Day 101 Question 101:
What was the last thing that made your heart break?
I am not a parent. Many people believe my opinion is not valid when it comes to children and anything parent-esque because of this fact. No I did not give birth to any children but I believe I have had a lot of positive voice in many children’s lives and I have taken a great deal of training and have seen mothers improve their parenting techniques because of me. My voice is valid because as I have said over and over again…it takes a village to raise a child. I am currently a nanny for twin girls that are 16 months old. No these children are not mine but I love them with everything in me and in a sense they are my family. I would take a bullet or throw myself in front of a bus for either of them. My job (not just as their nanny but as a kind and decent human being) is to protect these children and not one day passes that I do not think about that.
On my computer my homepage is set to Yahoo news. Yesterday I scanned the page before opening my email and a headline caught my eye. The headline read: Teacher/Bully: How My Son Was Humiliated by His Teacher and Aide. I was pulled in immediately. I am going to include the article as well as the Youtube video because I believe this story needs to go viral and these women that have done these horrible things need to be called out. This story broke my heart because a completely innocent child was treated in a disgusting manner by TEACHERS….the people that are supposed to protect him. This child is autistic. When I watched this Youtube video tears swelled up in my eyes and I felt so much sorrow for this child’s father. No parent should ever have to face what this father had to face. This young autistic boy was spoken to like he was a stray dog and the teacher and the aid in the classroom showed no love for him…the showed him no decency or respect at all. This made my heart break because I could not understand how people could act like that. I don’t understand how adults could harm a child in any mental or physical way and not feel any guilt in themselves. I could not understand how a school system did not stand up and immediately fire these women. I could not understand how the actual story got swept under the rug and it took the father making a youtube video for it to get attention. As administrators at this school, the entire staff should be absolutely embarrassed and disgusted with themselves for not taking a stand against what happened.
People question why I may not want to have kids and to be honest….this ranks right up there with the reasons. A child is to always be protected and if I were to bring my child to school and find out that he/she were being treated this way I am not sure of what I would do. I would be filled with anger because all children deserve a chance…even the ones that give us a run for our money. I may not be a parent but children mean the world to me and after reading this article I felt a deep sadness both for the father and the son. This little boy had to go through day-to-day torture in a place that everyone would tell him is safe. The father had to listen to a lengthy recording of his son being vocally abused….I cannot even imagine how that feels…and I hope to never feel that way. This father and son deserve justice in this situation and even though I am one person and this is one minor gesture I want to help….I want to continue the trek in making his video viral and showing the world that even our educators are the BULLIES!!!! I believe that when a teacher has worked hard and proven themselves they deserve to be rewarded but handing out tenure to animals such as this and allowing them to just receive a slap on the hand is WRONG (I am not sure if they are tenured teachers but I would make that guess). If you have a chance I also recommend watching the documentary Waiting for Superman…you can find it on youtube part by part. This documentary will blow your mind to find out what is really going on in the United States school system. It is time we take a stand and state our peace…people like this should NEVER be allowed to “teach” children. I would love to hear your opinions and thoughts. :0)
The article below is what I found on Yahoo news:
N.J. father records teacher, aide mocking autistic son
By Erin Wright
New Jersey might have what is considered the toughest anti-bullying law in the nation, but one Cherry Hill father felt it didn’t go far enough to protect his autistic young son. So he decided to employ a tactic that melded equal parts secrecy and publicity and that has propelled his case into the spotlight.
Stuart Chaifetz said that his 10-year-old son Akian had always been a “sweet and nonviolent child,” and so it was puzzling when his son began arriving home with notes from Horace Mann Elementary School claiming that Akian was having violent outbursts, and in some cases hitting his teacher and an aide. When meetings with school administrators and personnel didn’t produce any answers, Chaifetz was at a loss. “I felt I was beginning to lose my son — that these outbursts were changing his very nature,” he writes on a website he created. “I knew I had to find out what was happening in his class that was having a dramatic impact on him.”
Chaifetz’s method of getting to the bottom of things including wiring his young son for sound one February morning. Akian returned with more than six hours of audio, which Chaifetz listened to that night and said “changed his life forever.”
Chaifetz detailed his findings on a web page, “No More Teachers/Bullies,” and in a YouTube video titled: “Teacher/Bully: How My Son Was Humiliated and Tormented by His Teacher and Aide.” In clips of the audio, a classroom aide and teacher whom Chaifetz identifies as “Jodi” and “Kelly” can be heard discussing alcohol use, spousal issues and other personal topics, as well as mocking Akian and responding rudely to his questions. Chaifetz in listening to the audio, the reasoning behind his son’s outbursts became clear to him, and he then moved to take the case public.
And, as is so often the case with compelling YouTube videos, Chaifetz’s case has quickly gone viral. In a note atop the hundreds of comments he’s received since posting the video on April 20, Chaifetz states that he’s disabled the auto-post feature due to a large amount of “inappropriate posts,” and that he’s finding it hard to keep up with the amount of comments pouring in. Chaifetz has also noted a groundswell of support on Facebook.
As a result of Chaifetz’s impromptu sting, the aide was fired but the teacher was apparently reassigned to another school. On his web page, Chaifetz expresses the opinion that such teachers should be fired, “no second chances, no excuses.” To that end, he has collected more than 20,000 signatures on a petition seeking legislation that would result in the immediate dismissal of teachers who engage in bullying.
It's a New Day... 
I can’t believe that this would happen. couldn’t even finish the video cuz it just made me so angry that all they got was a firing and a transfer.
I could not agree with you more. This story is so upsetting and something needs to be done. Here’s a link to the petition for legislation ensuring that teachers who bully students are immediately fired: http://www.change.org/petitions/to-the-new-jersey-legislature-and-congress-pass-legislation-so-that-teachers-who-bully-children-are-immediately-fired
Totally Agree with and what u said !
The last thing that made my heart break was the Council agreeing to build 600 houses on the beautiful field behind our house, where we walk our dog. It used to be full of blackberry bushes and thousands of butterflies, large ponds with swans, ducks, egrets, gulls, buzzards, etc and early in the morning we would find deer and foxes. It’s all gone now. 😦
Ugh that is so sad :0( It seems nowadays that if something beautiful exists they must put a building on top of it :0(
My goodness. Thank you for bringing this story to me. I don’t have kids either, but this is one of the most upsetting stories I have ever heard. There is no reason for anyone to be treated like that. And the school district should be ashamed of themselves!
This is the last thing that broke my heart. I don’t have have children either (not through choice) but strongly feel children are the most important thing in the world and should be cherished and nurtured to be the best that they can be.
I suspect this kind of thing happens more often that we would like and all over the world and it breaks my heart…
I had children…and suffered two broken hearts when they both passed as vital, intelligent, caring young men. Neither of them were bullies nor were ever bullied by others.
The sad story from Jersey occurs all too often these days, as parents abandon their duty of child-rearing in favor of letting the teacher do it…who may be an understanding, compassionate person…but more likely prefers to utilize his/her ‘power’ over young minds.
I am encouraged by the fact the father recorded such dastardly proceedings. As for the teacher…well, that one can just ROT somewhere!
Ouch. How heartbreaking. I hurt for anyone who suffers any type of abuse.
Diane this is heartbreaking at all ages; the sadness is its prevalence too. I can’t have children either and yet, have practically raised my 2 sisters and its difficult to be a balance ~wonderful post again (forgive me for calling you by another name yesterday ~sorry ) Blessings Deborah
The last thing that made my heart break was that a friend of two decades in a fatal attraction mode of mole behaviour, took up with my abusive and manipulative ex, all the while siphoning info off of me for her quest. When it all exploded wide open (I was still mourning losses including my mother), my own family did not utter one word of comfort, just ignored me like he and she did as if I don’t exist, never existed and never will exist. GEtting stronger now but oh Ihate bullies, emotional bullies everywhere. So sad.
Heart breaking and sickening. They should be more than fired!
The last thing that broke my heart is the betrayal of a very dear friend whom I considered as my sister 😦 BTW, thank you for dropping by at my blog.
The last 10 times I tried to suggest ideas or improvements or creative things to help everyone at the office and was disregarded (for the 800th time in 4 years). Actually, the last time was just now watching that video, and also last week watching a youtube video of a woman slapping her baby. It makes me want to physically retaliate. 🙂
SHAME, shame, shame, on those teachers who did such a thing to those little boys! After listening to the video, I believe that they should have been fired instantly! Not only were they bullying the child, they committed the crime of indifference. They did not hate the child they were just indifferent to his existence. That is worse than hate! They did not care that the children heard their conversations, because they treated the children as if they were furniture in the room. I am a teacher, and this story makes me very angry on so many levels. I am angry at the treatment to those children, the lack of discipline given to those teachers, and the picture it draws for other teachers who do have the right intentions for the students they teach. Hell is too good for these women.
I couldn’t agree more!!!!
I have had an experience too familiar to this when I was 18 and worked in a daycare. One of the “care takers” was the sister of the owner/operator of the daycare. I was still in training and this “care taker” was particularly mean to a two-year-old little boy that had Fragile X. She would practically throw him back on the nap time mat when he got up, she would smack him and make threats. There were video cameras in each room, but conveniently they didn’t point where this little boy’s nap time mat was placed everyday. Most of the time instead of working with him she would leave him to bang his head on the wall. I would pat his back until he fell asleep, she told me I was spoiling him and he would expect it every time he had to go to bed. It was one of the “rules” to change the room around every week, which would agitate him. He needed familiarity and reassurance. I refused to move things around, she would tell me that was the way we had to do things to stimulate the other children, we can’t do things to benefit just one child.
I eventually told the owner and she said she didn’t see anything on the video recordings so I must be “misunderstanding” the way we need to handle this boy and his particular “condition”. I got fed up and went to his grandparents, who my family happens to know pretty well. The following week I quit. The boy was placed in the care of a private baby-sitter. I don’t know what happened to the woman that abused the little boy. I know her sister eventually sold the daycare. I hate that nothing was really done, but I am so happy that the little boy is doing well. He is in school now, he’s 11 years old now and doing great.
Wow! Good for you for taking a stand! It is really sad to think about how many of these occurences there are with absolutely nothing being done. What you did speaks so much about your character. Glad to know there are people like you out there :0)
I’ve had time to watch the video now and, as a teacher working with SEN children, I am really disgusted. That woman should never work with children again, autistic or otherwise.
Once again, close to home. Children, every child needs unconditional love, a smile, a hug, acceptance and good care.
My daughter-in-law recently shared a news item on her FB page about body searching and screaming at a very frightened 4 year old by TSA security checkers! The upset parents and grandmother were physicall restrained from comforting this very traumatized child! Outrageous. I commented that I probably would have been arrested for attacking such TSA officials behaving in this manner with either of my own grandhildren–or other children I might have observed undergoing this type of abuse!