Day 3
I worked a half day today because I had to appear in court
this morning. My ex-wife by help of a
lawyer entered a petition asking the judge for permission to remove my daughter
from the state so that they both can live in Georgia. She believes that since I have a master’s
degree and a few classes away from a second one, that I should earn more money
and being that I am due for a downward support modification, she claims that
she can’t afford to live in Illinois if the modification goes through. Humorously enough, finding her own job does
not seem to be an option for her. At any
rate, we were ordered to see a mediator.
This is very upsetting to me because I will miss 5 days of work in the
next three months due to domestic issues related to an ex-wife who wants more
money than I am paid.
When I arrived at the school, I saw that I was assigned to
work at the welcoming station for the third day of registration. There I was with two other aides, a secretary
who works in the attendance office and a band instructor. Our jobs were to give the registering people
a printout of their registration progress, then check to see if the registering
student was listed on the disciplinary dean’s list for mischief conduct or if
the student was a freshman who had not taken the Explorer Exam. After we verified that the student’s name did
not appear on any of the two lists, we checked the paper work brought with them
from home to ensure that the forms were properly completed and that the proper
proof of residency information was in the parent’s possession. They were required to have rental leases or
property tax bill, utility bills, state ID or driver license, and a birth
certificate. The most common form
missing was the birth certificate as it was not mentioned in the letter that
was sent to parents to detail what documentation they needed to register their
child. At any rate, we were told to turn
them away if they did not have the birth certificate.
I remember an in-service from three months ago. It was conducted by Mr. Frazier from the
regional office. He told us that it was
unlawful to prevent someone to register if they did not provide a birth
certificate at registration. The way he
explained it was that birth certificates were needed to show guardianship and
that we were to allow parents to register their children and they would have a
number of days to bring in the birth certificate so that it would be placed in
file. If after those days had passed,
the student was to be reported to someone who would take it from there, contact
the parent and do whatever their job required them to do. I mentioned that we – the school – may be
liable for turning them away, but it was not my call and I was here to parrot
what I was told and not to think or to make sense of what I was asked to
do. Furthermore, I was certain that the
parents who were here to register their children had no idea of the legalities involved. We turned away twelve parents from the time I
arrived.
Day 4
When I started today, I was at the same station as
yesterday. I was the first line of
defense, or the greeting team – whatever it was called. When I entered the band room where everyone
waited, I saw nearly thirty people seated and waiting. I thought to respect their time and announce
that if they did not have a birth certificate, they would not be allowed to register. About five people stood and walked away. I continued to make this announcement for the
entire day until 50 minutes remained and Mr. LaSorda, came into the band room
to explain that we could not turn people away for not having birth
certificates. He said that the returning
students’ certificates were on file and that we could only hope that new
students and freshmen would have the certificates with them. He then went on to explain everything that
Mr. Frazier explained months ago. For the last 50 minutes, we did not turn away
anyone for not having birth certificates.
There was a student who came to my table wanting to see her
counselor. She was already registered
and had her books. She was unhappy that
she was not placed in Honors English and wanted a schedule change. I tried to calm her by explaining to her that
the counselors were all busy with registration and that the issue of schedule
change was such a small one at this time that it could be resolved on the first
day of school. She left and in about two
hours, I noticed that she had returned and was in the registration line outside
of the school standing with her mother.
At this time the line was so long, that it was out the door and in the
parking lot. I stopped to talk to her
mother and I repeated what I told her daughter.
The mother understood what I said, but she was unwilling to leave. “I know these people,” she said and explained
that sense she was already hear, she would wait and settle the matter
today. She was so adamant, that she was
willing to wait the remainder of the day.
She said that she was not leaving until she spoke to a counselor. I had security call Mr. LaSorda who came in a
matter of minutes. I tried to brief him
of the problem, but he said that I didn’t have to. Not feeling very comfortable with that, I
simply said that I have a parent who is insistent on seeing a counselor. We walked to the parent still in line outside
of the door and I pointed her out. Mr.
Burks, the head of security showed his face accompanied by another security
officer. Naturally, security had their
ears open to hear what the parent had to say, and when she explained that she
needed to talk to a counselor for a schedule change, Mr. Burks turned to walk
away saying to me that he would not have bothered to call Mr. LaSorda over such
a matter. I told him that she was
insistent and that she said that she would not leave until she spoke to a
counselor. Mr. Burks said “Well, she has
that right.” His suggestion that she could have waited as long as she wanted
struck me as insensitive. He continued
on about his business and I went back to my table. Later, I overheard Mr. LaSorda summoning me
over the security radio held at the side of the one security officer who was in
the band room with us. When I went to LaSorda’s
office, he asked me to have a seat as he finished his telephone
conversation. When he was finished, he
told me that what I did was right and he wanted to let me know that he had no
intentions of insulting me when he said that he didn’t need me to brief
him. He said that he didn’t want me to
feel like it was my job to deal with disgruntled parents. He said that dealing with disgruntled parents
was part of his job. He said that with
registration going on, we tend to forget that we are here for other reasons and
services. I thanked him for saying what
he said and returned to my station.
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