Protecting teachers
Published April 18, 2015
Editorial by Greensboro News-Record, April 18, 2015.
In 2013, a 19-year-old student beat Dudley High School math teacher Wole Ajala to within inches of his life.
After being expelled for removing her shoes and refusing to put them back on, Khavasia Vaughn suddenly returned to the classroom in a fit of rage and pounced on Ajala. Then she pummeled him until he passed out. Ajala suffered a concussion and lost five teeth and some of his hearing as a result of the attack. He was so shaken by the assault that he chose not to attend Vaughn’s court hearing.
It’s hard to picture such a horrific incident and not want the punishment to fit the crime.
So, on one level, it’s perfectly understandable why a state lawmaker wants to send a clear message: If you lay a hand on a teacher, volunteer or school staff member, you will pay. If his new bill becomes law, any student, age 16 and older, who assaults school personnel would be charged with a felony. “It needs some serious attention to highlight that this is a problem and you will get more than a slap on a hand if this occurs,” says Sen. Jerry Tillman (R-Randolph), the bill’s sponsor.
Unlike some recent legislation, this bill addresses a legitimate problem. During the 2013-14 school year, the state Department of Public Instruction reports more than 1,333 student attacks on teachers and other school staff members. But as satisfying as it may seem in theory, would Tillman’s bill make things better in practice? Probably not. In fact, it could make matters worse with unintended consequences.
Under current law, assaults on teachers are considered Class 1 misdemeanors and treated as felonies only if they result in serious injuries.
But making every case an automatic felony paints all incidents, which can vary widely in severity and circumstances, with the same broad brush.
A felony conviction is a permanent blemish that could limit a student’s chances for jobs or college. That, in turn, could lead to poverty, hopelessness, more trouble, and possibly a life of crime. Is that what we want?
Further, a student could be subject to a felony conviction without physically touching a teacher, since a simple assault, as defined by the law, could involve gestures or threats.
Make no mistake, one assault on a teacher is one too many. But the preferred solution should stress prevention, not punishment, and focus primarily on the root causes of the violence. Once that fails, then the penalties should be severe.
The Dudley student who beat her teacher in 2013 got what she deserved: a prison sentence ranging from 16 months to two years, five months. But as Tillman’s bill is written, a student who committed a much lesser offense would have been branded, for the rest of her life, with the same scarlet letter: a felony conviction.
That wouldn’t be right. Tillman already has made changes to his bill to include exceptions for students with emotional disabilities (who comprised roughly half of the assaults in 2013-14). He needs to make others.
A problem as complex as school violence needs a more thoughtful solution.
