A Florida teacher who encouraged her kindergarten class to vote on whether or not a boy with autism should remain in the class says she would take back the incident if she could.
The teacher, Wendy Portillo, is on a one-year unpaid suspension from teaching stemming from the incident last May. She is now appealing the suspension. On Tuesday she testified before an administrative law judge and recounted the incident.
Portillo said that after the boy was sent to the office for behavior issues, the other students in her class began talking about what they had witnessed. When the boy returned from the office, Portillo says she proposed taking a poll about whether or not he should remain in the class. The exercise fit in well with recent lessons on keeping tallies, she said.
“It was just another learning opportunity. It was just another way for me to review that teaching,” she said.
Now, the administrative law judge will review the case and make a recommendation to the school board, reports the Scripps Florida Treasure Coast Newspapers. To read more click here.
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Previous stories on this topic:
Teacher Suspended After Class Votes Out Student With Autism (November 20, 2008)
Outrageous! School is difficult enough on kids (disabled or not). The emotional devastation from this could be profound. She has no common sense!
Her explanations for the incident appear to be very disingenuous. With such poor judgment skills and self-serving responses, how could a school community trust her? There are unfortunately many others in this world that lack insight of basic human rights and requirements of human dignity.
This is terrible.
Inexcusable. Children learn several important life lessons in a school environment and what this teacher did sent a horrible message to the other children in the classroom that day. No apology will ever change what that one child was subject to and the humiliation will last with that boy for a long time to come.
We had a similar situation happen to our daughter at the beginning of the school year. The teacher and staff were fully aware of her disability and her habit of taking small things (class pictures, pencil erasers) from others. However, one day the teacher went too far and I received a call from the secretary that my daughter was in the office while the rest of the elementary school had left the school to participate in its homecoming activities. The teacher had dropped our daughter off at the office without letting the secretary know why or telling anyone to give us a call. Thankfully I was able to pick her up and found time to leave a note for the teacher to call me immediately as to why she’d been left behind.
The teacher’s excuse was that it had gotten so busy and hectic that she didn’t have a chance to call. I still find it hard to understand why she didn’t have the paraproffesional in the classroom call me or at least quickly explain to the secretary what happened and to call us at home. It took all I had not to withdraw our daughter from that school that day, but it won’t take much thought to do it if something like this happens again.
I have a great respect for teachers and it’s sad there seems to be one who forgets how their own behavior leaves a lasting impression on all others involved. The teachers like the one in this story in FL and the one we’ve been dealing with need to be held accountable just as they expect their students to be.
I’m glad she is on an “un-paid” suspension!! What a lame excuse – that it was another opportunity to teach a lesson on keeping tallies – at the expense of a young child’s self-esteem and respect. That teacher used terrible judgment and doesn’t deserve to have the opportunity to influence young minds!
This is an unfortunate incident in the lives of all concerned. It seems the safe guards that should have been in place to protect student one, the teacher, and the other 14 children involved dropped the ball. The administrator/ counselor who sent the child back to the classroom without first conferencing with the teacher seems to be at odds with maintaining the safety of all students concerned. There needs to be more training and more options for teachers who have to deal with a child who is out of control. If any child, disabled or not, hurts another student during an outburst- who cries foul then? Prevention and positive behavioral supports need to be the first line of defense. The civil rights that protect a child w/ disabilities to a free and appropriate public education does not give that child the civil rights to endanger an entire classroom.
What a sad story. As if the poor boy did not already have enough issues to deal with, an adult (or is that questionable) allowed kindergarten students to vote the boy out! The suspension should hold! And if not, the parents should take it further!