The Use of Corporal Punishment in Schools Debate Heats Up
While the vision of being paddled in the principal’s office may seem an image of the past, corporal punishment is still legal, and used, in 20 American states. Advocates against corporal punishment have attempted to end the practice for years, but a recent push has encouraged several school districts to consider banning the method of punishment.
As a recourse to skipping detention at his Wichita Falls high school, 11th grader Tyler Anastopoulos was sent to the assistant principal’s office; where he received three blows to his backside with a paddle. The strikes left Anastopoulos with deep bruises. His mother, Angie Herring, expressed her outrage by saying, “If I did that to my son, I’d go to jail.”
In a vague response to Anastopoulos’s case, the superintendent of the City View Independent School District in Wichita Falls, Steve Harris, described corporal punishment as “one of the tools in the toolbox we use for discipline”.