Bothers

What bothers me today in the after-math of yesterday? Tipster lines for police. Tipster lines for colleges to report troubled youth. Tipster lines for public schools. Our local school system used to have an anonymous tipster line to call if a student witnessed or felt something was about to happen. I looked for that phone number today -- just in case -- and it wasn't online anymore. So now if someone makes my kid feel uncomfortable, if somehow there is a threat or a student paints a threatening sign on a locker, I have no one to call.

Both of my girls have had run-ins with bullies. I have to trust the school to find the person who hurt her and punish them appropriately. I don't trust anymore. All too often students who bully get off easy. Lunch time detention or a stern talking to. It may not be easy to pass students who do poor school work but it seems all too easy to let students who harm others move on to higher grades to get them out of the administrators hair. Less pain for the administrative people, more pain for the rest of us.