Just a Number

“To teachers I’m just another child”. Can anyone not relate to that thought? Seger has a gift for taking thoughts we’ve all had, putting them to paper & music and somehow they become profound. An article on school bullying got my attention. The CDC has done another study & there are dots we can connect. Is that reporter speak for, I’ll tell you what I think this all means, don’t bother to read or research it for yourself (or to have an independent thought) Unkind & maybe undeserved, but my read on this is a shift & emphasis on guns & school shootings. “Bullying victims are sneaking hundreds of thousands of firearms, knives and clubs into U.S. high schools”.

Direct from the CDC study:

School associated violent deaths are rare.1

• 17 homicides of school-age youth ages 5 to 18 years occurred at school during the 2009-2010 school year.

• Of all youth homicides, less than 2% occur at school, and this percentage has been stable for the past decade.

In 2010, there were about 828,000 nonfatal victimizations at school among students 12 to 18 years of age.1

Approximately 7% of teachers report that they have been threatened with injury or physically attacked by a student from their school.1

In 2009, about 20% of students ages 12–18 reported that gangs were present at their school during the school year.1

In a 2011 nationally representative sample of youth in grades 9-12:2

• 12% reported being in a physical fight on school property in the 12 months before the survey.

• 5.9% reported that they did not go to school on one or more days in the 30 days before the survey because they felt unsafe at school or on their way to or from school.

• 5.4% reported carrying a weapon (gun, knife or club) on school property on one or more days in the 30 days before the survey.

• 7.4% reported being threatened or injured with a weapon on school property one or more times in the 12 months before the survey.

• 20% reported being bullied on school property and 16% reported being bullied electronically during the 12 months before the survey.

OK, it’s not the reporters fault. I am an @ss, quick to judge & frequently wrong. I seem to remember President Obama assigning the CDC to study school shootings/violence. It’s hard for me to look at this “study” where a

gun=knife=club. In what world are they equal? The CDC wants to talk about mass/school shootings. Problem, the numbers do not help their cause. My guess only, since they didn’t publish numbers of guns, knives or clubs separately. I think they lump them together to inflate their hype on guns in schools. According to the CDC, there are around 50 million students in K thru college. There were 828,ooo instances of reported victimizations, ages 12-18. Statistically, any school student is very safe. Reality, as always, is not the same.

“20% reported being bullied on school property ” One/fifth of students are bullied in the survey year? And this is after years of increasing anti-bullying laws, rules and soap box promises that politicians would END bullying & school violence once & for all! But they haven’t fixed it, after all these years and studies and money spent. Why can that be? How can this keep happening?

Maybe because they don’t actually want to “fix” the problem. The Obama administration/CDC is interested in promoting gun control. This does not mean they want or support school shootings, but consider their efforts on bullying and compare it to energy spent on gun control. Seems oblivious they only want to treat the symptom, not “cure” the cold. There could and likely are other factors.

They have done studies on gun violence that discredit nearly every liberal talking point. When the numbers are displayed broken down by neighborhood, not state, an overwhelming fact emerges. There are no violent states, just small, violent area’s. A correlation between low income/gangs can be indicated, but again, who would want to cure a cold if they made their living off repeatedly treating that illness.

By the same token, are all schools violent? Are all failing to stop bullying? Or are some inner city schools overwhelmed? What are the chances of a school in any of those violent neighborhoods being an oasis from gangs and violence? Are those same schools heavily unionized? Those are topics this administration does not want discussed. Hence a “study” that leads to their desired conclusion, or at least, talking points.

Some personal experiences.

I attended a concert years ago. The show was ruined for me & hundreds by three obnoxious drunks shouting over the music. Several of us complained to several city police officers. They nodded and did nothing. I was sorely tempter to attack and fight them. Frustrated beyond belief that the police would not do their job, but had I acted, I would be arrested, possibly sued by the drunks.

A friend was called by the school years ago. His son was hurt & needed to be taken to a doctor. His son had a broken jaw. Broken by a bully he had been complaining about for a while. The bully sucker punched him outside the gym. The bully was suspended for ten days. The school did not call the police or an ambulance. My friend did call the police, who were reluctant. He ended up having to sue in civil court for damages. Bullies are not expelled because of the thousands of dollars in funding they bring to the school. Expel them & another school gets that funding.

Three or four years ago, the high school my kids are now attending had a bullying incident. Three, black, Sr high girls severely beat a black, Jr high girl. We were very interested in how the school would handle this incident. We were considering switching to a private school. We never could find out what was done. Must protect a child’s privacy, we are told. But then, college’s are very secretive when it comes to campus violence. I understand no school wants a reputation for violence, but what about the public’s right to know?

Would you knowingly send your daughter to a school with a high number of rapes over the years? How can colleges keep such secrets for so many years? It seems to me there is a lot of money spent on education. We hear tuition costs are jumping at headline making rates. And all school loans now go thru the federal government and are exempt from bankruptcy protections…..

My how I’ve jumped around….but there is a concise thought & conclusion. Schools are an artificial environment created for educating our young in a group of similar age. Since this environment has been taken over by central government control it has been on a path to failure only staved off by diminishing results, standards and accountability. Government does not cause this, but creates the environment where failure thrives.

Pity the students trapped in public schools being bullied and ignored. Can any of the bureaucrats presiding make them or us believe they aren’t just numbers….

Feel Like A Number
Words and music by bob seger

I take my card and i stand in line
To make a buck i work overtime
Dear sir letters keep coming in the mail
I work my back till it’s racked with pain
The boss can’t even recall my name
I show up late and i’m docked
It never fails
I feel like just another
Spoke in a great big wheel
Like a tiny blade of grass
In a great big field
To workers i’m just another drone
To ma bell i’m just another phone
I’m just another statistic on a sheet
To teachers i’m just another child
To irs i’m just another file
I’m just another consensus on the street
Gonna cruise out of this city
Head down to the sea
Gonna shout out at the ocean
Hey it’s me
And i feel like a number
Feel like a number
Feel like a stranger
A stranger in this land
I feel like a number
I’m not a number
I’m not a number
Dammit i’m a man
I said i’m a man