North Carolina Teacher Allegedly Cuts Disabled Student's Hair

seems to be a case of a teacher way overstepping their bounds. can you imagine your child coming home with a haircut done by a teacher? well apparently it happened to a girl suffering down syndrome.

abcnews.go.com...

The North Carolina mom of a 7-year-old girl with Down Syndrome is accusing a teacher of cutting off several inches of her daughter’s beloved hair without her consent. “Most of the time, she’s always brushing her hair, always doing something with her hair,” Jesslyn’s mother, Jessica Stirewalp, told ABC News’ Charlotte affiliate, WSOC-TV.

so we have a little girl who likes to play with her hair, not unusual for a girl that age.

The mom said that she has heard conflicting explanations for why Jesslyn’s hair was cut. She said the teacher initially told her on the phone that it was because of food in Jesslyn’s hair. But a letter from the teacher said that Jesslyn wouldn’t stop taking her hair down, so the teacher trimmed it, Stirewalp said.

now why would you need to cut hair that has gotten food in it? wouldn't washing be called for? only thing i can recall cutting hair for is gum in it, and that only normally would require a small amount be cut. not only that would you not just leave it for the parents to deal with?

but in all honesty i put more faith in the explanation in the letter stating that it was cut because the little girl would not stop playing with it. are teachers really getting that lazy? that they would just lop off the hair of a mentally handicapped student instead of working with the child. this is just so wrong it is NOT up to a teacher to do something like that arbitrarily. heck maybe just putting a hairnet on it would have worked if it really was an issue. this teacher should not only be given the boot but should be legally barred from working with the handicapped which she certainly proves is work she is not suited for.

what can be done to stop teachers who really have no right teaching children? could they not test teachers to see if they can handle the stresses of teaching, especially those who work with disabled children who can be rather more difficult to handle. as i see it this so called teacher did not know how to do her job, and that is the fault of the school board for not ensuring a teacher is capable of doing their job. now we have a fragile student that has been totally demoralized due to the incompitance of this one teacher. who knows how long it could take to try and repair the damage done. all the money the school board has is not enough for this type of damage to a child's self esteem.

I dont care what the teacher's excuse was for cutting her hair. She had no RIGHT to do anything to that child without the parents permission.

If it had been my child, I'd be tempted to take a knife to the teachers hair - scissors being too civilised and not nearly intimidating enough - then again some of my best friends are Comanches and we're pretty particular about who and how our hair gets cut.

ganjoa

This is horrible.

My grandson has mild Autism. Some things are extremely important to him.

Remind myself. If school calls - - - don't wait until he comes home. GET THERE! IMMEDIATELY!