March 29, 2024
BANGOR DAILY NEWS (BANGOR, MAINE

Parents’ concerns

I am just one concerned parent who has two children that attend the Leory H. Smith School. I have also been an avid volunteer for the school and other areas of the school system for six years. I am very much involved in my children’s education and recreational activities. I am not out to hang or fire anyone. Keith Welch (the school principal) has always been very nice to me. The Winterport teaching staff are excellent.

My concern is that as a mother and a school volunteer I was not aware of the time-out area. I, as a concerned parent, have questions that need answers. That does not make me a terrible person. It makes me a loving and caring parent who wants to know as much as possible about my children’s school.

My children have never spent any time in the time-out area nor would I ever want them to. I don’t disagree with a time-out area but my thought of such an area is different than this one. I feel that I should have had an opportunity to know that this area existed in my children’s school. Sue Beale Winterport

As a parent who often volunteers at the Smith School, where my child attends school, I am outraged at your (March 16) editorial, “Time out.” I find it deplorable that a newspaper would presume to draw conclusions about this situation without having made an effort to learn the truth, or, at least to balance the “fact” that you have learned with other “facts” from other viewpoints. Indeed, at this point, you really have no facts; you have only accusations, which you have obviously assumed to be true.

Can you substantiate the claiam that this room was “unlighted, unheated … and unsupervised”? I think not. That there was no effort to “clinically evaluat(e)” or exercise “other options” with these children; do you know this for a fact? I think not. Can you prove that this time-out area was not “used only with extreme caution and under limited circumstances by trained teachers”?

You give yourself a way out when you say, “If the Winterport parents’ accounts are accurate…,” but the whole editorial presumes that they are accurate. This assumption is not only unfair to the district’s administrators and teachers, it is irresponsible on your part. Why didn’t you reserve your judgments until all the facts are known or seek out other viewpoints? …

For the record, I have volunteered at Smith for three years. I have never seen evidence of mistreatment of any child. I have seen teachers and administrators demonstrate extraordinary patience and understanding in difficult circumstances. They have earned, through my direct involvement in my child’s education, my respect and trust. I thoroughly resent the damage that is being done to a good little school, and a fine school district, by news media that choose to report only half of the story. Jessica Gower Winterport


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