By Heather Sadlemire
An average preschool in Upstate New York has finally followed in the footsteps of more elite schools with longer waiting lists and has banned smiling, reports say, after a mother complained to administration.
A school administrator, who wished to remain anonymous due to her confidentiality agreement with the district, reported that a mother was disturbed to find three children laughing while playing in the pretend center in her son’s classroom as he was clearly still distraught that his iPad had died and the charger was nowhere to be found in his mother’s Escalade during the four minute commute to the learning center earlier that morning.
To make matters worse, due to the strict no-hugging policy that the mother had administration draft and enforce earlier in the month, her son’s teacher did NOTHING to coddle the preschooler and simply allowed all of the other children to continue playing while he cried in the doorway.
The school released an official statement:
After discussing the incident in person, on the phone, through a lengthy email chain and again in person with the student’s mother, his teacher and all members of our administration team, we decided the best course of action would be to follow the trend we are seeing in early education – that is to ban anything that can be misconstrued as fun or as someone having fun.
We are doing this so that no student or family is ever offended. Ever. By anything. Ever. We feel that instead of trying to encourage families to discuss emotions, feelings and different cultures at home while we incorporate them into our daily routines at school, it is easier on everyone to eliminate any sensitive matter altogether so that nobody, anywhere, ever, is ever offended. Ever.
This particular mother has helped guide administration on other reformed policies, such as including cherries and cherry juice at every meal due to the powerful antioxidants they contain, eliminating Earth Day lesson plans as children should be able to make their own decisions on whether or not they are pro-recycling based on their own personal belief system and that playing catch, coloring with chalk and using jump ropes should be absolutely forbidden, for very obvious reasons.
Because of her previous guidance and her unending, unyielding daily support and non-stop communication with our team, we’ve decided to move forward in putting this new Zero Tolerance policy in place. Students found smiling will be immediately sent to the office and guardians will be called to bring them home.
Additionally, medical professionals will be brought into the center so that any student who may have been affected by the smiling or who may feel that someone else’s fun has, in any way, harmed them or affected their time here in our learning center, will have a safe place to go and discuss how someone else’s actions has personally destroyed their lives.
We have reached out to the mother of this poor boy, as a GoFundMe page has been set up and donations of fully charged iPads have been pouring in since this story broke.
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About the Author
Heather is a marketing director and NY native (of the Upstate variety) who has to cover the last few pages of a good book with her hands so that she doesn’t skim ahead and ruin the ending. In between scouring the clearance racks at Target and stalking Anna Kendrick’s Twitter feed, she performs Disney numbers for her daughter (a preschooler who doesn’t object) and husband (who knew what he was getting into when he put a ring on it.) Follow her on Twitter @HeatherLWheeler.