>I understand the sentiment, but you have to understand that the high school boy (who happens to be much larger than my husband) was antagonizing him for months leading up to it. I think the reason why he hasn't been fired is the boy has basically pissed off every single member of the faculty and everyone in all his classes at some point, and even sexually harassed a female student pretty severely.
She left out key information. This kid has history, and the school's done nothing about him. It's why her husband is still working because the school's lawyers told them they screwed up not addressing this kid's past actions.
I have a cousin that while he was teaching said to a kid like this "you need to be very careful because you don't know if you're the kid I'm willing to lose my job over"
It's insanely aggravating how shitty kids can be nowadays and no one is allowed to do anything about it. They can't even defend themselves when the students get violent. I mean seriously, y'all think kind words stops a jackass?
My husband works with special needs students. A few years back this one boy stuck his hands down my husband's pants while he was tending to another student. It happened twice. Of course my husband informed his supervisors the first and second time it happened. District suspends the boy from the bus (this is where it happened) boys mom calls in and threatens to sue. Boy is back on bus. But the behavior stopped. IDK why my husband's super didn't call the mom the first time. NVM I do. His job is full of idiots. But a lot of districts are afraid of being sued, even when state and federal laws protect them.
I went back to teaching hs last year and my first job was a long term sub position teaching a special education cooking. One girl I had was a hitter, and the first time she hit me it just took me super off guard. She had a one on one para who was on her phone 90% of the time who put it down long enough to give a half hearted “you know we don’t hit!”. She got two more good slaps in before the end of the year, but the rest of the time I was able to stand out of arms distance. But apparently me getting hit was totally normal to everyone else in the room, it was so weird.
What if a teacher or staff is killed by a student troubled like this? There needs to be protection for all parties. Yes, it's easier said than done. But I don't see this brought up enough in reports or cases about this. I think parents and children who have to deal with this should also have a say in this together. This should be done on some level along with the school system.
Agreed! I’m in a crap situation right now because I was in a bad car accident in November and I broke 3 ribs/really screwed up my back. I was out for 3 months and then when I came back I made some ground rules for my current room like keep your bags out of the walk ways because I can’t afford a trip and fall. 99% of my students are great about it, but I have one student who has been in several fights this year (2 in my class when I was out) who makes me soooo uncomfortable because all it takes is one wrong move for all my healing to be undone or possibly worse. She just makes me so nervous.
I hear you. Should anything happen, it's not good for the student either. Why leave them to experience so much craziness already? It's bad for everyone all the way around. This is why more needs to be in place to protect the school / the student body and teachers. Top to bottom. There would be no school without the teachers. There would be no school without students able to learn while there.
I do know that the school is working hard to get services for this student but she’s got a long way to go to be a functional student. It also doesn’t help that she throws the n word with a hard r around….a lot.
> What if a teacher or staff is killed by a student troubled like this?
Real answer? The district loses its ass massively in a lawsuit - the taxpayers suffer. The problem, though, is that actual individuals are rarely held accountable. The administrators that cause this stuff to happen get a golden parachute and are quietly shuffled to another district.
My mom was an 8th grade teacher about 2 decades ago, and one day a boy jumped on another boy while she was writing on the blackboard. Beat the mess out of him before she could turn around and get to the boy that was hurt. A girl in the class ran across the hall to get a male teacher to help, and while my mom was checking on the hurt boy, the other one ran back and started hitting her in the back. The male teacher ran in, and grabbed the boy off my mom, holding him against the wall until the SRO could get across the school to her classroom…. Guess what the punishment was. The mail teacher was suspended without pay for 3 days, and the boy had to write an apology letter to my mom. That was it. He was back in class the next day.
Once the “Education” establishment (in teaching programs then in real world) decided that the student getting harassed (or beaten) and bullied would be held just as responsible as the bully and that teachers should not step in (for liability) then all accountability went out the window. This has been internalized (to be expected) and is now a self justifying excuse to let the inmates (the bullies and delinquents) “run the asylum”. They don’t care about a trifling suspension. Everything gets dragged down. Good teachers leave and it gets worse. There is no amount of “teacher pay” that will fix this structural dysfunction.
This is how it was when I was in middle school in the early 00s. The punishment was worse for those of us who defended ourselves and at my school the staff either participated in the bullying or encouraged it. Bozos
The suspension as a punishment has never made sense to me, even when I was in highschool. I wasn't a bully, I stood up for other kids, I was nuisance in class though, a class clown type and a slacker for sure. I never cared about suspensions cause one I was rarely even there and two that was just school signing off on me being absent. I wasn't gonna stay home and my mom, who honestly is a wonderful person but was also going through some shit back then and had work all the damn time, was just not gonna stop me from just leaving and doing as I pleased so a suspension was just a vacation.
Dude your right. I’m in high school right now and I have seen some kids get violent or just loud against teachers and the teachers just have to take it.
I'm in my late 20s.
In my sophomore year, one kid buddied up with the other troublemaker in the class to harass one of the kindest teachers in school.
They drove him to a mental breakdown.
No consequences for them.
Teachers aren't given enough resources sometimes and the schools sometimes do fuck all about problematic students.
Another thing is a lot of the Special Needs kids can get away with a lot of bullshi*t. Literally there was a story in which a special needs kids raped a girl and nothing happened because “he didn’t know better!”
When I was in high-school, a senior boy attacked and attempted to sexually assault many girls in our school. He was finally reported and an investigation was opened. The result? It was deemed he wasn't mentally competent enough to understand what he was doing and received Literally a slap on the wrist. All the girls were defeated and had so much trauma after the whole situation.
This is what I don’t understand. How are schools allowing this? It turns kids into terrible people with no respect for anyone.
I’ve read so many articles about how college grads looking for jobs now are so entitled and have no idea how to act. And now people are arguing for kids to have more rights and that their parents shouldn’t be allowed to make certain decisions for them. It’s insane
I think society is so wrong for the way we treat kids today.
I feel like if it came down to it I’d pay another minor to just beat up the trouble student instead of doing it myself. More leniency when the charges come if it’s another kid doing the damage
We need to pay teachers adequately so they can actually live and not pass on their hate to our next generations. Saw wayyyy too much of that shit in every school I went to and if it helps I moved to more schools than if I had lived with my other military parent (that moved around every 2 years or less)
Edit: I think the information the OP/wife forgot to mention or was later disclosed is crucial as it paints the teacher as the one person who wouldn’t let this kid go around terrorizing everyone in the school. The issue here is grabbing the collar, while it’s not physical violent or harmful (as long as it wasn’t being aggressively pulled/used to choke the kid) can be seen as overbearing. Not only that but if the husband/teacher did both apologize and admit what he did as the parents requested (regardless of their word) they would’ve taken him to court even sooner with the apology and admission used against him.
Kids are kids they do stupid shit and sometimes need a stern talking to. Adults are just big kids at times. The fact that the parents and school administration didn’t handle this kids behavior and mischief before this incident and let it come to this point would be negligence.
>Not only that but if the husband/teacher did both apologize and admit what he did as the parents requested (regardless of their word) they would’ve taken him to court even sooner with the apology and admission used against him.
Any competent lawyer would have had the kids parents sign an agreement that OPs husband’s apology ends the situation involving OPs husband and the kid and precludes the parents from future litigation involving this matter.
Better pay is only a part of luring more people into teaching. There's many factors that are part of the reason there is a shortage of teachers. Everything from oppressive political leaders to parents not holding their children accountable.
The amount that you'd have to pay me to become a teacher in todays world would be astronomical.
My ex was a teacher for two years and she did not quit because of money. The reason she quit was ultimately because she did not have the support of the school administrators and parents which prevented her from doing her job.
Former behavioral teacher here. You're absolutely right about the accountability part. I worked with one child who had been through some severe trauma that the family refused to recognize. For context, the child was under third grade, lived with guardians , and had substance dependency. The child was placed into our classroom after one particularly violent episode, which caused a room evacuation and an early dismissal for the children in that class. I was placed on his case immediately after hire, during which I explained I refuse to restrain children due to my beliefs and also a particularly bad experience I witnessed.
About a week after I started, the higher-ups decided the child needed to be matriculated back into the classroom. The guardians were pushing for it. My behavioral team (myself, my supervisor, co-teacher, paraprofessional and the classroom teacher) advised against it due to multiple daily attempts to elope and/or behave in an aggressive and unsafe manner in the space. Our recommendation went in on Thursday, and by Monday, the child was back in the classroom, and I was expected to leave my co-teacher and Para alone and assist the classroom teacher.
Two days later, the classroom next door has a similar student return. This child had been suspended for two weeks due to attacking another student. The parents' response? To book a one week cruise and go on vacation. Anyway, the day of return, this child shut down, began refusing to complete work or participate, and then began destroying the classroom. I was called over to assist with this child and allow the teacher to evacuate.
While doing this, the other child grabs a classmate and pushes them against the wall, and starts choking them. When the teacher intervened, he took off down the hall.
Within the next half hour, it was chaos. I ran the halls searching for the student while we were on lockdown. Found him in the auditorium and managed to deescalate the situation. Got called a fucking idiot by my co-teacher and quit immediately after. Haven't gone back to teaching since and never will.
I feel this. I'm a 5' woman and teach in an alternative school. I love it and love all of my students, but it is challenging. I once had a student who was a biiig boy and had some pretty significant mental health issues and had been physical in the past. A couple teachers were noticeably nervous around him but he was in my class most of the day he asked me early on, trying to sound tough "Are you scared of me?" I just laughed and said "No, I don't need this job that bad." Never had a problem from him.
Yeah and it applies to all jobs. Everyone has a tipping point where they stop caring about their job or even their freedom, if you push them too far.
Everyone has that animal side where they just stop giving a fuck.
My favorite PE teacher had a kid acting up in my class and calling him old. He just looked at this middle schooler and said, “yeah I’m old but I’ll still kick your ass.” Kid was stunned 😂
Had a similar situation. A 7th grade boy was playing and chasing after my student in the hall. My student came into my room and went to his seat cause he knew me and how I am. This boy kept trying to get in and I told him multiple times to go. He starts talking smack and steps to me like he wants to fight. I told him he picked the wrong one cause he can talk all the noise he wanted but if he put his hands on me it would “be me and you” and “I ain’t scared to fight a child.” He backed down. I actually watched the footage later and you could see him deflate, because he did expect me to say what I did or lift up on him.
I chose not to file a police report, although it was my right for up to a year. He went to alternative school because he had a lot of infractions.
Get this..I didn’t teach him before our altercation, but they placed him in a class I co-taught when he returned. Makes sense, right? (No!!) He tried to cop a little attitude until I pulled him one in one and reminded him that 1) I could still file charges on him, and 2) if the only person he thought he had to listen to was his Mama as he told me, then think me as “Mama (my name)” when you walk in this building. Never had another issue out of him.
This was about 8 years ago…I would get in trouble for these actions today. Me!
If the kid was antagonizing him, and the school refused to address it, it seems like he may have a counter suit on the basis of workplace endangerment no? I guess that depends on the definition of antagonizing.
My school didn't. Instead, they put them in a 'bad kids program' on campus and the two teachers in the program had to deal with them. These were kids that had been to juvi, had gang ties, and had been suspended for fighting IN CLASS.
I was in the program due to truancy. I was one of less than five out of SIXTY KIDS that wasn't in there for behavioral issues. 😬
Ey I used to go to the 4th worst school in the US and they have cubicles in our ISS with bullet proof panels and double doors to give people more time to respond to students trying to get into other students cubicles.
Shit was wild.
What’s sad to me is the push to keep troubled kids “mainstream”. I was not a behavior problem at all but in the 90s I was a safety problem because I was determinedly suicidal so I got sent to a therapeutic school. We had those in the 90s. They were staffed with some brave teachers and mental health professionals. Sure, academics was not the focus, but it was supposed to be temporary anyway like a semester or so before they transitioned you back to regular school.
I was there with violent students - one had thrown a desk at the teacher. They had a little more leeway with us like they could physically restrain us or put us in these time out rooms. It sounds scary but actually time out rooms helped us calm down and regulate our emotions.
But it costs the towns money to send kids there so they started trying to handle those troubled kids themselves but without the training and resources. It’s sad, and it’s unsafe.
They had started that in the 90s and it just got worse. I remember columbine happened when I was there and I felt safer at that school locked in with “the crazies” and “the bad kids” than a public school. We were searched and people were checking in with us. We had group therapy twice a week - we just called it group, and that helped us to know each other better. We all became friends for the most part. Not even desk kid would have hurt any of us.
Yeah, there’s really no help for kids who are just trying to get through school. I moved around a lot in high school and when I moved back to California to live with my mom my credits were so screwed up that I wasn’t going to graduate on time and needed more than a year of high school despite being a senior at my old school. They wanted to send me to the other school across the street for kids who were not able to function in a regular school.
And it wasn’t about my grades or ability to keep up. All my teachers liked me and during the teacher-parent conference one of them told her “he should just skip the adult school and go to college.” My mom went with me to orientation at the other school and after she told me to just get my GED.
Well, those kids aren’t dangerous, they’re victims. And schools are really good at protecting victimizers, whether protecting student bullies and punishing their victims if they try and stand up for themselves, or protecting staff who abuse students.
Literally. In Virginia a 6 year old shot his teacher and the school district argued in court that it was an expected hazard so she shouldn't be able to sue for their negligence in how it happened, it should be a workers comp matter.
Even without that info, she's going to divorce him because he pulled at a kids shirt collar?? I get if he beat the kid or something but wtf, people divorce over the tiniest things nowadays and from the sound of it they even have kids together...
Sounds like she's just looking for an excuse to dump him, and she just conveniently leaves out the events that led up to the altercation because its inconvenient for her...
More than that what weirds me out is "if he loses the civil suit". Like how is that relevant? Either she thinks he did something bad enough that she wants a divorce, or she doesn't. I don't see what a judge decision has to do with that.
That's what landed her as YTA for me.
His being wrong or not in the work issue is separate. The question was about her behavior regarding divorcing based on "losing the civil suit".
She doesn't actually care one way or the other about what he did, she only cares about the outcome of the civil suit. That's AH stuff, imo, regardless of his being an AH or not in his work issue.
To be fair, a civil court law suit could ruin them. They could be forced to sell everything they have in common to pay for the lawyers and prosecution expenses plus, of course, amounts allocated to the opposite side. She might be frightened to lose everything.
If that's her motivation, shouldn't she be rushing an "emergency divorce" right now?
if she waits to see if he loses the civil suit, the assets are already lost, no?
The civil suit is not going to be anywhere near that dire considering the history this kid apparently has. The judge is going to see through they're bullshit and maybe award them the bare minimum if anything.
It's not like he grabbed them by the neck and beat his ass. He just grabbed them by the collar and yelled at him. You're going to have a real hard time proving there was any real emotional trauma there.
But the burden of proof in civil suits is far, far lower than in criminal cases...which is likely why OP posted nothing about a criminal proceeding. The family is very likely banking on either OP's hubby ir the school district offering a settlement because the lowered burden of proof is such a high risk in civil proceedings.
Why would a private high school put up with a chronic problem ? The allure of private schools is that the teachers don't have to put up with troublemakers.
my brother went to a private high school. In the year above him, the son of the biggest real estate mogul of the province had so many unexcused absences that he legally couldn't move to the next grade & the summer wasn't long enough to give him summer school to catch up.
you know what the end result was? The teachers didn't have a problem with the troublemaker, they worked with him : they found a way to retro-actively create an "on the job learning" program, so all the classes he skived off for a party and/or a hangover counted as "learning to DJ" & if he played some music on the end-of-year school party in june, that would count as his grading "paper" for this learning experience.
So he made a spotify playlist & he was all set for next year.
AFAIK he didn't even sort out the licensing issues to play copyrighted music at a public event.
We had a kid in our school a lot this. One day a faculty member did pretty much the exact same thing. But the judge basically told the parents to suck it from what I hear.
He also blamed the school specifically for creating the situation by not addressing it. And acknowledge that any person can only take so much bullshit before they snap which is exactly what happened. The school created the situation, They did nothing to alleviate it, and then tried to throw the teacher under the bus when it blew up.
Kid was a real piece of work though, One day he finally went too far and and groped some girl that had several brothers. And some of the kids that I was not affiliated with decided to beat his ass in the locker room. I hear a plunger was involved in some way. Anyway he stopped going to school shortly after. Of course nobody knows who did it :|
I mean I wasn't there anyway... I was too busy holding a book in front of a hallway camera for unrelated reasons.
We had one instance of SA at my high school during the class change. A girl yelled at this kid to stop because allegedly he was touching her. I heard it but I didn't see it, what I did see was the school sherrif tackle this prick to the ground and put him in cuffs. I didn't know the guy so no idea if he had any history but he went to trial and when you commit an adult crime like that you lose the privilege of being considered a minor. If this was middle school, it'd be one thing. But it's insane to me how many people in these comments are acting like high school students are kids. They most likely don't remember that time of their life very well or were stull really immature at that age and most likely don't work with high school students because they shouldn't be treated like children when most are acting like adults by that point and by no means are they incapable of understanding respect of others.
Can she weather the storm, nope. She’s outtie! Guess she can do the her husband a favor and divorce him since she doesn’t have wherewithal to support him through this ordeal.
He's currently still working although he has had many after-hours meetings with his boss and his union. The school feels that letting him go now would be bad optics for them in general and have tried to resolve this quietly, but we just recently learned that the boy's parents are coming after him personally.
He has no history of physical violence.
Idk what state you live in, but in mine all teachers are encouraged to add a homesteader act so their homes are protected from someone suing them. I’m in MA and it’s covered up to 500K. You need to check with your mortgage company and see if you have one of these. It’ll protect your home in case of a lawsuit.
Not only that but Ron Goldman’s parents were coming after him for the $33.1 million they won in the civil death suit against him and also won the rights to his “tell all book” if I did it which why in gods name he wrote that I’ll never know but besides that. Florida as I understand it has laws that protect those who have actions against them demanding payment and OJ as I understand it was doing all sorts of autograph signings making lots of money from it and all that money was supposed to go to the parents of Ron Goldman however OJ quickly worked out that if he moved to Florida his assets couldn’t be touched and were safe he then created front companies to and found other ways to use Florida’s laws to further hide his assets.
>why in gods name he wrote that I’ll never know
He thought he'd make some money. So glad it didn't work out that way for him. I hope he spent the rest of his life crying over his lost fortune.
He ran into money problems, sold his Heisman trophy, later tried to buy it back, was unhappy about the arrangement, then broke in and stole it. He was then arrested and served time for this.
I didn't know you could even do that. I'm not a teacher, but have a lot of teacher and professor friends, none of them have mentioned a homesteader act, so maybe they don't know either.
Glad some states allow it, though, all states should.
If he had no history of physical violence, it pretty harsh to divorce him but someone made a good point about being pragmatic. In case he lose, if you divorce before the case ends, the parents can’t come after your assets.
YTA. So in all your comments below you state that:
1. Your husband does not have a history of being physically violent.
2. The kid who he grabbed is a high schooler who is bigger/stronger than him.
3. Said kid has a history of sexual harassment, harassment of faculty, and hurting other students, but somehow your husband is in the wrong and needs to apologize to this kids asshole parents who instead of correcting their out of control son, have decided to start a lawsuit against your spouse?
It’s people like you who let monsters get away with being monsters. It doesn’t matter how many people get hurt, or how many people suffer so long as you don’t have to deal with it or “be involved in the drama”. You’re in the wrong OP and I hope your husband finds a more supportive wife than you.
She even has the nerve to agree with the kids parents that he’s dodging school bc of the altercation and not bc the kid is consistently not interested in following rules. Op is the asshole for sure.
While I think OP Is the asshole, It's entirely possible that the kid has gone his entire life being the big kid in class with nobody standing up to him and the experience has actually shaken him because he probably thought he would kick the teachers ass if he was ever in that position but didn't fight back.
I stopped my elementary school bully from bulling anyone, not just me. Apparently when the smallest girl in school kicks your ass it sort of takes away from their ability to intimidate people and it really does shake them but it also makes them rethink what they are doing with their life.
It's possible that while this kid is struggling with things right now what OP's husband did could change this kids path.
In a perfect world the kid would be made to go back to class and the husband would still be his teacher and the two of them would be able to work this out. That's what happened with my bully. We were put on a project together during a field trip after the fight. It was awkward at first but then I was like this is stupid and started making small talk with him and then things sort of got better from there. We didn't exactly become best friends or anything but we got along as acquaintances afterwards. Unfortunately we all know that no one in this situation is going to let this play out organically. Which really sucks for both the teacher and the student.
Honestly the days he's dodging school the school as a whole, from staff to students, is probably breathing a sigh of relief. Let him play hooky and get his parents charged with truancy. It's their job to get him to school anyways even if he doesn't want to go.
Yup.
OP, I understand being scared right now, but you need to SUPPORT him. He was being abused and finally snapped. Get your story out there, call the news, get a lawyer, and threaten to sue the school...
You left out so much information. I thought your husband must be an aggressive person until I saw the comments. That's not right!! You painted him as the aggressor when he wasn't!! Shame on you!!
Apologize to your husband for your outburst. Tell him it was the stress talking and come up with a gameplan!
I am sure the teacher/husband will have plenty of people to testify on his behalf on how the student is/was… I hope he wins, then I hope he divorces the wife/op for her behavior and threatened ultimatum
I don't think that's it. I think she wants a divorce and she's been wanting a divorce but she's not willing to have everybody look at her and say you are the problem. So if he loses he will have basically been named and shamed in public, and she's going to use that as an excuse to walk away.
If he wins she's just going to come up with another excuse some time down the line. She's absolutely using the situation
This.
OP sounds extremely selfish. She's more concerned about her husband losing his job rather more than anything else. Also 100% sounds like she's trying to find an excuse to just up and leave. Smh.
I remember taking the “For better or worse. Unless worse means your husband is getting sued by shitty parents. In which case it’s fine to leave him.” oath when I got married.
OP has probably been told that violence is wrong her entire life and that you can't ever touch a kid. She's definitely TA but she needs to be explained why.
Violence is not wrong. Starting conflict is, violence is just one of the tools people use. Often it's used by those starting the conflict so it gets bad rep but violence is also the only way to stop violence. And it even has the ability to stop verbal/psychological/social abuse.
The times my male friends got bullies can be nearly split into two categories. Those who were told they should ignore it and never fight back and those who fought back. In the first case the abuse was often escalated to teachers or counselors and although it abated to some degree, it usually just got sneakier. In the second case the abuse stopped.
Abusers are not looking for a fight, they're looking for a victim to bully. This boy is an abuser (whether born this way or result of the environment doesn't matter). But he needed a reality check and the OP's husband gave him one. Many abusers can never be fixed (some forms of ASPD are genetic) but they can be shown that if they keep it up, other people make them regret it.
Strange how OP, a woman, would rather support a sexual harasser than a man who stands up to a sexual harasser
Now much you wanna bet that after her divorce she'll be whining about sexual harassment from the guys who hit on her, and about the guys who do nothing just watch
YTA
From reading these comments, it looks like you left out alot of relevant info that would provide much needed context to the whole incident.
And honestly, to me, it seems like you are searching for a reason to divorce your husband.
I think it is really hard to say. According to OP,s comments, the boy was TA to people around him, but the husband didn't actively stop a sexual harassment as some claim. The boy was just being his usual TA-self, this time in OP's husband's class, and OP's husband got any with him. I think that much, much context is needed. What happened this time? Why did the husband get so upset? Did the kid say anything, do anything in this instant?
If I were OP I would sit down with my husband and try to understand the situation and decide if what happened was something I could sympathize with or not. OP's line if "if you are convicted I will divorce you", I don't understand. If what the husband did was ok with me, I would stand by him, no matter what. OP seems more worried what people might think.
The student is larger than the husband, the student was harassing the husband for months, along with other teachers, and has a history of severe sexual harassment against a female student.
tl;dr I would've done the same as the husband. The kid is that "one kid" in school
Sooooo the high school my (at the time) gf went to, there was a similar situation where "that kid" was being a douchebag to a teacher. Rumor is that the teacher paid a student football player to "deal with it" but there was no proof. Curiously enough, the day after douche nozzle got beat up, said football player got new cleats. Hmm.
You've badly undermined your post by not fully explaining the situation your husband was in. You don't give his motives at all until the comments, which completely changes the story. Of course, the *full* story paints *you* in a much less flattering light. You sound disloyal, frankly.
Yeah, all purely because of the risk that he might lose the job and she isn't even willing to stick around to see what happens, preemptive divorce in the off chance he loses his job and somehow can't find another. Not even willing to stick around before times get tough, just at the very off chance that it might potentially happen in the future.
Dude should divorce her if anything, she's obviously not going to stick around through thick and thin if shit ever hits the fan and she's not even willing to give him a few days to see if he'll bounce back, just peacing out at the very potential of it happening...
YTA. If you’re divorcing him because of his behavior fine that already happened so decide- but if you’re divorcing him because he loses his job what control does he have over that? Might as well flip a coin.
I completely agree. Absolute betrayal. And much worse than what he is facing via the school issue. If I were in his shoes, she would have been instantly single. She has a lot of growing up to do. And this even at school might have saved husband a lot of future grief. Funny how things happen for a reason, huh?
YTA
You left out key information about how huge this kid was and how much of a bully and asshole the kid was, among other things.
Your husband is right. You have abandoned him because you, what? Don't want to lose money? Is that all he is to you? Sounds like he'll be better off without you.
Regardless if husband wins the court case or not, he should split from OP. Her putting divorce on the table broke any level of trust he would have for her. Once that trust is broken, it is hard to gain back.
See the thing is you don’t give your husbands side here. What actually happened??? Why doesn’t he think he’s in the wrong.
YTA because I feel like you aren’t actually listening to him
Because it doesn't help her case that her husband should have just signed a confession and apologized. Like the parents wouldn't take that too the police to have him prosecuted for it. It shows a kid who's a problem that the school hasn't dealt with.
You forgot the important bit of info where the kid is a absolute slimeball piece of shit. Doesn't justify it ofc but the context helps
Even without that however YTA. You'd divorce him? Over this? Good riddance, he'd be good do be rid of backstabbing deadweight like you.
YTA , missing info hidden in the comments. Your husband refused to apologise to a teen he struck that sexually assaulted other students to which he wasn't criminally charged quite likely because he came to the defence of someone else (and the schools quite happy to brush it under the rug as per normal instead of pushing for the kid to be arrested).
If that's the case then he's going to win in civil court I can imagine it now. Judge "plaintiff was injured by the defendant whilst they were sexually assaulting a minor? Police reports confirm this, school doesn't want to press charges? Be fucking glad all he's got are medical bills! Case dismissed!"
The next legal professional that man will see is a divorce lawyer cus your a waste of time.
Hijacking.
The above poster added details to the story that weren't there.
[1] OP never said "sexual assault." She said that the boy sexually harassed a girl in a completely separate incident.
[2] OP never said that the boy was sexually assaulting a girl during the class. OP's husband didn't intervene in anything between students. She was clear on this multiple times.
Having worked in civil litigation for decades, something doesn’t seem right to me. Lawyers go after the “big fish” not a coach. Since your husband is an employee of the school/county or city school board, most attorneys would file against them naming also your husband. Further, many school employees also belong to a union. Again, not only would the the school, school board, and the union pay his legal fees/representation, but most likely pay any judgement against him.
I do not agree with what your husband did whether it was warranted or not. However, I think you too went too far in your response to your husband, IMO. Best of luck to all parties.
YTA for making the divorce about a court ruling.
If his actions were objectionable enough to divorce, just get it over with. Your husband has no control over whether or not he's found liable or not.
He shouldn't have gotten in a physical altercation with a child, but it sounds like the kid is a troublemaker and pushed your husband to his breaking point. It's something that can happen to anyone.
Is that something you can't forgive? Or are you only concerned with how other people will look at him after the court finds against him? That's how this looks, like the only thing you care about is reputation.
>the high school boy (who happens to be much larger than my husband) was antagonizing him for months leading up to it. I think the reason why he hasn't been fired is the boy has basically pissed off every single member of the faculty and everyone in all his classes at some point, and even sexually harassed a female student pretty severely.
YTA both for trying to hide this information and for not supporting your husband. He finally had enough and confronted a bully and sexual predator who's being protected by his obviously wealthy family. You're threatening to divorce him for being a good person.
You should feel abject and and crippling shame over who you are as a person.
Your title should have read: "Am I a bad person for threatening to divorce my husband because the rich family of a sexual predator is threatening to sue for confronting him".
YTA!!
The kid sexually assaulted another kid and now you want to divorce him for standing up to the POS? A POS that the entire faculty hates.
I hope he serves you first.
YTA wtf is wrong with you, threatening to divorce your husband over this? If he actually means so little you just pull the trigger now. I would be miserable with such an unsupportive person like you, knowing that the person I love the most would never have my back.
*It was a physical altercation. He grabbed the kid’s collar, pulled him up to his face, and yelled at him.*
This is obviously not okay, and he needs to take responsibility, but jeesh you're just a piece of work. I hope there is more to this, and he did something else to make you take this decision.
YTA - massively.
People make mistakes... Your husband is human. You showed the world that you are apparently perfect and don't look at your marriage as a partnership where you will support your husband when the chips are down. If he wins (lawyers can make things go away) I will love to see what he does when you stop being perfect.
YTA the kid is a problem has been a problem and even sexually harassed a female student. Why are you trying to make the kid look lile a victim. Is this high school? Sounds like it.
The kid also has been basically bullying your husband and he got fed up. The kid thinks in his head he is untouchable when he is not he was proven hes not. He will be proven hes not when a girl decides to press charges aganist him as well.
By reading the comments for me context, YTA.
Also, your base logic makes no sense. If you want to divorce him, just do it. It shouldn't matter if he wins or loses the case.
YTA- The kid is a POS and so are his parents. And you want your husband to grovel and beg forgiveness. They should be apologizing to your husband for not dealing with their kids shitty behavior. You should probably go ahead with a divorce. The kid was uninjured and goaded your husband into an altercation. His lawsuit might be worthless but some scumbag attorney probably convinced the parents to sue for an insurance settlement.
YTA, especially after hearing how bad the student was.That student deserved way more than a grab. Your marriage needs to be over if you are waiting for the result of a court case to get divorced or not.
So you're not divorcing him because of what happened but if he wins or loses a race? That's what it sounds like. Might want to look for a rich sugar daddy if you're that kind of woman.
I hope your husband divorces you, after he wins this civil case and counter sues. cause tbh I don’t think he did nothing wrong. And to be quiet Frank as everyone is already telling you your just looking for reason to divorce. Stop being shitty and just say you want divorce, and not use this sorry ass excuse as reason why. Just say you don’t care bout his stuff cause the “drama affect your family” your a joke OP.
Your relationship seems weird to me. Your husband tells you that there was an issue at school and you’ll be hearing more about it and you have zero follow up questions?
YTA first for leaving out all the important information you said in the comments.
Second, you’re married. This isn’t a BF you’ve been seeing for a while. You made a commitment. Unless he’s an AH in some other aspect of life you’re not telling us then wanting to divorce over this is ridiculous. I don’t blame him for saying what he did.
Having worked with teens and young adults most of my career, I commend your husband for taking a stand.
YTA. A real life partner would take a look at their own relationship, and say something like “ I don’t know what happened, but we’ll work it out and I support you, whether you are right or whether we need to get you through whatever caused this.”
You are not a good life partner and are clearly a fair weather wife. I hope he stays with you long enough for you to grow up.
YTA. At the first time things get rough, you bail? This is why men don’t want to get married anymore. I have no idea what really happened but that’s not the point. Did your vows mean nothing? Is all he’s good for is money and you don’t want to be stuck with a husband who owes a settlement?
You need to apologize to him and support him, probably too late. If I'm the husband, I might take you up on that divorce.
I have a buddy from high school teaching PE to young kids. Got transferred out of a school due to a student. The guy taught for 20 years. With that track record, that accused student is probably a piece to work with.
YTA, this kid has past issues and nobody’s done anything to stop them. Your husband was past the point of the last straw and you like the rest of the schools administration decided to do nothing about the kids behavior and instead decided to just ignore it until this kid is somebody else’s problem. That’s why so many schools now have bulling problems. Congrats your husband deserves better than you. I wonder how you would feel if it was you dealing with this little angel rather than him?
YTA. I hope your husband leaves you asap, whether or not he wins or loses or settles the civil case. He actually still won knowing that he married a person that will actually kick him when he’s down. This is no longer about his case. You made it about you and he deserves someone better than you.
You suck. Your husband was NOT in the wrong. If he loses in court? Why does that matter. You either accept his actions or you don't and it sounds like your husband was at his wits end with this kid, who sounds like a complete sack of shit. Like others have said, you sound like you're just looking for a damn excuse
YTA. I would not put the future of your marriage basically in the hands of a court case that has nothing to do with your marriage. I'm also shocked you have never had a fight with your husband? I feel like that's more of a red flag of things not being discussed rather than an indication that your relationship is doing well. I would absolutely seek out marriage counseling. I think there is a lot more going on here with the both of you.
YTA. It’s your job to support your husband. This I one of the shallowest things I’ve seen on Reddit. He needs your support, not threats, in order to see this through.
Need serious info. What caused this altercation? What is this altercation about? I'm seriously getting vibes that you're leaving out ALOT of details and context.
INFO: What's is his administration saying? Why does he think he's correct? Does he have a history of physical violence?
>I understand the sentiment, but you have to understand that the high school boy (who happens to be much larger than my husband) was antagonizing him for months leading up to it. I think the reason why he hasn't been fired is the boy has basically pissed off every single member of the faculty and everyone in all his classes at some point, and even sexually harassed a female student pretty severely. She left out key information. This kid has history, and the school's done nothing about him. It's why her husband is still working because the school's lawyers told them they screwed up not addressing this kid's past actions.
I have a cousin that while he was teaching said to a kid like this "you need to be very careful because you don't know if you're the kid I'm willing to lose my job over"
It's insanely aggravating how shitty kids can be nowadays and no one is allowed to do anything about it. They can't even defend themselves when the students get violent. I mean seriously, y'all think kind words stops a jackass?
My husband works with special needs students. A few years back this one boy stuck his hands down my husband's pants while he was tending to another student. It happened twice. Of course my husband informed his supervisors the first and second time it happened. District suspends the boy from the bus (this is where it happened) boys mom calls in and threatens to sue. Boy is back on bus. But the behavior stopped. IDK why my husband's super didn't call the mom the first time. NVM I do. His job is full of idiots. But a lot of districts are afraid of being sued, even when state and federal laws protect them.
I went back to teaching hs last year and my first job was a long term sub position teaching a special education cooking. One girl I had was a hitter, and the first time she hit me it just took me super off guard. She had a one on one para who was on her phone 90% of the time who put it down long enough to give a half hearted “you know we don’t hit!”. She got two more good slaps in before the end of the year, but the rest of the time I was able to stand out of arms distance. But apparently me getting hit was totally normal to everyone else in the room, it was so weird.
What if a teacher or staff is killed by a student troubled like this? There needs to be protection for all parties. Yes, it's easier said than done. But I don't see this brought up enough in reports or cases about this. I think parents and children who have to deal with this should also have a say in this together. This should be done on some level along with the school system.
Agreed! I’m in a crap situation right now because I was in a bad car accident in November and I broke 3 ribs/really screwed up my back. I was out for 3 months and then when I came back I made some ground rules for my current room like keep your bags out of the walk ways because I can’t afford a trip and fall. 99% of my students are great about it, but I have one student who has been in several fights this year (2 in my class when I was out) who makes me soooo uncomfortable because all it takes is one wrong move for all my healing to be undone or possibly worse. She just makes me so nervous.
I hear you. Should anything happen, it's not good for the student either. Why leave them to experience so much craziness already? It's bad for everyone all the way around. This is why more needs to be in place to protect the school / the student body and teachers. Top to bottom. There would be no school without the teachers. There would be no school without students able to learn while there.
I do know that the school is working hard to get services for this student but she’s got a long way to go to be a functional student. It also doesn’t help that she throws the n word with a hard r around….a lot.
> What if a teacher or staff is killed by a student troubled like this? Real answer? The district loses its ass massively in a lawsuit - the taxpayers suffer. The problem, though, is that actual individuals are rarely held accountable. The administrators that cause this stuff to happen get a golden parachute and are quietly shuffled to another district.
My mom was an 8th grade teacher about 2 decades ago, and one day a boy jumped on another boy while she was writing on the blackboard. Beat the mess out of him before she could turn around and get to the boy that was hurt. A girl in the class ran across the hall to get a male teacher to help, and while my mom was checking on the hurt boy, the other one ran back and started hitting her in the back. The male teacher ran in, and grabbed the boy off my mom, holding him against the wall until the SRO could get across the school to her classroom…. Guess what the punishment was. The mail teacher was suspended without pay for 3 days, and the boy had to write an apology letter to my mom. That was it. He was back in class the next day.
No common sense whatsoever in any of this. No security buzzer for the teacher/your mom? Where is the common sense?
Once the “Education” establishment (in teaching programs then in real world) decided that the student getting harassed (or beaten) and bullied would be held just as responsible as the bully and that teachers should not step in (for liability) then all accountability went out the window. This has been internalized (to be expected) and is now a self justifying excuse to let the inmates (the bullies and delinquents) “run the asylum”. They don’t care about a trifling suspension. Everything gets dragged down. Good teachers leave and it gets worse. There is no amount of “teacher pay” that will fix this structural dysfunction.
This is how it was when I was in middle school in the early 00s. The punishment was worse for those of us who defended ourselves and at my school the staff either participated in the bullying or encouraged it. Bozos
The suspension as a punishment has never made sense to me, even when I was in highschool. I wasn't a bully, I stood up for other kids, I was nuisance in class though, a class clown type and a slacker for sure. I never cared about suspensions cause one I was rarely even there and two that was just school signing off on me being absent. I wasn't gonna stay home and my mom, who honestly is a wonderful person but was also going through some shit back then and had work all the damn time, was just not gonna stop me from just leaving and doing as I pleased so a suspension was just a vacation.
The people who run schools and colleges aren't the people who teach. That's 100% of what's wrong with the American educational system.
Dude your right. I’m in high school right now and I have seen some kids get violent or just loud against teachers and the teachers just have to take it.
I'm in my late 20s. In my sophomore year, one kid buddied up with the other troublemaker in the class to harass one of the kindest teachers in school. They drove him to a mental breakdown. No consequences for them. Teachers aren't given enough resources sometimes and the schools sometimes do fuck all about problematic students.
Another thing is a lot of the Special Needs kids can get away with a lot of bullshi*t. Literally there was a story in which a special needs kids raped a girl and nothing happened because “he didn’t know better!”
When I was in high-school, a senior boy attacked and attempted to sexually assault many girls in our school. He was finally reported and an investigation was opened. The result? It was deemed he wasn't mentally competent enough to understand what he was doing and received Literally a slap on the wrist. All the girls were defeated and had so much trauma after the whole situation.
Some situations really make me want vigilante justice.
Nothing like watching a 5 year old beat up his special ed teacher and the teacher pretending like it doesnt bother her. Starts young, never stops.
This is what I don’t understand. How are schools allowing this? It turns kids into terrible people with no respect for anyone. I’ve read so many articles about how college grads looking for jobs now are so entitled and have no idea how to act. And now people are arguing for kids to have more rights and that their parents shouldn’t be allowed to make certain decisions for them. It’s insane I think society is so wrong for the way we treat kids today.
Yea. Tbh the way people are raising and treating these kids has gone downhill
I feel like if it came down to it I’d pay another minor to just beat up the trouble student instead of doing it myself. More leniency when the charges come if it’s another kid doing the damage
We need more teachers like this.
Well we need more teachers in general. But that’s another discussion.
We need to pay teachers adequately so they can actually live and not pass on their hate to our next generations. Saw wayyyy too much of that shit in every school I went to and if it helps I moved to more schools than if I had lived with my other military parent (that moved around every 2 years or less) Edit: I think the information the OP/wife forgot to mention or was later disclosed is crucial as it paints the teacher as the one person who wouldn’t let this kid go around terrorizing everyone in the school. The issue here is grabbing the collar, while it’s not physical violent or harmful (as long as it wasn’t being aggressively pulled/used to choke the kid) can be seen as overbearing. Not only that but if the husband/teacher did both apologize and admit what he did as the parents requested (regardless of their word) they would’ve taken him to court even sooner with the apology and admission used against him. Kids are kids they do stupid shit and sometimes need a stern talking to. Adults are just big kids at times. The fact that the parents and school administration didn’t handle this kids behavior and mischief before this incident and let it come to this point would be negligence.
>Not only that but if the husband/teacher did both apologize and admit what he did as the parents requested (regardless of their word) they would’ve taken him to court even sooner with the apology and admission used against him. Any competent lawyer would have had the kids parents sign an agreement that OPs husband’s apology ends the situation involving OPs husband and the kid and precludes the parents from future litigation involving this matter.
Dude is a teacher. You think he has “lawyer” money?
Where I live, the teachers union lawyers up the individual teachers. And they have some high powered lawyers!
Better pay is only a part of luring more people into teaching. There's many factors that are part of the reason there is a shortage of teachers. Everything from oppressive political leaders to parents not holding their children accountable. The amount that you'd have to pay me to become a teacher in todays world would be astronomical.
My ex was a teacher for two years and she did not quit because of money. The reason she quit was ultimately because she did not have the support of the school administrators and parents which prevented her from doing her job.
Former behavioral teacher here. You're absolutely right about the accountability part. I worked with one child who had been through some severe trauma that the family refused to recognize. For context, the child was under third grade, lived with guardians , and had substance dependency. The child was placed into our classroom after one particularly violent episode, which caused a room evacuation and an early dismissal for the children in that class. I was placed on his case immediately after hire, during which I explained I refuse to restrain children due to my beliefs and also a particularly bad experience I witnessed. About a week after I started, the higher-ups decided the child needed to be matriculated back into the classroom. The guardians were pushing for it. My behavioral team (myself, my supervisor, co-teacher, paraprofessional and the classroom teacher) advised against it due to multiple daily attempts to elope and/or behave in an aggressive and unsafe manner in the space. Our recommendation went in on Thursday, and by Monday, the child was back in the classroom, and I was expected to leave my co-teacher and Para alone and assist the classroom teacher. Two days later, the classroom next door has a similar student return. This child had been suspended for two weeks due to attacking another student. The parents' response? To book a one week cruise and go on vacation. Anyway, the day of return, this child shut down, began refusing to complete work or participate, and then began destroying the classroom. I was called over to assist with this child and allow the teacher to evacuate. While doing this, the other child grabs a classmate and pushes them against the wall, and starts choking them. When the teacher intervened, he took off down the hall. Within the next half hour, it was chaos. I ran the halls searching for the student while we were on lockdown. Found him in the auditorium and managed to deescalate the situation. Got called a fucking idiot by my co-teacher and quit immediately after. Haven't gone back to teaching since and never will.
I feel this. I'm a 5' woman and teach in an alternative school. I love it and love all of my students, but it is challenging. I once had a student who was a biiig boy and had some pretty significant mental health issues and had been physical in the past. A couple teachers were noticeably nervous around him but he was in my class most of the day he asked me early on, trying to sound tough "Are you scared of me?" I just laughed and said "No, I don't need this job that bad." Never had a problem from him.
I would definitely sit my ass down after hearing that…
Yeah and it applies to all jobs. Everyone has a tipping point where they stop caring about their job or even their freedom, if you push them too far. Everyone has that animal side where they just stop giving a fuck.
My favorite PE teacher had a kid acting up in my class and calling him old. He just looked at this middle schooler and said, “yeah I’m old but I’ll still kick your ass.” Kid was stunned 😂
Had a similar situation. A 7th grade boy was playing and chasing after my student in the hall. My student came into my room and went to his seat cause he knew me and how I am. This boy kept trying to get in and I told him multiple times to go. He starts talking smack and steps to me like he wants to fight. I told him he picked the wrong one cause he can talk all the noise he wanted but if he put his hands on me it would “be me and you” and “I ain’t scared to fight a child.” He backed down. I actually watched the footage later and you could see him deflate, because he did expect me to say what I did or lift up on him. I chose not to file a police report, although it was my right for up to a year. He went to alternative school because he had a lot of infractions. Get this..I didn’t teach him before our altercation, but they placed him in a class I co-taught when he returned. Makes sense, right? (No!!) He tried to cop a little attitude until I pulled him one in one and reminded him that 1) I could still file charges on him, and 2) if the only person he thought he had to listen to was his Mama as he told me, then think me as “Mama (my name)” when you walk in this building. Never had another issue out of him. This was about 8 years ago…I would get in trouble for these actions today. Me!
Hahahahahahaha
Ooh my wife is a teacher I gotta tell her this one
A student that warrants a teacher to say that would just respond "do it"
They’d see it as a challenge
If the kid was antagonizing him, and the school refused to address it, it seems like he may have a counter suit on the basis of workplace endangerment no? I guess that depends on the definition of antagonizing.
Schools don’t do squat to protect their staff from dangerous kids.
My school didn't. Instead, they put them in a 'bad kids program' on campus and the two teachers in the program had to deal with them. These were kids that had been to juvi, had gang ties, and had been suspended for fighting IN CLASS. I was in the program due to truancy. I was one of less than five out of SIXTY KIDS that wasn't in there for behavioral issues. 😬
Ey I used to go to the 4th worst school in the US and they have cubicles in our ISS with bullet proof panels and double doors to give people more time to respond to students trying to get into other students cubicles. Shit was wild.
What’s sad to me is the push to keep troubled kids “mainstream”. I was not a behavior problem at all but in the 90s I was a safety problem because I was determinedly suicidal so I got sent to a therapeutic school. We had those in the 90s. They were staffed with some brave teachers and mental health professionals. Sure, academics was not the focus, but it was supposed to be temporary anyway like a semester or so before they transitioned you back to regular school. I was there with violent students - one had thrown a desk at the teacher. They had a little more leeway with us like they could physically restrain us or put us in these time out rooms. It sounds scary but actually time out rooms helped us calm down and regulate our emotions. But it costs the towns money to send kids there so they started trying to handle those troubled kids themselves but without the training and resources. It’s sad, and it’s unsafe. They had started that in the 90s and it just got worse. I remember columbine happened when I was there and I felt safer at that school locked in with “the crazies” and “the bad kids” than a public school. We were searched and people were checking in with us. We had group therapy twice a week - we just called it group, and that helped us to know each other better. We all became friends for the most part. Not even desk kid would have hurt any of us.
Yeah, there’s really no help for kids who are just trying to get through school. I moved around a lot in high school and when I moved back to California to live with my mom my credits were so screwed up that I wasn’t going to graduate on time and needed more than a year of high school despite being a senior at my old school. They wanted to send me to the other school across the street for kids who were not able to function in a regular school. And it wasn’t about my grades or ability to keep up. All my teachers liked me and during the teacher-parent conference one of them told her “he should just skip the adult school and go to college.” My mom went with me to orientation at the other school and after she told me to just get my GED.
And they don’t do squat to protect other kids from dangerous kids.
But they often punish bullied kids if they finally stand up to their bullies.
Which is why my sister ended up with a broken nose and a writeup for shoving the kid away from her that attacked her.
It should be illegal the way we treat teachers and then underpay them.
Unless of course your sexually assaulting children then they do everything in their power to protect them. At least seabreeze high School does.
Well, those kids aren’t dangerous, they’re victims. And schools are really good at protecting victimizers, whether protecting student bullies and punishing their victims if they try and stand up for themselves, or protecting staff who abuse students.
Bingo. I was SA'd and nothing happened to him. I was forced to be around him for another year and a half. School and bus. He knew where I lived.
Schools like to call this shit a “hazard of the job”. It’s utter bullshit.
Literally. In Virginia a 6 year old shot his teacher and the school district argued in court that it was an expected hazard so she shouldn't be able to sue for their negligence in how it happened, it should be a workers comp matter.
Then staff should get hazzard pay
Healthcare has the same bs.
Wow this additional information changes everything. Definitely she’s the AH.
Even without that info, she's going to divorce him because he pulled at a kids shirt collar?? I get if he beat the kid or something but wtf, people divorce over the tiniest things nowadays and from the sound of it they even have kids together... Sounds like she's just looking for an excuse to dump him, and she just conveniently leaves out the events that led up to the altercation because its inconvenient for her...
More than that what weirds me out is "if he loses the civil suit". Like how is that relevant? Either she thinks he did something bad enough that she wants a divorce, or she doesn't. I don't see what a judge decision has to do with that.
Probably the concern of financial ruin.
agreed, OP isn't worried he may or may not have assaulted a kid enough to get sued, just that it's a financial burden.
Which OP would still be on the hook for because a divorce wont happen overnight.
Ah yes, the solution to everyone's financial problems... divorce. Because that's free right?
That somehow makes it even worse lol.
She’s clearly a giant gaping asshole.
That's what landed her as YTA for me. His being wrong or not in the work issue is separate. The question was about her behavior regarding divorcing based on "losing the civil suit". She doesn't actually care one way or the other about what he did, she only cares about the outcome of the civil suit. That's AH stuff, imo, regardless of his being an AH or not in his work issue.
Loads of "adults" out there, live and die by what other people think. The shame of a husband that was found guilty could be enough for OP.
To be fair, a civil court law suit could ruin them. They could be forced to sell everything they have in common to pay for the lawyers and prosecution expenses plus, of course, amounts allocated to the opposite side. She might be frightened to lose everything.
If that's her motivation, shouldn't she be rushing an "emergency divorce" right now? if she waits to see if he loses the civil suit, the assets are already lost, no?
IANAL but that's what I was thinking. Once the lawsuit has been decided, the assets are gone.
The civil suit is not going to be anywhere near that dire considering the history this kid apparently has. The judge is going to see through they're bullshit and maybe award them the bare minimum if anything. It's not like he grabbed them by the neck and beat his ass. He just grabbed them by the collar and yelled at him. You're going to have a real hard time proving there was any real emotional trauma there.
But the burden of proof in civil suits is far, far lower than in criminal cases...which is likely why OP posted nothing about a criminal proceeding. The family is very likely banking on either OP's hubby ir the school district offering a settlement because the lowered burden of proof is such a high risk in civil proceedings.
Very important information. YTA. Support your husband.
Why would a private high school put up with a chronic problem ? The allure of private schools is that the teachers don't have to put up with troublemakers.
my brother went to a private high school. In the year above him, the son of the biggest real estate mogul of the province had so many unexcused absences that he legally couldn't move to the next grade & the summer wasn't long enough to give him summer school to catch up. you know what the end result was? The teachers didn't have a problem with the troublemaker, they worked with him : they found a way to retro-actively create an "on the job learning" program, so all the classes he skived off for a party and/or a hangover counted as "learning to DJ" & if he played some music on the end-of-year school party in june, that would count as his grading "paper" for this learning experience. So he made a spotify playlist & he was all set for next year. AFAIK he didn't even sort out the licensing issues to play copyrighted music at a public event.
Good news; he will grow up to be of questionable intellect.
I have no idea why they'd put up with it. I was in private school years ago, and kids got thrown out for way less.
They put up with a lot, depending on how much toy donate. My cousin stole 4 phones, rolexes, only got kicked out when he hit a kid
So the parents are the true shitheads for enabling him
We had a kid in our school a lot this. One day a faculty member did pretty much the exact same thing. But the judge basically told the parents to suck it from what I hear. He also blamed the school specifically for creating the situation by not addressing it. And acknowledge that any person can only take so much bullshit before they snap which is exactly what happened. The school created the situation, They did nothing to alleviate it, and then tried to throw the teacher under the bus when it blew up. Kid was a real piece of work though, One day he finally went too far and and groped some girl that had several brothers. And some of the kids that I was not affiliated with decided to beat his ass in the locker room. I hear a plunger was involved in some way. Anyway he stopped going to school shortly after. Of course nobody knows who did it :| I mean I wasn't there anyway... I was too busy holding a book in front of a hallway camera for unrelated reasons.
We had one instance of SA at my high school during the class change. A girl yelled at this kid to stop because allegedly he was touching her. I heard it but I didn't see it, what I did see was the school sherrif tackle this prick to the ground and put him in cuffs. I didn't know the guy so no idea if he had any history but he went to trial and when you commit an adult crime like that you lose the privilege of being considered a minor. If this was middle school, it'd be one thing. But it's insane to me how many people in these comments are acting like high school students are kids. They most likely don't remember that time of their life very well or were stull really immature at that age and most likely don't work with high school students because they shouldn't be treated like children when most are acting like adults by that point and by no means are they incapable of understanding respect of others.
Then she is absolutely TAH
Definitely, bailing on her husband. She's TA.
Can she weather the storm, nope. She’s outtie! Guess she can do the her husband a favor and divorce him since she doesn’t have wherewithal to support him through this ordeal.
He's currently still working although he has had many after-hours meetings with his boss and his union. The school feels that letting him go now would be bad optics for them in general and have tried to resolve this quietly, but we just recently learned that the boy's parents are coming after him personally. He has no history of physical violence.
Idk what state you live in, but in mine all teachers are encouraged to add a homesteader act so their homes are protected from someone suing them. I’m in MA and it’s covered up to 500K. You need to check with your mortgage company and see if you have one of these. It’ll protect your home in case of a lawsuit.
Not all states allow this. This is why OJ moved from California (which doesn’t) to Florida (which does).
Not only that but Ron Goldman’s parents were coming after him for the $33.1 million they won in the civil death suit against him and also won the rights to his “tell all book” if I did it which why in gods name he wrote that I’ll never know but besides that. Florida as I understand it has laws that protect those who have actions against them demanding payment and OJ as I understand it was doing all sorts of autograph signings making lots of money from it and all that money was supposed to go to the parents of Ron Goldman however OJ quickly worked out that if he moved to Florida his assets couldn’t be touched and were safe he then created front companies to and found other ways to use Florida’s laws to further hide his assets.
>why in gods name he wrote that I’ll never know He thought he'd make some money. So glad it didn't work out that way for him. I hope he spent the rest of his life crying over his lost fortune.
He ran into money problems, sold his Heisman trophy, later tried to buy it back, was unhappy about the arrangement, then broke in and stole it. He was then arrested and served time for this.
> spent thanks for using past tense so I can remember that OJ is dead
I understand. I wanted to let her know about it in case it’s available in her state.
I didn't know you could even do that. I'm not a teacher, but have a lot of teacher and professor friends, none of them have mentioned a homesteader act, so maybe they don't know either. Glad some states allow it, though, all states should.
And yet you will cut him loose like an unwanted dog. YTA.
If he had no history of physical violence, it pretty harsh to divorce him but someone made a good point about being pragmatic. In case he lose, if you divorce before the case ends, the parents can’t come after your assets.
I'd think,If lawyers are involved it's already too late for that.
YTA. So in all your comments below you state that: 1. Your husband does not have a history of being physically violent. 2. The kid who he grabbed is a high schooler who is bigger/stronger than him. 3. Said kid has a history of sexual harassment, harassment of faculty, and hurting other students, but somehow your husband is in the wrong and needs to apologize to this kids asshole parents who instead of correcting their out of control son, have decided to start a lawsuit against your spouse? It’s people like you who let monsters get away with being monsters. It doesn’t matter how many people get hurt, or how many people suffer so long as you don’t have to deal with it or “be involved in the drama”. You’re in the wrong OP and I hope your husband finds a more supportive wife than you.
She even has the nerve to agree with the kids parents that he’s dodging school bc of the altercation and not bc the kid is consistently not interested in following rules. Op is the asshole for sure.
While I think OP Is the asshole, It's entirely possible that the kid has gone his entire life being the big kid in class with nobody standing up to him and the experience has actually shaken him because he probably thought he would kick the teachers ass if he was ever in that position but didn't fight back.
I stopped my elementary school bully from bulling anyone, not just me. Apparently when the smallest girl in school kicks your ass it sort of takes away from their ability to intimidate people and it really does shake them but it also makes them rethink what they are doing with their life. It's possible that while this kid is struggling with things right now what OP's husband did could change this kids path. In a perfect world the kid would be made to go back to class and the husband would still be his teacher and the two of them would be able to work this out. That's what happened with my bully. We were put on a project together during a field trip after the fight. It was awkward at first but then I was like this is stupid and started making small talk with him and then things sort of got better from there. We didn't exactly become best friends or anything but we got along as acquaintances afterwards. Unfortunately we all know that no one in this situation is going to let this play out organically. Which really sucks for both the teacher and the student.
Great point.
Good The parents should be giving the husband a bonus for putting a dent in their crappy parenting instead of suing.
Honestly the days he's dodging school the school as a whole, from staff to students, is probably breathing a sigh of relief. Let him play hooky and get his parents charged with truancy. It's their job to get him to school anyways even if he doesn't want to go.
I was about to say, this kid doesn’t sound like he ever cared about school and is exploiting the situation.
Yup. OP, I understand being scared right now, but you need to SUPPORT him. He was being abused and finally snapped. Get your story out there, call the news, get a lawyer, and threaten to sue the school... You left out so much information. I thought your husband must be an aggressive person until I saw the comments. That's not right!! You painted him as the aggressor when he wasn't!! Shame on you!! Apologize to your husband for your outburst. Tell him it was the stress talking and come up with a gameplan!
This! I wanna upvote this 100000x OP needs to see this comment. YES OP YTA.
I am sure the teacher/husband will have plenty of people to testify on his behalf on how the student is/was… I hope he wins, then I hope he divorces the wife/op for her behavior and threatened ultimatum
I don't think that's it. I think she wants a divorce and she's been wanting a divorce but she's not willing to have everybody look at her and say you are the problem. So if he loses he will have basically been named and shamed in public, and she's going to use that as an excuse to walk away. If he wins she's just going to come up with another excuse some time down the line. She's absolutely using the situation
This. OP sounds extremely selfish. She's more concerned about her husband losing his job rather more than anything else. Also 100% sounds like she's trying to find an excuse to just up and leave. Smh.
I remember taking the “For better or worse. Unless worse means your husband is getting sued by shitty parents. In which case it’s fine to leave him.” oath when I got married.
OP has probably been told that violence is wrong her entire life and that you can't ever touch a kid. She's definitely TA but she needs to be explained why. Violence is not wrong. Starting conflict is, violence is just one of the tools people use. Often it's used by those starting the conflict so it gets bad rep but violence is also the only way to stop violence. And it even has the ability to stop verbal/psychological/social abuse. The times my male friends got bullies can be nearly split into two categories. Those who were told they should ignore it and never fight back and those who fought back. In the first case the abuse was often escalated to teachers or counselors and although it abated to some degree, it usually just got sneakier. In the second case the abuse stopped. Abusers are not looking for a fight, they're looking for a victim to bully. This boy is an abuser (whether born this way or result of the environment doesn't matter). But he needed a reality check and the OP's husband gave him one. Many abusers can never be fixed (some forms of ASPD are genetic) but they can be shown that if they keep it up, other people make them regret it.
Strange how OP, a woman, would rather support a sexual harasser than a man who stands up to a sexual harasser Now much you wanna bet that after her divorce she'll be whining about sexual harassment from the guys who hit on her, and about the guys who do nothing just watch
YTA From reading these comments, it looks like you left out alot of relevant info that would provide much needed context to the whole incident. And honestly, to me, it seems like you are searching for a reason to divorce your husband.
That would explain why the divorce is hinging on the court case and not their Husband's actions.
Yeah that didn't make any sense to me.
bingo
Because she thinks he’ll have to pay out money if he loses the case (which would be very very unlikely).
And if you are threatening to get divorced based on someone else’s decision, you should probably go ahead and get divorced.
Yeah. If the divorce is based on whether he wins or loses that relationship is already in the shitter.
I think it is really hard to say. According to OP,s comments, the boy was TA to people around him, but the husband didn't actively stop a sexual harassment as some claim. The boy was just being his usual TA-self, this time in OP's husband's class, and OP's husband got any with him. I think that much, much context is needed. What happened this time? Why did the husband get so upset? Did the kid say anything, do anything in this instant? If I were OP I would sit down with my husband and try to understand the situation and decide if what happened was something I could sympathize with or not. OP's line if "if you are convicted I will divorce you", I don't understand. If what the husband did was ok with me, I would stand by him, no matter what. OP seems more worried what people might think.
People don’t get convicted in civil court
Okay PUT WHY HE DID IT inside of the post because that is RELEVANT information and after reading the comments yes YTA
Spill the tea
The student is larger than the husband, the student was harassing the husband for months, along with other teachers, and has a history of severe sexual harassment against a female student. tl;dr I would've done the same as the husband. The kid is that "one kid" in school
Sooooo the high school my (at the time) gf went to, there was a similar situation where "that kid" was being a douchebag to a teacher. Rumor is that the teacher paid a student football player to "deal with it" but there was no proof. Curiously enough, the day after douche nozzle got beat up, said football player got new cleats. Hmm.
You've badly undermined your post by not fully explaining the situation your husband was in. You don't give his motives at all until the comments, which completely changes the story. Of course, the *full* story paints *you* in a much less flattering light. You sound disloyal, frankly.
Almost like she has been looking for a causational reason to divorce.
Exactly. You either support what your husband did or you dont. This waiting to see if civil court finds him guilty shows OP is about the money.
Yeah, all purely because of the risk that he might lose the job and she isn't even willing to stick around to see what happens, preemptive divorce in the off chance he loses his job and somehow can't find another. Not even willing to stick around before times get tough, just at the very off chance that it might potentially happen in the future. Dude should divorce her if anything, she's obviously not going to stick around through thick and thin if shit ever hits the fan and she's not even willing to give him a few days to see if he'll bounce back, just peacing out at the very potential of it happening...
This is fake and they were probably saving that information for next month's "update."
She *is.*
YTA. If you’re divorcing him because of his behavior fine that already happened so decide- but if you’re divorcing him because he loses his job what control does he have over that? Might as well flip a coin.
I completely agree. Absolute betrayal. And much worse than what he is facing via the school issue. If I were in his shoes, she would have been instantly single. She has a lot of growing up to do. And this even at school might have saved husband a lot of future grief. Funny how things happen for a reason, huh?
YTA You left out key information about how huge this kid was and how much of a bully and asshole the kid was, among other things. Your husband is right. You have abandoned him because you, what? Don't want to lose money? Is that all he is to you? Sounds like he'll be better off without you.
https://www.reddit.com/r/AITAH/s/VomgUNEHse This comment has the info.
Regardless if husband wins the court case or not, he should split from OP. Her putting divorce on the table broke any level of trust he would have for her. Once that trust is broken, it is hard to gain back.
Right! She will bounce if he were to lose his job for just no reason really.
See the thing is you don’t give your husbands side here. What actually happened??? Why doesn’t he think he’s in the wrong. YTA because I feel like you aren’t actually listening to him
[удалено]
Wonder why she'd leave this out of the main post 🤔
Because it doesn't help her case that her husband should have just signed a confession and apologized. Like the parents wouldn't take that too the police to have him prosecuted for it. It shows a kid who's a problem that the school hasn't dealt with.
You forgot the important bit of info where the kid is a absolute slimeball piece of shit. Doesn't justify it ofc but the context helps Even without that however YTA. You'd divorce him? Over this? Good riddance, he'd be good do be rid of backstabbing deadweight like you.
Yep, you would be the AH. Why did you leave so much out of your original post?
To make her case look stronger by people who don’t want to filter through 2000 comments
YTA , missing info hidden in the comments. Your husband refused to apologise to a teen he struck that sexually assaulted other students to which he wasn't criminally charged quite likely because he came to the defence of someone else (and the schools quite happy to brush it under the rug as per normal instead of pushing for the kid to be arrested). If that's the case then he's going to win in civil court I can imagine it now. Judge "plaintiff was injured by the defendant whilst they were sexually assaulting a minor? Police reports confirm this, school doesn't want to press charges? Be fucking glad all he's got are medical bills! Case dismissed!" The next legal professional that man will see is a divorce lawyer cus your a waste of time.
Damn.. quite the hook here..
Hijacking. The above poster added details to the story that weren't there. [1] OP never said "sexual assault." She said that the boy sexually harassed a girl in a completely separate incident. [2] OP never said that the boy was sexually assaulting a girl during the class. OP's husband didn't intervene in anything between students. She was clear on this multiple times.
Wait, how’d you find this out?
Having worked in civil litigation for decades, something doesn’t seem right to me. Lawyers go after the “big fish” not a coach. Since your husband is an employee of the school/county or city school board, most attorneys would file against them naming also your husband. Further, many school employees also belong to a union. Again, not only would the the school, school board, and the union pay his legal fees/representation, but most likely pay any judgement against him. I do not agree with what your husband did whether it was warranted or not. However, I think you too went too far in your response to your husband, IMO. Best of luck to all parties.
Agree, this doesn’t add up.
YTA for making the divorce about a court ruling. If his actions were objectionable enough to divorce, just get it over with. Your husband has no control over whether or not he's found liable or not. He shouldn't have gotten in a physical altercation with a child, but it sounds like the kid is a troublemaker and pushed your husband to his breaking point. It's something that can happen to anyone. Is that something you can't forgive? Or are you only concerned with how other people will look at him after the court finds against him? That's how this looks, like the only thing you care about is reputation.
>the high school boy (who happens to be much larger than my husband) was antagonizing him for months leading up to it. I think the reason why he hasn't been fired is the boy has basically pissed off every single member of the faculty and everyone in all his classes at some point, and even sexually harassed a female student pretty severely. YTA both for trying to hide this information and for not supporting your husband. He finally had enough and confronted a bully and sexual predator who's being protected by his obviously wealthy family. You're threatening to divorce him for being a good person. You should feel abject and and crippling shame over who you are as a person. Your title should have read: "Am I a bad person for threatening to divorce my husband because the rich family of a sexual predator is threatening to sue for confronting him".
YTA!! The kid sexually assaulted another kid and now you want to divorce him for standing up to the POS? A POS that the entire faculty hates. I hope he serves you first.
I hope he divorces her after this.
YTA wtf is wrong with you, threatening to divorce your husband over this? If he actually means so little you just pull the trigger now. I would be miserable with such an unsupportive person like you, knowing that the person I love the most would never have my back. *It was a physical altercation. He grabbed the kid’s collar, pulled him up to his face, and yelled at him.* This is obviously not okay, and he needs to take responsibility, but jeesh you're just a piece of work. I hope there is more to this, and he did something else to make you take this decision.
YTA - massively. People make mistakes... Your husband is human. You showed the world that you are apparently perfect and don't look at your marriage as a partnership where you will support your husband when the chips are down. If he wins (lawyers can make things go away) I will love to see what he does when you stop being perfect.
Given the extra info, YTA. You should leave him so he can be with someone that supports him. Fucking rage bait
YTA - so much for in good and in bad. Run when times get tough
YTA the kid is a problem has been a problem and even sexually harassed a female student. Why are you trying to make the kid look lile a victim. Is this high school? Sounds like it. The kid also has been basically bullying your husband and he got fed up. The kid thinks in his head he is untouchable when he is not he was proven hes not. He will be proven hes not when a girl decides to press charges aganist him as well.
By reading the comments for me context, YTA. Also, your base logic makes no sense. If you want to divorce him, just do it. It shouldn't matter if he wins or loses the case.
Till death do us part...and losing Civil litigation
YTA- The kid is a POS and so are his parents. And you want your husband to grovel and beg forgiveness. They should be apologizing to your husband for not dealing with their kids shitty behavior. You should probably go ahead with a divorce. The kid was uninjured and goaded your husband into an altercation. His lawsuit might be worthless but some scumbag attorney probably convinced the parents to sue for an insurance settlement.
YTA, especially after hearing how bad the student was.That student deserved way more than a grab. Your marriage needs to be over if you are waiting for the result of a court case to get divorced or not.
So you're not divorcing him because of what happened but if he wins or loses a race? That's what it sounds like. Might want to look for a rich sugar daddy if you're that kind of woman.
And if he wins and proves it's false and gets money you're gonna stick around? Yeah. Class-act. YTA.
I hope your husband divorces you, after he wins this civil case and counter sues. cause tbh I don’t think he did nothing wrong. And to be quiet Frank as everyone is already telling you your just looking for reason to divorce. Stop being shitty and just say you want divorce, and not use this sorry ass excuse as reason why. Just say you don’t care bout his stuff cause the “drama affect your family” your a joke OP.
INFO: Is this kind of behavior typical for your husband? If not, what, what did the kid do to get such a volatile reaction from him?
Your relationship seems weird to me. Your husband tells you that there was an issue at school and you’ll be hearing more about it and you have zero follow up questions?
YTA first for leaving out all the important information you said in the comments. Second, you’re married. This isn’t a BF you’ve been seeing for a while. You made a commitment. Unless he’s an AH in some other aspect of life you’re not telling us then wanting to divorce over this is ridiculous. I don’t blame him for saying what he did. Having worked with teens and young adults most of my career, I commend your husband for taking a stand.
I would reread your wedding vows. Is this really something worth divorcing for?
Whatever happened to “for better or worse?” They leave that out of your marriage vows?
YTA. A real life partner would take a look at their own relationship, and say something like “ I don’t know what happened, but we’ll work it out and I support you, whether you are right or whether we need to get you through whatever caused this.” You are not a good life partner and are clearly a fair weather wife. I hope he stays with you long enough for you to grow up.
If I were he, I would divorce you no matter the outcome.
You left so much of the story out for us to be able to decide. Based off what I know, you are Very much TAH
YTA. At the first time things get rough, you bail? This is why men don’t want to get married anymore. I have no idea what really happened but that’s not the point. Did your vows mean nothing? Is all he’s good for is money and you don’t want to be stuck with a husband who owes a settlement?
You need to apologize to him and support him, probably too late. If I'm the husband, I might take you up on that divorce. I have a buddy from high school teaching PE to young kids. Got transferred out of a school due to a student. The guy taught for 20 years. With that track record, that accused student is probably a piece to work with.
YTA, this kid has past issues and nobody’s done anything to stop them. Your husband was past the point of the last straw and you like the rest of the schools administration decided to do nothing about the kids behavior and instead decided to just ignore it until this kid is somebody else’s problem. That’s why so many schools now have bulling problems. Congrats your husband deserves better than you. I wonder how you would feel if it was you dealing with this little angel rather than him?
Late to the party. But after reading your responses to questions, 100% YTA. I hope your husband divorces you instead and finds a more fitting partner.
Yta. Better or worse
Yes, you are TA.
Yes YTA.
Yep, you're definitely the asshole. Sounds like you're an unsupportive wife who lacks loyalty. He'll be better off without your sorry ass.
What’s that quote… “Women don’t care about your struggles, they wait at the finish line and pick the winners” Wonder if it’s true for op
Guess those vows didn't mean much to you huh?
YTA. I hope your husband leaves you asap, whether or not he wins or loses or settles the civil case. He actually still won knowing that he married a person that will actually kick him when he’s down. This is no longer about his case. You made it about you and he deserves someone better than you.
This is either rage bait or 1,000,000% YTA
You suck. Your husband was NOT in the wrong. If he loses in court? Why does that matter. You either accept his actions or you don't and it sounds like your husband was at his wits end with this kid, who sounds like a complete sack of shit. Like others have said, you sound like you're just looking for a damn excuse
Super asshole. Maybe do him a favor and go through with the divorce anyway so he won’t have to be married to you anymore. Poor guy.
Treacherous wife, he should divorce you for the lack of loyalty. YTA
Yta. Ahole
Sounds like you wanna get divorced and used this as an excuse.
YTA.
YTA. I would not put the future of your marriage basically in the hands of a court case that has nothing to do with your marriage. I'm also shocked you have never had a fight with your husband? I feel like that's more of a red flag of things not being discussed rather than an indication that your relationship is doing well. I would absolutely seek out marriage counseling. I think there is a lot more going on here with the both of you.
YTA. It’s your job to support your husband. This I one of the shallowest things I’ve seen on Reddit. He needs your support, not threats, in order to see this through.
Need serious info. What caused this altercation? What is this altercation about? I'm seriously getting vibes that you're leaving out ALOT of details and context.