Middle School beating leads to bullying talk in Bristol Warren

Student's nose broken last month; mother wants policy changes

By Ted Hayes
Posted 7/9/18

The mother of a Kickemuit Middle School student who last month suffered six stitches and a broken nose at the hands of a classmate wants the state and the Bristol Warren Regional School District to get …

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Middle School beating leads to bullying talk in Bristol Warren

Student's nose broken last month; mother wants policy changes

Posted

The mother of a Kickemuit Middle School student who last month suffered six stitches and a broken nose at the hands of a classmate wants the state and the Bristol Warren Regional School District to get tougher on bullying, and has helped organize a meeting on the matter this Thursday at school district headquarters.

Diane Swire, of Bristol, the mother of Evan Swire, an eighth grader at Kickemuit, is calling for a systemic change in the way bullying is handled across the state, following an incident on Tuesday, June 19 that left her son bloody, beaten and traumatized. It was the last day of school, and with lessons completed Kickemuit administrators organized a field day for students at the Pete Sepe Pavilion. Walking back to Kickemuit at the end of the day a boy, one of a group of four walking behind Evan, started poking him and saying things designed “to get a rise out of him,” Ms. Swire said. She said her son asked the boys to stop several times, pushed one of them gently when he got no response, she said, and was then threatened with a beating. After her son tried “to defend himself” and pushed back a second time, one of the boys punched him once in the nose, breaking it and opening a gash that required six stitches to close. Ms. Swire received a call from the school minutes later, and though she’d been told her son had a bloody nose was surprised to learn about the fight when she arrived to pick him up. She took Evan to the emergency room, where doctors attended to his injuries.

The next day, they spoke to Warren police detectives, who have not brought charges in the matter. Ms. Swire said that though her son could legally be seen as the instigator as he pushed first, he has been haunted by the run-in. But though he has tried to apologize to her multiple times, saying that he just couldn’t take the taunting, aggression, poking and name-calling, she doesn’t think an apology is necessary — “I can’t blame him for protecting himself.” Ms. Swire reserves less understanding for the school department, which she believes handled the incident poorly.

District policy dictates that suspensions do not carry over from one school year to the next, and therefore administrators have not and do not intend to punish the student who hit her son.  On Monday, Superintendent Dr. Mario Andrade confirmed that that is the case and added that while all policies are reviewed from time to time, the incident will not likely lead to a review of that suspension carryover policy. 

Overall, the district takes its lead on school bullying from regulations on the subject put in place statewide by the Rhode Island Department of Elementary and Secondary Education (RIDE). In addition, Dr. Andrade has agreed to meet with Ms. Swire, Bristol Warren Regional School Committee Chairman Paul Silva, District 68 Rep. Kenneth Marshall and perhaps, other parents, to talk about the matter this coming Thursday, July12. The meeting is set for 5:30 p.m. at school district headquarters. Rep. Marshall, who helped organize the meeting after getting a call from Ms. Swire, said he hopes the meeting will start discussion on a possible change to statewide Rhode Island Department of Education (RIDE) policy on bullying, which he said sometimes ties the hands of local districts.

“One of the frustrations … is when bullying occurs, there isn’t any type of disciplinary action for it, because the schools seem to have their hands tied from the RIDE regulations,” he said. “I told her this may be an opportunity to have a discussion of what schools can do to (punish) students when they’re found to be an instigator of bullying, maybe with community service? It would have to be legislated through RIDE, and RIDE would have to authorize a program like this to be instituted. So this conversation (Thursday) is seeing if this is something that the school system wants to take part in. I think this is the first of many.” Ms. Swire said she has contacted other parents who have had dealt with bullying, and hope the meeting will bear some fruit. “What can we do?” she asked. “We need tougher laws. We need something to be done for these kids. I don’t understand how this isn’t taken more seriously.”

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