Mama Bear and the Big Bad Wolf

Oh, the joys of motherhood of a teenage boy named Duncan. Apparently last Wednesday before gym officially started, two boys severely lacking self-esteem were arguing and it escalated to a fist fight. Name calling occurred and Duncan witnessing all of it jokingly told one of the boys, "Are you going to take that? He called you a wuss." So then the two boys threw more punches resulting in the loss of two bottom front teeth of one of the boys. At this point, the fight was broken up and the two boys were sent to the office. They both accused Duncan of instigating the fight. There were plenty of witnesses but.....whatever. So Duncan was summoned to the office. He wrote out his statement and was truthful.

This is where it gets sticky. Last summer, Grantsville Elementary School caught fire. The school was split between the other elementary school here. Willow Elementary got the third and fourth grade students and the Jr. High has the fifth and sixth grade students. The staff and teachers were split accordingly except the principal now had no school or two split schools to care for. It was decided that Mr. Jeff Wyatt would go to the Jr. High but remain the principal of GES and not be demoted to vice-principal.

So back to the challenge. Mr. Davis, principal of Grantsville Jr. High, was out of the office when the fight occurred. Mr. Wyatt called the two fighting boys in and suspended them. He talked with Duncan and gave him a lecture. End of story? NOOOOOOO! When the fighting boys returned on Monday after the suspensions were completed, they wrote out a contract to eliminate future problems. During this process, Mr. Davis heard from the boys that it was Duncan's fault. Without looking at the recorded statements or doing any research, he calls Duncan in and, of course, Duncan smarts off to him. I demanded in October/November that I be present if Duncan was called into the office for anything, period, because of past visits with and ridiculous threats from Mr. Davis did not bode well!!! I warned Mr. Davis that I was a mother bear, that I was not afraid of him nor would I back down to his bullying tactics. In fact, I told him I would file harassment charges against him if he continued to harass my son.

So Duncan called to inform me that Mr. Davis (aka the big bad wolf) had suspended him for three days. I was, you might say, slightly mad (haw, haw!) I quickly marched down to the school and had a lively "talk" with the big bad wolf. The big bad wolf rehearsed his little spill. I asked why he did not call me. He sheepishly said, "I forgot." I informed him of my son's rights and he violated them; therefore, there was no suspension. He admitted when confronted he was wrong for not calling and the suspension was reduced to two days. Then I told him he could not suspend Duncan for the fight either. He insisted he could with one of his ridiculous twisted claims. I knew he was unreasonable so Duncan and I left the school.

Then Duncan and I talked about the situation revealing more details. He had told us about it earlier when it first happened and we discussed it was a family days before this so I kind of had an idea of the situation. I came to learn that Mr. Davis had not been forthright with all the information and uncovered his lack of research on the case. He had jumped to conclusions. That did not set well at all with me.

I called John, who is the level-headed parent in this household, and he agreed with me so I returned to the school with a letter of apology from Duncan concerning his disrespect for Mr. Davis. I confronted him again with the details of the situation and he was still oblivious. And informed him that Duncan had complied with everything the administration had asked of him (referring to the meeting with Mr. Wyatt).

On and on he when with his spill again. He said we could meet Tuesday morning with Mr. Wyatt, himself and me. As our "meeting" was ending, I told him my son would be attending school the next day. I knew the district policy manual stated that parents had the right to sit with their child throughout the school day during a suspension rather than staying home. Knowledge is power! When I had almost reached the exit door of the main office filled with students, teachers, parents, secretaries, the big bad wolf responded, "You can dream." What a ..... No, I won't say it. I retorted, "So can you, but he'll be here. And I will be talking to the school board about your disrespect for Mr. Wyatt's authority!" Ok, I said what everybody else was thinking around that school but never said it out load in front of Mr. Davis' face.

Tuesday morning comes. John, Duncan and I arrive at the school for our "meeting". After having a good discussion of a stupid administrator, rules, respect and disrespect, student rights, etc., Duncan attended the remainder of his classes with me tagging along. So looking back to who's "dream" it was for Duncan to attend school - Mama bear can roar and fight like none other when she's told no and she's right!!

It was later explained to me by a friend that Mr. Davis is not a fan of my visits and will be relegating future office calls for Duncan to Mr. Wyatt if at all possible. A victory? Rrrrrrrrrrr!