perspectives) based on the situation provided, the inclusion of the fact of the child being adopted, and the question regarding the acceptability of following the mom’s request.  The question seems to be posed based on a real situation that a teacher is experiencing (situation – context is a need for opinions from outside sources) who needs help in determining the appropriate way to handle this situation. 

A.J. joined the conversation by posting to the original question.  She provided a claim based on personal experience of a situation gone wrong that was about a student who was adopted to support the specificity of the question.  She also included an opposing viewpoint to show that she was looking at several perspectives to answer the question. Her post sparked conversation between participants rather than posts only directly made to the initial question.

“Individuals often respond emotionally to what they read in social networks posting or reposting without critically analyzing the argument being made” (Turner & Hicks, 2017, p. 104). This was true in this situation. Some of the responses had a hostile tone, such as the one from D.W.  She seemed to be taking the answer provided by A.J. personally and accused her of not actually answering the question.  S.S. later came to A.J.’s defense by stating that she did, in fact, answer the question and continued by providing his own thoughts. When people find information that sparks an interest, “social networking can be one part of the broader digital writing toolset” (Hicks, 2013, p. 153).

“[W]e can control the spread of misinformation within our communities by engaging in social media as readers and writers of argument” (Turner & Hicks, 2017, p. 106). Claims were made that children who have been adopted have a higher chance of being murdered.  A counter argument was made stating that step-children are the ones most likely to be murdered.  However, I did not see any clear evidence from anyone making these claims.  Any evidence that was posted was based on personal experiences rather than research and there were no resources provided for further exploration of the topic. Turner and Hicks (2017) agree that “it is incumbent on users to fact check and think carefully before sharing” (p. 105). 

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As teachers, a.k.a. caregivers, we have to be cognizant of all of the potential warning signs of danger.  It may be displayed in the form of writing, illustrations, physical evidence, conversations, parent communication or changes in student behaviors. We must be more aware of our biases that keep us from reporting possible child abuse (Tillman, Prazak, Burrier, Benezra & Lynch, 2016).  “Child maltreatment is a problem that affects children of all races, sexes, and socioeconomic statuses and has many negative consequences for those who have been affected” (Tillman et al., 2016). Being aware of the signs surrounding this issue is an imperative topic for teachers to be made aware of as it relates to keeping our students safe.

References:

Hicks, T. (2013). Crafting across digital writing: Composing texts across media and genres. 

     Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.

Tillman, K. S., Prazak, M. D., Burrier, L., Miller, S., Benezra, M., & Lynch, L. (2016).  Factors 

     influencing school counselors’ suspecting and reporting childhood physical abuse: Investigating 

     child, parent, school, and abuse characteristics.  Professional School Counseling, 19(1), 103-115. 

     Retrieved from https://ezproxy.montevallo.edu/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?

     direct=true&db=eric&AN=EJ1099041&site=eds-live

Turner, K.H. and Hicks, T. (2017). Teaching adolescents to read and write digital texts: arguments in 

      the real world. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.

Anonymous. (2018). I am working at a school where the mom is asking all teachers to keep any

     snacks, any candy, anything, away from her kid (he is adopted). Is it okay to do this? [Msg 1].

     Message posted to https://www.quora.com/I-m-working-at-a-school-where-a-mom-is-asking-all-

     teachers-to-keep-any-snacks-any-candy-anything-away-from-her-kid-he-is-adopted-Is-it-okay-to-

   

     do-this