Letter to the editor: ADM needs to address bullying, reader says

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To the editor:

The Adel-De Soto-Minburn schools have a massive ongoing bullying issue. Our family has absolutely had it with ADM ignoring the serious bullying issues they have and have had for entirely too long.

Apparently in ADM you get an out-of-school suspension and are not allowed to participate in your sport when you get punched at school two days in a row. My niece slapped her assailant back on Thursday, trying to get her off of her after getting punched in the back of the head and thrown into a locker.

On Friday all she did was verbally say something back to the girl when the girl was also saying stuff to her, and then in the hallway the girl got a hold of her and punched her multiple times in the top of her head, and my niece didn’t even touch her back.

My sister had to go get my niece, and all the principal was concerned about was what happened Thursday, which he only knows about via hearsay from middle school gossip in the halls.

No teachers witnessed either of these altercations, which makes me question why the halls aren’t being monitored even slightly between classes. That was not the case when I was in school.

The principal did all he could to avoid any talk of Friday’s altercation, just saying that it “would be addressed Monday.”

This is beyond unacceptable, and we have had it. If the schools won’t do a single thing to address the bullying and harassment, then we will.

Every single year in Adel, a kid I know has to go through this nonsense, and it needs to stop. It needs to stop being brushed off as “kids will be kids,” or “that’s life,” or “it’s a rite of passage that we all endured.”

I even know parents of this group of girls who are low enough to encourage their children to start these physical altercations. No child should be afraid of going to school.

The ADM schools are failing our community and our youth horribly by ignoring this.

Kiarha Rae Steece
Adel

6 COMMENTS

  1. I got bullied at this school, too. By the cheerleaders when I was in sixth, seventh and eighth grades. In sixth grade I went to the counselor and told him I was being bullied about the way I looked by a girl who I thought was my friend. I was made fun of because I didnt like to change in front of other girls for gym class. All they told me was to ignore her and avoid her, and I tried my best to do that but it didnt help that she was in all the classes I was in, and I had to wait to second semester to get my classes changed. In seventh grade I was followed home by the same girl, and we were both in cheerleading. She accused me of stealing her phone, and she took my cheerleading bag and dumped it out. I told the counselor. In eighth grade I was having family problems, and one day I missed school because we had a big family problem. The next day when I got back to school, the same girl from sixth grade somehow found out that something big happened and told the whole class and kept pressuring me to tell her what happened, so then all the other students started questioning me about it, too. Feeling cornered, I grabbed my books and left class. I was in my locker, and the counselor walked over to me and told me he didn’t have time to talk to me because he had to teach the class I had just left. He told me to pull myself together and come back to class. All the bullying stopped when the girl moved after eighth grade year.

  2. I, too, was bullied. It started at my babysitters house in the district. Her kids went to the middle school, and one was younger than me. They all used to call me names, and I remember one specific incident where I was supposed to be napping, and one of her boys came to me and actually lifted up my eyelid to check if I was asleep. Once I got older and was in elementary school, a new kid made me his target and continuously harassed me and my friend all through middle school. I was almost always telling teachers and asking them to help me stop it. It didn’t stop until I had finally snapped as a freshman and physically retaliated against him. He finally got the message that I was done with his nonesence. The staff at ADM only care about their sporty children, not the quiet kids. My little brother is still bullied every day, inside and outside of school.

  3. Been there, done that. I stood up for myself when a girl kept hitting me in the head with a basketball, and the school didn’t care all because her parents gave money to the school. I ended up hitting her a couple of times, and they never did anything to her, but I got suspended for a week all because I was defending myself in front of the whole class. ADM is a joke. I’m surprised there hasn’t been a shooting there yet because of all the people and teachers who see it but don’t care.

  4. Thank you for this letter! In a period of time when school violence and teen suicide is so horrendous, bullying just can’t be ignored anymore. I live in Adel, and Facebook is rampant with families in town struggling with these issues. We don’t need a tragedy to happen to do something. Something needs done now!

  5. ADM only cares about the students who are in sports. The whole place is runs on social status. If your kid doesn’t play a sport, then you’re not important. Even the kids in band were horrible, very passive agressive.

  6. I have gotten bullied ever sense kindergarten, and it seems like no one will do anything. A few months ago I was too afraid to go to school because of the bullying, and I lied to my mom, saying I was sick. Someone needs to do something.

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