Children, elementary through high school should not have cell phones in school. Why do they need phones? Certain the private schools in Topeka have strict rules concerning cell phones. Why did the administration in public schools allow cell phones?

I had a similar situation with my daughter in middle school, being picked on by a male teacher who had made her walk back and forth down a hall as a punishment for running into the class room as the bell was ringing. He was always making mean comments to female students in his class. The school principal would not listen to me regarding his behavior, so I sent my daughter to school with a small tape recorder and when we had evidence of his behavior, I went back to the principal & superintendent ..(did not tell them at this point that I had a tape) they called the teacher down and when he denied everything, I pulled out the tape recorder. I did not even have to play it. I demanded an immediate apology to my daughter and threatened a lawsuit if action against the teacher was not taken. He was no longer teaching at the school the following year.

Having been a teacher when the kids first started to have cell phones, I watched my own school struggle with the problems created by them. At first, we looked into the concerns of parents when their children received threatening texts from other students but then had to take a different stance. Many of our students were receiving threatening texts and sending them as well - if we had looked into every parent's concerns, that's all we would have been doing everyday - checking cell phone texts. The same with the e-mails they send each other - at first, we expelled a student who had sent a threatening e-mail to another. Then more and more parents came to us with threatening e-mails sent by great numbers of students - not just one - could we have expelled them all??
We then made a rule - no cell phones in school. They can bring them in their bookbags but no cell phones out during the day and if you bring them in your bookbags, you do so at your own risk. If your cell phone is stolen by another student, as a school we can and will do nothing about that. Or we would be spending the entire day tracking down stolen cell phones.
So in my school we would react with sympathy to your concerns but sadly tell you that we cannot police the text messages that students send each other. I truly don't know the legality as to whether a teacher can listen to a student's cell phone messages but again - if your daughter had not had the phone in school....

Your post mentions several things but never mentions why the teachers would be harassing your daughter - teachers get discouraged when students bring cell phones to school but that alone wont' set them off so much they begin harassing a child. There's a missing piece of the puzzle here. Why are the teachers angry with your daughter?

And - once they are angry with a child - it's hard to settle teachers down again. Of course they shouldn't harass any child but principals have only nominal control over teachers and school boards have even less control over principals.

You can repair this - people have short memories. If your daughter leaves her cell phone home and stays out of trouble for a while, she can regain the favor of her teachers.

If nothing else, I hope your daughter has learned to "protect her identity" whenever electronics are involved...sharing her phone with others, letting others know her internet passwords or use her accounts, etc., are all dangerous things to do.

I still think that having a written account of what happened is important, but the fact other students are supporting your daughter's side of the story is encouraging. I hope the matter gets resolved promptly, and your daughter can get back to studying, instead of all these other distractions.

my daughter is 14 and in 10th grade. my daughter let him use the phone during lunch. guess it was as class started back up that he was trying to give her the phone back. yes other kids use her phone outside of school they use the camara and texts their friends all the time. so yes those improper mess. could have been for a friend.not her. but the threats were made to her.they say her name in the text. her name then you trailer trash ::: . fowl name. no she didnt get out of school susp.,they threatened to but instead,they gave her 2 days of in school susp. plus we turned it off for a month.we only turned it on then because we made strict ground rules for it and one problem at all and she will lose it again,for a good long time. i tried to send her back thurs. just to have to pick her up at almost noon. because the teacher we have a problem with sent her to i.s.s. for the three hours she is suppost to be in that class. my daughter didnt do anything. i have had students from that class confirm her story. i have gone to the school district just to be told basically im lying.because the lady that they had me talk to says she personally knows her and that she doesnt see her acting that way. im trying now to get ahold of the school board of all the public schools in topeka. they still havent let me speak to the main princable ive tried on several occations. thanks for tryin to help. i think we might go to the media. but first the students of her school want to get a petition going about the teachers behavior towards students to back us up. i will accecpt any advice i can get at this point, so if can come up with any please let me know. thanks again concerned,confused work mom

my daughter is 14 and in 10th grade. my daughter let him use the phone during lunch. guess it was as class started back up that he was trying to give her the phone back. yes other kids use her phone outside of school they use the camara and texts their friends all the time. so yes those improper mess. could have been for a friend.not her. but the threats were made to her.they say her name in the text. her name then you trailer trash ::: . fowl name. no she didnt get out of school susp.,they threatened to but instead,they gave her 2 days of in school susp. plus we turned it off for a month.we only turned it on then because we made strict ground rules for it and one problem at all and she will lose it again,for a good long time. i tried to send her back thurs. just to have to pick her up at almost noon. because the teacher we have a problem with sent her to i.s.s. for the three hours she is suppost to be in that class. my daughter didnt do anything. i have had students from that class confirm her story. i have gone to the school district just to be told basically im lying.because the lady that they had me talk to says she personally knows her and that she doesnt see her acting that way. im trying now to get ahold of the school board of all the public schools in topeka. they still havent let me speak to the main princable ive tried on several occations. thanks for tryin to help. i think we might go to the media. but first the students of her school want to get a petition going about the teachers behavior towards students to back us up. i will accecpt any advice i can get at this point, so if can come up with any please let me know. thanks again concerned,confused work mom

How old is your daughter/what grade? Was she suspended because of the incident? I'm confused about how a boy got your daughter's phone and was texting his girlfriend....could other people have also used her phone, and are responsible for some of the inappropriate comments, and could it be that the racist and threatening texts were meant for those other people who used her phone?

I realize it doesn't solve the problem of teachers having looked at your daughter's messages, but I'm guessing the best you can do at this point is to write a letter that documents you/your daughter's side of the story. Verbal comments back and forth are not considered "admissible evidence" of anything... You might also want to post your question on www.lawguru.com to see if any attorneys can give you their free legal advice in this matter.