SRVUSD board discusses hate crimes, support staff, Dougherty Valley temporary school

'"What you allow, you encourage," Byrd said. "If my teachers…don't know how to respond to me, how will they know how to respond to a student?"'

Amen. I believe that appropriately decisive responses need to be learned, and practiced, -- by students, teachers and staff alike, until they're practically second-nature. Hang-in there, Ms. Byrd -- the budding bigot needs to know It.Won't.Work.

"After board Vice-President Greg Marvel assured Byrd that if the culprits were found there would be "serious consequences" and applause, support staffing reorganization was considered."

"...and applause?" Is there an editor in the house? Oh. :-)

If I remember correctly, the 2000-2001 Grand Jury told the SRVUSD that their estimates of children per household in Dougherty Valley were way too low! But then what did they know?

Ms. Byrd,

Is it a bit hyperbolic to say, “This has changed the fabric of who I am,"? Uh…fabric? What does that mean, exactly?

Sorry you got harassed. Hopefully the culprit is apprehended.

You say you’re “disappointed” and it is a “shame” that SRVSD, “wasn't willing to stand up and rally around me." What did you want the district to do? Did you want a special meeting with the faculty and student body? A news conference? What kind of “rally” did you have in mind?

The vast majority of people are likely appalled this happened to you and support you. Hang in there.

Wow spcwt, Wake up on the wrong side of the bed? Obviously this person was seriously hurt and disappointed that her administrators did not act in accordance to the harassment policy that she /he has been upholding. It is easy to right rules and regs, but when they have to be acted on the true colors of the district comes out. I hope this teacher finds support in her community.

The District responded on Friday rather than Monday. Does that mean the District doesn’t support her against this terrible act of bullying and vandalism?

SRVSD officials are high caliber professionals. Sometimes response times may not be as fast as we'd like. Isn't that the case with any of us? But why shouldn't we trust that the District is very concerned about this incident and will get to the bottom of this?

I am sorry that this happened to a teacher. However, I guess I find it a bit hypocritical when it is listed as such a problem for her and yet students are expected to daily deal with more extreme situations. Case in point..two years ago I was at a local middle school waiting to pick up my child. I heard a bunch of boys yelling homosexual slurs at a young boy leaving the office of the school. I went over to see what is going on as the child in question (sixth grade) was running away as fast as he could. I spoke to the harassers and then went into the school office to report the issue, the vp went out to talk to the students, the principal looked up but did not question what was occurring. The kids/harassers were in school the next day, if they were punished at all beyond a "hey don't do that" it was not apparent.

Why should an adult expect better protection then a child? Perhaps the real situation would be to address the bullying where it has the most impact?

To me this is no different than a swastika tag with anti semitic epithets or a racial slur written and dropped into a student's locker....these are examples of cowardly bullying by individuals hoping to inflict hurt and not get caught doing so. I hope the limited access to the sports locker can be tracked to help determine who was behind this act. I hope Ms Byrd knows the vast majority of our community finds these actions to be reprehensible and should be fully investigated.

I agree with JRM, there must be zero tolerance of this type of behavior, and I would hope the administration would make every effort to investigate and hopefully catch those responsible...Howeer, this issue also leads to another problem facing our District, regarding the teacher's union and others demands that more administrators lose their jobs due to budget shortfalls, rather than the teachers union agreeing to cutbacks of benefits. Unfortunately, the teachers union can not have it both ways: Cut administrators, but yet expect to have enough administrators to immediately respond to these type of problems facing teachers and students. In the ideal world, we would have no budget problems, and no need to have so many administrators. However, the world we live in now does have huge budget problems, hate crimes and bullying that requires administrators to deal with the problems...In fact, it is only going to get worse if the town allows all those new homes to be built around Magee Ranch, as the schools will get more crowded, causing the need for even more administrators.

It should be interesting to see how the community responds to the principal training yesterday.

I'm waiting to hear back from Asst. Superintendent Jessica Romeo, but did anyone receive a newsletter about it?

Jessica Lipsky
Editor

Beckyjean, it seemed to me that Ms. Byrd was making the point that if she had to endure these behaviors with a lack of timely institutional support, that the students would fare no better. I could be wrong, but I thought that her point was that she wanted to ensure students would receive more support.

I don't understand what the difference is between a student calling a female teacher a "B" or a male teacher any derogatory term and this incident of writing about her sexual orientation. How does the district react when students write nasty things about teachers on bathroom walls? Don't they just paint over it? Seriously, Ms Byrd needs to quit this divisiveness. Why is what happened to her any worse than what happens to any other teacher? I thought gays want equal treatment. Isn't that what the Board has done?

To Difference Maker:

The words "referenced both her name and sexual orientation which was meant to "hurt and question who I am and what I stand for."

My understanding from the quote is that the words used weren't only a 'swear word' but in addition a derogatory term aimed at her sexual orientation. If you can't figure out what the word used was, I can't help you. Using a derogatory term aimed at someone's sexual orientation or ethnicity is reprehensible. If anyone used a derogatory term for ANY teacher's ethnic background and/or sexual orientation they should be dealt with swiftly and their peers and superiors should support them in a timely fashion, not waiting a week. The incident happened on a Monday and she didn't hear from the district until Friday. Her complaint was:

"Byrd's chief complaint was that no one from the district contacted her about the incident until Friday, despite having filed a report with the Sheriff. Byrd said she felt like her colleagues didn't know how to handle the situation".

This could only be considered equal treatment if her peers had similar incidents and weren't dealt with in a timely manner. So if this hasn't been the case, she has every right to bring this to the Board's attention.

If your child faced a bullying incident at Montair, would you be happy to wait a full week until the issue was dealt with? I doubt it.

DiffMaker,

1 -- are all epithets created equal in your estimation? For instance, I believe there's a real difference between complaining about what someone "did," (he failed me on that quiz, the so-n-so!), and what they "are" (female, Asian, old, gay, disabled, etc.). It seems to me that the latter -- so-called "status offenses," are generally much more "offensive" and bigoted. Your mileage may vary, but I doubt it.

2 -- I don't believe that "gays want[ing] equal treatment" has much to do with wanting equally Poor treatment. I don't think the District would want to defend its delayed action based on the claim "It's okay -- we're unresponsive to EVerybody."