Comments on: Reaction to the Obama Bullying Conference http://www.colage.org/advocacy/bullyingconferencereaction/ Thu, 20 Sep 2012 11:08:52 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.5.1 By: JAYSON http://www.colage.org/advocacy/bullyingconferencereaction/#comment-41 JAYSON Sun, 13 Mar 2011 08:43:56 +0000 http://www.colage.org/?p=743#comment-41 In 1996, my family fought our school district to change the discrimination policy changed to include the words “sexual orientation or perceived…” My 16 year old son, out in high school, stood before a panel of bigots in a room full of outraged citizens demanding to include wording to protect our children, while a small group of closed-minded individuals tried to teach the point that if we putting wording in for that group, then we should put wording in for fat kids, and red heads, and not-so-good-looking, etc. The end result was instead of making a strong, solid anti-harrassment policy that would protect all, they voted to water down the policy by removing all language. It read something like, “Harassment will not be tolerated by any person, for any reason at any time.” Two weeks later my son was attacked and we learned quickly that “harassment” is subjective. That policy has since changed, however, the attitudes and behaviors of those entrusted to enforce it hasn’t changed all that much.

Fast forward to 2011. My 11 year old 6th grade, who is the son of 2 out gay men is under attack constantly. He’s being picked on, pushed around, pushed to tears more recently, and his grades, curiously, went from AB Honor Roll to D’s and F’s. We had to change schools because once because it had gotten so bad. What does a parent do when the bullies are the staff, the teachers? The people we entrusted to educate kid are targeting him because 1 of his dads has a big mouth and refuses to let a teacher walk all over him. When the classroom abuse of a teacher was reported to the principal, and it was backed up by 3 classmates, my son began receiving similar treatment from different staff.

I had my very last meeting, parent teacher meeting, with counselor and principal yesterday (Friday), and my next meeting is with the superintendent.

I wasn’t moved by the White House conference. It was nice having panelist from known places, however, it doesn’t take research to say what the affects of being bullied will have on a kid. It takes experience and common sense. It wouldn’ve been nice to hear more about what to do, how to stop it, etc. That’s not even my main point. I didn’t hear anything about staff on kid bullying – nothing.

Staff on kid bullying in schools is the elephant in the middle of the living room. During my meeting yesterday, a teacher kept rolling her eyes. First, she did it to my husband, then she did it to me. I told her to knock it off. So, it was nice, the conference spoke about LGBT stuff, but I wouldn’t start planning a parade.

I CAN REALLY USE HELP IF ANYONE HAS SOME TO SEND, I’D GREATLY APPRECIATE IT (some prayers would be good too.).

And this is Clark County, Las Vegas, Nevada that we’re in. And they wonder why Clark County School District is towards the bottom of the pit’s list.

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