Shortly after my first semester in graduate school for education, I happened to see on the news this story:
Teacher who punched student: 'I had to defend myself"
Yikes. Talk about a scary situation for anyone in education and a deterrent to getting into education at all. This teacher was put in the unenviable situation of having to decide between getting hit herself or leaving the school building in handcuffs. Though the prosecutor ultimately chose not to press charges for felony child abuse, simply being faced with felony charges is overwhelming.
What truly alarms me about this scenario is not the prospect of facing this situation myself, but the quote of one student not involved in the conflict directly shouting in the background "you can't punch him in the face. You can't even call him stupid." This combined with anecdotal stories of teachers who felt their students were astutely aware of our at times limited rights as teachers. As someone not currently teaching, I am very unsure of how commonplace the issue has become. For those of you teaching, have you faced a similar situation? If so, how do you handle it?
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