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Texas Dad Protests for Son Suspended After Standing Up to Bully


Max Duke, 14, was suspended from school for two days and placed in an alternative school after a fight in which he says he was standing up to a bully. (Courtesy Randy Duke)





By KEVIN DOLAK (@kdolak)
Oct. 15, 2012

A Texas dad who recently returned from a year in Afghanistan spent his time at home picketing his son's middle school after the teen was sent to another school for standing up to a bully he says had been harassing him for years.

Randy Duke, who trains police officers in Afghanistan, has found himself spending his days back in Victoria, Texas, wedged between two pieces of poster board with the phrase "BULLYING VICTIMS ARE PUNISHED HERE" emblazoned on each side. The 48-year-old dad spent hours each day wearing the signs and picketing outside of Cade Middle School.

"The school administration assessed the situation, and gave what I believe was a harsh punishment," Duke told ABC News. "They looked at this as a fight -- which it was not. Had it been, in-school suspension would be an appropriate punishment."

Duke's 13-year-old son Max said he hit his breaking point after another student stomped on one of the expert paper airplanes Max had made and given to a classmate with special needs.

"My son said, 'why would you do that?' and the kid shoved my son. Max shoved back, and an altercation continued," Duke said. "Max has been working hard to stay away from him, since he had been confronted by him and other kids before. They would use racial slurs – saying 'we don't like you because you're white.'"

Accodring to Duke, a teacher said both Max and the other teen were able to get blows in. After the fight was broken up, Max was subjected to the school's policy on fights within the school -- a two-day suspension, after which he was sent to Victoria's Mitchell Guidance Center – an alternate school where students are sent through metal detectors, given pat-downs before entering and even have their fingernails checked.

Max's harshest punishment, however, was the nullification of his opportunity to play with Victoria High School's marching bands. He was one of eight middle school students selected to march with the band at football games. His dad says that playing with the band was a point of pride for Max, who had been withdrawing because of the bullying he'd suffered at school.

Since he has been working overseas, Duke had yet to see his son play with the high school band – for which one of his other daughters performs color guard.

"He was drawing into a shell, not making friends or going out to play," Duke said. "When he played with the band, he started coming out of his shell. Now all of a sudden, he had something to drive towards, he was opening up and making friends."

After two meetings with the school's assistant principal, a conversation with the middle school's principal, and unreturned calls from the superintendent of Victoria's secondary schools, Duke decided to start a protest.

For two hours per day, Duke, a former law enforcement officer with 20 years of experience, headed down to the middle school and began walking the public sidewalks outside the school, wearing his sign. He says he was there at times when parents and teachers would definitely see his message about what was going on at his boy's school.

"I got lots of thumbs ups, and cars honking at me," Duke said. "I talked with other parents who said their child was bullied and it was improperly handled. There's been a lot of national attention with children committing suicide over [bullying]."

Duke says soon he started to see police patrol cars drive by -- which he says he figured out were sent by the school to keep an eye on him. He says that he personally knew all of the officers that were sent over.

"What a waste of their time I was!" he said.

Duke's protest began to gain more attention as a hearing on a formal complaint he'd filed approached. After a meeting with the soon-to-be new superintendent, he was under the impression that Max, whose grades had begun to suffer while at the alternative school, would be back at his middle school. But the investigation into the incident continued.

"He said that it would take time. Meanwhile my son is being punished as we sit here. My goal was to get him back into classes, and get his grades back. I got frustrated. I was about to put my signs back on," he said.

Duke's wife Wendy then made two well-placed phone calls, and quickly an agreement was made that the couple we would retract their complaint against the school, which Duke said was incorrectly worded. Max was quickly reenrolled at his middle school, and was able to perform with the marching band. Duke credits his wife's cool temper for her son's reenrollment.

"It's good I was never a hostage negotiator," he said. "It wouldn't end well."

Since resolving the issue, Duke has begun to organize with other parents in his community to create more awareness about bullying problems within the schools, and urge the district to have comprehensive training on how to handle the issue. The principal at Cade Middle School told Duke that representatives from the school will be sent to his meetings.

"Instead of us against them, my purpose is to mend our community," he said. "I'm hoping to plant the seed in the community. And I hope community leaders will step up and roll with it."

Now, with 15 days left before he returns to Afghanistan for another year, Duke can now say that after standing up for him, he was finally able to see his two kids perform together.

"I watched through tears," he said. "It was amazing."

Source:
http://abcnews.go.com/US/texas-dad-protests-son-suspended-standing-bully/story?id=17482938#.UH-pZIUlzxg

It's an age old story, the school loves the bullies and won't do anything to stop them because they're usually made up of the more popular kids and so they want the cool kids to be friends with them and so will always look the other way until one of the victims finally retaliates, OR somebody gets killed. More and more the staff of public schools are making it clear they possess no brains, the greatest irony of all considering WHY kids are supposed to be sent to school in the first place.

Another example of why we need a woman for president.

Good for him for standing up for his son. I was bullied in school and the teachers always made excuses for the bullies. One of the main reasons that bullies are so widespread is because they essentially have the schools backing them up. Unless the case can be spun into a politically correct sob story (or somebody winds up dead), the school is perfectly happy to make things easier for bullies and harder for victims.

This happened just about a week ago here in BC
The tragic story of B.C. teen suicide victim Amanda Todd has taken another bizarre twist as the internet hacking and activist group Anonymous has named a man the group says was the girl's primary tormentor.

Todd, 15, of Port Coquitlam, died last Wednesday, a month after posting a haunting video on YouTube that cited the sexualized attack that set her down a path of anxiety, depression and drug and alcohol abuse.

During her nine-minute video, the teen explains in handwritten notes that she was in Grade 7 when she was lured by an unidentified male to expose her breasts via webcam.

She says that a year later, she received a message from a man on Facebook threatening that if she didn't give him a show, he would send the webcam picture to her friends and family. She says police later told her the man followed through with his threat.

Anonymous published the name and address of a Vancouver-area man that the group claims was bullying and preying on Todd via the internet.

The activist group, whose members are known for wearing Guy Fawkes mask in order to hide their identities, claims the 32-year-old man has also made postings to child pornography sites.

The man himself has now been threatened online by others vowing to carry out vigilante justice, a development that worries Vancouver defence lawyer Eric Gottardi.

"The system isn't supposed to convict someone before charges are laid. It’s not supposed to be judge, jury and executioner, all in the public forum," Gottardi said. "We have a justice system. It’s supposed to work, it does work."

Family pleads for help
Todd's family has pleaded with people to report anyone desecrating online tribute pages to Amanda and also to come forward with information about those who bullied her online:

Her aunt, Leanna Todd, of Halifax, told CBC News that the public response to Todd's death and the discussion about bullying have provided the family with much comfort.

“I've really been overwhelmed by it. I knew there would be an outcry. I didn't know it would be an international outcry and I don't think her parents expected it either."

Two dozen RCMP investigators have been assigned to look into the bullying, which could bring charges of criminal harassment.

Todd's video was posted weeks before she took her own life. (CBC)
A spokesman told CBC News Monday that police are aware of the social media speculation about Todd’s alleged tormentor, but would not comment further.

A national child anti-exploitation group, cybertip.ca, says it received a tip almost a year ago about Todd.

A concerned citizen contacted the organization last November to report that images of Todd were being circulated online, said spokeswoman Signy Arnason.

"We did receive one report, and that was passed along to law enforcement as well as child welfare," Arnason said Monday. "It was not a report from her, but it was a report from a concerned citizen."

Seedy underworld
The kind of sexual exploitation described by Todd is part of a seedy cyber-underworld that targets young girls and it is not bullying, but a vicious crime that should be pursued even after her death, say child advocates.

"Threats are a very common tactic utilized by individuals in their attempts to extort more information off of the kids," said Arnason, whose group will release a report on online luring later this week.

About one per cent of the 67,000 reports they've received since 2005 involve luring – a number that is significant when cases can spiral out of control as they did for Todd.

"Being sexually curious is not an abnormal thing as an adolescent. It's quite developmentally normal. The problem is that when you combine it with the online world then the effects can be devastating."

"You get a lot of youth — and Amanda's not unusual — where they do feel like their life is over, and it's just so incredibly tragic what occurred for her," Arnason said.

Guess I agree with the dad. Kids today are soft, I'm glad he's telling his son to stand up for himself....even if he has to fight. These kids today need a good ass whipping. If they're not getting it at home, why not in the streets? Might curb their attitude.

Eight teenage girls at a high school in London, Ont., have been arrested in connection with a bullying incident involving another student, police say.

Const. Dennis Rivest of the London Police Service said the eight girls were arrested Thursday.

Police said an investigation revealed that the victim had been the target of physical and emotional bullying, and cyberbullying.

'If we can change behaviours about drinking and driving, if we change behaviours and attitudes around smoking, why can we not change behaviours and attitudes around bullying.'
—Bill Tucker, Thames Valley District School Board
The arrested girls face charges of criminal harassment.

Police said information about the bullying came from individuals who came forward in person and through an anonymous reporting web portal, called "South Cares," which is on the London South Collegiate website.

Bill Tucker, director of education at Thames Valley District School Board, said they had 70,000 community members take a pledge last year to end bullying.

BULLYPROOFVideo booth captures raw tales of teen bullying
"We know that the research says if an individual intervenes in bullying behaviour, we can stop bullying behaviour within seconds ...in 50 per cent of cases," he said.

Tucker added that school boards know they need help to end bullying, especially cyberbullying.

"It is such a complex, intricate challenge for school boards that we went to community and said, 'We need your help.'"

"If we can change behaviours about drinking and driving, if we change behaviours and attitudes around smoking, why can we not change behaviours and attitudes around bullying."

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/story/2012/10/19/london-bullying-arrests-girls-cyber.html