Still a Work in Progress

I mentioned here that Tricia loves going to school. More than a week ago though, she has dropped out. Well, actually, her parents opted to pull her out of school. The release form said: “I am pulling out my daughter from school because during her 5 week stay in your school, she had 5 injuries – 2 broken lips from a classmate throwing her a wooden block and a fall down the stairs; 2 bites and a hematoma on the face from another fall.”

My brother and his wife chose the school because the facilities are nice and it was just a few minutes away from our office. We were so disappointed because the school had a good reputation and the tuition fee is not really cheap. The admission officer also reassured them that the maximum is only 10 students per class with 1 teacher and 2 teacher assistants; that would mean 3 students per teacher. My niece is not the easiest of kids to look after because she is very active and inquisitive but she is not one to disrupt a class or bully a classmate. Even the teachers said she was well behaved in class. When the first incident (wooden block) happened, we let it go thinking that sometimes it is unavoidable in a group of kids. As the days went by, we learned that my niece’s case is not an isolated one. Everyday, one child gets one form of injury or another almost caused by the same student. The 2nd and the 3rd incidents happened, the teachers reassured us that the kids need time to adjust. We also heard that they have already talked to the parents of the problem student. The 4th incident was allegedly a fall from a table which caused my niece to hit her face on a shoe rack hence the hematoma. If the teachers already saw Tricia climb on top of the table, shouldn’t they have reprimanded her and immediately removed her from there? The head teacher once again reassured my brother that they will be more vigilant. If that was so, why then did the 5th incident happen? Apparently, Tricia was climbing the stairs to their classroom and doesn’t want to hold the teacher’s hand so she tripped and fell down from the stairs. Our house and even my brother’s house are both 3 floors high! Tricia started climbing the stairs with assistance as early as 1 year old. We taught her early on that she should hold on to the railing everytime she goes up or down the stairs precisely to avoid such accidents; so I really am not convinced that it is what really happened. My brother complained to admission about it and the only solution they had was to add another teacher/assistant to the class.

We are not paying our hard earned money the expensive tuition fee of the school just to have my niece returned to us with an injury. My brother and sister-in-law didn’t want to wait anymore before something worse happens to my niece. When my brother went to the school to officially withdraw my niece from them, they weren’t allowed to enter the school premises and had to wait for about 30 minutes for a personnel from admission to fetch them and neither one of the teachers, the guidance counselor or the head of admission talked to my brother. We are really very disappointed because we expected much from the school. A lot of people are telling us to file a case already.

It’s a good thing Tricia is not traumatized by what happened but we have noticed that she’s a little hard-headed now compared to when she wasn’t going to school yet. She’s also biting us now everytime we reprimand her. She already started Toddler class in another school earlier this week. Although going to her new school is a hassle because of the traffic, we are willing to travel there everyday because we pity her, she really missed going to school and would always tell mommy and daddy that she wants to play with friends (what she calls her classmates). We are also hoping that she forgets the bad attitudes she picked up from the other school. So far, everything is looking good.

**Photo credit here