What about the rights of the parents?
Do you think parents should have the right to know if their child is caught making out with another student at school? Do you think the principal has the right to knowingly deny the information to the parents?
ST-The principal of Gig Harbor High School said Thursday that a school official should not have shown the parents of a student the video-surveillance footage of the girl kissing another girl in the cafeteria. And he vowed that such an incident wouldn’t happen again.
But Principal Greg Schellenberg said an investigation has found that no rules or policies were broken.
“It wasn’t a violation of policy and procedure … but we all agree it was not a good use of surveillance,” Schellenberg said. “It was an abnormal use of our equipment and it won’t happen again. This is not a Big Brother institution.”
Even so, a spokesman for the American Civil Liberties Union of Washington said the group plans to look into the matter.
“I have a hard time believing this incident would’ve been handled the same way if it was a heterosexual couple,” said spokesman Doug Honig.
Earlier this year, Schellenberg said, the parents of the sophomore girl asked the school’s dean of students, Keith Nelson, to alert them if school officials noticed their daughter engaged in any “unusual behavior.”
Then in early February, a video camera in the cafeteria recorded a kiss between the sophomore and a senior girl, Schellenberg said.
Nelson showed the video to the sophomore’s parents, who then transferred her to a school outside the Peninsula School District, Schellenberg said.
April 30th, 2007 at 11:03 pm
So the ACLU is attacking this from a “gay vs. straight” issue?? Interesting. Are they at all concerned about cameras in the schools to begin with? But as long as they got the footage I think there’s no problem showing the parents. Is that what the ACLU is REALLY upset about????
May 1st, 2007 at 7:05 am
Yet another reason to keep you kids out of public schools. This is yet another example of government believing that they own your kids; that you are serving them, not that they are paid employees of the taxpayer.
Unemployed government teachers is the only way to show them the truth. Take your kids OUT!
May 1st, 2007 at 7:57 am
I don’t know about anyone sles but school officials at every level these days are starting to really piss me off. Who do these people think they are?
May 1st, 2007 at 7:57 am
else* dang.
May 1st, 2007 at 8:43 am
Good judgement is important. Not that Principal Schellenberg or ACLU Borig has any. It’s a case of two or three stupids.
As for the kiss, good judgement is necessary. If it was just a peck, so what. However, if it was making out passionately all over the place on top of lunch trays, a groping, moaning frenzy - then yes, the parents should be notified and shown the video - this is what your kids did in school. Parents are still responsible for their children. Boyfriends and girlfriends in high school do give each other an occasional smooch. I don’t know what the school district’s policy is on it, but they have a right to have a policy regarding that behavior at school and sticking to their rules. Just because the kids were two girls shouldn’t matter. Is it criminal behavior to be lesbian? We can debate morality all day long, but criminal? I think the school has to accept that kids are different. Some people are homosexual whether anyone likes it or not…or is comfortable with it or not.
For the student to accuse that her privacy was violated shows how immature and delusional she is.(or simply a teenager) To think you have privacy when you’re kissing someone of the same sex in front of your entire school is ridiculous! ACLU, go chase another ambulance.
Would I want to see a video of my own child doing that? It depends. A simple smooch is not inappropriate. And if I had previously contacted the school and asked about suspicious behavior, as her parents had, then perhaps I suspected what the deal was anyway. Perhaps the thing here is the parents defining suspicious behavior. Did they mean drugs, stealing, cheating, aggressive behavior, or sexual preferences or just anything out of the ordinary?
May 1st, 2007 at 12:24 pm
re #2…right on the money!