Politically Annoying

Yesterday I received a large manila envelope addressed to "Mr. and Mrs. Potvin" from the elementary "school" here.  I haven't been Mrs. Potvin since 2007.  I'm not going to say that the administration at the school is incompetent, but you would think that they would have looked at that GD paperwork that I just sent in for the FOURTH time due to their mishandling of paperwork outlining all of her family information!  You would think!!!

Today my panties are in a twist because when I opened this manila envelope, expecting yet another copy of that form that I just sent back, a stapled copy of the bullying and student conduct policy fell out accompanied by a confusing and vague form letter.  While happy for the change from redundancy I quickly felt a hot coal of irritation and anger growing in my squishy gut.

The gist of this letter is this (paraphrased of course):

"Your daughter may have been exposed to inappropriate student behavior on Feb 8.  We can't tell you anything about it due to our strict confidentiality policy, but here is a packet of common sense for you to go over with your daughter.  We put both prevention of harrassment and student discipline forms in there so you really just can't figure out which side of the tracks your daughter was on.  Due to that there confidentiality policy we have to try to confuse you to the extent that you might beat your kid just in case they were the bully.  Oh and please have your daughter narc out whoever and whatever happened if you get a chance.  Have a nice day (or not, depends on what you think happened),


PreK-2 Principal"

Wait, what?  This happened a week ago, my daughter never told me anything about it, and I received NO phone call about this incident that was important enough to send me a packet of crap about.  When I see the words "exposed" and "inappropriate behavior" I'm thinking someone showed her their thingy or they made her show them her thingy!!

I asked her this morning about it and she said "OH yeah Mom my friends and I were playing a chase game and Alex (a boy that is a known trouble maker in her class) punched my best friend Hailey in the face.  But it was an accident!  She didn't tell the teacher about it because she didn't want to have to go to the nurse's office."

Apparently the administration spoke to all the students involved as a GROUP.  This means that they treated both bully and victim exactly the same.  Oh, but its being investigated and they will contact me upon resolution.  YEAH RIGHT.  If I do nothing I bet I never hear of it again.

Just yesterday I was telling a friend that my neighbor thinks her 11 year old son does no wrong.  He's been suspended, sent home early, and issued warnings for behavioral matters.  But she says, "He is just with the wrong group of kids.  He didn't do anything wrong they just think he did." Yeah, ok lady.  Keep living in that fantasy world of yours and when you are bailing him out of jail you can tell that to the judge.

Here's what I think of my 7 year old daughter's personality from what I have seen over the years:

• Thinks a snapdragon is an insect and jumps 10 feet in the air when you tell her there is one near her.  Is afraid of most things that move.
• Gives her baby sister a bath and patiently washes her hair even though she's screaming and trying to kick her in the face.
• Cries when someone else is getting hurt.
• Cries when someone says "I hate you" at school even if they weren't directly talking to her.
• Cries for no reason except that she misses her _______________  (dad, aunt, grandparent, blankie, stuffed animal, etc.)
• Still has a blankie that she carries around the house.  I'm not going to take that away from her.
• Protective of her friends even when they tell her they want to kill her. (yes this happened just 2 weeks ago.  didn't get a note home about that one)
• Concerned that same friend who wants to kill her thinks she is half-vampire and doesn't believe in Heaven.  Prays for this friend.
• All the pictures that she draws include hearts, princesses, rainbows, and churches.  Doesn't look like typical serial killer artwork at least.

And here is what her latest parent teacher conference summed up as:
"Your daughter is one of my favorite students.  She is so well behaved, always quiet when she is supposed to be, considerate, cooperative, just an absolute JOY to have in my class" --2nd grade teacher

So you can see why I'm kind of confused here.  Does she have some kind of violent tendency? Am I pulling the wool over my eyes and seeing only innocence when there might be aggression?  I have absolutely NO idea.  That is how vague this letter was.

So, do I contact the school?  I have a WTF letter written in email and saved in draft that I'm not sure I should bother sending.  Would I be able to make any difference in the machine that is Political Correctness?  Why is the administration so afraid to call kids out for what they are?  Oh dear, the parent might remove their kid and homeschool them or send them to private school.  GOOD!  There are too many kids in that school anyway.  If I still had half my brain and more of an attention span than that of a flea I would try to homeschool.  But I know it would be a disaster.  And private school is upwards of $5000 a year PER kid on top of the insane school tax we already pay for this crappy school.

I just haven't had any good experiences with this school yet outside of my child's parent teacher conferences, which are always good news, but that is such a small part of the school experience.