Taunton second-grader suspended over drawing of Jesus

yizuman

yizuman

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Taunton second-grader suspended over drawing of Jesus - Taunton, MA - The Taunton Gazette

A Taunton father is outraged after his 8-year-old son was sent home from school and required to undergo a psychological evaluation after drawing a stick-figure picture of Jesus Christ on the cross.



The father said he got a call earlier this month from Maxham Elementary School informing him that his son, a second-grade student, had created a violent drawing. The image in question depicted a crucified Jesus with Xs covering his eyes to signify that he had died on the cross. The boy wrote his name above the cross.



“As far as I’m concerned, they’re violating his religion,” the incredulous father said.

He requested that his name and his son’s name be withheld from publication to protect the boy.



The student drew the picture shortly after taking a family trip to see the Christmas display at the National Shrine of Our Lady of La Salette, a Christian retreat site in Attleboro. He made the drawing in class after his teacher asked the children to sketch something that reminded them of Christmas, the father said.



“I think what happened is that because he put Xs in the eyes of Jesus, the teacher was alarmed and they told the parents they thought it was violent,” said Toni Saunders, an educational consultant with the Associated Advocacy Center.



Saunders is working with the boy’s parents after a mutual acquaintance referred them to her.



“When I got that call, I was so appalled that I had to do something,” Saunders said.

“They weren’t looking at the fact that this is an 8-year-old child with special needs,” she added. “They made him leave school, and they recommended that a psychiatrist do an evaluation.”



The school, in fact, required the evaluation before the boy could return, the father said.

Maxham School principal Rebecca Couet referred all questions on the matter to the superintendent’s office.



Superintendent Julie Hackett said district policy prevents her from discussing a “confidential matter regarding a student.”



“Generally speaking, we have safety protocols in place,” Hackett said. “If a situation warrants it, we ask for outside safety evaluations if we have particular concerns about a child’s safety. We followed all the protocols in our system.”



Hackett refused to specifically discuss the student’s drawing or the school’s reaction to it.

The father was flabbergasted when he learned his son had to undergo an evaluation.

“When she told me he needed to be psychologically evaluated, I thought she was playing,” he said.



The man said his son, who gets specialized reading and speech instruction at school, has never shown any tendency toward violence.



“He’s never been suspended,” he said. “He’s 8 years old. They overreacted.”



The boy made the drawing and was sent home from school on Dec. 2. He went for the psychological evaluation — at his parents’ expense — the next day and was cleared to return to school the following Monday after the psychological evaluation found nothing to indicate that he posed a threat to himself or others.



The boy, however, was traumatized by the incident, which made going back to school very difficult, the father said. School administrators have approved the father’s request to have the boy transferred to another elementary school in the district.



This is not the first time in recent years that a Taunton student has been sent home over a drawing. In June 2008, a fifth-grade student was suspended from Mulcahey Middle School for a day after creating a stick figure drawing that appeared to depict him shooting his teacher and a classmate.



The Mulcahey teacher also contacted the police to take out charges in the 2008 incident.
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This isn't the first time this happened. Back in the 1980s, a Virginia school teacher asked the school kids to draw what Christmas meant to them. So they did. She checked each student's work.

One drew Santa Clause.

One drew a Snow Man.

One drew a Christmas tree with presents around it.

One drew Reindeers.

Until....

She came across a little girl who drew Baby Jesus on the Manger, the teacher became enraged and grabbed her paper. She held it up for all the students to see and screamed, "This is against the law!!!" and tore it up in front of the girl in which made her cry. She told her daddy what happened when she came home. The parents called the school. They called the media. They filed a lawsuit against the school for religious discrimination. They won.

The girl was so traumatized that she had to transfer to another school.

Pretty sad how our wonderful country is turning out to be.

In some schools kids fight, sell drugs, have teenage sex in the poorest inner cities schools and it's all ok. But the second you see kids gather around at the flagpole in prayer, they're suspended or expelled from school.

What's wrong with this picture?

Yiz
 
Sue the schools till they learn! I see a future of home schooling with robots for teachers.
 
I grew up very, very Catholic. My mom taught in a Catholic school, I went to CCD, and so forth. Crucifixes all over the house, in church, and in half the houses I knew.

The boy's drawing (checked the link) _does_ strike me as disturbing for Christmas, for exactly that reason. The manger? Baby Jesus? Mary and Joseph? A dove? The Three Wise Men? Jesus is the reason for the season? Yep, Christmas. Graphic depiction of Jesus's death (not birth)? No. For Easter, the imagery of the cross makes sense -- that's about the resurrection (even if the x's over the eyes are kind of over the top.)

If I drew that in CCD for a Christmas assignment, there would definitely be some questions asked. This could be a kid being a kid, which sometimes involves doing inappropriate things, and it could be something else. That would explain the school asking questions.

yizuman said:
This isn't the first time this happened. Back in the 1980s, a Virginia school teacher asked the school kids to draw what Christmas meant to them. So they did. She checked each student's work.

*snip*

She came across a little girl who drew Baby Jesus on the Manger, the teacher became enraged and grabbed her paper. She held it up for all the students to see and screamed, "This is against the law!!!" and tore it up in front of the girl in which made her cry.
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Do you have a source for this?
 
This boy may not be catholic, how he see Christmas is different than how you see it. He could be a baptist.

The x on the eyes could simply mean Jesus died for our sins . The boy was just simply trying to show that the best he knew how. Maybe drawing an eye closed means "sleeping" to him so that probably why he chose the "x" instead of the "U" for the eyes. Died on the Cross is very important for people of some religions, not the birth of Christ. His religion simply could taught him that a Savior was born to died for us.

He is 8 years old, and the school went overboard. They should have waited til they seen other signs.. but this is really religion discrimination.
 
deafdude1 said:
Sue the schools till they learn! I see a future of home schooling with robots for teachers.
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I'm all for home schooling in my house, but I would not presume to tell others they need to. Robots just doesn't make sense. You would never get the programming right. Remember, garbage in=garbage out.

I think the drawing could be taken a number of ways, but by no means does it suggest the child is "unhunged" (my wording). He is 8 years old, and boys have a weird sense of description. My son used to draw pictures of guns, knives dripping with blood and never once has he had any issues regarding stuff like that. He just has a very weird imagination. Still does at 14.
 
Lighthouse77 said:
This boy may not be catholic, how he see Christmas is different than how you see it. He could be a baptist.

*snip*

He is 8 years old, and the school went overboard. They should have waited til they seen other signs.. but this is really religion discrimination.
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The shrine the family visited is a Catholic site. Here's a link: La Salette Home Page They do have crucifixes, but that's not the main focus of their Christmas displays. Christmas at the Shrine

The family might not be Catholic, although if they're going to Catholic sites specifically, I would guess that they are.

So yes, I think asking questions is appropriate. I agree that if the kid was suspended before the school actually asked those questions, then that's going overboard. Don't they have a school counselor?

I don't think it's religious discrimination though. The article mentions another boy in the same district suspended fora non-religious drawing. Sounds more like garden-variety overreacting.
 
I am like you, ms_redcat. I grew up in a dominantly Catholic household, you name it, I wore the t-shirt.

This is the painting you find disturbing for Christmas? Please remember this is an 8 year old who still does not have his cognitive skills down to pat. 8 year old children cannot draw like Picasso. The best they can do are stick people.

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It is the adults who have issues with children's drawing capacities. Whatever sinister thoughts the adults have when they see children's drawing, it is those adults that need to seek psychiatric help, not the children.

Why you need to seek relevancy behind the 1980's Virginia classroom incident, I don't know why. All I know I would not allow a misguided teacher or person teach our future leaders.
 
ms_redcat said:
I grew up very, very Catholic. My mom taught in a Catholic school, I went to CCD, and so forth. Crucifixes all over the house, in church, and in half the houses I knew.

The boy's drawing (checked the link) _does_ strike me as disturbing for Christmas, for exactly that reason. The manger? Baby Jesus? Mary and Joseph? A dove? The Three Wise Men? Jesus is the reason for the season? Yep, Christmas. Graphic depiction of Jesus's death (not birth)? No. For Easter, the imagery of the cross makes sense -- that's about the resurrection (even if the x's over the eyes are kind of over the top.)

If I drew that in CCD for a Christmas assignment, there would definitely be some questions asked. This could be a kid being a kid, which sometimes involves doing inappropriate things, and it could be something else. That would explain the school asking questions.



Do you have a source for this?
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This was in the 1980s when the story broke out. I'll have to do some research in order to find it. May be hard due to the pre-popularity of the internet. Not everything is archived.

Yiz
 
I think it's a whole bunch of to do about nothing. There is nothing disturbing about the picture. Geeze! Some people need to get over themselves.
 
Lighthouse77 said:
This boy may not be catholic, how he see Christmas is different than how you see it. He could be a baptist.

The x on the eyes could simply mean Jesus died for our sins . The boy was just simply trying to show that the best he knew how. Maybe drawing an eye closed means "sleeping" to him so that probably why he chose the "x" instead of the "U" for the eyes. Died on the Cross is very important for people of some religions, not the birth of Christ. His religion simply could taught him that a Savior was born to died for us.

He is 8 years old, and the school went overboard. They should have waited til they seen other signs.. but this is really religion discrimination.
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I agree that the birth of Christ was ultimately for the redemption of all mankind.

John 3: 16 For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.

17 For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved.
 
Those are nice displays. I wouldn't be surprised if any non-catholic visit there for the light show.

I always feel that when a teacher or counselor don't understand certain person's religion, it is easy for them to discriminate or jump into conclusions. I do understand that they felt it is possible that the child was drawing a picture of himself, but again, they should send him to a school counselor and have him explain the picture. If it is about Jesus, then they should just let it drop.

Even if the child was don't care for religion, and drew a broken cross stick body with "x" he is still expressing himself. If a child grew up in a home where he was taught religions cause too many wars and problems, we wouldn't want the school go against him for expressing that, anymore we wouldn't want the school go against children who were raised in a baptist household. The father usually know what the child is trying to draw and feel no further evaluation is needed so that's what so frustrating.

oh it is very possible that the "x" could be the crown of thorns . Again, the school gave the father and the child too much trouble over a religious picture.
 
Before we are quick to judge, why don't we ask for that drawing and see what it's really looks like. I am not sure putting "X" over eyes make any sense to me as well but I also suspect there are more factors to that than just the drawing itself. The fact that he put HIS name is worrisome as it may signal that he thinks he's Jesus.
 
netrox said:
Before we are quick to judge, why don't we ask for that drawing and see what it's really looks like. I am not sure putting "X" over eyes make any sense to me as well but I also suspect there are more factors to that than just the drawing itself. The fact that he put HIS name is worrisome as it may signal that he thinks he's Jesus.
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We need to ask the boy who drew it.

Again, if it is about Jesus, The boy could simply put in name on the cross to show that Jesus died for him. Believe me, If this boy was in a baptist private school, the teachers would see it that way as well.

There's different interpretation of this picture. We need to find out from this boy himself what the picture meant. But the father would know what his son was trying to draw because he taught his son about Jesus. And apparently, the father doesn't think his son has a mental illness.
 
This reminds me of the time in art class a little boy announced he would draw a picture of God. The teacher told him that no one knew what God looks like. The little boy said "They will when I'm done."
 
Lighthouse77 said:
We need to ask the boy who drew it.
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Exactly! I couldn't agree more.

I looked at the picture and thought "hmm, maybe this child thought the crucifix was frightening." Some kids do. So I think it's worth asking him. If he did think that, then let the parents know. If not, go on with the class.

Besides, if we don't ask kids what their drawings mean, we can't find out that they think there should be dinosaurs in the nativity scene. Or that the Easter Bunny is a girl, which both my parents and my third-grade teacher scolded me for! (Why? I have no idea!)
 
we should never scold a child for expressing himself. Drawings are the keys to finding out a child have witnessed something or been abused. You should always find out why a child drew something in certain way.

My son drew his ears WAY too big, and I personally think deafness was a big issue for him (because he is a CODA).
 
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