Readers — Here to help you start your day with a little scream (beats coffee!) comes this story from KMOV in St. Louis, MO. Apparently, last week, the mom of a special needs son got a “frantic” call from his teacher. She rushed to the school, got buzzed in and ran to his classroom, committing a cardinal sin: She didn’t sign in.
Informed of her transgression by a school administrator, the mom asked to have the sign-in book brought to her but was informed: Too late, the police were already on their way.
And so they were. She was taken to the police station. The charge? Trespassing. Meantime, the school went on lockdown for 12 minutes — as if the administrators didn’t well KNOW that this was a mom and not a shooter. Why are we so addicted to overreacting — or, worse, pretending something terrible and threatening has happened when it obviously has not? – L
62 Comments
Do these people not realize how completely foolish they make themselves look to the rest of the world?
They are behaving quite irrationally. Not an ounce of common sense.
The principal and the police officers need to examine why they acted like unthinking drones rather than as human beings. I bet in their defense they will say “I was just following orders.”
WOW. So you weren’t kidding about “start your day off with a scream”. This is completely beyond stupid. So much so, that I don’t even know what to say.
Now, I wasn’t arrested, but… but when my special needs son started kindergarten, he would occasionally have an “accident”… and since I work on the school campus (I work on campus but not for the school district directly), he would come see me at recess or lunch to ask for help in taking care of it. When the school got wind of this, they pretty much blew a gasket.
Had to meet with the principal. Even though I’ve been working on the campus for nearly a decade and am well-known and regarded by all the teachers and classified staff, they made sure I knew I had to go to the school office to sign him out first, then take him to my on-campus office to help, then bring him back to the school office and sign him in again. Adding about 20 – 30 extra minutes to a process that would only take about 5 minutes out of his recess – and a process that both he and I wished could be handled more discreetly.
Really? Yes, schools are this ridiculous these days.
It is what Bruce Schneier first called “security theater”. It exists as an opportunity for all of its performers to be seen to be showing “grave concern” and ostentatiously demonstrating their moral probity. Much like praying loudly and visibly in the marketplace. Aren’t they just wonderful?
“She rushed to the school, got buzzed in and RAN to his classroom”
She RAN. There’s the problem. In that school, obvious she was supposed to goose-step.
I think that some people suffer from the delusion that they are at the center of the universe, making them the MOST likely protagonist within the next tragedy that will run for weeks on the 24 hour news channels.
I recall waiting in a two hour security line up right after 9-11, thinking “Dayton? Please …”. Meanwhile, the brave and valorous security guards at Dayton International (?!?) Airport we’re mulling over how friends and loved ones would memorialize them after they expired by single-handedly stopping the next great disaster.
Narcissism?
So, she was buzzed in, then ran to the classroom. I’m assuming that some responsible adult in charge was the one that buzzed her in? Wouldn’t the unlocking of the door be thing that prevented a criminal from entering the school, not the signing of a piece of paper? Maybe they need to redesign the process. Clearly, someone needs to set up a desk outside in front of the school door to make identification of the person entering, have them sign in, then buzz them in the door. But I bet it’s too cold for someone to sit outside.
Wow. I feel so bad for this mother. I have been that mother that gets the frantic calls from the school when your special needs child is having a full blown tantrum or episode and I do the mad dash to the school. I usually still sign in to the office but if I didn’t I KNOW they would not call the cops on me. Everyone at that school knows me and my kids since I am over there all the time.
The school is 100% at fault here. First of all because it is THEIR fault there was an issue with the child in the first place because obviously his/her needs were not being met or there would have been no emergency episode they had to frantically call the mother in for. Secondly, they were not able to handle the child themselves so they have to call the mother in and then you have the balls to blame the mother for not signing in!!!!???? Are you f-ing kidding me!!!???
Oh I hope she goes off and sues the holy hell out of them. I am sue happy and don’t feel bad about it when it comes to stuff like this because it is the only way to make them realize they were WRONG and make them change for the better in the future. So I fully support suing in situations like this. They would be paying me back for court fees, time I spent in jail, emotional trauma for being arrested, emotional trauma to my child to see Mommy being arrested, lost wages if I had to leave my job, etc.
Outrageous.
Funny story, some of the other mothers were telling me I better wear my visitor sticker badge when I was in the school and I said “Oh they won’t say anything to me” and its true because that school already knows not to mess with me. I refuse to wear the sticker badges most of the time now because they have already ruined my expensive LL Bean raincoat because it got wet when I went back outside and now the sticker stuff is permanently stuck on my raincoat. And it would ruin silk or cashmere or anything else nice you stick it to. So I just carry it and they can deal with it.
On the FRK insane-o-meter, this story is a solid 11.
To give the school a small benefit of a doubt, they can sometimes be caught between common sense and state/local regs that demands this sort of insanity. Our outstanding local daycare lost their certification for a brief period because a child was accidentally left alone in the hallway for about five minutes. I would be interested to find out if this is their own idiocy or one the law mandates upon them.
“The school was also put on a 12-minute lockdown and a letter was sent home to parents.”
A lockdown for a known mother of one of students?
And paper had to be wasted because…?
The school needs to reimburse the local police for wasting their time with ridiculous, non-emergency calls. This is not a police matter. I worry that these school administrators are having a lockdown of common sense. This one clearly did.
Why do they never include the names of the responsible officials in these stories?
And sh** like this is exactly why a friend of mine with a special needs kid now homeschools.
THE SCHOOL CALLED HER! They “thought” it was enough of an emergency that they needed the mother, and the teacher should have ALSO called the office to let them know what was going on! There is NO reason the cops should have been called.
My friend was also constantly called to attend to her son. And in fact they DEMANDED that she sit in the kinder class with her son most days. She was going to college and ended up loosing all of her scholarships and had to drop out. Once she dropped out, and they were still making her come in she decided that since they were having her do all the school work with her son at home anyhow (he refused to do it in the school due to number of kids, the frequency of sugar snacks that resulted in meltdowns and just a bad attitude between him and the teacher.) The final straw was when the principal threatened to call the cop on the boy (who in 1st grade had kicked her when she invaded his space) when the mom said that she was NOT going to talk about the kid in front of the kid (on advice of the psychologist he was seeing) and was going to take him home. The mom took him home, and then came back after she first called a cop friend who said that they had more important things to deal with….like shootings between gang members near the high school. He basically said they would not arrest a 1st grader and would laugh at the call and say they couldn’t respond.
So at that point, the writing was on the wall, and it was soon after that she pulled him out. And though she never has been able to complete her education, they are both much happier now. It would, however, had been nice if the school had actually done their job and followed the IEP so that mom could have finished her education.
“Never let a good emergency go to waste”
They probably practiced the lockdown in numerous drills.
They just wanted to be able to use their new found skills.
Since when do police officers enforce “school policy”? What’s next, SWAT teams to recover library books?
Clearly we have forgotten how remarkably, absurdly safe schools are. They are far too safe. It crosses the line between school and prison when security and safety override common sense and understanding.
This was probably because of the uproar over the principal who didn’t call police over the accidental great-grandpa abduction we recently read about. :/
And you know, call me crazy, but this upsets me because I think I have the right to go get my kids any damn time I want to. I should not have to ask permission or wait for clearance. Not that I plan on ever doing that, but the state should not be able to control parents’ access to their children. That gives them waaaaaay too much power.
So the judge will say something like this:
“So, the school invited the mother in? And then buzzed the door open? Doesn’t trespassing require you to be on someone’s property *without* permission?”
Case dismissed.
Welllll, keep in mind that this is the same area where, a few weeks ago, a news reporter checking on school lockdown procedures, went wandering around the school and caused a lockdown.
http://www.kmov.com/news/local/Unknown-subject-prompts-lockdown-at-Kirkwood-High-School–240583411.html
I’m guessing all St. Louis schools have “improved” their monitoring procedures after that incident.
Am I the only one who thinks that if there’s a problem, that the person with the intent to harm isn’t going to sign in and will just blow by the office staff? The sign in sheet does nothing to protect the kids or people in the building.
I hope the school has a good lawyer in this case.
So did the police officers sign in, or are they going to call 911 on them too?
CrazyCatLady: I am sorry to hear about your friend. The same thing was what essentially happened to me. Luckily I was a stay at home mother because no way would I have been able to keep a job when the school was calling me every day to come get my son or calm him down or take him home because he got suspended yet again. They could not handle a 5 year old.
I finally had to take the school system on and threaten to get lawyers and everything else till they finally got him taken care of properly. It took a year to get it taken care of and I spent hours on the phone and had to attend probably 15 IEP meetings.
The system will take advantage of parents that are good parents and will try to come in. I finally told them “Look if I was a working mom you would not be calling me in every 2 hours. So from now on pretend I have a job and you guys figure it out yourselves.” I was not putting up with it anymore.
I even mentioned they might as well go ahead and give me a staff parking pass and keys and a badge, if I was going to be coming in and out that often. Finally once we got the superintendent and the head of the special education department for the county involved they finally fixed everything.
So her experience from what I am hearing is common and its a shame. I say it all the time. There is not enough support out there for parents of special needs kids. If we can’t hold a job because we are required to be at school all the time, then we should be getting disability payments monthly.
This has got to be one of the most incredible situations I have read about on this site. I can’t even muster up a coherent thought.
In American schools today, as this incident demonstrates, ANY infraction can be The Excuse used to call in the police and have the lawbreaker arrested.
Does Walnut Grove Elementary state in their handbook that recognized parents who don’t sign the guess book can and will be arrested by police?
“She rushed to the school, got buzzed in and RAN to his classroom”
So they buzzed her in but didn’t make sure she signed in before continuing? Sounds like someone at the school needs to enforce their own policies.
NO! I can’t even….
“He basically said they would not arrest a 1st grader and would laugh at the call and say they couldn’t respond.”
I wish cops in these cases would just do that more often! Maybe they should educate people on what an emergency is, exactly.
“So did the police officers sign in, or are they going to call 911 on them too?”
Excellent question 😀
Just got back to the office and saw this. Americans are absolutely screwed. While I was out I went and saw my one daughter on her lunch at high school. I walked in, checked by her locker on the way to the cafeteria, then to the cafeteria, where I found her. We talked about that nites schedule, and I left. No problems.
Let’s remember though this school does not have a security force, no metal detectors, no sign in sheet, and the students are not confined to campus. It is a school not a prison. And oh wait for it………….no school shootings, bombs or biological attacks in the school history. And the only two students to go missing ever, were runaways.
The cops should file charges against whoever misused 9-1-1 to call for a failure to follow procedure. Clearly no reasonable person could have concluded that there was a threat.
Had that been me, they best call the cops the next day as well, because I would be raising hell in the office.
THEY CALLED HER AND ASKED HER TO COME TO THE SCHOOL!!!
A lockdown and arrest would be outrageous even if she had just shown up and forgot to sign in. After all, they knew exactly who she was and where she was going since they went there to arrest her.
A lockdown and arrest is completely absurd considering she was ASKED TO COME TO THE SCHOOL. That is beyond belief. And I can’t imagine any strange trespassing law that would allow you to be convicted after being invited onto the premises. I would love to take her case to trial.
@Jeff Gilling Nice as I’ve found most Americans to be, I never got the impression that most of them cared what the rest of the world thinks.
Warren: Your child’s high school sounds nice. I wish ours were run that way. Nice schools in nice suburban areas with low crime treat the schools like prisons. If they can that block off all entrances and exits into the parking lots of the school except one so they can post someone there to question and stop all cars going in and out of the school once class is in session.
They stop parents, substitute teachers, teachers, everyone and question their business. My mom always snarked off to them when I was in school because she thought it was stupid. She would tell them it was none of her business what she needed to go into the school for and she would take that up with the people working in the office. It might be their business what she is there for, but not the business of some football coach which is usually who was out there driving around in his little golf cart.
It got to where they would not allow parents to bring like Mcdonalds or pizza to their kids for lunch. Which yes, that does not need to be an everyday thing but if occasionally a parent wants to do that, who is the school to tell them they can’t as long as it is during the kids lunch break? Its not. Parents will always have more authority over their kids than the schools.
They keep most of the bathrooms locked during certain times and certain areas of the school are off limits during certain times. It really is more like a prison. I don’t know how much of that is for safety or some kind of purpose or how much is just for CYA agenda or how much for lets make these kids feel like they are under our complete authority agenda.
But honestly what is this teaching our kids? How many offices control what you bring in to eat for lunch on your lunch break? Probably not many. Most jobs adults have the adults are supposed to monitor themselves so we need to teach these teens how to do so over time or they won’t understand how to when they graduate. Which I guess is why some many kids flunk out of college first semester. They can’t handle the freedom.
I believe Ann Rand put it best:
“There’s no way to rule innocent men. The only power government has is the power to crack down on criminals.
Well, when there aren’t enough criminals, one makes them.
One declares so many things to be a crime that it becomes impossible for men to live without breaking laws.”
I think that the people who create these policies know, deep down in the very marrow of their bones, that they cannot stop the next Sandy Hook type shooting or kidnapping or other generic tragedy. So rather than do what they can and hope for the best, they run perfectly innocent people through the ringer. These people are ham-fisted in the face of a true emergency. This isn’t just security theater, this is security kabuki theater.
SOA,
Well until parents fight back it will only get worse, and you will have no one to blame but yourselves.
We have fought some proposed rule changes and always won. The school years ago when my oldest was attending, wanted to restrict leaving the campus, when students were on their own time. As parents we fought it, and won.
They once proposed random locker searches, and we won that one as well. Basically blackmailed them, but we won.
As for your school locking bathrooms…………that is insane.
Health codes up here would prohibit the locking of bathrooms.
As a parent I would be raising hell, and possibly organizing a group of parents to come in a remove the locks, so they cannot be used.
I cannot believe people let their family members be treated this way, and do nothing about it.
“I bet in their defense they will say ‘I was just following orders.'”
Amtssprache: denial of responsibility… “I had no choice…”
Amtssprache: This expression was used by Nazi officials to describe a bureaucratic language that denies choice, with words like: “should,” “have to,” “ought,” “must,” “need to,” “got to.”
We condemned “war criminals” who were “just following orders” and “just adhering to the laws as they were written.” And yet… in the name of “safety,” we become just like those we condemned.
Look in the mirror, America. You are your own worst enemy.
Warren,
The problem is that I don’t know anyone who wants things to change. Sure little stuff like snacks and recess people will fight with the administration about. Idiotic things like this, people will be outraged over. But if you even mention that schools should not be more difficult to enter than the jails and prisons I go in every day, you are viewed as someone who doesn’t care about safety. I’ve tried it out with the parents on the playground and nobody wanted to join in my crusade. They all would rather sign in than risk a Sandy Hook (despite the fact that Sandy Hook has security).
So, yes, I could fight against my daughter’s school over making me sign in to bring a swimsuit to school, but it would be banging my head against a brick wall since it would be 1 vs 400. That is why I have repeatedly said here that our institutions are a reflection of what we (meaning the majority of society) want and until society’s fears change, institutions won’t either.
Wow, stories like these are a very sharp contrast to the schools in my area. My former vision teacher asked me to come back to my former elementary school to help in her classroom. The first time, I checked in at the office and the secretary, who had been there at least since I was in kindergarten, recognized me right away and was amazed at how grown up I was now. In subsequent visits, I have just walked right by the window, where they can see me and gone right to where I need to go, no questions asked.
“I had no choice…”
And that’s the same excuse people give for signing up their children for these prisons in the first place…
A. Letter. Was. Sent. Home. To. Parents.
No….please…I don’t…..I can’t….
When my kids get to middle and high school I very well might start fighting against some of that stuff. You have to pick your battles and can’t fight them on everything but the things that really negatively effect my kids I absolutely plan to fight them to the death if need be.
It is not that way in every U.S. school. So glad our schools haven’t become like that. The side doors are no longer unlocked but the front doors are always open, with no need to be buzzed in. Technically the elementary schools want us to sign in, but they don’t enforce the rule much less contact the police. The middle school never mentions signing in, and I have wandered the halls for various reasons without a second glance.
Did it ever occur to these administrators that, in the extremely rare situation in which someone posed an actual threat, they probably would not comply with the sign in requirement and would not wait around peacefully while the school called the police? The rule only makes it look like the school district is doing something to keep kids safe, while actually doing nothing but creating inconvenience and now an awful situation for an innocent mom.
So we’ve had cases where armed lunatics come into a school and shoot / kill / injure people there.
Have we EVER had a case where there was no sign-in sheet (you know, the olden days) and an adult went in and caused harm? Probably. And have we had cases where someone went into a school, signed in, and THEN did harm? I don’t know. What does it freaking matter, anyway?
What I’m getting at is that it seems kind of idiotic to say that sign-in sheets prevent mass shootings or other violence in schools.
It seems if someone is off base enough to hurt people at a school, they don’t sign in first before they do it, or am I wrong about this? So what, exactly, is a sign-in sheet doing?
I understand how I had to sign my kid out of her 500+ student elementary if I picked her up early. That seems reasonable, to have a record that she went away before dismissal, but parents signing in? Getting badges? What does this solve, anyway?
How was this trespassing if A- she was let in, B- her son was enrolled in the school, and present that day, and C- her son’s teacher called her to come to the school?
This should be a slam dunk for common sense, but I fear she’ll get a record for this.
And so it goes. Children need adults to provide them with the strong sense that their world is in order, and the folks running the show (adults) know what they’re doing. (for real)
Otherwise, anarchy grows in the darkness of hearts.
The poorest of excuses to a kid, that we somehow let this get away on us.
There were enough adults in this story who could have at any time, exercised a little bit of common sense – and even commoner compassion, (for this mother) who failed to do either. And these are entrusted with the safety and well-being of children, and with the law and order of our public domain.
That special needs child really needed to see his mom arrested, um? What kind of blood-sucking weasel fails to see what’s wrong with that picture?
Alice couldn’t have had a wilder time in Wonderland, methinks.
That’s the difference between countries then, Donna. We want our kids to be safe, but not at the cost of their freedom and childhood.
And who gives a shit if they think you are aiding the next school shooter?
And to all you cowards that say you have to pick your battles, I ask why? Wrong is wrong. Stop making excuses and be heard. Or stop complaining.
If you are not part of the solution, you are part of the problem.
Some of these “security” measures remind me of the guy who goes down the street snapping his fingers at regular intervals. Finally, one of his buddies asks, “Why do you do that?” and he say, “That’s to keep the rogue elephants away.” “Are you crazy? There isn’t a rogue elephant in 5000 miles!” To which the guy replies, “See? It works!”
I don’t often comment and I know I’m just going to say what everyone else is saying but are you serious??????? I’d say it would be just as traumatic for the kids of the school (especially the child of the parent “trespassing”) to witness such over the top behaviour, than if something untoward DID actually happen. I’d be taking my kid out of that school, but are the others any better? I’m in Australia and I’m getting more and more nervous about taking my kids to school – mainly because I don’t want to accidentally break the rules!
Ludicrous!
Ummm, wow….must be a lot of cops around this town with nothing to do. How embarrassing for the school district.
I would like to say we never have anything this stupid in our area, but this week I actually cannot. Our little primary school had a ‘sort-of’ lockdown a few days ago (I wasn’t there, damn it – it sounded fun!) I say ‘sort-of’ because no-one was quite sure what the policy was (let’s face it, it doesn’t happen more than a handful of times a decade, maybe), and some classes were locked, some were unlocked, some were sitting reading. No one was quiet and under desks, which someone pointed out later maybe they should have been – though as someone else pointed out, given the very open design of our schools, it wasn’t as if an actual gunman wouldn’t know where to shoot….
The really ‘funny’ part was the cause of the lockdown. We’re very close to both an intermediate and a high school, and the school only found out something weird was happening when high school students who were kids of staff texted said staff. High school wouldn’t tell anyone what was happening, intermediate didn’t know anything was going on….
In the end it was evidently a bomb scare. And they locked the high schoolers in. Make sense, anyone?
Sadly, even Godzone has its moments of idiocy 🙁
“She thinks her arrest was unnecessary” uh, ya think? Wow, just wow – I think this takes the cake for most insane story I’ve. This is even worse than the lock-down for the unbroken mercury thermometer. If she was arrested for not signing the book what was the penalty for the secretary who buzzed her in as a “known parent?”
Just so I’m clear, I can call someone and invite them over, buzz them up to my apartment, and can have them arrested for trespassing if they refuse to sign the sigh-in sheet in my living room? Neat.
Also, that Ayn Rand quote is scarily true, though I think part of the issue also the fact that Americans have become very tribal amongst themselves, and one tribe is using the law and the police to make everyone else a criminal (or putting them in fear of being treated as one). The tribe with this power is a very small group of the population, and loves to use fear as a tactic of control, as well as letting other people think they are part of this tribe (when they’re not) and using them to exact control.
I kind of like the fact that a letter was sent home to parents.
“Dear Parents,
We are idiots. Today we invited a parent to come help with her out of control child (that we provoked to that state because even though we have extra training to handle kids like this we still expect them to be totally normal.) Anyhow, she came, because the teacher said it was an emergency. And she was buzzed in because she is known, but she was in such a hurry that she DIDN’T SIGN THE BOOK, she just directly went to help her child and his teacher.
So we called the police instead of doing the logical thing and calling the teacher to see what was going on. Because this child has a behavior plan and we should probably expect things like this. So, like we said, we are idiots and we locked down the school and called the police who arrested the mom in front of her kid that we still had to deal with and will act worse in school now because of this.
So yes, when you kid says there was a lock down, please know that we are tools and we don’t know what the heck we are doing.
Sincerely,
Your School
omg folks…she just ran in, the didn’t who it was so no they were not overreacting..had it been someone with a gun and they did nothing you people would be pissed…can’t win
Bit of thread jack but HOLY HELL!!!
So last week this kid brought about an ounce of mercury in a coke bottle to a school in Odessa, Tx. He played with it in one of the classroom.
All. Hell. Broke. Loose.
60 students and 10? I think, administrators were sent to the hospital for possible mercury exposure, they are talking about destroying the desk and the lunch table where he sat, and possibly bringing charges against this poor kid.
Even parents are saying they are way over the top on this.
We PLAYED with mercury as kids, and even experimented with it in Middle School and Elementary school in the 70-80’s.
@Betty: Please read the story before you comment…
It’s interesting that she’s being punished for proving the ineffectiveness of the “system” that was set up, apparently by an idiot, to protect children from evildoers.
Here’s how the “system” is supposed to work. Evildoers, upon entering the school, are confronted with a neatly written notice demanding that they “sign in” before going about their evildoings. Research has shown that evildoers cannot resist such notices, and will promptly pause for a moment from their pursuit of evil to, well, sign in.
Thus the school ensures that, later, after the evildoer has gone about and finished their evil business in the school, there will be a SIGNATURE that will, um, somehow, ah, immediately result in the evildoer being apprehended by officers of the law.
Let me guess; no doubt this brilliant strategy already has been hugely successful, as this school to date has likely NEVER had a child abducted, or worse. Therefore, clearly, this “system” is successful.
I couldn’t in good conscience leave my child alone in school all day to be “taught” by these people.
Why did she get buzzed in?? They should arrest the receptionist for being complicit.
Oh for crying outloud! My kids attended that school and I worked there many moons ago. The office, as in many schools, is NO WHERE near the front door. And if one of their staff called about her child why was the police called? stupid stupid stupid rules. stupid stupid stupid waste of police resources.
I just want to point out that signing in is sometimes required to aid evacuations for fires and other emergencies. I visit a different work facility every so often and always have to sign in. In theory I’m meant to sign out as well, but I nearly always forget. So far I haven’t been arrested! In my daughter’s schools ( 1 kindergarten, 1 primary and 1 senior school in Australia) we are meant to sign in when visiting, but I don’t think it always happens.
How was this an “unauthorized entry” or “trespassing” when she was buzzed in. That alone contradicts the reasoning for calling the police let alone them arresting her. Maybe it was in retaliation for the previous day’s meeting with the principal…