EHS PR disaster
The shocking attack of a teacher at Elgin High School is turning into a public relations disaster for Elgin High School, U-46 and the city of Elgin. The attack in itself is terrible, but it has been made much worse by the refusal of the papers to release the name of the attacker. They are protecting his identity, because he’s a juvenile. As far as I’m concerned, if you’re 16 years old and you try to stab a teacher to death, your rights to privacy are forfeit. This isn’t a case where some kid is caught smoking pot or spraying graffiti on a wall. This is almost as bad as shooting up a school, and you know when that happens, that the names are in the news within hours if not minutes.
Why is it such a big deal that the name has not been released?
Take a look at the comments being left here.
We had looked to purchase in Elgin when my husband job was relocated and coming from Chicago wanted the city life environment….So glad we did our research and moved to Geneva.
Why is all this happening now? We never had these problems, years ago. It has to be the gang inlfuence or the heavy influx of minority students.
Since they haven’t identified the student, chances are he was black or hispanic and the teacher was white. If it was a white kid stabbing a black teacher, rest assured it would be front page news for days and Jesse and Al would be coming and calling for a national apology. Obviously it’s a horrid crime no matter what the races are, and needs to be prosecuted fully. But the MSM and govt have an agenda to cover up the race angle if it’s black-on white or hispanic-on-white crime.
Comments from EHS teachers:
Perhaps they’ll decide to wand every kid entering the building to prevent any retaliatory or ethnic incidents in case students perceive this as a gang/ethnicity-related incident….or maybe they’ll play ostrich, say nothing, and hope all gossip, anger, and frustration will just go away.
We cannot continue to ignore gang activity or just throw our hands up in worthlessness anymore than we can continue to allow students to block the hallways, swear, threaten, scream, wander, listen to their iPods in class.
I get the sense that even teachers do not know what’s going on. When there’s no information, there is misinformation. If you don’t give people the whole story, they make up their own stories. And the story they are making up is that Elgin is full of illegal aliens, gangs and violence and that this is related to that. Of course, we know in reality that gangs don’t have any business stabbing teachers–they typically shoot other gang members, not innocent bystanders. In all likelihood this is a young man with a mental illness. But that’s not the story that people are creating and gossiping about. They create the worst story, not the most plausible one.
If the press does not release the name, U-46, the city of Elgin and the myriad other people who have the details of this case ought to leak it forthwith so that the real story can start to be told–by bloggers if need be. This is the sort of public relations damage that can take years and millions of dollars to undo. The city of Elgin and U-46 had better be in crisis mode, but one doesn’t get the impression that they are…
UPDATE: 1/23/03
The Elgin Courier News printed the name of the attacker in today’s paper. Congratulations to the Courier News. I hope they will continue to aggressively investigate this and get the full story out. The Herald and the Tribune continue their refusal to name the attacker. Presumably they will also refuse to investigate the story, and rely on press conferences. Aren’t you glad we still have a hometown newspaper?
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My condolences to the injured teacher and the family of the accussed attacker.
I agree that more public information should be made available about the incident. Knowing whether the student had mental illness symptoms or treatment, exhibited any violent tendencies or came from a violent home or gang can guide public policy toward making effective change. Just putting in a metal detector will not stop deranged individuals. I think if the child is charged as an adult (which is likely), the release of the offender’s name SHOULD follow adult guidelines.
My son attends Elgin Academy rather than the public schools, in large part, to avoid the safety and student behavior problems endemic to U46. I still love Elgin though.
Thanks for posting about this. I hadn’t known about those forums. Reading through them was a bit scary and sad though. I am continually shocked by the amount of ignorance and prejudice running through Elgin. It’s hard to believe it’s the 2000s and people still say–and believe!–these sorts of things.
Thanks for the comments, guys.
Like you said, metal detectors are probably not the answer. There are plenty of scissors and sharp objects inside the school that could be used as weapons. If you have a motivated attacker, he/she can evade almost any system.
There’s little you can do to prevent a random attack by a disturbed person.
It’s critical that U-46 and Elgin quickly control the news coverage and make sure that the message gets out: this has nothing to do with gangs or the level of violence in the community; this is purely a random act of violence by a disturbed person.
I’m waiting to see how Emily Krone of the Herald tries to tie this tragedy to Connie Neale’s contract. Thank goodness the Courier is still around to dig out information and represent the interests of law-abiding Elgin residents.
On that point, it does seem a bit unfair to indict ordinary Elginites for “prejudice and ignorance” when our media and officials do so much to spin, cover up or ignore pressing civic problems and their origins. RS suggests that U-46 and Elgin try to spin the Gilbert stabbing as “nothing to do with gangs or the level of violence in the community” but just “a random act of violence by a disturbed person.” Perhaps I’ve missing something here, but as of this (Thursday) afternoon I’ve seen no information justifying such spin. And anyway, Elgin and U-46 need a lot more than spin right now. They need leaders committed to frankness, full disclosure, the rule of law and the interests of ordinary, law-abiding American citizens.
It is important that the U-46 Board of Ed. has it’s priorities right, AFETY FIRST. Secondly, if they believe they can’t find a supt. to work for a decent wage, then they should start making some offers to the folks working as Cabinet Level Supts. in U46 right now. For example, Barb Bonnet. Or, some of the others (Head of Secondary Ed., or Head of Elementary Ed., or the list goes on and on and on.) We could make jokes about how many Supt’s. does it take to prevent a gun from being brought in to a high school and we’d be plum out of luck here in U-46 where we have a whole list of people with Sup’t. attached to their names, but none accountable and none apparently wanting to apply for the 420,000+++++
year salary job. How about just eliminating that particular Supt. title-and position, and spend the 420,000+++++
on walk through metal detectors. While cutting positions, cut one or two more. There’s one million dollars to work with, immediately. The Board of Ed. is going about this the wrong way. they need to begin with looking at what they need and then fill those positions. There are MANY Superintendents who would be more than happy to come to work for a few thousand dollars a year salary. Lots of folks out there working as high school prin. with Supt’s. licenses. Lots on staff in U-46 too.
Does the Board think they did so well with the last Sup’t.? Does the Board have something against hiring local talent and homegrown educators? Perhaps some loyalty to the children and community would be gained if they hired a local, as was true with Bob Gilliam. The children in this district aren’t “products” they are people. The teachers are human beings who deserve to be treated with respect and deserve to be working in safe conditions.
Tying correction to previous entry: I meant to say many sup’ts. would be more than pleased to come to Elgin to work for a few HUNDRED thousand dollars a year, perhaps one hundred and fifty, or two hundred, as opposed to over $400,000 per year.
Typing error in prev. entry. The Board of Ed. could save a lot of money that could be used for school safety measures. Security measures have to include technology and preventative measures, behavioral and social.
The Courier News just published more information about the attacker. It seems that this 16 year old was accused of raping an 8 year old on AUGUST 13th. The “Child Advocacy Center” and the “State Crime Lab” have delayed for now over 5 MONTHS to figure out whether or not to charge him. Did U46 know they had a rape suspect in their classroom? If not, I believe the “CAC” was criminally negligent in their duties to safeguard the public. If U46 knew they had a rape suspect in class, they should have informed the teachers and established guidelines keeping the suspect from being alone with a female teacher!
Thanks for the head’s up, Todd. What a shocker. I’ll make a post about this.