These parents are making very important points with far-ranging implications beyond their child’s school. There is something wrong with our culture when parents like these aren’t taken seriously until this point. I hope schools beyond this one are paying attention, changing policies, and establishing modern practices for proactively dealing with chronic bullying.
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I think the argument people would make with your points is who should leave the school- the bully or the bullied?
In this case, from what I have read, it sounds typical- the bully was allowed to remain for far too long while continuing to bully and target a particular student. Why?
This is typical in private schools, and from what I’ve seen, it’s not as much about donations as it is about saving face and minimizing liability. When unseen inside counsel takes over parent relations, students suffer because the administration stops paying attention to the students.
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Obviously we all prefer the bullies to leave the school. But since their identity and/or culpability may not be easy to establish, particularly for wealthy litigious parents, schools will likely focus on students in therapy or otherwise vulnerable to mental health concerns and be quicker to suggest they return home to ensure their care.
Of course, for some students, home and parents exacerbates students’ mental health concerns. But the school can’t fix that and isnt liable for it.
Public schools have issues of bullying and suicide as well; the issue isnt unique.
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The problem with this response that you are detailing is that it fails to account for the specific typical social and personal dynamics present with Gen Z.
For example, for this generation, particularly with a parent who works or is qualified in medicine or mental health, seeing a therapist is as normal as getting a hair cut. In no way does it carry the stigma that you are citing in your above post. It is not a sign of fragility or even necessarily a sign of mental illness to do what this particular student and his parents were doing.
I hope this helps. It is the job of the administrators (public, private, etc.) in a school such as this to figure out who the bully is and to expel them. Accusing another student of a crime that they did not commit is a serious problem, which it appears this bully did. Of course it’s difficult, but it must be done. Counseling out victims of bullying for inflated reasons will simply amplify, not mitigate, the social problems that lead to these sorts of outcomes.
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Both my kids had therapists. I am all for it. They can be enormously helpful. But speaking as a lawyer, the school must do everything possible to curb its liability-both legal and moral. Suicides on campus hurt the entire student body. It is not always possible to identify the “bad actors” in the student body, and it is likely no school can do so with perfect accuracy and will overlook some. Even identifying the bad actors will require reliance on rumors and kids reporting on each other, which is not usually conducive to a positive environment.
To quickly reduce the risk and liability of suicide, schools are most likely to remove those feared to be suicidal, rather than engage in a long investigation of the possible causes of the problem ( which may not be fully discovered anyway).
In this case, no investigation was needed. The student who falsely reported a crime is known to the administration. The administration investigated (which was likely a process like the one you described above) and determined that the report was fabricated. If a person does that with a law enforcement officer, that’s a crime. School administrators need to treat false reporting the same way.
This school knew that this case was not a rape case from the beginning, when they investigated the bully’s report and found it to have no merit. It’s a bullying case.
And I will add that if the person who made the false report wasn’t actually lying, then this person is in need of acute mental health care outside of school. These kids know what a crime is and what it isn’t.
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The nature of the crime complicated the situation. At my kid’s university, 3rd parties are encouraged to report sexual assault crimes, presumably due to some lingering presumption that victims are hesitant/intimated to do so. I disagree with the premise, but note that it is quite commom at universities, and perhaps high schools now as well. Both Princeton and Stanford have pursued cases against students when the victim did not complain, but were based upon 3rd party reporting.
All SA reports should be taken seriously. No matter who it comes from. But as soon as it is proven to be a false claim, the school needs to take action. If a school is expelling victims instead of bullies, they are perpetuating a horrible victim blaming complex that is prominent in our society. Any school who expels the victim lacks the common decency to be educating the future of society.
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They are not being expelled, and certainly not because they are victims. This is part of the unintended consequences. Those who are suicidal or medically mentally vulnerable, regardless of reason, will be counselled not to return.
I wish the school had expelled the bully. But there is no guarantee doing so would have solved the suicidal ideation of the student, and the school needed to take immediate action on that.
As someone who left BS due to mental health (I experienced harassment), I can confidently say that the fact that many BS don’t allow you to discuss what happened makes it so much worse. I had rumors going around about me. I would get in trouble not only for talking about the situation to clear my name, but I would get punished for talking about my feelings with friends. It gets lonely.
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And many kids’ mental decline stems from the inability for schools to protect them. Yes they should return home, but the school also should take responsibility.
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To build on @lilyesh’s explanation, some young people who are hesitant to come forward might need mental health care before they can file a report, but they should be required to pursue the case themselves if they want to. If they don’t want to, then the school should respect their decision. It appears that some of these students are taking the term “encouraged to report” too literally.
To counsel a student out for being bullied by another student is traumatic to the student and detrimental to the culture of the school.
Boarding schools and universities need to look at their reporting policies and make some changes based on this outcome.
Counseling out one student who files a false SA report will have a significant influence on those who may be tempted to file false reports right away.
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Absolutely. We cannot cater to those who disturb others’ life.
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It will also discourage possibly truthful reporting of actual sexual assaults. That may be a price that is accepted, but so far many universities are unwilling to take that approach.
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It will not. Maybe kids will be encouraged to report if the victim gets appropriate care, and instead of rumors being spread and victims getting expelled people will actually learn.
Every allegation should be investigated until it is determined that it is true or false.
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I hope this also stops the “turkey trot” of affluent students from one private school to another when things go sour. This happens more often than one might think… instead of expulsion, the student who is a bully is “advised” out of the original school and calls from the original school are placed to another peer institution who then takes the student for the next school year (often after March 10 or other application deadline). I have seen this happen in our local private school system. The original private school breathes a sigh of relief but all they did was pass the problem onto the next institution.
And absolutely the school should take responsibility for this - the “well that kid was kind of fragile/had mental health issues schtick” is no excuse. You admitted the kid, that to me is a pledge that you will look after that student as well. Yes, some students end up not being a good fit but I think there is often a quick jump to send the student home/advise them to look elsewhere for school rather than dealing with the issues that are contributing to the mental health concerns. I am glad to see Lawrenceville taking some responsibility, it’s a good step forward.
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If a victim chooses to file a report, they should not be punished for it.
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I too am glad the school has implemented an aggressive wellness campaign; all schools should have one. It is also incumbent upon the school to recognize when it can not sufficiently address a student’s mental health concerns, for whatever reason and pursue alternative placement at home or elsewhere.
I haven’t, and won’t discuss my own child’s journey in the last couple of years but just want to take a moment to praise the really excellent and sensitive experience we had at Choate. I recommended the school unreservedly to our dearest friends this year and two other kids we know well, all of whom, are attending this or last year.
Schools all over are overwhelmed with kids in crisis, many of whom have yet to be identified. The crisis continues to build and will continue to expand. We now know four suicides personally in the last four years, the first occurring five minutes after class during a year of distance learning. The relevant teacher is currently on a mental health leave as well. This is not just an issue for BS or even intensely academic places. The kids are not alright.
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Indeed, and if it cannot be determined whether whatever occurred between the parties was or was not SA, then the administration should refer both students for counseling.
Of course, in this case, none of these actions would be relevant, as the student who filed the report was later expelled for another infraction and then returned to campus. I am simply acknowledging that any allegation of rule breaking of any kind, especially criminal allegations, should be taken more seriously than they currently are as described in this thread.
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