By Darren Smith, Weekend Contributor
The mother of a third grade girl attending Mill Plain Elementary School in Vancouver, Washington is demanding changes in a school room program where students are required to pay to use the bathroom. The program was to be a lesson in money management where students received and worked for Monopoly Money to buy items in the classroom but the teacher required a payment of M$50.00 in order to use the bathroom.
Jasmine Al-Ayadhi told reporters her nine year old daughter, Reem, did not want to pay to use the bathroom and ultimately had an accident, causing her both discomfort and having to endure teasing by other children. In agreeing with the need to teach children the value of money Jasmine said, “Work for your money, to earn it, to buy like a little toy or a little squirt gun or a little ball. When it comes to a bathroom issue, when a child has to pay money to use the bathroom – that’s wrong. It’s inhumane. That’s a health issue.”
Reem said the students in her class earn money by doing things, such as good deeds, being nice, and finishing school work. She said she uses the money to buy treats like popcorn and pizza.
She also said each student in her class has to pay their teacher M$50 dollars in pretend money to go to the bathroom.
On Thursday, Reem was down to her last M$50. She also had to go to the bathroom. She wanted to buy popcorn, like her friends were doing. She said she wasn’t allowed to go to the bathroom because she didn’t want to pay. She then had an embarrassing accident.
“When it comes to using the bathroom, having to hold her pee, and if she wants to use the bathroom, you make a choice,” Jasmine said. “OK, if you want to use the bathroom it’s going to cost you M$50, but then you don’t have money to buy popcorn. What do you think a child’s going to do?”
The school gave Reem a change of clothes, a pair of royal blue boy’s basketball shorts. Reem said the other kids made fun of her for having an accident, and then for having to wear boys clothes.
“It didn’t feel so well because I had to wear boy pants and I did get teased,” Reem said.
Jasmine said she talked to the principal on Thursday, who promised to follow up about the issue on Friday. As of Friday night, Jasmine said she hadn’t heard back.
“This is a school,” Jasmine said. “This isn’t a jail. This isn’t a prison. We send our kids to school to learn and to get a good education.”
The school’s spokeswoman released a statement.
“We were made aware of the situation Friday evening. We will investigate as soon as possible Monday morning. We work hard to ensure the health and safety of every child and will make sure we do not have any classroom rule that prevents that.”
A similar incident occurred in Lebanon, Oregon and was reported by news station KATU of Portland, Oregon and the school principal dropped the payment requirement after the story aired.
A pediatrician was consulted and provided an opinion of this based upon his experience. Dr. Bruce Birk is a Portland pediatrician. He says that there’s consensus in the medical community on this issue.
“It would be chaos in a classroom for teachers not to have a system,” says Birk. “Holding in the classroom in between well-established potty breaks has not been shown in any sense of the word to be harmful to kids.”
Yet the message this might be teaching children is something that some parents are going to have much objection to. But not only the parents have concerns, the incident at Mill Plain Elementary could have been interpreted as close to violating state law, at least in the sprit of the law as noted by the state legislature.
In 1977, when bathrooms requiring payment were more common, the legislature enacted a law in the state’s Public Health and Safety code to address the issue of those needing to use restrooms and facility owners demanding payment for their use. The law reads:
RCW 70.54.160
Public restrooms — Pay facilities — Penalty.(1) Every establishment which maintains restrooms for use by the public shall not discriminate in charges required between facilities used by men and facilities used by women.
(2) When coin lock controls are used, the controls shall be so allocated as to allow for a proportionate equality of free toilet units available to women as compared with those units available to men, and at least one-half of the units in any restroom shall be free of charge. As used in this section, toilet units are defined as constituting commodes and urinals.
(3) In situations involving coin locks placed on restroom entry doors, admission keys shall be readily provided without charge when requested, and notice as to the availability of the keys shall be posted on the restroom entry door.
(4) Any owner, agent, manager, or other person charged with the responsibility of the operation of an establishment who operates such establishment in violation of this section is guilty of a misdemeanor.
While many could see this as making a mountain out of a mole hill, one has to ask what kind of lesson a policy requiring payment by nine year old students to use a bathroom teaches children.
By Darren Smith
Sources:
KATU
Revised Code of Washington
The views expressed in this posting are the author’s alone and not those of the blog, the host, or other weekend bloggers. As an open forum, weekend bloggers post independently without pre-approval or review. Content and any displays or art are solely their decision and responsibility.
Again, Paul needs education more than the rest.
The nickname “Artful Dodger” is still commonly used to refer to someone who is good at avoiding responsibility or the consequences of his or her actions.
Lucy – the Artful Dodger is a key character in Oliver Twist and the mentor of Oliver. Don’t any of you read?
Lucy – here is a dictionary definition of artful dodger as used now
someone who is clever and manages to get out of difficult situations and avoid answering questions
Elaine – one of the great disappointments to children is when they finally learn they are not a ‘special snowflake’ and they never were. We are not doing them any favors by treating them as such.
I agree with the above statement 100% but that does not mean you treat them as special snowflakes.
Every child IS special. Teachers should strive to learn about each child’s uniqueness, talents, strengths, and needs. Mike Appleton didn’t miss anything. In his comments on this thread, he showed–as he usually does–that he is the voice of reason and common sense.
As said by the second artful dodger.
Lucy V – if that was directed at me, thank you for the compliment. The Artful Dodger was highly skilled at his craft. He was the best of the group of children. It is a high compliment indeed. 🙂
The very wise Mike Appleton wrote: “Teaching children the value of money is important. That can be accomplished in a variety of ways. Charging a child to use a school toilet is not one of them. This is a failure of basic common sense. Enough said.”
And it bears repeating.
swellkid – there are some here…
vs
swellkid – there are some…
Personalizing in an understated, backhanded manner.
anon – you appear to be one who thinks every child is a special snowflake. That is your privilege. I wrote what I did exactly the way I intended. I think the ‘very wise Mike Appleton’ missed the intended purpose of the lesson, which seemed to be as much about teaching the difference between wants and needs as it was money. Money is abstract, it only represents what we can buy with it. In itself it has no intrinsic value, it is just a piece of paper. Just like Monopoly money.
BTW, just to call you out, using “the very wise” is a call to authority. We have no knowledge that Mike is any authority on the teaching of children in a school setting. He has an opinion.
Good Grief.
swellkid, PaulS and I were teachers[secondary] who were castigated here for saying what you just did. Thanks for weighing in w/ your experience. We need more teachers commenting here. I’ll assume you’re female since you teach first grade. We need more women here as well. Keep your real world experience, common sense comments coming.
Anyone who is jumping to the conclusion that the teacher is in the wrong needs to take a moment and think about what the classroom environment is like. I teach 1st grade. Would it surprise you to hear that often students ask to go to the bathroom even when they don’t need to go? Would it surprise you that students have been trained to say “it’s an emergency” because they know I have to let them go. Kids miss instruction, sometimes a lot. I can’t go looking for a kid who’s been in the bathroom for ten minutes because I can’t leave my classroom unattended. We have a system to make sure that kids are in the classroom during learning times and that they use their breaks and transition times for using the bathroom. This is the reality. The idea that any student can go at any time isn’t realistic. I also don’t send more than one student at a time so a student may have to wait to go. Is this cause for outrage? If this situation outrages you, I think you may need to read some real news.
swellkid – there are some here who think every child is a ‘special snowflake’ and as we teachers know, none of them are that special. 🙂 I am not sure I would set my token economy up that way, but I am not sure that I would not have. I would have to see the state mandated curriculum to decide.
“The idea that any student can go at any time isn’t realistic. I also don’t send more than one student at a time so a student may have to wait to go. ”
Sigh, someone who made it into the teaching profession and can’t tell the difference between an artificial constraint that cannot be justified in the classroom and limitations in the facilities and staff over which the teacher has no control.
Just one more example of why we ought to pay more so we can hire better teachers.
Byron – he was paid by the word and they were serialized in one of the local London papers, then hard-bound. That is why they are so long. 🙂 Barristers in England used to get paid by the word for their legal documents which is why some of them are longer than necessary.
Attorneys produce nothing, they just slice up the pie made by others and take a slice or 3 themselves. Welcome to the “beef box” MikeA.
Paying a lawyer for most anything is a failure of common sense. All it does is put money in their pocket and take from yours and the person on the other side.
The only ones who win in a conflict are the lawyers. Go with arbitration if you can and make sure they arent lawyers.
Conflict avoidance and swift resolution is bad for lawyers, now there is a scary thought. The lawyers have a vested interest in a chaotic society. There is much money to be made on chaos.
Not allowing a young child the use of the bathroom in time of need is the mark of an authoritarian control freak.
When nature calls, it is best to answer.
Personanongrata – different schools have different policies about bathroom breaks. Sometimes the administration sets the policy, sometimes the teacher sets the policy.
Teaching children the value of money is important. That can be accomplished in a variety of ways. Charging a child to use a school toilet is not one of them. This is a failure of basic common sense. Enough said.
Charging someone to use the court system is also a failure of common sense?
Glad you’re still here nick, are me done watching Rudolph?
BFM, LOL! You have a great sense of humor ad imagination. But, I could not be the Moderator Emeritus. That would cause a full blown mutiny. I think you have the chops to be the new Joe Pyne. Joe was a tough, no BS, moderator and his audience was mostly misfits. Kinda like here!
Feynman, hang in there. I firmly believe in the goodness of most people and in the end they prevail. And thanks for your support, I did see it before it was deleted.
We are an impossible bunch.
Someone advises not to engage while engaging.
Someone wants only substantive comments and writes 500 words that belong in a private email.
I believe this comment is civil. I won’t be surprised if it is deleted.
We are an impossible bunch.
Paul,
Did you read the headlines?