By Nikki McKim
The Kids are Not All-right, EVERYWHERE.
I hate to say it, but the bullying isn’t just at Humbold Table-Rock Steinauer. It’s everywhere. It was at Dawson-Verdon when I was in school 20 years ago (though nearly not as bad because we didn’t have social media yet) and it’s in your child’s school now. Nobody can sit back and look at HTRS and say, “Wow, they have a big problem.” We all have a problem; everywhere this paper is delivered has a problem. HTRS were the ones who were willing to open up about it and say, ‘hey, let’s get it out there and try to get help with this. Let’s get the parents and public involved and see if we can help. If one kid gets help, just one kid-we’ve done something good.’
What ran in the Falls City Journal last week wasn’t a letter and it wasn’t clickbait; it was the story of open dialogue between adults hoping to do better by the children in our community. I am surprised and disheartened by the backlash this story has created.
The goal was to always to get people involved and create a dialogue about the issues facing our kids with social media and bullying in our schools. It was never to turn on HTRS and single them out as a problem school with problem children. That is absolutely not the case. But in the age of “quick news,” misleading headlines, one-paragraph stories and social media gossip, you get only a fraction of the story. You must read the story in the Journal to get the entire story. Nobody was quoted as saying the problem was only at HTRS. You may have heard that HTRS is THE problem, which is incredibly unfair to the school, the children and the Humboldt community.
The story was planned and written to open dialogue in all schools with all children, teachers, administration and parents. It was done to see laws and policies change and it was done to have us all look in our own backyards. Change starts with us.
