We can do better

My mid-week blog post on the Lincoln Police Department's response to behavioral crises involving young children at elementary schools started a spirited discussion, with comments ranging from the ignorant to the eloquent. I'd like to close it with a few observations.

There are a fair number of Lincoln police officers who were teachers and even members of school boards. There are several school staff members, likewise, who wore our uniform. There are plenty of husbands and wives, brothers and sisters, and other family members whose professional lives take place in police cars and classrooms. We cope with the same kinds of social problems and dysfunctions every day, and it's a pretty common topic of discussion. Protest as you may, you know we can do better in coping with the high needs of a small number of children in our schools.

Most people in Lincoln are somewhat oblivious to this issue. They simply don't know what teachers, principals, administrators, and police officers know: we have an increasing number of little kids with serious behavior disorders, mental illnesses, and just plain conduct problems. Other people are more aware, but don't realize just how acute it can be at times.

It's not going away soon, and no amount of wistful pining for the 1950's will change that. Although some of these problems are clearly traceable to the complete absence of parental care and responsibility, others are not, and in many cases very loving and capable parents are trying to cope as best they can with a high-needs child for whom they desperately want the best opportunity.

Maybe we need more capacity at the special-needs facilities and programs already operated by our school district. Maybe we need better laws, policies, or guidelines. Maybe we need a small group of more highly-trained and experienced rapid responders for our rare but acute crises. Maybe we need more creative thought. I don't know, or pretend to know. It's incredibly easy to run someone else's business--poorly. I do know, however that we certainly need more parenting education, more teenage pregnancy prevention, more substance abuse treatment, more surrogate grandparents, more respite care, more home-visiting public health nurses, more Teammates, more Big Brothers and Big Sisters.

Right now, it appears to me that we rely upon teachers and principals to control the most serious manifestations of these behaviors. They are very good, but sometimes they are overwhelmed by the severity and intensity of the behavior they are called upon to deal with. In these extreme cases they must rely on the coercive power of the police, and on the ability and willingness of the police (when necessary) to physically restrain, arrest, or take children away. As a City, School District, and society, we ought to do better.

I hope that funding priorities are not an impediment to finding a better way. Those are some pretty impressive athletic facilities, and I hope that garnering support for schools in Lincoln does not come at the expense of bending our priorities to fit what we perceive as the demands of our popular culture, rather than the most important needs of our educators and our students.

There are some teachers or staff members who have posted on this blog who are mad at this messenger who is questioning the response to behavioral crises involving little children.

I don't buy it.

This is an emotional response (to which they are entitled), but they, more than anyone, know that we can do better and that we should. They may call the police, but they cry when a mentally ill child, or a child with a behavior disorder, or a child with no impulse control, must be intimidated by the presence of a police officer--or worse. They cry. I know this with certainty. Even when they are frustrated, frightened, assaulted, and exhausted, their heart breaks. They know that what this child needs is a skilled counselor, or a clinical psychologist, or a psychiatric social worker, or a hospital bed, or a competent parent. Or love.

They do not need, at the age of 7, a police incident report, a citation, handcuffs, fear, and the Plexiglas-enclosed back seat of a police cruiser. Unfortunately, several times a year that's the best we can muster.

As Forrest Gump said, "That's all I have to say about that."