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Ellen Belcher is the Dayton Daily News opinion pages editor. She writes about state government, education, the environment, higher education and all things Dayton.
Martin Gottlieb is an editorial writer and columnist for the Dayton Daily News opinion pages. He focuses on the political process itself and does such national issues as war, the economy, taxes and Social Security, as well as a hodge-podge of local and state issues.Home > Blogs > A Matter of Opinion > Archives > 2009 > February > 20 > Entry
Editorial: Schools don’t have to hit kids to control them
Tucked in Gov. Ted Strickland’s $54.7 billion proposed budget is a provision that won’t cost Ohioans a dime, but could help put the state back in the mainstream and end a rare, but wrong, practice.
The governor wants to stop government-sanctioned striking of children — an idea that’s way overdue.
Corporal punishment — the practice of school officials paddling or spanking students — is banned in nearly all states in the northern half of the country. In the few northern states that still allow paddling — Ohio, Indiana, Wyoming and Idaho — the practice is rare.
It’s in the South where paddling is disturbingly common, especially in Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Tennessee and Arkansas. But the trend has been moving strongly in the right direction. In 1985, only five states banned schools from paddling. Today, 29 states prohibit it.
Ohio’s track record on paddling also has improved during the past 25 years. In 1984, 68,000 schoolchildren were paddled. Last year, the number was just 110.
The decline was helped along by a 1994 law that didn’t ban corporal punishment, but discouraged it. Districts had to form citizen committees, review data and procedures and make a recommendation to the school board in order to keep paddling. At least 80 districts jumped through those hoops.
In practice, it is unlikely your child will be punished in this way at school. Just six Ohio school districts had any cases of corporal punishment last school year — five districts in southern Ohio and Canton City Schools. The closest paddling district is Lynchburg-Clay of Highland County, on the other side of Wilmington.
So why bother to ban a practice that is rare? Because it’s the right thing to do.
If parents want to discipline by spanking in their homes, that’s their right if the punishment is administered within reason. But the evidence that paddling is an effective disciplinary tool at school is scant.
Plus, paddling is a lawsuit waiting to happen. In a day when some schools limit kids from playing tag on the playground for fear of a lawsuit-inducing injury, school boards are asking for trouble to sanction a practice that is intended to inflict pain.
Perhaps a ban would force those districts clinging to paddling to re-evaluate their approach and find better solutions to disciplinary problems. The biggest “hitter” in Ohio was South Point school district in Lawrence County. With 68 incidents, that one district was responsible for more than half of the state’s paddling cases last year.
How will South Point possibly maintain order without the paddle? For ideas, it could start by asking any one of the 604 other Ohio districts that do it every day.
Permalink | Comments (3) | Post your comment | Categories: Editorials, Education, Scott Elliott
Comments
By Julie Worley
February 20, 2009 6:13 PM | Link to this
Thank you Governor Strickland for taking action to eliminate an outdated, ineffective and dangerous practice. Our family has 3 schoolchildren and we reside in a paddling school district. All learning environments in the U.S. must be safe and healthy. We have great hope that our State of Tennessee will follow your fine example and ban physical punishment of Children in schools. Hitting is never ok and no good comes of it.By Rick
February 22, 2009 11:23 AM | Link to this
Children should never be beaten, unless they deserve it.By Scott Elliott
February 22, 2009 10:26 PM | Link to this
Rick, you’d have been right if you stopped at the comma. Nobody “deserves” to be hit. And paddling/spanking is a tremendously ineffective disciplinary tool.