2012 conventions 2012 election 2013 session arts arts and culture author ballot measures basketball bomb books boy scouts budget bullying business charlie hales children clackamas climate change coal college courts crime culture culture club democrats drugs economy education environment family film fluoride food gay rights guns handguns health health care health insurance high school history housing immigration internet kitzhaber language law legislature lgbt literary arts living marijuana marriage media medicine mental health military minor parties mohamed mohamud movies music native americans news newspaper obama olympics oregon our town parenting pers photography police politcs politics port portland portland business journal president prevention public safety religion republicans rnc romney rural salem sam adams sandy hook schools science shooting sports suicide supreme court taxes technology television terrorism theater third parties transportation union university of oregon washington wildfire women

My experience is that bullying occurs in both public and private educational institutions.  I have not, however, seen any indication that school administrators, as a general rule, are anti-gay or homophobic, even though I am certain that some are.

My experience with private educational institutions is that while they may have good sounding policies (on paper) the enforcement of those policies is haphazard.  Sometimes students are called on their behavior and sometimes they are not.  Often it seems like in private educational institutions it depended very much on how a teacher perceived the offending student.  If the student was thought of as being a good student (or the family of the student was thought of as being a good family) the bullying was ignored.  If, on the other hand, the student was thought of as being a bad student (or the family was not highly prized by the private institution) the student was disciplined for behavior that other students would get away with.

My experience in the public educational setting is that while a classroom teacher may be very attentive to bullying, more likely than not lunch and recess are being monitored by volunteers or high school students or a person who has little contact and therefore knowledge of individual students in a wider context.  The adult is putting out too many fires to worry about specifics of who did what, to whom, and why.

This is how bullying is treated in the public system.  Administrators often don't investigate upfront, they remove the offender and the victim and wait to investigate based on the blow-back such capricious actions create.  No blow-back, no further action needed - problem solved!  Everyone feels good at a fraction of the cost.

posted 2 years, 7 months ago
view in context

I am currently a member of the library board in Tigard, but I am submitting this comment as a private individual.  I was disheartened to hear a number of callers to your show expressing the sentiment that they use the library all the time because they can check out books and movies, or access the internet, for FREE.  Libraries are not free.  The widespread perception that they are, means that the funding of public libraries, especially through voter initiative, must always overcome the the contradiction that these perceived FREE services cost as much as they do.

Yesterday I spent the entire day downtown and periodically I wanted to check my email using my iPod touch.  I stopped into the main branch of Multnomah County Library to use their public wifi connection.  Later I was sitting at a Starbucks and decided to see if they offered wifi.  They did, and it was "FREE."  You see, this is where our problems begin with the notion of free.  I paid for my wifi access at Starbucks when I bought my drink there.  The fact that Starbucks is able to offer wifi access out of the profit they make on each sale makes this service appear to be free, but its cost was merely hidden.  If, in the future, Starbucks increases their drink prices so that they may continue to offer wifi service in their coffee shops, we as consumers, may not understand or appreciate that these higher drink prices are funding this service.  Yet we rarely complain.  We rarely get outraged that coffee shop profits are funding services that we, as individuals, may not be using.  The dozen or so other Starbucks customers who bought items while I was accessing my email via the Starbucks wifi gateway never complained that they were funding my ability to get my email.

I know it is a small point, and I have spent perhaps too long dwelling on it, but when library funding is brought before voters for their approval, it is good to remember that the valuable services provided by libraries are not FREE, they have to be paid for or they disappear.  If these public services vanish, if public libraries are not funded, as they were not in Hood River, people will still be able to buy books, to download movies, to access wifi at their local Starbucks or Barnes and Noble bookseller, but their cost, individually, and the cost to society as a whole, will be much higher.

posted 2 years, 10 months ago
view in context