Bullying in High School

I agree with JoW. Sounds more like a "hazing" and much stricter and serious follow through comes as a result.

I think you would be better off not calling it bullying because it really isn't. Bullying is ongoing, pervasive and targeted. This just sounds like some stupid upperclassman and your son being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Why I say you are better off not calling it bullying is if they apply their antibulling rules nothing will happen. What this is is hazing gone wrong and it needs to be addressed as such.

See because bullying is ongoing they are going to say lets see if it happens again, you have this first, second, third offence system of rules. The first being next to nothing.

Hazing does not have or expect a second offence from a specific child, it is a one of and is treated more harshly because if they don't then next year more kids can get hurt, make sense? If they don't make a big deal about it this year then next year some other kids will think it is a great idea with no real punishment.

How exactly did your son get injured and what did the injuries consist of?

If you are getting nowhere with the principal, I would go to the school board. I also would wonder what the police would have to say, especially if there is documentation of his visit to the hospital.

I agree with Jo W. too, and I also don't think the principal is taking this very seriously. The fact that he's just chalking it up to the kids being class clowns?! Ridiculous. Personally, I would keep pressing the school to address this issue to the whole student body, so that it does NOT happen to someone next year. I am so sorry this happened to your son. The good news is that I doubt your son will continue to be picked on by these kids. It does sound like a one time hazing sort of incident.

What are your righhts as a parent? See a civil rights lawyer. But be prepared to be disappointed. If your son can be classified as a minority, he has some civli rights. If he is a white male you have no civil rights, but you do have the right to be safe on your person. If he was seriously injured call the police and file a complaint. The police than have to investigate. Harrassment is against the law in most states and may be against the law in cases of school harassment. But that's why you have to contact a lawyer.

Good luck to you and yours.

Call the police and report it. This is where all that horrible college hazing starts. The school won't take it seriously - they always like to sweep this sort of thing under the carpet.

Make a report and have the kids arrested. They AND THE SCHOOL need to know that this is not going to be tolerated.

Also make a claim with the school district for payment of the hospital bills and if they won't/don't pay, file a lawsuit. Money is the ONLY thing they take seriously. So, you can jump up and down and scream at the top of your lungs; all that will happen is that they will label you a problem and a crazy lady. Threaten to make they cough up some money, and their demeanor will magically change.

Your son was so injured that he had to be taken to the hospital?
He was beaten? His arm was broken? What happened?

"Class clowning" shouldn't result in serious physical injury and it shouldn't be described or relegated as such when physical harm has been documented.

My son's high school has a wonderful mentor program. Upper classmen volunteer to look after freshmen and they buddy up with them so that they aren't alone. My son's mentor was the star of the football team and he told my son that if anyone tried to mess with him, they'd have to go through his mentor first. Fortunately, my son could hold his own, but he was inspired to be a mentor himself. He has intervened on several occasions because anyone that wants to pick on someone is usually a wimp who doesn't really want to mess with someone who isn't afraid of them.

If your son's school doesn't have something like this in place, perhaps you can suggest it. Instead of just saying "clowns will be clowns", they should be proactive in making sure these things are minimized to the point of zero tolerance. I'm sure there are good kids who would be more than willing to take freshmen under their wing and have an association with them so that it wouldn't be cool at all to mess with them.

I'm sorry this happened. If you have hospital bills, you can certainly try suing in civil court for the parents to pay. That could be a long and drawn out process. I don't believe the school has to divulge the disciplinary actions they have taken with the other kids involved. But, like I said, if they don't have a mentor program in place, it might be good for you to suggest it and help get that put in place so that these things don't have to happen again to your son or any other kid.

Pranks CAN be carried out too far. Some pranks just aren't funny.
Don't go overboard with assigning a victim label to your son because that will just make it worse. Get proactive.

Again, I don't know how badly your son was hurt physically.
Emotionally, you can help him get through this and I bet he would be an amazing mentor for other kids.

I wish you and your son the very best.

Many states now have laws against hazing. Look into it, even if you don't intend to pursue criminal prosecution, because it might be enough to scare the principal into action. Also, depending on what your son was doing and what was done to him, the boys who hazed him may be responsible for his medical bills.

Good luck.

Lawyer, cops and possibly the news media (unless my son wants to avoid publicity) . . .that has to all be handled carefully with an eye for his future too.

My kid would be out of that school.

Disgusting.

I would go directly to the school and meet face to face with the principal and talk about this. It truly may be a confidential matter on the discipline but I wouldn't leave before feeling comfortable that it was handled appropriately. Many schools have a resource officer these days that works with the police department. You can call and speak directly to them if so. If it were enough to warrant a trip to the hospital, that nearly sounds criminal and you should have filled a report with the police department. It's not too late if you have your medical records to support the claim.

If it was bad enough that you had to take your son to the hospital that is bullying and in the us there are laws. With so many kids taking their own lives over being bullied that principal needs to put a stop to the freshman friday thing before someone dies. Class clowns or not this needs to stop period because he could be a target and the weak always get hit the hardest, I know my son was until I started showing up at odd times bring him pencil, pens, lunch, and even the teachers flowers. Do some voulteer(spelling) work around teachers and the office would love it.

That's awful, what a HORRIBLE way to start high school! I hate these stupid freshman pranks and so called "traditions." And I'm really surprised the principal is not taking this more seriously, especially since your son ended up at the hospital. Our high school comes down h*** o* any kind of bullying or hazing (and I'm sure this would be considered hazing) incidents, mostly because they are afraid of being sued I'm afraid, but still...
I'm not sure that the school is required to tell you what the other boys punishment should be, but I know that they are required by law to provide your son with a safe learning environment. Every school has some kind of "student and parent rights" handbook that you can refer to, this will spell out exactly what the expectations are. Most likely you can find it online but I bet you can also walk into either the school or district office and get a hard copy. Start with that and go from there. If you feel not enough is being done at the school level then go to the district. Good luck!

If the hospital was involved, make a police report. The principal is an idiot.