Please read my update on the situation: My Beef: An Update
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Dear LAUSD,
For years I've been reading about looming teacher layoffs, failing schools and low parental-involvement in the Los Angeles Unified School District. (Not to mention stories like this, about an LAUSD teacher being paid $68,000 not to show up for work! Which led me to inquire about applying for his job.)
Yet, from the time my children, now 11 and 13, were old enough to attend school I've been a huge proponent of our district, and public schools in general. I've served as PTA president, organized fundraisers (my family has enough wrapping paper to last them through Christmas, 2016), helped out in classrooms, donated money, chaperoned field trips and baked countless numbers of cupcakes for bake sales (okay, I confess - some of them were store-bought.) I'm not alone - there are many parents like me, striving to contribute in hopes that our efforts will, in some way, make our schools a better place for our children and our teachers.
And for the most part, it's worked. My daughters are honor students and are now attending our local public middle school and have, in my opinion, made valuable contributions to their school communities.
And then something like this happens, that makes me want to throw in the whole public-school-towel and make a mad dash for the nearest private or religious school. Ugly uniforms? Mean nuns? Probably preferable to what my kid had to go through today.
It started when my 8th grade daughter (at a school I won't name here but would be glad to divulge to anyone who asks), was talking with one of her teachers in the hallway and got 'dress coded,' and not in the nicest way, by the vice principal. Despite her apologies and even an appeal by the teacher present who tried to intervene on my daughter's behalf who said what a great student and a nice kid she was, the VP insisted she be cited.
For the record, this is what my daughter was wearing, on this 90° day. I understand spaghetti straps, or any strap narrower than 2-inches, are not allowed. But really - since she offered to put on her jacket wouldn't that have sufficed? And can I see the studies that show a correlation between strap-width and academic achievement and character? Are SPAGHETTI STRAPS REALLY THE PORTAL TO PROMISCUITY AND DEPRAVITY?

My daughter walked crying to see her counselor, who was apologetic, saying he knew how unfair it was but alluding to the fact that he had to 'listen to his boss.' He told her he 'entered it into her record' and gave her a notice to be signed by her parents. He told her to come back and see him later to prove that she had covered up by wearing her jacket. (Again, did I mention 90° day?)
During lunch my daughter approached the counselor to show him she had covered up, and the VP found it necessary to once again chide her for violating dress code and asked the counselor to notify her parents by phone. The counselor replied that he knew my daughter and that a signed notice would suffice. When the VP still tried to insist on a phone call the counselor prevailed and thank goodness because who knows what punishment the VP was planning on meting out? Ten years of hard labor? A public lashing with a rolled-up tank top?
I get it - rules are necessary - but where does common sense and discretion come into play? Is spending this much time dealing with an honor student's strap-width violation really the best use of this administrator's time? How about busting the boys who have a locker near my daughter, who stand around and flip through Playboy magazine and then make lewd comments to girls passing by? (Yes, that's a true story.)
And don't get me started on the countless girls who I see wearing things far far worse than what my daughter was cited for today. Let's just say they'd make Hugh Hefner blush.
And why did this administrator find it necessary to subject my daughter to his needling twice, even in the face of both a teacher and a counselor speaking out on her behalf? Was this out of some need on his part to shame her? And why the insistence that the parents be notified by phone, in light of the fact that my daughter's counselor who has known my daughter for the past three years and knows her immaculate record, felt it was unnecessary?
Can I introduce another visual here? It's my daughter's last report card that I wanted to shaare, if for the only reason to show how overwhelmingly proud we are of her, even though some adults might treat her like crap. Oh, and to show how her grades kick ass:

I can think of so many ways he could have handled this differently. How about speaking to her quietly and giving her a warning? How about stopping himself before he talked to her the second time, knowing that the problem had been handled and she was contrite? How about stopping to consider that maybe his time as an educator, a supposed advocate for children, could be used in a more valuable way?
And wait there's more! After my daughter came home and told me this whole sordid tale through tears, I called this vice principal and he was rude and dismissive and repeatedly interrupted me. Is this how administrators are supposed to treat parents, to make them feel that intervening on their child's behalf is the wrong thing to do? And when I asked why some kids were allowed to violate the dress code while others, like my daughter, weren't, his reply was something to the effect of, "I don't have time to police all the kids." I guess zero-tolerance only applies to an unlucky few. How fair is this?
I'm not sure what message the VP was hoping to get across, but it has backfired tenfold. My daughter sees this person as a man to be feared now, and certainly not as someone who is on her side or who is encouraging her success. It has left me angry and bitter at a system that is supposed to work for our kids, not against them. It's sent the message to me and my daughter that good behavior and hard work are not rewarded at this school.
It sends the message to parents everywhere that the problems of the LAUSD may lie in administrators who abuse their power and refuse to get to know our children and who fail to act in in their best interests. And sadly, those are problems that aren't going to go away, no matter how hard we work with our kids or how much wrapping paper we sell.
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tags: lausd | los angeles unified school district | lausd dress code | spaghetti straps and other signs of the apocalypse