[Paleopsych] NYT: College Expels Student Who Advocated Corporal Punishment

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New York Region > College Expels Student Who Advocated Corporal Punishment
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/03/10/nyregion/10paddle.html
March 10, 2005

    By PATRICK D. HEALY

    SYRACUSE, March 8 - As a substitute teacher in the public schools
    here, Scott McConnell says students are often annoyed that he does not
    let them goof off in class. Yet he was not prepared for the sixth
    grader who walked up to his desk in November, handed in an assignment,
    and then swore at him.

    The profanity transported him back to his own days at Robert E. Lee
    Elementary School in Oklahoma in the 1980's, when there was a swift
    solution for wiseacres: the paddle.

    "It was a footlong piece of wood, and hung on every classroom wall
    like a symbol, a strong Christian symbol," said Mr. McConnell, who is
    26. "Nobody wanted that paddle to come down."

    He said he had been a disruptive student, and routinely mouthed off
    until his fourth-grade teacher finally gave him three whacks to the
    backside. Physically, it did not hurt. But he felt humiliated and
    humbled.

    "I never wanted that again," Mr. McConnell recalled. "It was good for
    me."

    Supporting corporal punishment is one thing; advocating it is another,
    as Mr. McConnell recently learned. Studying for a graduate teaching
    degree at Le Moyne College, he wrote in a paper last fall that
    "corporal punishment has a place in the classroom." His teacher gave
    the paper an A-minus and wrote, "Interesting ideas - I've shared these
    with Dr. Leogrande," referring to Cathy Leogrande, who oversaw the
    college's graduate program.

    Unknown to Mr. McConnell, his view of discipline became a subject of
    discussion among Le Moyne officials. Five days before the spring
    semester began in January, Mr. McConnell learned that he had been
    dismissed from Le Moyne, a Jesuit college.

    "I have grave concerns regarding the mismatch between your personal
    beliefs regarding teaching and learning and the Le Moyne College
    program goals," Dr. Leogrande wrote in a letter, according to a copy
    provided by Mr. McConnell. "Your registration for spring 2005 courses
    has been withdrawn."

    Dr. Leogrande offered to meet with Mr. McConnell, and concluded, "Best
    wishes in your future endeavors."

    If the letter stunned Mr. McConnell, the "best wishes" part turned him
    into a campaigner. A mild-mannered former private in the Army, Mr.
    McConnell has taken up a free-speech banner with a tireless intensity,
    casting himself as a transplant from a conservative state abused by
    political correctness in more liberal New York. He also said that
    because he is an evangelical Christian, his views about sparing the
    rod and spoiling the child flowed partly from the Bible, and that Le
    Moyne was "spitting on that."

    He is working with First Amendment groups to try to pressure Le Moyne
    into apologizing and reinstating him, and is considering legal action
    as well as a formal appeal to the college. He says Le Moyne
    misconstrued his views: he believes children should not be paddled
    without their parents' permission. He said that even then, the
    principal, as the school's head disciplinarian, should deliver the
    punishment.

    "Judges live in the real world, and I think they would see that Scott
    got an A-minus on his paper and was expressing views on a campus that
    supports academic freedom," said David French, president of the
    Foundation for Individual Rights in Education, a group based in
    Philadelphia that is supporting Mr. McConnell. "It's hard to see a
    court looking kindly on Scott's expulsion."

    Dr. Leogrande did not respond to telephone messages. Le Moyne's
    provost, John Smarrelli, said the college had the right as a private
    institution to take action against Mr. McConnell because educators had
    grave concerns about his qualifications to teach under state law.

    New York is one of 28 states that ban corporal punishment; most of
    those that allow it are in the South and West. Most states did not ban
    corporal punishment until the late 1980's, after parents, educators,
    and other advocates began pressing for the laws. More than 342,000
    students received corporal punishment in the 1999-2000 school year, in
    the most recent figures from the federal Education Department.

    Because it has an accredited school of education, moreover, Le Moyne
    officials said that the college was required to pledge that its
    graduates will be effective and law-abiding teachers who will foster a
    healthy classroom environment.

    "We have a responsibility to certify people who will be in accordance
    with New York State law and the rules of our accrediting agencies,"
    Mr. Smarrelli said. In Mr. McConnell's case, he said, "We had evidence
    that led us to the contrary."

    Mr. McConnell said that he had been only conditionally admitted to the
    graduate program; typically, such students earn full admission by
    earning good grades and meeting other requirements. Mr. McConnell
    added that he had earned mostly A's and his fate rested largely on his
    November paper.

    Mr. Smarrelli said that the paper itself was "legitimate" and
    "reasonable," because the assignment sought Mr. McConnell's plan for
    managing a classroom. Yet Mr. McConnell's views were clearly not in
    the mainstream of most teachers' colleges.

    For example, many educators focus on nurturing students' self-esteem,
    but Mr. McConnell scoffed at that idea in his paper. He said he would
    not favor some students over others, regardless of any special needs
    some might have.

    "I will help the child understand that respect of authority figures is
    more important than their self-esteem," he wrote.

    Some professors and college officials were also concerned that Mr.
    McConnell wrote that he opposed multiculturalism, a teaching method
    that places emphasis on non-Western cultures.

    In an interview, Mr. McConnell said he disliked "anti-American
    multiculturalism," and gave as an example a short story on the Sept.
    11 attacks intended for classroom use. The story, published in a
    teachers' magazine in 2002 by the National Council for the Social
    Studies, was about young American boys teasing an Iraqi boy named
    Osama.

    Mr. Smarrelli said Le Moyne had to ensure that its students had the
    judgment, aptitude, temperament and other skills to succeed in
    challenging their students.

    But Dr. Smarrelli acknowledged that Le Moyne had not warned students
    like Mr. McConnell that they could be removed for expressing
    controversial beliefs, nor had the college said that education
    students must oppose corporal punishment or support multiculturalism.

    Joseph P. Frey, the assistant commissioner for quality assurance in
    the New York State Education Department, who monitors colleges and
    graduate schools, said he could not offer an opinion on the McConnell
    case because he did not know the specifics.

    Mr. Frey said: "One valid question is, 'Is the paper an academic
    exercise in terms of theories of education, or is it a belief that
    this is how Mr. McConnell will carry out corporal punishment in the
    classroom no matter what?' "

    Mr. Frey added, however, that private colleges have broad latitude in
    accepting or rejecting students. And he said that graduate education
    schools might face a threat to their accreditation, or legal action by
    school districts, if they produce teachers who fall into trouble.

    During an interview at the kitchen table in the comfortable suburban
    home he shares with his wife, Liz, a dentist, Mr. McConnell said he
    had wanted to instill civic virtues in students in the same way his
    teachers had in him.

    As a child, he moved from Texas to Florida and then to Oklahoma as his
    mother pursued failed marriages to "bad men," he said. Teachers became
    a source of stability and life lessons. They taught him to read, to
    respect others, and to serve his country by inspiring him to join the
    Army.

    "Because I didn't talk and think the same way that Le Moyne did,
    because I didn't drink their Kool-Aid, I received the ultimate
    punishment," Mr. McConnell said. "Corporal punishment is nothing
    compared to this."