To Paddle Or Not to Paddle? It's Still Not Clear in US Schools. | Csmonitor.Com Page 1 of 4

To paddle or not to paddle? It's still not clear in US schools. | csmonitor.com Page 1 of 4

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In this week's It's still not clear in US Learning section: Subscribe: America's first students get schools. a second look By Stacy A. Teicher | Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor Free sample issue Proud first-graders now say: Cherokee spoken here When it comes to spanking, there's no such thing as a consensus in Infants use their hands to America's schools. 'talk' Apparel Hard-charging high schools Twenty-seven states and the District of Columbia have outlawed Buy Shoes urge students to do less corporal punishment in public schools, all in the past 40 years. Business The NY Public Library's Resources Digital Gallery Search Engine But as the number of students feeling the In the Monitor Optimization sting of the paddle declines, some Thursday, 03/24/05 Financial What is this? parents and educators are digging in to The retiree math war Car Insurance defend it as an effective form of Mortgage Loans Around the dinner table, discipline. Personal Loans Kidspace talk of end-of-life care UK Car Insurance A weekly feature for Sunnis now want to join students aged 6 to 14. It's another symbol of the nation's red- Gifts blue divide. Most states that still allow the Iraq politics Engagement Rings : Don't miss our Teachers practice are in the South and Midwest. Find Florist Kidspace archive. Mexico aims for soccer But policies long favoring corporal redemption Italian Charm Bracelets punishment have come up for debate Italian Charms Sale! COMMENTARY: Does Necklaces recently on Southern school boards - in Matt Santos really have Home & Garden Union County, N.C.; Memphis, Tenn.; to be fictional? and Dallas. Patio Furniture 'Don't forget us' Music Read these and the Song Lyrics "It's very uneven terrain out there," says rest of the Monitor's 50 years of Ronald Rohner, who is not pro or con but Real Estate headlines by e-mail. integration has researched the issue as director of Moving Subscribe for free. Moving Companies the University of Connecticut's Center for Competition for Mortgage college the Study of Parental Acceptance and E-mail this story Mortgage Advice Rejection. "There's a movement back to Mortgage Calculator Campus it on the part of some schools, but some Write a letter to the Real Estate Aftershocks Editor

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are banning it for the first time.... We'll be The Gender Printer-friendly hearing more and more about this as Travel Equation version time goes by." Airport Hotels Acting with Permission to City Hotels Discount Hotel Rooms Conviction reprint/republish Two recent cases show how strong the Hotel Deals more projects... passions are on both sides, and how Hotels individuals can sometimes find themselves up against the prevailing Hotel Reviews local standard: Vacation Rentals Most-viewed stories: Web Services (for 03/23/05) • In Chicago, the mother of a 6-year-old was called in to his private Internet Marketing Web Directory 03/24/05 Christian school after he received multiple disciplinary notes for Finally, planet hunters see Web Hosting Reviews talking in class, chewing gum, and not completing assignments, the the light Chicago Tribune reported last week. 03/23/05 Lawsuit over an embryo fuels debate on when life The mother said an administrator told her to spank her son there at the office or he would be suspended. The corporal punishment policy Purchase articles for as begins little as 15 cents each. is in the school's handbook, but the mother was surprised by the 03/23/05 A 10-lane road to the future ultimatum. She does not practice spanking and has withdrawn her son from the school. 03/23/05 School shooting: familiar New! Subscribe to the Treeless Edition! echoes, new concerns • Scott McConnell, a graduate student in the education program of Le Moyne College in Syracuse, N.Y., was told he could not continue 03/24/05 A poorer OPEC no longer because of a mismatch between the college's goals and his personal E-mail Alerts Environment spreads its wealth beliefs about teaching. One of those beliefs (expressed in a paper that received an A-minus) was that corporal punishment has a place Politics Ethics in classroom discipline. More topics... Sign up now: Corporal punishment is not allowed in New York public schools, but he says he didn't advocate practicing it in violation of the law.

The Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE), a Philadelphia group, has taken up his case as a matter of academic freedom, and he hopes to be readmitted.

Mr. McConnell says his view is partly based on his own transformation from rude to respectful after being paddled by a caring teacher in the fourth grade. Monitor Store Many defenders cite the Bible as their guide, saying that if a child needs correction, it's not loving to spare the rod.

"If the spanking can be done by an individual who knows the child and the child's parents, as is often the case in private schools and Christian schools, and if the parents wish that to be done, then it can be appropriate as long as it's in the proper context," says DuBose Ravenel, a pediatrician in High Point, N.C., and an adviser to the evangelical group Focus on the Family.

Dr. Ravenel does not support school corporal punishment for teenagers, and says it generally should be used only on children under 10.

Other proponents say it's practical for parents to be able to opt for the quick lesson of corporal punishment, rather than to have the student miss classes because of suspension.

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Opponents counter that the practice is too likely to lead to abuse, and that schools should be better role models.

"In the past 30 years, we have gotten better at understanding what makes kids tick.... We've got some alternatives to spanking ... and educators have a responsibility to teach kids how to solve problems without resorting to spanking," says Sal Severe, a veteran school psychologist and parent educator.

A number of child-advocacy groups have positions similar to the National Association of School Psychologists, which states that "corporal punishment negatively affects the social, psychological and educational development of students and contributes to the cycle of child abuse and pro-violence attitudes of youth."

Research weighs heavily in favor of alternatives, says Nadine Block, executive director of the Center for Effective Discipline in Columbus, Ohio. "The big catchword today is evidence-based practices, and there's no evidence to support corporal punishment in schools.... If it works, it should work the first time. They hit the same kids over and over."

Too often, she says, it's not used as a last resort, despite what policies dictate. And in some districts, "they don't allow parents to opt out."

A charter school student has sued in Texas, claiming she was injured after being restrained and hit with a wooden paddle known as "Ole Thunder," the San Antonio Express-News reports. Although her mother had signed a form permitting corporal punishment, the student had since turned 18, and claims that as an adult the school needed her consent.

Another common criticism is that racial minorities, children with disabilities, and boys bear the brunt of corporal punishment.

At one elementary school in Union County, for instance, black children were 47 percent of the student body but received 82 percent of the paddling in 2003-04, according to an analysis by the Charlotte Observer.

The superintendent has suspended corporal punishment until the school board revises or eliminates the policy.

Although experts say that 80 to 90 percent of American parents have resorted to spanking at one point or another, the trend toward alternative forms of discipline at home - everything from "timeouts" to taking away privileges - has led to less corporal punishment at schools, too.

Between 1980 and 2000, the number of students struck in US public schools declined from 1.4 million to 342,000, according to analysis by the Center for Effective Discipline of data from the US Department of Education.

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Two states - New Jersey and Iowa - ban the practice in private schools. But even where it's legal, some private schools are shifting away from corporal punishment for pragmatic reasons.

In its next newsletter, the Colorado-based Association of Christian Schools International plans to advise its member schools (including 4,000 in the US) against paddling.

"It's in recognition of the highly litigious society we're in right now," says Burt Carney, the group's director for legal and legislative issues. "It's just probably wiser for schools not to use that type of punishment."

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