By Brittany Hanson/Garden Grove Journal
Schools deal with problems from all over the board. And then that board has to deal with problems from all over the schools.
At Tuesday’s school board meeting for the Garden Grove Unified School District pay to take adult education classes and an unfortunate outcome from a bullying situation were discussed and acted upon.
Adult education programs in GGUSD have recently come under much scrutiny as the district looks to save money to help K-12 education. Because of extra costs, adult education is faced with cutbacks and changes, with some fearing that it would not even be available at all in the next school year.
However, the current solution to maintaining the Mac lab, yoga, Teen Mothers Program and the Adults with Disabilities programs has been to offer them on a pay-to-take basis with registration and fees for support.
The school district does not expect for the programs to be totally self-supporting by the 2011-2012 school year, however, they feel this is a step in the right direction to make sure they can still offer these services to the community.
Bullying is a problem that often occurs in schools all and has the potential to turn dangerous for anyone involved. In some cases, confrontations can occur and it is left up to school district to manage the aftermath.
Due to the sensitive nature of the situation, exact details such as name, age, or location could not be discussed publicly.
A middle school boy in GGSUD felt threatened and bullied by others at his school. He had complained to his parents about apprehension in going to school and had seemed depressed. At some point, details unknown, he was found to have been in possession of a knife.
The result of a situation like this is immediate expulsion from school for one year. Education code dictates that the expulsion is immediate, starting from the day of the alleged incident.
Dr. KimOanh Nguyen-Lam expressed regret at the idea of having to expel the boy, on accounts of his having a good academic and general standing in the school, aside from this incident.
However, Superintendent Laura Schwalm said that regardless of his standing, the code expressly calls for this kind of punishment. Schwalm said that the issue at hand is how victims of bullying respond and that there is even bullying at all.
“It creates a problem for us when youngsters feel threatened and don’t feel that they can talk to someone,” said Schwalm, “Youngsters deal with a lot of things, everyday.”
Schwalm also said that it was difficult for administrators to handle situations like this where students took issues into their own hands. She said that had someone been notified of bullying taking place that the student could have been transferred or helped.
