Boy allegedly forced to use hands to unclog toilet

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EAGAN, Minn. (AP) -- An elementary school principal could be disciplined for allegedly forcing a 6-year-old boy to unclog a toilet with his bare hands. The principal of Rahn Elementary has been on paid leave since mid-December while the school district investigated a complaint from the boy's parents. The school board proposed disciplinary action on Thursday. The nature of the discipline wasn't made public

The 6 yr old used paper towel instead of toilet paper and accidentally clogged the toilet.

Is this what our kids can expect? Every day I find things in the news that just makes me cringe. I hope they fire the principal.

Was there a particular reason that the 6 year old used paper towels instead of toilet paper? Were there prior problems from this child like behavior, disrespectful attitude?

A six year old should know the difference and if there was toilet paper in the stall then gathering paper towels from quite a distance from a stall would appear to be a premeditated act.

In my day, which would have been 1976-77 (depending on time of year) the punishment would have been swats with a paddle and still unclogging the toilet with my bare hands. And afterwards the supervised hand washing and I may or may not have to write a sentence 500-1000 times while having recess limited to sitting on the ground with my back against the walk for some time period.

The kid got off light. However in this new climate it would be better somehow to charge the parents for having a professional plumber come in and remove the clog and suspend the child until the bill was paid.

Punishment for wrong behavior tends to lead to not having that behavior repeated. Shame on that principal for trying to give the child some direction and character in life.

reply to post by Ahabstar


It doesn't matter whether the six year old knew or not, you don't FORCE a student to do anything they don't want to, it's just plain wrong. That principal should be fired IMO.

I would love to anybody to attempt something like that with my kids, thankfully my kids would have looked at him funny and flipped him the bird most likely for trying to get them to put they're hands in a dirty toilet.

Discipline in school is warranted in certain situations, but you cannot say that what he did was right, no matter how much behaviour problems that child was undergoing, it should be the schools responsibility and the parents to deal with those on a personnal level with the appropriate measures.

~Keeper

Wow, not force a child to do anything they don't want to do? Really?

I guess that explains why we are in such an economic mess today...no one forced those children to do things in a respectable and honest manner when they were kids.

I hated reading Shakespeare and classic literature when I was in school. Only read it because I had to do so. I find myself quoting the old bard from time to time today.

Aw let them hang the guy out to dry. Just be prepared to have to pay higher taxes when the school districts need more money for new buildings since the current ones are so ran down.

Originally posted by tothetenthpower
reply to post by Ahabstar

 

It doesn't matter whether the six year old knew or not, you don't FORCE a student to do anything they don't want to, it's just plain wrong. That principal should be fired IMO.

Homework and tests.

Obviously thats not exactly what you meant... but I'm making the point that discipline is necessary. Perhaps they should have let the toilet overflow then handed the child a mop instead of having him shove his hands in the toilet, but punishing the parents for something the kid perpetrated on school time won't necessarily fix a damn thing, especially with the "baby our children" movement.

Assuming the toilet was clogged on purpose then I have no issue with the kid being made to unclog the toilet... I do however have an issue with him having to do it with his bare hands. They're a lot of crazy diseases that can be gotten from toilets, I mean give the kid some gloves and a plunger at least!

If the clog was accidental then they had no right to make him clean it up, thats what the taxpayers pay the janitors for...

I would say with a school aged kid myself, depending on the circumstances i would not be opposed to an off the wall punishment like that. I bet the child learns quickly not to do it again. I agree that the schools hands are tied behind their backs on anything but are the first ones to be blamed when something goes wrong with their kid. If i were the principal i would have called the parents and asked them if this punishment was something they would allow and if now what sort of punishment would seem fitting. My sons teacher does that to me almost every day. (my son i believe has ADHD) but will not do the meds so me and the teacher work with him and sometimes have to get quite creative on punishments when he is delibertly acting out, which to me sounds like this kid could very well have been.

Go to the janitor's closet and at least give the kid some rubber gloves.

There's a point where these people step over the line, and yes, this was one of those times. I would not be a happy parent!

Peace

I'd have made him unblock it then flushed his head down to make sure it never happened again.
Not really, this is not the way to behave if you are a principle, very stoneage. We had to pick litter without gloves at school for punishment but that pales in comparison.

If it was an accident, the embarrasment alone is enough. If it were on purpose, then yea, I can see the kid getting a punishment, but at 6 yrs old, I don't think he should be plunging toilets as a punishment, and certainly not with his bare hands. That's just disgusting.

reply to post by Ahabstar


WoW! Your quite the thinker...

My son uses a lot of toilet paper when he goes. A teen who is scared of getting p00p on his hands. He's plugged the toilet a number of times and I've had to unclog it. I also talk to him about it, it's decreasing and he uses less paper now. Would I have my son or anyone I KNOW put their hand into a toilet to make a point??? I think not.

What would you do if your child was to take his food and make a statement to you and drop it into the toilet bowl??? Hypothetical... don't tell me what you really do...

This just goes to show how your children will be controlled in every way. they are slowly taking control of your child and will soon leave you with NO control over your own children. They will tell you when to put your children to bed and what to feed your child. Like the thermostat in your home they will control your children from afar.

As for any type of lesson that this may have been, I think the school had a plunger and they could have let the child use that instead. Your thinking on this leads me to wonder about the response you'd have to my hypothetical question above.

IMHO
Rgds

great. Can he clean mine as well?

Part of the reason our kids lose respect for the school administration is because of bone-headed decisions like the one made by this principle. Discipline is best shown by example. I don't think the principle had the self-discipline to be able to properly handle the situation. If that was the best punishment he/she could come up with then the school needs a new administrator with a little more creativity.

As for the tired old arguments about "in my day they would have beaten me to a bloody pulp and smiled while they did it" well that is just pointless. Just because we somehow survived the kind of crap they did to us as children, it doesn't make it right.

I recall the one and only time I got swats in high school - it was for being late to class. The reason I was late however, is that the slacker of a gym coach locked us all into the practice field so that no one would leave to skip class. Not a problem in itself except that this particular day he hadn't finished his coffee and so didn't come unlock the gate.

An unsympathetic assistant principle would hear no explanations, so swats were the order of the day.

That didn't make me respect the school authorities. On the contrary I thought then that they were unjust, and I know now that they were not only petty tyrants with a little power, but they were idiots as well.

Don't ever make the mistake of confusing discipline with punishment.

This principal is a moron.

What was he thinking?

Call a plumber and charge the parents. The discipline part would have taken care of itself.

reply to post by AllTiedTogether


I'll answer your hypothetical if you clarify. Is the child coming to ask a question while I using the restroom? Or is it more of a "peas are yucky" type deal?

But to give a little story. One time I had stopped at a Wal-mart in Arkansas while I was an OTR truck driver and there was a boy about 9-10 years old throwing a tantrum over buying a toy and just generally giving his mother hell as children are often wanton to do.

The mother was really on her last nerve, so I walked up and asked him outright why he was causing his mother so much grief. The child flat out said "f* you." I bent down so he could see the very serious look on my face and see in my eyes that I was very serious and informed him if he was adult enough to use that kind of language that I would treat him like an adult and dot his eye for him. This took him rather by surprise and he immediately looked to his mother who by this time stood there completely gobsmacked.

Now at this point I said don't look to your mom to fight your own battles. Besides I think you owe her a very sincere apology. And you know what he did indeed give her an apology that sounded very sincere. So at this point I told him that it looked like he growing up to be a man after all. And since he did exactly what I wanted to do in the first place I reached in my pocket and gave him a dollar and explained that it was indeed his and that in my book he earned it.

I said he was free to spend it however he wished, but I also said that a dollar wasn't going to be enough to buy that toy and if he really wanted it he could talk to his mom about doing things to earn more money. And if he saved that money he could buy that very toy in time.

And while at first the mother was more than ready to take my head off, she thanked when it was all said and done. And explained that he had been a holy terror after his dad had left them two year before hand.

So while I do not see a problem with correcting a child and giving him motivation to do what is right and far from the ogre that you imagine me to be.

A six year old boy is going to play with far more germ laden things than a toilet. And more than likely will not be washing their hands directly afterwards either. Rubber gloves, while a nice sentiment, are not normally sized for a six year old's hand and will indeed been filled with water while doing the deed.

But while we are at it, just how do you think paper towels which are by the sink ended up being used if there was toilet paper there at the stall?