Because the answer is that OUSD can’t discriminate on the basis of gender in the hiring or assignments of teachers and other school staff and administration. So, setting up this hypothetical school with largely male authority figures would be illegal.

Though there may be a germ of an idea here that could be effective. There are times when I’ve found it really useful (as a small woman) to have a larger male ally deal with a situation where I wasn’t being treated with the fairness and respect that was appropriate.

It has been my experience as an elementary school teacher that students are made aware of rules at the beginning of the school year (sometimes even allowed to help establish them) and made aware of the consequences of not following those rules. For minor infractions, students usually receive warnings first (giving them a chance to correct their behavior) before consequences (usually loss of recess time) are imposed. In the case of serious misconduct, warnings are bypassed, and more severe consequences are imposed.

In Oakland, elementary teachers use a program called “Second Step” that is designed to help students learn to respect each other and resolve conflicts peacefully. It involves a weekly lesson and brief discussions as needed during the course of the week. It does not require a lot of time and planning. This program, combined with class and school rules and modeling from adults, provides students with a very good idea of how they should behave and treat others. Consequences are not being meted out in a vacuum.

Most students respond well to this type of policy, especially when you add incentives for following the rules. Breakdowns occur when a student consistently acts out and does not respond to the consequences that are imposed. If Restorative Justice can help students like this transform, I would support its use in those types of cases.

Consequences are a part of good discipline. And the consequences should be tailored to the individual kid. With our sons, we generally let them take the naturally-occurring consequences of their actions. For example, a kid running around the house and jumping on the furniture. In our house, there’s one warning, “you could fall off that couch and hurt yourself.” Sure enough, the kid falls. He gets no sympathy (once we know there aren’t any broken bones) and a reminder that we’d warned him of the risk of falling. Next time, when he’s warned of the consequences of another unwelcome behavior, he’s also reminded about the past fall – “Do you want to hurt yourself again?”

Obviously, that doesn’t work with some kids – there’s a level of brain development required that not every kid has. And equally obviously, the natural consequences of, say, running across a busy street, can’t be allowed to happen, or the kid could be dead and the parent facing the legal consequences of their neglect.

But the opposite approach, punishment without even an attempt to discipline (i.e. teach) doesn’t seem to work out too well either. How many times have any of us watched a parent in a public place ignoring their kid who is acting out, trying to get some attention from that parent – who’s too busy talking on their cell phone, or looking at merchandise in the store, or whatever has their attention instead of their kid. Finally, the desperate child does something really outrageous (start throwing a tantrum, or pulling candy off the grocery shelves and putting it into the shopping cart), and the parent hits him/her. No discussion precedes or follows. The kid still has no idea how to get Mommy/Daddy to pay attention to him/her without resorting to bad behavior. Once s/he stops crying, s/he goes right back to doing whatever-it-was that finally got the parent’s attention. It would be a happier situation for both if the parent had noticed the kid trying to get some attention before the situation got out of control – either engage the kid in whatever has the parent’s attention (at the grocery store, ask if the little one would rather have orange juice or apple juice, or which brand of cereal has the better price if the kid is old enough to read the prices. That kind of thing.) If the adult really needs to focus on that cell phone conversation, pause for just a second, explain, briefly, why the call is important, and promise that it will be short, and that the kid will have the adult’s attention in two minutes, or in five, but a reasonable short period of time that a kid that age can wait. Then *keep* the promise – get off the phone and pay attention to the kid.

It’s not magic, and it won’t work the first time. But if the parents are consistent, the kid learns that s/he will get his/her needs met. The child will also learn from that parent’s example of how to make and keep commitments, and how to be polite and respectful to others, because the parent is being polite and respectful to the child and keeping the commitment that was made.

Sorry, this got really long, and I didn’t even put in the-correct-way-to-put-a-child-under-age-two-into-a-timeout lecture. In our house, timeouts were a vital part of early-childhood discipline – long since outgrown. But again it wasn’t about punishment, it was about teaching self-control.

Thus you do no favors by lightly chastising black boys who are misbehaving. Failure to get their attention and produce change in the short time you have before they can really do whatever they want, can mean the difference between prison or freedom.

Likewise boys and girls require different levels of correction. Differences are physical, and hormonal.

Good old Webster’s gives:
discipine – training that develops self-control, efficiency
punish – to cause to undergo pain, loss as for a crime

I would submit that my sons are rarely (maybe never) punished, but they are well disciplined.

Maybe that is attributable to our family’s religious tradition. My husband was raised Southern Baptist, his father and maternal grandfather were ministers, so he got lots of punishment as a child. As an adolescent he rejected his “milk religion”. Similarly, I was raised Roman Catholic, and found my way out of the punative Christian sect as well.

My husband and I are Pagans (specifically, we practice Wicca, and are elders in the NROOGD tradition). Our sons have been raised with the Wiccan Rede: “And it harm none, do what ye will.” Back when they were too small for that many words, we started with the simplified form: “Harm none.” It’s pretty simple, and it covers everything – don’t harm other people, don’t harm other living things, don’t harm other’s property, and don’t harm yourself (or allow others to harm you).

Others have found good guidance in many varied religious paths and traditions. The problem I see with the religions my husband and I rejected was that members of those sects felt they were superior to those who didn’t belong to their “one, true religion”, and felt they could/should punish or harm anyone who wasn’t part of their particular club. We chose a religious tradition that doesn’t see itself as superior, or as the only way to “get to be with God in His heaven.” (We don’t even believe there is a Christian God, or devil either, and certainly no heaven or hell.) Among Wiccans (and most of Paganism) it doesn’t matter what one believes – what’s going on inside the skull is a personal thing – it matters what one does. Actions count. Every single Pagan-raised child I know, behaves in ways that make them welcome anywhere and everywhere they go. They have self-esteem and a strong sense of self-worth. They are polite and respectful of their elders, and even when they disagree with us – which they do, they have minds of their own – they do so respectfully.

As Thomas Jefferson said: “Say nothing of my religion; it is known to myself and my God alone. Its evidence before the world is to be sought in my life; if that has been honest and dutiful to society, the religion which has regulated it cannot be a bad one.”

Discipline is the tool – teaching self-control and self-regulation. Punishment is likely to fail, since it teaches avoidance of people who are more powerful than oneself and use their power to inflict pain. When young adults turn into good neighbors and good citizens after they grow up and leave their childhood homes, then the adults who raised them did their jobs. If they are criminals, leaches on society, or otherwise no-good-pieces-of-sh!t, then the adults who were responsible for them failed the child and the rest of us.

You all “exspelled two children of pastors” at your school in the last 7 months. So, you keep track of parent’s job. So much for “social justice” and our children, based the information (research) you are keeping it seems like you guys have a problem working with preacher’s children.

I have not read anything on this blog that Mrs. Spearman is against your social justice progam. Is there a law or policy that school board memember or OUsd employees can not give their input on this blog or you trying to “exspell” Mrs. Spearman from this conversation? I will keep you in my prayers tonight and at church on Sunday.

Do you realize the contradiction in your method “restorative justice” with someone who has a differnt view than you? I encourage all of you to keep dishing it out, because I enjoy reading your different takes on our education system.

And for everyone else, if your child is in the boy scouts, cub scouts, with priest who are scouts,etc. I advise you to keep an EyE on all of them.