There are some real issues on the side of hand-cuffing.
(1) Safety – In violent situations you don’t have to hit them in the head with a night stick. [ You can't talk to a person trying to break something including you.]
(2) Insanity – Children are insane (meaning they haven’t grown up enough to realize the consequences of their actions) This is a hi-pressure situation and an immature child may go berserk and jump out a window or run in front of a car.
(3) Handcuffs are real and strong – they have helped a log of the “temporarily uncontrollable Children: grasp the situation.
Twice I’ve seen kids sit-down and cry when they finally realized the horrible situation that they had created. The first time a 250# cop cried with him and he was never a problem again.
The second crying incident was a time when a female juvenile officer released a crying 11-y-o girl who then stabbed the officer in the neck with the principles letter opener.

I am sure there are lot of abuses out there – but they may be hard to spot.

Try going to Catholic schools around here in the 1960′s with Irish and Italian Nuns.

Just talking back to them could get you backhanded out of your desk. I remember one girl was dumb enough to show up with either makeup or red nail polish on and she was dragged to the girl’s room and violently scrubbed clean. There was diversity, the Italian Nuns could scream you to death and the Irish Nuns would beat you to death. Worse punishments were reserved for passing notes and stabbing each other with pencils.

And when we got home the Nuns had already called ahead and our parent’s tuned us up also.

No permanent damage done. The worse student offenders learned how to read and write and became cops. Everybody else seems to have survived the experience quite nicely. And we learned how to get away with something, not like kids today who have no sense of timing.

So I’m just not impressed about the handcuffs. I want the Nuns back.

In my view, the reality of “equity and justice” is only available to those who demand it and fight for it and refuse to settle or compromise. I run into an awful lot of people who whine about its lack, and seem surprised that the mere idea doesn’t magically bring them what they wanted without any other effort on their part.

Like a 2-y-o yelling, “that’s not fair!” when a 6-y-o picked up his toys and turned in his homework, and gets to pick a movie rental from the video store.

This isn’t a political blog, so I’ll drop the subject.

It speaks specifically to special education, but would seem to be applicable to all students.

Under these guidelines, it would appear that state standards would allow for handcuffing of students in “emergency situations,” since it does not involve confinement of “all four extremities.”

On the other hand, I would think that being handcuffed at school could be “expected to cause excessive emotional trauma.”

The standards also address procedures to be used to avoid such interventions.

Any thoughts?

Sue, with regard to your comments about equity and justice, if justice is only available to some people, some of the time, is that not the definition of inequity and injustice?

However, should my resolve wear too thin, someone PLEASE HANDCUFF ME!

I know that the security staff at Montera Middle stopped harrassing and threatening my husband and son while he attended that school. And now that our son’s at Skyline, the security staff there had to have a couple lessons, but they’ve gotten a clue too, and they behave appropriately.

“Justice and equity” aren’t always easy to attain, but they’re possible, at least for my family. YMMV

But, then I have to stop myself from that over-emotional reaction and consider some of the other kids with autism that I’ve met over the years. I’ve encountered a couple that I could readily accept could become so out of control as to be physically dangerous to themselves or others.

It’s not a clearcut issue at all, much as I’d like it to be. It’s always going to be a judgement call made by the staff or security persons in the situation. Sometimes that judgement will be wrong. Do we want the security person to err on the side of safety, possibly restraining a student unnecessarily, or err on the side of respecting the student’s rights with the risk that an unrestrained, out-of-control student will cause injuries or damage? If a student-gone-berserk were to injure my kid at school, how does that change the equation?

Rhonda,

I just want to say that your anecdotes are unfortunate, but they don’t support your conclusion:
“My point is there is no equity and no justice in the Oakland Schools on any matter and for anyone.”

On some matters, for some people, sometimes, there’s equity and justice. Even in OUSD. I’m not saying it’s easy, but it’s attainable. I’m sorry you don’t see it and come to such a sweeping, but unfounded generalization. Yours seems to be a very sad and disheartening viewpoint.