May 12, 2005

By Diane Chiddister

Student behavioral problems seem to be on the rise at Yellow Springs High School, and a “code of silence” among students frustrates administrators who seek to hold young people responsible for their actions.

These trends were the focus of a Youth Forum on Monday, May 9, at YSHS, during which about 35 parents, students and local residents met to consider how the school, parents and community can address the issues.

“I feel like Yellow Springs ‘CSI,’ ” YSHS Principal John Gudgel said at the beginning of the meeting. “I spend an inordinate amount of time investigating things, and it’s not what I’m about.”

Vandalism against teachers has increased in recent years, said Gudgel, who noted that YSHS teachers’ homes and cars have been egged or otherwise harmed, and some students are also more defiant of teachers’ rules and guidelines in class.

Holding students accountable for their actions is difficult because other young people adhere to a “code of silence” rather than speaking up, Gudgel said. He offered as examples a recent instance when a student stole a teacher’s grade book, then, when a teacher was out of class, put it back in full view of about 20 other students, who would not reveal the offender. In another recent example, one student gave another Exlax disguised as candy, causing health problems. However, the boy who was harmed refused to say who did it.

“In this day and age, students don’t want to be perceived as a snitch or a narc,” Gudgel said. “As a school community, we’re dealing with more situations in which students feel uncomfortable telling things that could improve the school climate.”

The phenomenon is not unique to Yellow Springs, according to Gudgel. “It’s happening nationwide,” he said. “More and more we’re dealing with these issues.”

After the introduction, forum participants split into two groups: one addressed how to counter the code of silence and empower students to be “good Samaritans,” while the other discussed how to deal with young people who don’t respect others’ boundaries.

In the good Samaritan group, parent Richard Donnelly said that the code of silence seems based on students’ choice to respect the person who does harm rather than the one who receives it.

“The good Samaritan comes to the aid of someone who needs help,” he said. “Why does the person who does harm get respect?”

Several students in the group responded that friendship plays a key role in maintaining a code of silence.

“Yellow Springs is so small and everyone is friends,” said freshman Kilan Brown. “We don’t want to hurt each other. People are scared to lose their friendships.”

Friendships are especially important to those who do not have strong family bonds, Kilan said. “For some kids, friends are who they rely on. They don’t rely on their parents or trust them,” he said.

Asked by Yellow Springs Superintendent Tony Armocida if the students think the code of silence is a problem, several said they did not.

“It’s a trust issue,” said freshman Jonathan Haller. “You don’t know what would happen if you told, and you want to be trusted by your friends so you don’t tell.”

In response to a question from Donnelly, the young people agreed that students who cause problems tend to come from families in which parents aren’t involved in their children’s lives, or who don’t punish their kids for bad behavior.

“The question may be, how to get the parents involved?” said parent Anita Brown. She said she sees herself as the primary educator in her children’s lives, and the one to be held accountable for their behavior. “I want to bring this back to, ‘this is my responsibility,’ ” she said.

Parents have a huge influence in their children’s lives through the behavior they model, several parents said. And when parents ask their children not to tell anyone about something the parents said or did, they are modeling secretive behavior, group participants said.

Parents can undermine the code of silence by communicating more freely with each other about their children’s behavior, said Donna Haller.

“Breaking the code of silence has to start with parents not having a code of silence, having more parents know we can talk to each other,” she said.

Several students said that they would tell a teacher or the principal if they saw someone do something that physically or emotionally harmed another. However, when the problem behavior seems minor, such as name-calling, the students said they wouldn’t tell for fear that teachers would blow the instance out of proportion.

But freshman Sara Boettcher pointed out that “it could be a small thing to one person but a big one to someone else.”

While several students said the high school’s policy of issuing detentions to students for problem behavior seems effective, some adults suggested that a more fitting punishment might involve the perpetrator having to face the victim.

Several adults suggested that students might more readily act as good Samaritans if they had a safe and easy way of doing so, such as a box in the school where they could anonymously offer information. However, YSHS already has a suggestion box, others said, and any new mechanism would have to offer complete anonymity to be effective.

At the end of the discussion, adults expressed appreciation for the students’ participation and honesty. The world is a different place from when they grew up, several adults said, and they appreciated hearing the students’ perspectives.

Group facilitator Bob Barcus noted “how much energy there was in the inquiry of students. There seems to be a hunger on the part of adults to talk to students about their culture.”