We Have To Get Rid of Time-Out Rooms

Following up on my post yesterday, I am going to make a follow-up plea today that we start eliminating these rooms. Last night I had access to some school data on usage of time-out rooms and I was absolutely in shock. Unfortunately, I cannot share this raw data and you will just have to take my word for it, but it was stark. Students were being forced into the "time-out" room sometimes more frequently than they were in the classroom. In one school year, one of the students at this school spent 80 hours in the time-out room. Some teachers referred students to the time out room on a daily basis. Sometimes for nothing more than not having their homework finished. Some administrators, in taking in a troubled student from another district, planned for the student to spend the majority of his days in time-out. Before they even met the kid.

This has got to stop. 

The question is how do you make this stop.

Legislation would be a good idea. A bill in Missouri attempted to do just that, and hopefully those bills will become more popular across the country until a few get passed and hopefully that will start the ball rolling. Some departments of education are passing guidance, but I see this as being above the DOE level. 

Secondly, Colleges of Education have to do better on preparing administrators and teachers for this. The disparity between teachers in how they used this room in the data I saw (some teachers never, some teachers daily) speaks to the lack of preparation for this issue.  

Third, though, I think there is a huge potential for lawsuits here to bring these rooms down. First, this is false imprisonment. Certainly my post yesterday had the makings of a viable false imprisonment claim and the beauty of a false imprisonment claim is that it is an intentional tort, so immunity laws would not protect and teachers could be personally liable as well. It wouldn't take many of these cases to shock administrators and teachers into changing their behavior. There may even be a criminal charge that could be applicable (I would have to do more research on that to be sure).  

Next, there is a lot of due process issues entangled in this - and my feeling is that schools are not getting them right. Really, this is a suspension, plan and simple. Since it is a suspension, all the due process that accompanies suspensions should accompany this ... but my feeling is that it is not. From the number of incidents I saw yesterday, the principal would be spending all her time filling out paperwork for these things if it was being done properly. Students and parents need to be aware that their rights are probably being violated in a ton of these cases, and again, a few highly publicized lawsuits would help. 

Bottom-line: This needs to stop. The padded room concept has gone way past its original intentions and there is simply no way to justify the expansive use of these rooms today. How did we even allow this to happen in the first place?  

Comments

[Joe D'Amato]

My school has a Time-out room which teachers have the ability to use. It is staffed by a certified teacher, and is for a temporary "Student Removal". This is the first building I have worked in that has a time-out room, and I was under the impression that is fulfills the SAVE legislation regarding teachers removing a student from class.

We have a procedure in place that must be followed. It includes talking to the child regarding the behavior, and immediate parental contact.

What are your thoughts?

[Justin B.]

Well, I have a couple thoughts - thanks for the question, Joe.

First, this is certainly the most palatable of these ideas - and I think this is the intention by which administrators are adopting these rooms across Kentucky and the nation. So, in theory this is not that bad.

But, even in theory I don't love this idea. You are removing the student from the "least restrictive environment" to borrow a term. Students learn best in the classroom with their regular teacher and all their regular classmates. This is the environment where they are the most comfortable and there is no mental strain - the student is ripe for learning. On top of that, the best teacher for teaching 7th grade math is the homeroom teacher, not the time-out teacher, who is probably not certified in that area. So, you are taking something away from the kid, whether or not that removal is enough to trigger due process (in my opinion it is, and that due process should be no different than a suspension).

That is just the theoretical and legal aspects of this, though. The practical aspects is what is even more concerning because based on the data I saw and my experience as an educator, the natural result of creating this kind of space is that teachers will exploit it and send kids for unreasonable things. Administrators can put procedures in place, but even the administrators position is going to be mixed. They spent $60,000 or so in their budget to put a certified teacher in that room, so what good is that expenditure if it is not used? Plus, the room starts to serve as a first line of defense against these issues arriving at the principal's office. Bottom line is that this room just makes things easier on teachers and administrators ... which in and of itself is not a bad thing. But, it is at the expense of student's education. Most discipline issues should be dealt with in the classroom. Removal from the learning environment should be one of the last resorts, not a first resort ... like I clearly saw was happening with that Kentucky data.