A friend gave me a heads-up about this story, and I think it’s an indicator that “zero tolerance” in schools may have gone just a bit far (emphasis in original throughout)…
SHAWANO, WISCONSIN – What’s love got to do with it? Not much, especially if you say the words “I love you” in the Menominee language in front of a certain Wisconsin teacher.
Seventh grader Miranda Washinawatok, Menominee, found this out.
Miranda speaks two languages: Menominee and English. She also plays on her basketball team. However, two Thursdays ago she was suspended for one basketball game because she spoke Menominee to a fellow classmate during class.
Miranda attends Sacred Heart Catholic Academy in Shawano, Wisconsin. The school body is over 60 percent American Indian. The school is approximately six miles from the south border of the Menominee Indian Tribe Reservation.
It also sounds like no one wants to take responsibility for the decision to suspend her from the basketball team:
“Miranda kept saying she was only told by her assistant coach she was being benched because two teachers said she had a bad attitude. I wanted to know what she did to make them say she had a bad attitude.”
At the school, the teachers and coaching staff seemed to want to cast blame on each other, according to Miranda’s mother.
So what did Miranda do?
The alleged ‘attitude problem’ turned out to be that Miranda said the Menominee word
“posoh”
that means
“hello”and said
“Ketapanen”
in Menominee that means “I love you.”
Miranda and a fellow classmate were talking to each other when Miranda told her how to say “Hello” and “I love you” in Menominee.
“The teacher went back to where the two were sitting and literally slammed her hand down on the desk and said, “How do I know you are not saying something bad?”
The story did not end there. In the next session, another teacher told Miranda she did not appreciate her getting the other teacher upset because “she is like a daughter to me.”
The school did eventually apologize… sort of.
[Miranda's mother Tanaes] Washinawatok has had a total of three meetings with school officials and was promised Miranda would receive a public apology, as would the Menominee Tribe, and the apologies would be publically placed.
“On Wednesday, a letter was sent to parents and guardians. A real generic letter of apology, that really did not go into specifics as to why there was this apology,” Washinawatok told the Native News Network Thursday evening.
“I still don’t think it was enough,”
Normally, I am a supporter of Catholic schools, though I am not Catholic myself, because they generally provide a much higher quality education than public schools do. This incident, however, sort of shakes that. I’d say those teachers need to be disciplined and a better apology needs to be given to Miranda.
(Image of Miranda from Native News Network story linked above)
i’m surprised the school did not torture the girl like the japanese did to the navajo code talkers in order to learn what was being said
I sometimes mumble to myself in Korean, Japanese, Vietnamese, or Spanish. I don’t speak any of them fluently but since I learned them in the Marine Corps while working with their people or in their countries you can bet I’m not mumbling nice thoughts when I switch away from English. I bet those teachers would hear quite a bit of mumbling from me.
Interesting. If the girls had been saying something nasty, would that make the punishment acceptable? Which does make me wonder if the kids would admit it if they had been saying something rude?
If they’re going to insist that only English be spoken at school, then they need to make that an explicit rule. Benching a kid for an infraction that is not spelled out is ridiculous.
Catholic schools or not, the teachers are the brain-addled indoctrinees of modern schools of education, where concern for the students has been supplanted by PC.
If you tell them they did something wrong, they stare at you blankly, at best, or more likely with condescending disapproval, because of course they are the professionals, and you are not.
Solution: schools under the control of the parents – even the inmates running the asylum would be better than this – and the elimination of tenure. Or is there a better solution? Charter schools? Or some other way of opening the educational system to market forces.
Unfortunately, this was a Catholic school, which makes the free-market solution unworkable.
I wouldn’t be so quick to condemn the teacher. These stories tend to leave out details that do not fit the journalist’s narrative. Maybe the kid was a brat.
Always possible, given seventh-grade kids, but I think if that were the case the school wouldn’t even have offered the lukewarm apology that they did.
羔羊中的孤羊
I love Firefly.
I think the teacher should have taken the girl’s word – I mean, if she’d been calling the teacher a ‘bitch’ don’t you think that would have meant there would have been more discussion between the girls, or laughter? I think the teacher jumped to conclusions and they really deserved more punishment, and the girl’s deserved more than the generic apology they were given.
Do they teach other languages, such as German, Spanish and French at that school? Wouldn’t they want students to practice other language skills? (I’d say foreign, but can’t really call Indian languages “foreign”.)
It may not be instantly obvious, but this is particularly a sore point for us Indian Peepuls because it was a long-term policy of some of the Reservation Schools to try to stamp out the use of native languages. So while I don’t think it’s this school’s policy, I can tell you the teacher has stepped in it big time.
This.
Also, the teacher should lose her job. Most ‘teachers’ should lose their jobs, actually.
If she wanted to know what the kid was saying, she should make an attempt to learn the language.
Sounds to me the teacher has a insecurity issue. All
children talk about their teachers, good or bad.
Why did the other teacher say anything to the girl?
Did Ms. Insecurity need support against teenage
girls? If so, both should not be teaching.
The girls should learn some good old-fashioned Latin profanity. How could the “teacher” object to that?
I can’t resist this…perhaps the teachers should be given a–wait for it–”Miranda” warning?
Seriously, she’s talking a different language, and teaching one of the other kids. How is this bad?
Punny, David, very punny.
And I’m almost ashamed I didn’t think of it myself. Almost.
@Charlie: I think it’s STUPID. Before long, all we’ll be speaking is English, and that’s WRONG. I see nothing wrong with this girl and her friend speaking their native language. If the teacher doesn’t understand it, that’s THE TEACHER’S problem, but they try to squash the use of native languages – they are our heritage, and we will be the losers in the end, if people are allowed to squash this. (And no, I’m not Indian, I’m Caucasian, but I feel strongly about this).
@David: I don’t think she was TEACHING the other kid, I think they were just exchanging greetings in their native tongue. And it’s not bad. What’s bad is the teacher’s reaction. A generic apology is not what *I* would accept. I’d want a specific one.
But then again, I’m also someone that would get discriminated against. Put a set of stairs in front of me, and I am stuck. I use a wheelchair, due to physical disability.
My point is, discrimination is discrimination. And it’s wrong. These girls were discriminated against because they spoke to each other in their own language.
“Before long, all we’ll be speaking is English, and that’s WRONG.”
Oh, nonsense. There is a huge lobby in this country that wishes to make us a Spanish speaking country. Our illegals will never assimilate.
well at least now the teacher can rest assured that they will all be speaking badly ..about her!
Of course, had Miranda spoken Spanish, the reaction and outcome would have been very different.
Good grief. Over reaction much? I’m so glad I’m not in school anymore, public or private. I’d have been suspended so many times at this point for doing perfectly harmless things that I’d only be as educated as your typical OWS supporter! It was still legal to bring an ACTUAL butter knife to school when I was a kid; real metal and everything. Try that now and you’re expelled.
Without knowing the full story I can’t entirely blame the school, but nor am I going to give them a pass on this. They must know the racial makeup of their student body, and should have picked up at least SOME Menominee from osmosis alone. “Hello” is not exactly an uncommon phrase in any language, and with a student body that is 60% Menominee, it’s probably spoken a lot in the halls. Do these teachers and coaches not LISTEN when their students are chatting with each other? Sure we know they hear things being said — that’s how this whole debacle got started — but do they actually LISTEN? Because I’m pretty sure the way “I love you” is spoken is going to be very different from the way “You’re a b!tch” or “f**k the police” is spoken. The former is generally benign; the latter two would justify a trip to the Principal’s office.
A simple reminder, “Remember, girls, English only while in school,” would have been perfectly sufficient in this situation, provided such a proviso exists in the school’s Rules and Regulations. Otherwise, an equally simple question – “Miranda, are you teaching your friend some Menominee? That’s nice. What words?” – would have gone a long way to making this situation positive rather than divisive.
Please sign this petition to show your support for Miranda and the importance of reviving this beautiful language of Menominee.
http://www.thepetitionsite.com/1/Ketapanen-not-four-letter-word/
Language is a vital part of culture, and trying to destroy it is like destroying a species. We must start respecting and preserving our cultures and languages, before we lose all the wisdom and beauty they bring us.
There are more written comments on this petition than any other I have seen. Please join and show the world how important this issue is to some many. Don’t let this culture get buried again, as it has been for too long.
Thanks, Susan V