More Spanking? Nooooooo

Barbara Pytel, Paulline Larson Photography

Posted by
Barbara Pytel
Feb 16, 2007

Teaching can be a very stressful profession. Having control of the classroom is necessary for good teaching. But, do we have to resort to spanking?

Melodee Blobaum of The Kansas City Star reports that Journey is proposing that school districts and employees who spank students should be immune from lawsuits and criminal prosecution. The spanking would only be done if the school had permission from parents in writing to do so. 29 states have banned corporal punishment but Kansas is not one of them. However, the majority of Kansas school districts have banned corporal punishment within their district.

Are local school districts supportive of this proposed legislation? No. In fact, they state that corporal punishment is not effective. Kelli Mather, executive director of student and family services for the Kansas City, Kansas School District states, "If we model a behavior that is exactly what we don't want students to do, I don't see how that would improve the situation,"

So, what is the point to all of this? This is another example of government legislating what schools should do without the knowledge to make informed decisions. Surely, the Kansas legislature has more to do than discuss corporal punishment when most of the state has already discussed it and voted against it.

Read previous articles on Educational Issues.